Black People Today

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WASHINGTON — Barack Obama became the 44th president of the United States on Tuesday afternoon, banishing forever more than 200 years of history during which the office passed from white hands to white hands.

Under the Constitution, Obama became president at noon ET, even though he had not formally been sworn in with the inaugural ceremonies running behind schedule.

Using his full name, Barack Hussein Obama, the new president took the oath of office at 12:05 p.m. from Supreme Court Chief Justice John Roberts, whose nomination to the court he opposed as the junior Democratic senator from Illinois.

Clasping hands with his wife, Michelle, Obama smiled and waved to the crowd of as many as 2 million people who jammed the National Mall.

Supreme Court Justice John Paul Stevens swore in former Sen. Joe Biden of Delaware as vice president at 11:57 a.m. ET before as many as 2 million people who swarmed the National Mall. They were there to witness Obama’s banishing forever more than 200 years of history during which the office had passed from white hands to white hands.

Obama and Bush arrived together at the Capitol, riding in a motorcade from the White House, where Bush and his wife, Laura, hosted Obama and his wife, Michelle, along Biden and his wife, Jill.

The ceremony got under way at 11:45 a.m. ET with a welcoming message from Sen. Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif., chairwoman of the Joint Congressional Committee on Inaugural Ceremonies.

The invocation was delivered by the Rev. Rick Warren, the pastor of the evangelical Saddleback Church in Lake Forest, Calif.

Warren’s selection created controversy among some of Obama’s supporters because of his opposition to homosexuality, but he delivered a nonsectarian message celebrating Obama’s “inauguration as the first African-American president of the United States.”

Warren said all Americans were “united, not by race or religion or by blood.”

Obama, who is known as an inspiring speaker, was to deliver his first address as president at about noon, an 18- to 20-minute speech that aides said would balance a serious and somber tone with a “dose of hope and optimism.”

Obama will lay out the challenges facing the country, reassuring Amercians that he believes the challenges will be met. He will call for a “new era of responsibility” and describe the price of citizenship

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