THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1997, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Sunday, January 12, 1997 TAG: 9701120049
SECTION: LOCAL PAGE: B1 EDITION: NORTH CAROLINA
SOURCE: ASSOCIATED PRESS
DATELINE: RALEIGH LENGTH: 78 lines
Gov. James B. Hunt Jr. started his fourth term Saturday with an impassioned plea for public education to a crowd of 4,000 shivering spectators at his inauguration.
``I ask you - I ask all North Carolinians - to unite in a new commitment to public education,'' Hunt said in his inaugural address, delivered in front of historic Broughton High School.
``Our young people deserve it. Our future demands it,'' he said. ``And our history teaches it. It teaches us what public education can mean for our state and our future.''
Temperatures were near freezing with a wind chill in the teens during the ceremony. The crowd disappeared in a fog as a brisk wind carried the smoke from Hunt's 19-cannon salute across the audience.
Members of the Council of State took their oaths of office before Hunt. One of them, Secretary of State Elaine Marshall, became the first woman ever elected to a Council of State office.
Agriculture Commissioner Jim Graham, beginning his ninth term, towered over Supreme Court Associate Justice Sarah Parker as he took the oath.
``I WILL, so help me God,'' Graham bellowed.
Hunt added a number of unusual twists to his fourth inauguration.
To emphasize his focus on education, he moved the ceremony from the front of the Archives and History Building to Broughton High School. And he appointed student marshals from each of the states 118 school systems to lead the inaugural parade and form a backdrop to the inauguration ceremony.
He also asked Chapel Hill writer Doris Betts to read at the ceremony.
She produced a short story, ``Whose Child Is This?,'' about King Solomon confronted with a child no one claimed. Eventually, the various interest groups who rejected the child make it their own.
Singer James Taylor performed ``Carolina in My Mind,'' telling the crowd he had written it while in the Mediterranean and homesick for the Piedmont.
``Let me run through this one more time for you,'' Taylor said as the crowd cheered.
Singer James Taylor performed ``Carolina in My Mind,'' telling the crowd he had written it while in the Mediterranean and homesick for the Piedmont.
``Let me run through this one more time for you,'' Taylor said as the crowd cheered.
Hunt's inaugural address outlined the problems North Carolina has faced in the past and how they were overcome with education.
The state still faces problems of poverty, violence, hatred and discrimination, Hunt said.
``Worst of all, it is the children who suffer,'' Hunt said. ``Who are neglected and abused. Who are innocent victims of violence and crime. Who are poorly fed, poorly educated and poorly prepared for their future.
``And these problems can seem so daunting and so overwhelming that some people want to give up,'' he said. ``Some even want to give up on our public schools.''
Hunt called on elected officials, parents and volunteers to make the public schools as good as North Carolina's universities.
``Make a new commitment to the next generation,'' he said. ``And above all - more than ever before in our history, more than any state in America has ever done - I ask you, I ask all of us, to make a new commitment to public education.''
Hunt campaigned to expand Smart Start, his early childhood education initiative, to every county and to raise teacher salaries to the national average.
The student marshals led the 90-unit parade past the reviewing stand on the east side of the Capitol. ILLUSTRATION: [Color Photos]
Associated Press
Gov. James B. Hunt Jr., right, with his wife, Carolyn, is sworn in
Saturday for his fourth term by Chief Justice Burley Mitchell.
Singer James Taylor, above, performs ``Carolina in My Mind'' for the
inaugural crowd of about 4,000. At left, Lindsey Hunt, 5-year-old
granddaughter of Gov. James B. Hunt Jr., watches the inaugural
parade perched on her father's shoulders. Her dad, Baxter Hunt, is a
U.S. Foreign Service officer.