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Later Jimmy and Rosalynn dropped in at the post-concert dinner for the performers and made political groupies out of many superstars of the entertainment world. "Oh, I want so much to shake his hand," sighed Bette Davis, patting her hand over her heart. Hugged by Carter, she left beaming.
Inauguration Day, crisp and clear, began with a moving 8 a.m. religious service on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial, where 10,000 people sang Carter's favorite hymn, Amazing Grace, and the Rev. Martin Luther King Sr., bundled up in a heavy black overcoat and brown hat, praised Carter for not forgetting the little people. According to an aide, the Carters skipped that ceremony to keep it from "turning into a circus," and worshiped instead at Washington's First Baptist Church.
Later in the morning, the gleaming white Inaugural platform in front of the Capitol was crowded with family members, Supreme Court Justices and congressional leaders. Television microphones picked up some of the dignitaries' chitchat about what they had done to ward off the cold. Cracked Senator Hubert Humphrey: "I've got my Minnesota thermal underwear on."
Some 100,000 shivering people had thronged onto the lawn and into the makeshift bleachers. The Marine Band played the Navy Hymn in Carter's honor, and Walter Mondale was sworn in as Vice President by—at his own request —House Speaker Tip O'Neill. Then came Carter's turn. "Are you ready to take the oath of office?" Chief Justice Warren Burger asked him at precisely 12:03 p.m. No man had ever been readier. While Rosalynn held the family Bible, Carter placed his hand on it; in front of him was the Bible used for George Washington's swearing-in, open to the verse from the prophet Micah that Carter quoted moments later in his Inaugural Address. "Congratulations," murmured Burger after the oath. "Thank you," whispered Carter. The Marine Band struck up Hail to the Chief, Army troops fired 75-mm. howitzers from the Ellipse just off Capitol Hill in the traditional 21-gun salute, and Jimmy Carter was President.
Not everyone adjusted at once to the transformation. Hamilton Jordan, Carter's longtime aide, allowed as how it would be difficult to go from calling him Jimmy to the more formal Mr. President. After the Inaugural speech, Miss Lillian protested, "I don't like it. I don't like everybody calling him Mr. President." To set his family at ease, Carter, in a private moment in a room in the Capitol a few minutes after the swearing-in, asked if they had ever seen his 18-month-old grandson Jason imitate him. "Come on, Jason, smile like Jimmy," he coaxed. Jason obliged with a toothy, if tiny smile.
Following a post-Inauguration lunch in a Senate office, Carter walked with Rosalynn (and part of the way with Amy as well) down Pennsylvania Avenue, leading the Inaugural parade—a mile-and-a-half stroll on a crystalline but subfreezing day. Four years earlier, fruit and garbage had been thrown at the limousine that carried Nixon down the same avenue.