What the best inaugural addresses have in common

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0:00An inaugural address can be a defining moment for a president and certain lines become iconic.

0:04"Ask not what your country can do for you, ask what you can do for your country."

0:11But why do some addresses echo through history while others don’t?

0:16I asked

0:16Kathleen Hall Jamieson

0:17I am director of the Annenberg Public Policy Center at The University of Pennsylvania

0:20And what she told me is that an inaugural address should do three things:

0:23unify the country, announce guiding principles, and affirm the limits of power.

0:27So let’s take those one by one, starting with the need to unify the country.

0:31One of the more important characteristics of an inaugural is that it establishes that

0:35this is the president of all the people.

0:37Coming after a campaign, a president’s first task to heal a divided electorate.

0:41In 1801, Jefferson welcomed his opponents when he said,

0:44“Every difference of opinion is not a difference of principle.

0:47We have called by different names brethren of the same principle.

0:51We are all Republicans, we are all Federalists.”

0:54And in 1953, Eisenhower echoed Jefferson’s plea for unity,

0:58"May cooperation be permitted and be the mutual aim of those who, under the concepts of our

1:05Constitution, hold to differing political faiths…”

1:09Eisenhower’s inaugural explicitly suggests that we are coming together in this moment

1:15regardless of the kind of partisan divisions that we have had in the past.

1:18That’s actually a common theme across the inaugurals.

1:21We remember it more when it is phrased more memorably, as it is with Jefferson

1:26or Eisenhower, but you’ll actually find an element of it

1:29in virtually all of the inaugural addresses.

1:31Second, an inaugural should announce principles that will guide the presidency.

1:34“We'll restore science to its rightful place, and wield technology's wonders

1:38to raise health care's quality and lower its cost.”

1:41But, unlike the state of the union, the inaugural should focus on principles, not policy.

1:46When you get to policy proposals, you’re back in campaign mode.

1:49“In this present crisis, government is not the solution to our problem;

1:55government is the problem.”

1:57Notice that when Reagan said, ‘government isn’t the solution, government is the problem’,

2:02what he was essentially doing was articulating a principle, not saying,

2:06‘and as a result, I recommend that we do x, y, and z.’

2:11The philosophy of the president is embodied in an inaugural and if it’s maintained at

2:17a level of principle it is not highly problematic.

2:20Third, an inaugural affirms the limits of power, stating that no one is above the law.

2:25One concern -- when you let some president -- particularly among those who didn’t vote

2:28for the candidate -- is that person may overreach and may misuse the power or use the power

2:33in ways that will hurt the people that did not vote for the president.

2:36Look at the passage in Gerald Ford’s inaugural address

2:39-- which was, in effect his inaugural address -- that begins,

2:43“...our long national nightmare is over.

2:48Our Constitution works;

2:51our great Republic is a government of laws and not of men.”

2:54That is a repudiation of the Nixon Presidency. Ford is affirming it explicitly:

3:00that no president is above the law.

3:03That’s the speech that tells us that, in language that we should always remember.

3:07Besides indicating what the address should be about, past inaugurals suggest

3:11how a president should deliver it.

3:13First, they should keep it short.

3:15People who assume that you have to speak at length in order to be eloquent are wrong.

3:20A leader’s message should be clear and concise.

3:22The three shortest speeches were delivered by some of the most respected presidents,

3:26albeit during subsequent inaugurals;

3:28while the three longest came from some less well-known

3:31presidents, including William Henry Harrison, who aggravated a cold during his epic inaugural

3:35and died the next month from pneumonia.

3:37Second...

3:38Put the campaign behind you.

3:41Do not be Ulysses S. Grant, who whines about having a scandal-ridden campaign.

3:47“I have been the subject of abuse and slander scarcely ever equaled in political history,

3:53which today I feel that I can afford to disregard in view of your verdict,

3:57which I gratefully accept as my vindication.”

3:59If you come out of an inaugural address feeling as if the candidate is still there and the

4:04president isn’t -- we’re still in campaign mode, this isn’t a president speaking --

4:09it’s a failed address.

4:10A third caution is to avoid making it about yourself, which a president can do by using

4:14“we” instead of “I”.

4:16When you’re trying to speak to a nation that has been divided by a campaign, the unifying

4:22rhetoric requires that the audience hear itself in the rhetoric.

4:26And as a result, the collective rhetoric -- the rhetoric of “we” -- is the characterizing

4:31rhetoric of the best inaugural addresses.

4:33“…let me assert my firm belief that the only thing we have to fear is...

4:41fear itself.”

4:43Lastly, and most importantly, we tend to remember inaugurals..

4:46...because history vindicated the observation and the observation was made memorably.

4:52So, you might say that the deciding factor for a successful inaugural speech

4:56is the presidency that follows.

4:57There’s a reason we remember FDR and Kennedy.

5:00Both were speaking at a point of crisis and their words inspired a future that would follow.

5:04But no president did this better than Abraham Lincoln, who on the eve of Civil War,

5:08predicted a Union victory when he said:

5:10“The mystic chords of memory,

5:11stretching from every battlefield and patriot grave to every living heart and hearthstone

5:16all over this broad land,

5:18will yet swell the chorus of the Union,

5:20when again touched, as surely they will be,

5:23by the better angels of our nature.”

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What the best inaugural addresses have in common

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