TAKING THE OATH OF OFFICE

On January 4, 2005, cheered on by members of his family who had traveled from Illinois, Hawaii, London, and Kenya, Barack was sworn in as a member of 109th Congress of the United States. He writes in his memoir The Audacity of Hope that the day was a “beautiful blur.” The sun was bright and the day was unseasonably warm as he and his new

colleagues raised their right hands to take the oath of office. 13 On that day, he shook hands with Vice President Cheney and, afterward, his two daughters played on the Capitol steps. It was a day of smiles, thanks, and ceremony—warm feelings that everyone familiar with the politics of the day knew wouldn’t last. At the time, the country was deeply divided on issues, including the Iraq war, immigration, education, energy policy, abor- tion, the environment, taxes, and the role of the courts in the legislative process. All across the United States, there was disagreement. The No- vember 2004 election had seen the Democratic leader of the Senate, Tom

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a disabled Vietnam war veteran who had lost his seat in the previous election, be accused of not being a patriot. Senator John Kerry of Massa- chusetts and his running mate, Senator John Edwards of North Carolina, lost the election to a reelected George W. Bush. Democrats all over the country, and in the House and the Senate, were feeling bruised. The Re- publicans had a majority in the Senate of 51 to 48 Democrats. President Bush, feeling buoyant in his victory, declared that he had political capital and he intended to use it.

Two days after his swearing in as the freshman senator from Illinois, Barack cast his first vote to install George W. Bush for a second term as U.S. president. He immediately received his first negative phone calls and mail. For Barack, there was no notion whatsoever that his life as the freshman senator would be easy. But then Barack wasn’t a typical or normal first-time senator by any means. The unusual and near constant media attention he received after his speech at the convention and his overwhelming and unexpected victory in Illinois saw to that. It seemed that everyone wanted to know what he was thinking and where he stood on issues. All eyes were seemingly on this man with an unusual heritage,

a foreign sounding name, and so much charisma that he couldn’t help but

be noticed. Barack had few doubts about his role in the Senate and within his own party. He knew who he wanted to be and who he could be: a force in shap- ing the future. In the article entitled “Great Expectations” that appeared in the American Prospect in February 2006, author Jodi Enda notes that in Barack there is a sense of destiny, and his background and charm, his intellect and his way with words, all mark him as someone special. She adds that he is ever mindful to show respect for his colleagues, some of

whom had been in the Senate for most of Barack’s life. 14 Barack wrote in his memoir The Audacity of Hope that when senators are asked to describe their first year in Congress, they often say it is like drinking from a fire hose; Barack says that is an apt description for his first months in the Sen- ate. Everything, he wrote, seemed to come at him all at once. He had to set up an office, hire staff, negotiate for committee assignments, and learn about pending issues.

Then, Barack notes, there was life away from his home and family. 15 After a great deal of discussion with Michelle and other advisers, the family decided to remain in Chicago. The plan was for Barack to stay in Washington three nights per week and then fly home to Chicago. He rented an apartment and tried to settle into a more solitary, but very busy, life away from Michelle and his two beloved daughters. There were other senators with young families at home, and this common experience gave

71 them the desire to compare notes on what works and what doesn’t. As he

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spoke with colleagues, advisers, and new friends, comparing notes, getting advice, and making decisions, he was often told he needed to schedule time to meet with Senator Robert Byrd. Byrd, from West Virginia, was the veritable dean of the Senate and known as a passionate expert on the Constitution. At the swearing-in ceremony, Barack listened first to Senator Harry Reid and then to Senator Byrd. At nearly 90 years of age, Byrd rose slowly to speak about his many years in Congress, dating back to 1952. Barack, the new senator from Illinois, felt the full force of tradition and how not many years before, someone who looked like Barack couldn’t

be seated within the hallowed walls of Congress. After listening to Sena- tor Byrd, Barack decided to unpack his constitutional law books from his teaching days at the University of Chicago Law School and reread the document. For, as Senator Byrd had said, to understand Washington in 2005 and to know what his new job as senator from Illinois meant, he needed to understand what had happened when that document was en- acted and how those first debates and all the debates that followed determined where he, a black man, and America as well, was today. 16

During the first hectic months, Barack was determined to have a focused agenda. At first, he took careful, slow steps. He turned down many invitations for appearances. He deliberately focused on several issues, such as veteran’s disability pay and money for locks and dams in Illinois. He sought to demonstrate to the voters who had sent him to Washington that

he was working for their interests. He also hired a knowledgeable staff, including an experienced policy adviser. Despite an experienced staff, Barack moved slower than perhaps he could have during his first year.

Author Jodi Enda, for her February 2006 American Prospect article, visited Barack in his office in the Hart Senate Office Building. Lining the walls, the author observed, were pictures of some of Barack’s heroes: Abra- ham Lincoln, John Kennedy, Mahatma Gandhi, Martin Luther King Jr., Thurgood Marshall, and Nelson Mandela. She saw a White Sox baseball cap on his desk. And Barack, his long, lean frame clad in a finely tailored, charcoal-gray suit, appeared both energetic and exhausted. Following a question about the future of the Democratic Party, Barack closed his eyes and turned his face upward, as if to “contemplate the world’s problems from a place deep inside himself.” The question, the author noted, isn’t one typically asked of a first-term senator. Barack’s answer was at first typical as he listed the issues important to the party: education, health care, and energy independence. Then he said, “Where I probably can make a unique contribution is in helping to bring people together and bridging what I call the ‘empathy deficit,’ helping to explain the disparate factions

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in this country and to show them how we’re joined together, helping bridge divides between black and white, rich and poor, even conservative and liberal. The story I’m interested in telling is how we can restore that sense of commitment to each other in a way that doesn’t inhibit our individual responsibility, but does promote collective responsibility.” 17

A senior aide to Barack told Enda that if Barack could name one regret during his first year, it would be that occasionally he was too slow, noting that Barack regretted not signing on as a cosponsor to an immigration bill sponsored by fellow senators Edward Kennedy and John McCain. Despite his staff’s encouragement, Barack felt that since he didn’t have a hand in crafting the bill, he shouldn’t add his name to it. After it was clear that immigration would be a contentious topic across the country and in Congress, he ultimately attached his name to the legislation, stating

he wanted to strengthen a section in the bill relating to border security. 18 When Barack was asked what he was most proud of after his first year in office, he responded, “I am really proud of the work we did on veterans affairs, because it’s an issue that affects people across the state of Illinois. We were able to help close the gap in disability payments going to Illinois’ disabled veterans, compared to other states.” 19

One of Barack’s favorite responsibilities as a senator was hosting town hall meetings. During his first year in the Senate, he attended nearly 40 of them all across the state of Illinois. After shaking hands with everyone,

he listened to concerns, answering those who sent him to Washington. Barack writes in his memoir The Audacity of Hope that looking out at the diverse crowds—Democrats and Republicans, young and old, rich and poor—he was encouraged because he felt hope, and his time with people in his home state cleansed him and made him glad in the work he had chosen to do. He writes that sometimes, after a town hall meeting, people came up to him and gave him notes, articles, tokens, and good-luck charms, and they asked him not to change, not to be taken in by people in power; they also asked him not to disappoint them. 20

Supporters in Illinois and around the country say that Barack often projects an “everyman” sentiment, and as often these supporters project their viewpoints onto him, saying they see themselves in him. Valerie Jarrett, a longtime friend and treasurer of his political action committee, said in February 2006 that the danger of this is that supporters assume

he will do what they would do and vote the way they would vote. She adds that he has the ability to touch diverse crowds and, because of this, the expectation is that he will agree with them. 21 This universality and personal appeal keeps him from being put into a specific category. When asked whether he was a liberal, a progressive, or a centrist, Barack an-

73 swered that he likes to believe he’s above all that. He says, “The way I

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would describe myself is I think that my values are deeply rooted in the progressive tradition, the values of equal opportunity, civil rights, fighting for working families, a foreign policy that is mindful of human rights, a strong belief in civil liberties, wanting to be a good steward for the environment, a sense that the government has an important role to play, that opportunity is open to all people and that the powerful don’t trample on

a less powerful.” 22 While campaigning for the Senate and after arriving in Washington, Barack was often a fierce critic of the George W. Bush administration policies. He considered the Bush administration’s tax cuts for the wealthy to be fiscally irresponsible. He criticized the administration for its lack of

a health care agenda and energy policy. In 2002, before he announced his candidacy for the Senate, Barack spoke at an antiwar rally in Chicago, where he questioned the administration’s evidence of weapons of mass destruction in Iraq. He suggested in the speech that an invasion of Iraq would be a costly mistake. He said that day, “I don’t oppose all wars. What

I am opposed to is a dumb war. What I am opposed to is a rash war. What

I am opposed to is the cynical attempt by Richard Perle and Paul Wolfo- witz and other armchair, weekend warriors in this administration to shove their own ideological agendas down our throats, irrespective of the costs in lives lost and in hardships borne.” 23

During his first year, he continued to speak out against the war in Iraq, although his speeches were more moderate. After a number of his Demo- cratic colleagues had begun calling for a quick withdrawal, Barack told the Chicago Council on Foreign Relations that the military is a part of the solution in Iraq. He stated his support for a phased withdrawal of forces and that an exit needed to be undertaken in a responsible way, with the hope of leaving a stable foundation for the future. 24

After the devastation of Hurricane Katrina in August 2005, Barack began to speak out more. As the only African American senator and someone who had worked on and was passionate about poverty issues, he felt it necessary to give his voice to what had happened to the region. He also knew many of the citizens living in the southern coastal areas would

be looking to him for leadership. Speaking on ABC’s Sunday show This Week,

he stated that whoever was in charge of planning was detached from the realities of inner-city life in New Orleans and they couldn’t con- ceive of the idea that people there couldn’t easily leave. He later noted that Democrats, too, must accept some of the blame because they also

had downplayed poverty as a national issue. 25 At the time, he also began to speak out on other issues, such as avian flu and health care costs for

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automakers, and he began to work on bipartisan issues, such as no-bid contracts for Katrina reconstruction projects. He traveled to Russia with Republican Senator Richard Lugar to inspect nuclear and biological weapons sites in August 2005 and then cosponsored a bill that would reduce the stockpiles of conventional weapons. As well, he encouraged members of his party to speak more about the issues typically associated with Demo- crats, such as energy, health care, global issues, and education. And after perhaps a slower beginning to his time in the Senate than he envisioned, it didn’t take long before he was more outspoken and more active in the issues plaguing both parties and his Illinois constituents. Senator Richard Durbin, Barack’s fellow senator from Illinois, said of Barack in early 2006 that there was no doubt about the future of his state’s most popular politi- cian, adding that he was an odds-on favorite to run for higher office. He also stated that if anyone wanted to invest in a Barack IPO (initial public offering), it would be a solid investment in U.S. politics. 26

Barack also raised his standing within his party by raising money for individual congressional colleagues’ campaigns and the Democratic Party. On one evening alone, he raised nearly $1 million for the Arizona Democratic Party at a dinner attended by nearly 1,400 people. He also, in 2005, raised an estimated $1.8 million for his own political action committee, known as the Hopefund. And for Senator Robert Byrd of West Virginia, first elected to the Senate nearly three years before Barack was born and who was once a Ku Klux Klan member, Barack raised $800,000 with one e-mail message. 27

In his first two years in the Senate, Barack traveled around the world, visiting Russia, Iraq, and Kenya again. According to CNN.com, his travels were more costly to taxpayers than any other senator who entered the Senate with him. Although other freshmen members also took trips, private groups funded them; Barack does not accept such funding. In his travels, he studied such issues as nuclear proliferation, AIDS, and vio- lence in the Middle East. Of his trip to Kenya, Barack told the Associated Press that the trip held “symbolic power” because he is the only black senator, adding, “What a trip like this does is it allows me to really target

a wide range of issues that come up on the international stage and help Americans appreciate how much our fates are linked with the African continent.” In Africa, Barack was treated like royalty, with crowds gath- ering everywhere he went. While there, he met with AIDS researchers and activists, and he and his wife, Michelle, publicly took an AIDS test, hoping to encourage Kenyans to do the same. While in Russia, he toured weapons factories and watched workers destroy explosives, and he visited sites where nuclear missiles were being dismantled. In the Middle East,

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he met Israel’s foreign minister, spent two days in Iraq talking to officials and military commanders, and visited the Palestinian territory, Jordan, and Kuwait. 28

Barack’s travels and the issues he studied and spoke about were unusual for such a young senator, but they would not be so unusual for someone considering a run for the presidency. As well, Barack was one of two freshmen members of the powerful and highly visible Senate Foreign Rela- tions Committee. As his first two years in the Senate came to a close, Barack was under pressure and was certainly under speculation. Would

he be a candidate for the presidency in 2008? For someone with so much charm, drive, initiative, and dedication, the prospect of running for the highest office in the land, and being elected as the leader of the most powerful nation in the world, seemed like an easy decision.

TAKING THE OATH OF OFFICE