Period of mourning
Visitors honour Bush for military victory, disabled rights
Soldiers, people in wheelchairs and long lines of other Americans filed through the hushed Capitol Rotunda on Tuesday to view George H.W. Bush’s casket and remember a president whose legacy included military victory half a world away and a landmark law affirming the rights of the disabled. Sully , Bush’s service dog, came by, too.
People filed into the Capitol throughout the chilly, overcast day to pay respects to the 41st president, a son and father of privilege now celebrated by everyday citizens for his common courtesies and depth of experience.
“He was so qualified, and I think he was just a decent man,” said Sharon Terry, touring Washington with friends from an Indianapolis garden club. Said her friend Sue Miller, also in line for the viewing: “I actually think I underestimated him when he was in office. My opinion of him went up seeing how he conducted himself as a statesman afterward.”
The CIA, too, honoured Bush, the only spy chief to become president, as three agency directors past and present joined the public in the viewing.
In the midst of the period of mourning, first lady Melania Trump gave Laura Bush, one of her predecessors, a tour of holiday decorations at the White House, and the Trumps planned to visit the Bush family at the Blair House presidential guesthouse.
Although President Donald Trump will attend Bush’s national funeral service today, he is not among the eulogists announced by the Bush family, a list that includes the late president’s son, former President George W. Bush.
“The elegance & precision of the last two days have been remarkable!” Trump tweeted of the funeral ceremonies, which opened in Texas and came to Washington on Monday, with Bush lying in state at the Capitol until the Washington National Cathedral service. The Trumps visited Bush’s casket Monday evening.
Dignitaries came forward on Monday to honour the Texan whose service to his country extended three quarters of a century, from the Second World War through his final years as an advocate for volunteerism and relief for people displaced by natural disaster. President from 1989 to 1993, Bush died Friday at 94.
Not all the people who came for the viewing in a heavily Democratic city and suburbs were Bush supporters. They waited in line nonetheless.
“I’m just here to pay my respects,” said Jane Hernandez, a retired physician. “I wasn’t the biggest fan of his presidency, but all in all he was a good, sincere guy doing a really hard job as best he could. And anybody who does that job deserves some respect.”
Fred Curry, one of the few African-Americans in line, is a registered Democrat from Hyattsville, Md., who voted for Bush in 1988, the election won by the one-term president.
“Honestly I just liked him,” he said. “He seemed like a sincere and decent man and you couldn’t argue with his qualifications.”
Inside the Capitol, people in wheelchairs visited the casket alongside Sully, the two-year-old Labrador retriever assigned to Bush after his wife, Barbara, died in April. Their presence was to commemorate Bush’s signing of the Americans with Disabilities Act, the 1990 law that, among its many provisions, required businesses that prohibit pets to give access to service dogs.
“After Mrs. Bush’s death, general companionship was a big part of Sully’s job,” John Miller, president and CEO of America’s VetDogs, said in a phone interview. “One of the things that I think was important to the president was the rest command, where Sully would rest his head on the president’s lap.”
Bob Dole, 95, an advocate of that legislation and the former Senate majority leader from Kansas, came in a wheelchair to honour his fellow Second World War veteran. At the casket’s side, an aide helped Dole into a standing position. Once steadied, Dole saluted.