Barack, Abe, and Andy Go to the Inaugural

There's been a lot of talk comparing Barack Obama's inaugural to Abraham Lincoln's--much of it from Obama himself, who will be sworn in with Lincoln's Bible and whose Inauguration Day luncheon will feature Abe's favorite foods. Lincoln, of course, is everybody's favorite president. But if we were to reach back into history for an inaugural celebration that truly defined a presidency, only Andrew Jackson's has made anywhere near the kind of impact most of us are expecting from next week.

Certainly our seventh president's first inaugural, in 1829, is the most written about, the most iconic, and the most revealing about the nature of a presidency than any other. Jackson was the first populist chief executive, and his Inauguration Day festivities cleared away the pettifogging formality of the Adams dynasty with a swoosh of buckskin-clad supporters from the West and South, tracking mud on the White House carpets and rowelling gashes into the parquet floors with their spurs. The contemporary press was not amazed, it was scandalized that such crowds were allowed to toast their victory with corn whiskey and ululating hunting calls in what had been the white palace of America's Enlightenment.

But Jackson's inauguration changed America forever, ringing in the mass politics--emotional, self-centered, and often only sketchily informed--that have defined our elections ever since, as Jackson's latest biographer, Newsweek's Jon Meacham, reminds us in American Lion.

Now, we all know the man on the twenty dollar bill, and Obama is no Old Hickory--Andy Jackson was, after all, the truculent core of the racialist movement in American politics. But in the sheer weight of their inaugurals' symbolism, the two are mirror images of each other. Some conservatives may fear (or at least try to raise money on the manufactured fear) that Obama will be a black version of Jackson, letting his people spray-paint graffiti on the pillars of the White House porch and rap R. Kelly lyrics in the Rose Garden. It won't be anything like that, of course.

Obama's inaugural may well rival Jackson's in its impact--it will certainly be the largest, the most watched, and, considering the extraordinary security required, extremely expensive. (Though reports that it could cost $160 million are completely "unsubstantiated," according to Media Matters' Eric Boehlert.) But there's a different sort of pop to O's populism. Jackson's was marked by an exclusionary zeal: By chivvying nearly every Native American in the East onto the forced, genocidal march called the Trail of Tears, Jackson defined the hegemony of America's white tribe, and laid the racial foundation of American unity that persisted through the Civil War and even into World War II.

Obama, like Jackson, is bringing a long-marginalized constituency to the center of American politics, but this time it will be middle-class blacks, young people, and working Americans of every stripe. That tribe does not define itself by the shade of its skin but by its desire to reform the social contract.

And in ways both symbolic and real, Obama is making this a people's inaugural unlike any since Jackson's. From inviting the surviving Tuskegee airmen to an inauguration for the first time ever to making the official inaugural poster the spray-painted stencil portrait of Obama by Shepard Fairey, which comes straight out of the skateboarding scene, we are looking at a vast celebration of contemporary culture and not a ticketed minuet around hoarfrosted traditions. There will be more high-school marching bands from poor communities, for one thing, most notably the Blue Eagles from South Cobb High School in Austell, Ga., who had people statewide donating money for them to attend. In a video message, Michelle Obama has asked the nation to join her family and the Bidens in a "Day of Service" on Jan. 19 (MLK Day) in soup kitchens, homeless shelters, and the like in every state.

And she and Barack will throw the first-ever "Neighborhood Inaugural Ball," in the Washington Convention Center, where tickets will be free or "affordable," with a portion reserved for D.C. residents. That will actually be the first ball of the evening, shown on ABC and the Web. It will be linked to local neighborhood balls across the country, setting the tone for the whole shindig and quite possibly eclipsing the nine more fancy-schmancy exclusive balls around town.

The one quality sure to be missing from Obama's inaugural that most profoundly characterized Jackson's, however, is triumphalism. Just as No-drama Obama said throughout the campaign, he's trying to bring Republicans in, not freeze them out. Similar to the way Stephen Colbert "doesn't see race," Obama doesn't see enemies, and one can easily imagine him frequenting dinner parties with David Brooks and Bill Kristol at George Wills's house, as he did earlier this week, as well as popping into Ben's Chili Bowl every now and then for a dog.

Such an inclusive vision runs its own risks. We worry, quite naturally, that Obama will become so accommodating to the powerful interests that he'll fail to effect the enormous changes needed. For example, Obama has admirably banned corporations from picking up any of the inaugural tab, but, according to the watchdog group Public Citizen, almost 80 percent of the $35.3 million in contributions disclosed so far has come from just 211 banking, Wall Street, and other wealthy "bundlers"--they include, no doubt, many of the people whose greed brought us to this impasse in the first place.

On the other hand, Obama's political superiority and generosity risk making some conservatives feel small by comparison. That could work in one of two ways. In their petty attempts to pull him down (like RNC chair hopeful Chip Saltzman's distribution of Rush Limbaugh's "Barack the Magic Negro" song), the gap between O's openmindedness and their churlishness will be so obvious that they could be shamed into acting on the better angels of their nature.

Or, they could just troop night after night through the Fox News studios, spinning their spurs fruitlessly and ululating calls of rage at Obama's America.

The question is, how many will still hear the calls.

Comments (14)

1. Well, Ms Savan, I think pre-emptively putting Obama on the currency or Mt. Rushmore...

   is just as persumptious as the Right who are pre-emptively saying he'll destroy America or "turn us into a socialist state"....or who think Dubya will someday be "redeemed by history."

   Let's let history play out and see. Or as "Chuck Yeager" (Sam Shepard) said in "The Right Stuff"..."Yeah, well, let them write the damn history and let the pilots fly the planes!"

   Posted by Mask at 01/15/2009 @ 1:02pm

2. Jackson was truely one of our best. I'm thinking Obama will be too.

   Posted by CHIP THORNTON at 01/15/2009 @ 1:17pm

3. Mask, don't be so certain that GB won't be viewed differently later. When one considers that this was the most secret administration since Nixon, it is safe to say it will be decades before many more truths come out. They will, of course: They always do. But for now, we only THINK we have the answers: And we do, I guess,untill the next discovery, which may support our preconceptions or possible render them nonsense.

   Posted by CHIP THORNTON at 01/15/2009 @ 1:25pm

4. the triumph of the schmuk!!!

   vive le schmuk!!!!

   Posted by ibbleblibble at 01/15/2009 @ 1:28pm

5. "it will certainly be the largest and the most expensive, costing altogether at least $160 million."

   golden parachuting his way in.

   i'd be pissed if it were my money.

   a TRUE hero would say "we're broke. i'll do the thing in my living room instead. use the $160,ooo,ooo to buy kids lunches."

   absolute cheesiness corrupts absolutely.

   Posted by frosty zoom at 01/15/2009 @ 1:57pm

6. Didn't Bill Clinton already try to reach out to conservatives--or at least mimic much of their beliefs, and what did it get him? An impeachment.

   Posted by KJusko at 01/15/2009 @ 2:14pm

7. The United Nation's Millennium Development Goals aim to cut world hunger in half by 2015 and eliminating it completely by 2025. An estimated $19 billion would eliminate malnutrition and starvation around the world. Our current defense budget is $522 billion, in comparison.

   The Borgen Project (borgenproject.org) provides lots of information about this issue.

   Posted by Alenka at 01/15/2009 @ 3:17pm

8. Posted by CHIP THORNTON at 01/15/2009 @ 1:25pm

   Sorry, CHIP, you think "when the secrets are revealed"...it's going to be GOOD for Dubya and Darth?!?!??!???

   Posted by Mask at 01/15/2009 @ 3:20pm

9. vive le schmuk!!!! Posted by ibbleblibble at 01/15/2009 @ 1:28pm

   That line made me crack up. Thank you ibble.

   Posted by Cccomfo1 at 01/15/2009 @ 3:46pm

10. Well, Bush having cake with Limbaugh speaks volumes...two highly intellectual minds together, that must have been some riveting conversation between them...PLEASE!!! See the difference here, Obama has dinner with the opposing side as he is willing to listen and learn! Now Bush on the other hand did no such thing when he came to power, instead here he has cake with a jackass, so I guess it must be a case of fools gravitating to fools!!

    Posted by Caj at 01/15/2009 @ 3:52pm

11. If the Obama's are gonna throw a "Neighborhood Ball", they better make sure all the metal detectors are in place.

    Posted by ACook at 01/15/2009 @ 6:57pm

12. That line made me crack up. Thank you ibble.

    Posted by Cccomfo1 at 01/15/2009 @ 3:46pm | ignore this person | warn this person

    i'm full of 'em!

    lol

    Posted by ibbleblibble at 01/15/2009 @ 7:16pm

13. Jackson was truly one of our worst presidents.

    Simply because, more than any other, he symbolizes and epitomizes the crimes our forefathers committed against the original inhabitants of this continent.

    Posted by FDR43 at 01/15/2009 @ 8:38pm

14. Remember? The Supreme Court ruled that "Indian removal" (the forcible eviction/expulsion of Indians from their native territories) was unconstitutional.

    Remember Jackson's famous response?

    "The Supreme Court has made its decision. Now let them enforce it."

    He then proceeded to move tham anyway, thousands of miles, on a forced journey in which thousands died from disease and starvation. (This event is known to history as "the trail of tears.")

    Posted by FDR43 at 01/15/2009 @ 8:41pm