From Archives: Our governors `do solemnly swear'
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If you’ve watched a governor or other statewide elected official being sworn in during the first week of a legislative session, you’ve noticed that the Supreme Court justice reads the oath as he or she swears in that official, and then both of them sign that document. Then it’s on to the next official and justice, and so on.
But what happens to the oath of office documents afterward? They eventually wind up with the State Archives for safekeeping. In fact, if you want to search for the oaths of office docs for Washington’s governors and other officials, you’re in luck. The Washington State Digital Archives has a collection of oaths of office from 1854 (a year after Washington Territory was established) all the way to 2009.
In this post, we’re providing the oath of office documents going all the way back to 1957 when Al Rosellini was sworn in as Washington’s 15th governor. You can also see the first-term oath of office docs for nearly all of the governors since then (just click on each name to view the oath doc), including Dan Evans in 1965, Dixy Lee Ray in 1977, John Spellman in 1981, Booth Gardner in 1985, Mike Lowry in 1993 , Gary Locke in 1997 and Chris Gregoire in 2005.
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Secretary of State
Steve Hobbs
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