Millions Await for this Historic Event

Barack Obama is poised to make history on Tuesday as the first black U.S. president, buoyed by surging public confidence for dealing with the biggest economic headaches in 70 years, two wars and a web of other international problems.

Obama, 47, the son of a black Kenyan father and a white mother from Kansas, will take the oath of office at 12 p.m. EST on the steps of the U.S. Capitol, his hand placed on a Bible used by Abraham Lincoln at his first inauguration in 1861.

His inauguration as the 44th president caps hopes and dreams of, among others, generations of African-Americans who suffered slavery and then racial segregation that made them second-class citizens.

Crowds of people bundled up against the freezing temperatures streamed before dawn toward the inauguration site and the national mall, a long grassy park that stretches from the Capitol Building in central Washington.

More than 1 million people were expected to fill the Mall to be as close as possible to the event and watch it on huge television screens.

Traffic backed up at parking lots at metro rail stops and even at 5 a.m. trains were packed. Some die-hards camped out to be the first through security checkpoints, where crowds quickly built up.

Overnight, the capital buzzed with "Obama-mania," with well-wishers, many in tuxedos and formal gowns, attending formal balls in a run-up to a bigger round of inaugural bashes Tuesday.

No president has begun his four-year term in office with as much public confidence -- a 78 percent approval rating in the most recent Gallup poll -- and a sharp contrast with outgoing President George W. Bush, whose ratings plumbed record lows, weighed down by unpopular wars in Iraq and Afghanistan and the worst economic problems since the Great Depression.

Thousands of security personnel were in place to maintain order and guard against any attempt to disrupt the inauguration. Much of the city center was barricaded and shut to private cars.

"Slavery to History, The Obama Inauguration," was the slogan on a handwritten cardboard sign held by a smiling man on a downtown sidewalk.

In an eagerly anticipated inauguration address he has been working on for weeks, Obama will rally Americans to an era of responsibility, urging them to join in a spirit of unity to take on difficult issues.

"Government can only do so much," he told participants in a service project honoring slain civil rights leader Martin Luther King Jr. on Monday. "We're going to have to take responsibility -- all of us."

Obama in recent days has stressed that Americans should expect even rougher economic times and that his plan to revive the struggling economy will take time to work.

The president-to-be appeared in a giddy mood on Monday night as he spent the evening at dinners honoring former Republican rival John McCain, former Secretary of State Colin Powell and Vice President-elect Joe Biden.

At the event for McCain, he could not resist referring to the sometimes testy campaign debates in which they took part.

"I'm here tonight to say a few words about an American hero I have come to know very well and admire very much -- Senator John McCain. And then, according to the rules agreed to by both parties, John will have approximately 30 seconds to make a rebuttal," he said.

His eight years in power over, Bush is returning home to Texas on Tuesday.

Bush's vice president, Dick Cheney, 67, pulled a muscle in his back while moving boxes and will be in a wheelchair for the inauguration ceremony, White House spokeswoman Dana Perino said.

The incoming vice president, Joe Biden, was chagrined to hear his wife, Jill, make news by telling "The Oprah Winfrey Show" that her husband had been offered his choice of two plum jobs, vice president or secretary of state.

Internal deliberations over top-level jobs are usually kept secret. Biden's spokeswoman, Elizabeth Alexander, later issued a statement saying Obama had offered Biden only the vice presidency.

Obama, who campaigned for the presidency by criticizing Bush, is to spend the morning with him before taking the oath of office. By all accounts, the two men have gotten along well since Obama won, and Bush has repeatedly spoken warmly about him.

Obama and his wife, Michelle, and the Bidens are to attend a church service on Tuesday morning at St. John's Episcopal Church. Then they will have coffee with the Bushes and the Cheneys at the White House.

The group will proceed to the U.S. Capitol for a time-honored ceremony in which Obama will repeat a short oath, pledging he will "faithfully execute the office of president of the United States, and will to the best of my ability, preserve, protect and defend the Constitution of the United States."

Source: Reuters.com