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WILKES-BARRE — This will always be a historic week for Ron Ferrance, chairman of the Luzerne County Republican Party — his party’s candidate, Donald Trump will be sworn in as the country’s 45th president Friday, one week after Ferrance got married.

Ferrance and his wife and two children traveled to Washington, D.C. Thursday to witness Trump’s inauguration and to take part in the festivities.

“This is just such a historic event,” Ferrance said. “No way can you miss something like this, no matter who is being sworn in as president. But since it’s Donald Trump, it raises the bar even higher.”

Ferrance said Luzerne County’s support of Trump — he totaled more than 26,000 votes than Democrat Hillary Clinton — is a credit to the local GOP organization, all the volunteers and the Pennsylvania Republican Party.

“That’s why we were able to turn out so many people for Trump,” Ferrance said. “And there were so many Democrats who wanted to cross over and support a candidate who was for smaller government, lower taxes and a stronger military.”

Ferrance said the job of government must include taking care of the elderly, the sick and children.

“But you have to have a sense of pride to go out and achieve something through hard work,” he said. “Republicans expect everybody to be equal at the staring line, while Democrats expect everybody to be equal at the finish line. We want to empower people to be able to succeed.”

Ferrance and his family will attend the parade, the swearing in of Trump, the Welcome Concert and the Freedom Inaugural Ball, which Trump is expected to attend.

“But what I’d most like to see is the peaceful transfer of power,” Ferrance said. “I don’t want to see any violent protests. People have the right to protest, but without violence. This is our country and Donald Trump is our president. I hope this historical moment is not marred by something terrible.”

Ferrance said, as a Republican, he wasn’t happy with the results of the 2008 and 2012 elections when Barack Obama won.

“But Republicans accepted it and we got on with our lives,” Ferrance said. “There shouldn’t be any sour grapes now — that’s just nonsense. Trump is our president; we must accept it and move on.”

Ferrance said he wasn’t surprised by Trump’s victory — in Luzerne County, in Pennsylvania or against Clinton.

“Nobody, really, in our area was supporting Hillary Clinton,” Ferrance said. “If I went to 100 homes in Luzerne County, 97 of them would be for Trump. That’s the real poll.”

Attorney Bob Davison attending

Bob Davison, originally from Wilkes-Barre — he’s a graduate of Meyers High School and King’s College — is an attorney who now resides in Dallas. Davison served in various positions during all eight years of the Reagan administration.

Davison was not an active supporter of Trump, but he said he is a loyal supporter of our system of government and the centuries-old core principle of “peaceful transfer of power.”

Davison is concerned about the recent growing awareness of an organized plot to “diminish” the meaning and the value of the presidential inauguration. Davison is upset that dozens of congressional Democrats have announced their “boycott” of the swearing in ceremony.

“Under the guise of the First Amendment, they see their public absence from this event as an expression of a freedom, a freedom they would deny to others who disagree with them,” Davison said. “But they have a sacred duty that ‘trumps’ their political freedom not to show up for work (Friday), and they are horribly misguided.”

Davison feels by boycotting the inauguration, they give “legitimacy” to those bent on disrespecting the governmental process and the Constitution. He said those who do boycott have an unfounded basis to believe that the results of the vote in the Electoral College can somehow be changed or reversed simply because they disagree with the outcome and don’t like the victor.

“These are the dangerous radicals — the blatant hypocrites,” Davison said. “I would submit that their no-show violates their oath of office to support and defend the Constitution of the United States.”

Davison said he decided to attend the inauguration after watching a television interview with a leader of an anarchist group that is planning to form a human chain around the Capital with 10,000 souls to intimidate other citizens and persuade them not to come to what should be a historic and “partisan- neutral” event.

In 2009, as much as he disagreed with President Obama, Davison said he respected the office and the man who was being sworn in to fill it.

“I even shed a tear seeing the historic context of that man who raised his right hand,” Davison said. “But I, nor anyone I would associate with, threatened the citizens attending, or the very system that brought them to that historic place that day, for that historic occasion.”

Ferrance
https://www.timesleader.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/01/web1_Ferrance.-1.jpgFerrance

Davison
https://www.timesleader.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/01/web1_Davidson_cropped-1.jpgDavison

Workers place plastic flooring on the grass of the National Mall in Washington, Wednesday as preparations continue for Friday’s presidential inauguration.
https://www.timesleader.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/01/web1_Inauguration-1.jpgWorkers place plastic flooring on the grass of the National Mall in Washington, Wednesday as preparations continue for Friday’s presidential inauguration. (AP Photo/John Minchillo)

By Bill O’Boyle

boboyle@www.timesleader.com

Inaugural Trivia

• Firsts and facts about presidential inaugurations

— George Washington’s was the shortest inaugural address at 135 words. (1793)

— Thomas Jefferson was the only president to walk to and from his inaugural. He was also the first to be inaugurated at the Capitol. (1801)

— The first inaugural ball was held for James Madison. (1809)

— John Quincy Adams was the first president sworn in wearing long trousers. (1825)

— William H. Harrison’s was the longest inaugural address at 8,445 words. (1841)

— The first inauguration to be photographed was James Buchanan’s. (1857)

— Abraham Lincoln was the first to include African-Americans in his parade. (1865)

— William McKinley’s inauguration was the first ceremony to be recorded by a motion picture camera. (1897)

— Women were included for the first time in Woodrow Wilson’s second inaugural parade. (1917)

— Warren G. Harding was the first president to ride to and from his inaugural in an automobile. (1921)

— Calvin Coolidge’s oath in 1925 was administered by Chief Justice (and ex-president) William Taft. It was also the first inaugural address broadcast on the radio.

— Harry Truman’s was the first to be televised. (1949)

— John F. Kennedy’s inauguration had Robert Frost as the first poet to participate in the official ceremony. (1961)

— Lyndon Johnson was the first (and so far) only president to be sworn in by a woman, U.S. District Judge Sarah T. Hughes. (1963)

— Ronald Reagan’s second inaugural had to compete with Super Bowl Sunday. (1985)

• All but six presidents took the presidential oath in Washington, D.C. The exceptions were:

George Washington—1789, New York City; 1793, Philadelphia

John Adams—1797, Philadelphia

Chester Alan Arthur—1881, New York City

Theodore Roosevelt—1901, Buffalo, N.Y.

Calvin Coolidge—1923, Plymouth, Vt.

Lyndon Baines Johnson—1963, Dallas, Texas

Source: infoplease.com

Reach Bill O’Boyle at 570-991-6118 or on Twitter @TLBillOBoyle.