building. Speaker Henry Clay declined the use of the hall and
suggested that the proceedings be held outside. The President's
speech to the crowd from a platform adjacent to the brick building
was the first outdoor inaugural address. Chief Justice John
Marshall administered the oath of office.

***

I should be destitute of feeling if I was not deeply affected by
the strong proof which my fellow-citizens have given me of their
confidence in calling me to the high office whose functions I am
about to assume. As the expression of their good opinion of my
conduct in the public service, I derive from it a gratification
which those who are conscious of having done all that they could
to merit it can alone feel. MY sensibility is increased by a just
estimate of the importance of the trust and of the nature and
extent of its duties, with the proper discharge of which the
highest interests of a great and free people are intimately
connected. Conscious of my own deficiency, I cannot enter on these
duties without great anxiety for the result. From a just
responsibility I will never shrink, calculating with confidence
that in my best efforts to promote the public welfare my motives
will always be duly appreciated and my conduct be viewed with that
candor and indulgence which I have experienced in other stations.

In commencing the duties of the chief executive office it has been
the practice of the distinguished men who have gone before me to
explain the principles which would govern them in their respective
Administrations. In following their venerated example my attention
is naturally drawn to the great causes which have contributed in a