Originally Posted By danyoung It's my understanding that at 12:01pm, Obama became president. The oath is mostly ceremonial, and had nothing to do with the reality of his being president. I think it was probably a good thing that they did it again anyway, just to keep the goofballs off their backs. You never know when something trivial like this would blow up into a huge deal (oh wait, yeah we do know - every freakin' time!!!).
Originally Posted By alexbook Well, the Constitution says: >>Before he enter on the Execution of his Office, he shall take the following Oath or Affirmation: "I do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will faithfully execute the Office of President of the United States, and will to the best of my Ability, preserve, protect and defend the Constitution of the United States."<< So, I suppose to be really, really nitpicky about it, he may have become President at noon, but he wasn't allowed to use his Presidential powers until he recited the oath as specified. I wonder if anybody's going to sue to overturn one of the executive orders he signed in the interim.
Originally Posted By alexbook It's also interesting that the Constitution refers to the President as "he". Won't it be fun, when the first woman President is elected, to see if somebody tries to sue over that?
Originally Posted By mawnck >>Why didn't the doofus (Roberts) just use a simple 3"x5" card with the oath printed on it?<< He also said "President *to* the United States of America." Give him a break. He's just the Chief Justice of the SCOTUS. You can't expect him to know the Constitution.
Originally Posted By danyoung To be fair, he was thrown by Obama reciting his first line too early. Roberts said "I, Barack Obama..." and while he was trying to say "do solomnly swear...", Barack jumped in with "I, Barack Obama". It just threw off the entire timing of the thing, and it started with Obama messing up.
Originally Posted By DyGDisney Yeah, but Roberts should have paused there. This reminds me of my dad's wedding to his current wife. My grandfather performed the ceremony and he had the names of the previous people he had married written in his notes still. He got my dad's name right, but said the wrong name for the woman he was marrying. Hey, maybe his marriage isn't legal!
Originally Posted By danyoung From a UPI story - "Constitutional law experts said the do-over probably wasn't necessary but was done to avoid any gray area."
Originally Posted By danyoung But I do find the situation interesting. If it is indeed a requirement of the Constitution that the oath be stated as written, then Obama didn't do it. So it's entirely possible that anything he did between then and the time he took the oath a 2nd time is invalid. I don't know if anyone is in any position to step up and challenge him, and it probably will go away quietly. But at least to me it is interesting.
Originally Posted By hopemax Then do you also find it interesting, that during Richard Nixon's oath, he added an extra "and?" <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pYaTjixNRq8" target="_blank">http://www.youtube.com/watch?v...TjixNRq8</a> Nixon: Preserve AND protect and defend Constitution: Preserve, protect and defend. And the Oath as written in the Constitution does not include a spot for the person's name. So I wonder when the last time was that someone recited the oath without inserting their name. Maybe we've never had a President!
Originally Posted By alexbook >>Maybe we've never had a President!<< That's it! It's all been a crazy dream!
Originally Posted By mawnck "So help me God" ain't in there either. It was just an ad-lib by that holy roller Washington. "Preserve protect and defend the Constitution of the United States, including separation of church and state, so help me God." ;-)
Originally Posted By Mr X ***So, I suppose to be really, really nitpicky about it, he may have become President at noon, but he wasn't allowed to use his Presidential powers until he recited the oath as specified. I wonder if anybody's going to sue to overturn one of the executive orders he signed in the interim.*** They might try, but I believe they would lose. For the record, President Obama didn't "garble" it or anything like that. He stated all the words required clearly. The ONLY difference is that, taking his cue from the Chief Justice's first rendition, he reordered one word in a sentence but did not (I believe) adjust the meaning whatsoever. He was constitutionally supposed to say "That I will execute faithfully the office of President of the United States". He said "That I will execute *pause* the office of President of the United States faithfully". I firmly believe that in any court of law you could not make the argument that the meaning or intention written in the constitution was in any way adjusted or garbled. But that's just me.
Originally Posted By markymouse Come on. We can go a lot farther down the "Will the courts have to rule if Obama is really President" road. When that happens, who will it be who will finally rule that Obama never took the Oath of Office? The very same Chief Justice who caused it to happen! I think we're on to a pretty good conspiracy theory here.
Originally Posted By mawnck It's because he's not a citizen. That's why the judge refused to administer the correct oath. ;-) (Yes, I've actually read this on one web site. I refuse to link to it.)
Originally Posted By Mr X <a href="http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=r6IiEp2R3s4" target="_blank">http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=...iEp2R3s4</a> Apparently he didn't refuse to administer it correctly the next day! (I'm sure some conspiracy whacko's will question why it's audio only )
Originally Posted By danyoung >Guys let's take it easy. He's President nothing is going to change that. < Everybody IS taking it easy. It's still an interesting discussion.
