George Washington took the first U.S. presidential oath in New York City on April 30, 1789.
The ceremony took place on the balcony of Federal Hall, then the nation’s temporary capitol. Robert Livingston, chancellor of New York, administered the oath because the federal judiciary had not yet been organized. Vice President John Adams and members of Congress attended the ceremony.
New York City served as the seat of the new federal government from 1789 until 1790. The capital then moved to Philadelphia, before eventually moving to Washington, D.C., in 1800. This sequence explains why Washington’s first inauguration did not occur in the city that now bears his name.
Washington had been unanimously elected by the Electoral College in the first presidential election. His inauguration began the first presidential administration under the Constitution, making it an important bridge between the Revolutionary generation and the federal government remembered in America250 history.