ugural Address Thursday, March 4, 1841

Called from a retirement which I had supposed was to continue for the
residue of my life to fill the chief executive office of this great and
free nation, I appear before you, fellow-citizens, to take the oaths
which the Constitution prescribes as a necessary qualification for the
performance of its duties; and in obedience to a custom coeval with
our Government and what I believe to be your expectations I proceed to
present to you a summary of the principles which will govern me in the
discharge of the duties which I shall be called upon to perform.

It was the remark of a Roman consul in an early period of that
celebrated Republic that a most striking contrast was observable in the
conduct of candidates for offices of power and trust before and after
obtaining them, they seldom carrying out in the latter case the pledges
and promises made in the former. However much the world may have
improved in many respects in the lapse of upward of two thousand years
since the remark was made by the virtuous and indignant Roman, I fear
that a strict examination of the annals of some of the modern elective
governments would develop similar instances of violated confidence.

Although the fiat of the people has gone forth proclaiming me the Chief
Magistrate of this glorious Union, nothing upon their part remaining
to be done, it may be thought that a motive may exist to keep up the
delusion under which they may be supposed to have acted in relation
to my principles and opinions; and perhaps there may be some in this
assembly who have come here either prepared to condemn those I shall now
deliver, or, approving them, to doubt the sincerity with which they are
now uttered. But the lapse of a few months will confirm or dispel their
fears. The outline of principles to govern and measures to be adopted
by an Administration not yet begun will soon be exchanged for immutable
history, and I shall stand either exonerated by my countrymen or
classed with the mass of those who promised that they might deceive and
flattered with the intention to betray. However strong may be my present
purpose to realize the expectations of a magnanimous and confiding
people, I too well understand the dangerous temptations to which I
shall be exposed from the magnitude of the power which it has been
the pleasure of the people to commit to my hands not to place my chief
confidence upon the aid of that Almighty Power which