Obama joins select 'four oath club'

US: Barack Obama on Monday joins select political company, as by a quirk of history, he becomes only the second US President, after Franklin Roosevelt, to take the oath of office four times.

Roosevelt, who guided America through the Great Depression and World War II forged history the hard way, as he was the only US leader to be elected to four terms, serving in the White House from 1933 until his death in 1945.

After a new amendment to the Constitution was ratified in 1951 limiting presidents to two elected terms, Obama, and others elected to the White House, have no hope of emulating FDR's political longevity. Obama joins the four oaths club thanks to a slip of the tongue.

Swearing in Obama at the West Front of the US Capitol in 2009, Chief Justice John Roberts mixed up the wording of the oath of office, which the newly minted president repeated.

AFP