Oath of office of the president of the United States

The wording of the oath is specified in Article II, Section One, Clause 8, of the United States Constitution, and a new president must take it before exercising or carrying out any official powers or duties.

Article VI, Clause 3, similarly requires the persons specified therein to "be bound by oath or affirmation, to support this Constitution."

This clause enjoins the new president to swear or affirm: "I will to the best of my ability, preserve, protect and defend the Constitution of the United States.

Circuit Court, administered the oath to Millard Fillmore on July 10, 1850, when he became president after the death of Zachary Taylor.

Herbert Hoover is often listed to have used "affirm" as well, owing to his being a Quaker, but a newsreel taken of the ceremony indicates that the words used were "solemnly swear.

In 1881, the New York Times article covering the swearing in of Chester A. Arthur, reported that he responded to the question of accepting the oath with the words, "I will, so help me God.

[18] By convention, incoming presidents raise their right hand and place the left on a Bible while taking the oath of office.

[19][20] Subsequent presidents up to and including Harry S. Truman, followed suit in kissing the Bible,[21] although in 1953, Dwight D. Eisenhower said a prayer at the end instead.

[22] Truman, Eisenhower, Richard Nixon, George H. W. Bush, Barack Obama each swore the oath on two Bibles.

[25] Theodore Roosevelt did not use the Bible when taking the oath in 1901,[25][23] nor did John Quincy Adams, who swore on a book of law, with the intention that he was swearing on the Constitution.

[28][29] The First Congress explicitly prescribed the phrase "So help me God" in oaths under the Judiciary Act of 1789 for all U.S. judges and officers other than the president.

The first, now in disuse, is when the administrator articulates the constitutional oath in the form of a question, as in, "Do you George Washington solemnly swear ...", requesting an affirmation.

[38] In 1881, the New York Times article covering the swearing in of Chester A. Arthur reported that he responded to the question of accepting the oath with the words, "I will, so help me God.

Conversely, there was a claim made by A. M. Milligan (a Presbyterian minister who advocated for an official Christian U.S. government) that letters were sent to Abraham Lincoln asking him to swear to God during his inaugurations, and Lincoln allegedly wrote back saying that God's name was not in the Constitution, and he could not depart from the letter of that instrument.

[46] Since the office of President of the United States came into existence in 1789 there have been 59 public swearing-in ceremonies to mark the commencement of a new four-year presidential term, plus an additional nine marking the start of a partial presidential term following the intra-term death or resignation of an incumbent president.

Chief Justice John Roberts administering the presidential oath of office to Donald Trump on January 20, 2025.
Lyndon Johnson being sworn in as next president, two hours after President John F. Kennedy 's assassination
Franklin D. Roosevelt being administered the oath of office by Chief Justice Charles Evans Hughes on March 4, 1933, the first of Roosevelt's four presidential inaugurations.
Joe Biden takes the oath of office on the Biden family Bible, January 20, 2021
George H. W. Bush being administered the oath of office by Chief Justice William Rehnquist on January 20, 1989.
Barack Obama being administered the oath of office by Chief Justice John Roberts for the second time, on January 21, 2009.
Map showing locations where the oath of office was first taken, marked with a green 'O' (or a green dot for scheduled occurrences). Locations where presidencies ended unexpectedly are marked with a red 'X' (a red dot denoted scheduled transitions). The nine sets of names shown in black denote the location where presidencies have ended intra-term due to the incumbent's death (four presidents have died of natural causes and four were assassinated —names underlined in grey) or resignation (one, noted by a superscript 'R'). The inset at the bottom of the map is Oath or Affirmation Clause (Article II, Section One, Clause 8) of the U.S. Constitution.