5/5 of a Person

In twenty minutes Barak Obama will place his hand on the Bible and swear to uphold a Constitution that originally defined an Africa-American man as 3/5 of a person.

My brother-in-law and niece at the last minute obtained tickets to the standing-room-only area. My father-in-law, who works in Silver Spring, Maryland, didn't go to the office out of concern that it might take him ten hours to get home. So it's all the more remarkable that, having been in Washington for previous Inaugurations, I've seen no picketers. No abortion signs. No pro- or anti-war plackards. No radical feminists. None of that. Today is about so much more than the complex issues facing our country, difficult as they are.

We have not yet overcome, but we've come a long, long way.