[United States Statutes at Large, Volume 123, 111th Congress, 1st Session]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]

123 STAT. 3609
 
PROCLAMATION 8343--JAN. 20, 2009

Proclamation 8343 of January 20, 2009
National Day of Renewal and Reconciliation, 2009
By the President of the United States of America
A Proclamation

As I take the sacred oath of the highest office in the land, I am
humbled by the responsibility placed upon my shoulders, renewed by the
courage and decency of the American people, and fortified by my faith in
an awesome God.
We are in the midst of a season of trial. Our Nation is being tested,
and our people know great uncertainty. Yet the story of America is one
of renewal in the face of adversity, reconciliation in a time of
discord, and we know that there is a purpose for everything under
heaven.
On this Inauguration Day, we are reminded that we are heirs to over two
centuries of American democracy, and that this legacy is not simply a
birthright-it is a glorious burden. Now it falls to us to come together
as a people to carry it forward once more.
So in the words of President Abraham Lincoln, let us remember that:
``The mystic chords of memory, stretching from every battlefield and
patriot grave to every living heart and hearthstone all over this broad
land, will yet swell the chorus of the Union, when again touched, as
surely they will be, by the better angels of our nature.''
NOW, THEREFORE, I, BARACK OBAMA, President of the United States of
America, by the authority vested in me by the Constitution and laws of
the United States, do hereby proclaim January 20, 2009, a National Day
of Renewal and Reconciliation, and call upon all of our citizens to
serve one another and the common purpose of remaking this Nation for our
new century.
IN WITNESS WHEREOF, I have hereunto set my hand this twentieth day of
January, in the year of our Lord two thousand nine, and of the
Independence of the United States of America the two hundred and thirty-
third.
BARACK OBAMA