Jim Bendat -- my undergrad classmate, occasional coauthor, and good friend for life -- picked up the term "Democracy's Big Day" to describe presidential inaugurations, celebrating the democratic tradition of peaceful transitions of power. He wrote a book of the same name, which is the definitive history of American presidential inaugurations, filled with fascinating details of every inauguration from Washington to Obama (he did not write a new edition to include Trump).
Jim has been a frequent television commentator at presidential inaugurations. He covered the Trump inauguration for CNN is 2017. He is now back in action, having given many interviews about Wednesday's Biden inauguration. You can hear him discuss the history of inaugurations on C-Span here.
UPDATE: The original version of this post said that Jim coined the term "Democracy's Big Day," but he has corrected me. He actually picked it up from the inaugural address of George H.W. Bush in 1989. After the jump, see the note from Pres. Bush to Jim, following publication of the book.
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