Oath of office of the President of the United States with the president-elect repeating those phrases, until the oath was completed. By convention, incoming presidents raise their right hand and place the left on a Bible or other book while taking the oath of office. In 1789, George Washington took the oath of office with an altar Bible borrowed from the St. John's Lodge No. 1, Ancient York Masons lodge in New York, and he kissed the Bible afterward. Subsequent presidents up to and including Harry Truman, followed suit. Dwight Eisenhower broke that tradition in 1953 when he said a prayer instead of kissing the Bible. Theodore Roosevelt did not
White House travel office controversy "the President, if he were not the President, would have delivered a more forceful response to that—on the bridge of Mr. Safire's nose." As a result of the discovery of the Watkins memo, and based upon a suggestion from the Office of Independent Counsel, on March 20, 1996, Attorney General Janet Reno requested that Whitewater Independent Counsel Kenneth Starr expand his inquiry to specifically include the travel office affair, in particular allegations that White House employees had lied about Hillary Clinton's role in the firings, and that David Watkins or Hillary Clinton had made false statements in previous testimony to