The view from the Capitol. (Getty Images)

President Obama and Vice President Joe Biden’s second inauguration was not half as frenzied as the first, when some 1.8 million people descended on this city to witness the swearing-in of the United States’ first black president. But District and federal officials’ estimate of 500,000 to 700,000 spectators today was still considerable—and sometimes felt larger.

Metrorail trains ran half-full about 6 a.m. as the early risers headed for the National Mall and U.S. Capitol. Some riders looked still half-asleep; surely many reporters, staffers and security personnel being dispatched for the day commiserated. But most seemed eager, even giddy, to bear witness to the quadrennial display of national pomp.

“It’s exciting,” Terri Hamilton, a teacher from Indianapolis, said aboard a half-full Green Line train. She got to D.C. on Saturday with her colleague, Blanche Edwards. The women were not among the masses who trekked to Obama’s first inauguration in 2009, but Hamilton said the second go-round was worth the trip. “He won. When will we ever again get to see a black president?”, she said.

They departed at L’Enfant Plaza and searched for their color-coded queue. Meanwhile, people offloading at Capitol South encountered a line that stretched for blocks behind the House office buildings. U.S. Capitol Police officers and volunteers in red parkas attempted to marshall the tourists and journalists flowing toward them, with varying accuracy. As one reporter was guided into the Rayburn House Office Building to pass through security, the next was hurried toward the frosty, outdoor checkpoint.

The group at the head of the line for red tickets did not want to talk to many reporters. Perhaps it was because they were holding out for a well-known newspaper instead of an unfamiliar local website, or, giving them the benefit of the doubt, because they had been standing in a cold, dark January morning since 3:45 a.m.

Still, the security perimeter all over was far less hectic than four years ago, when bad directions and poorly planned feeder routes caused many to become bottlenecked against mesh wire fencing and others to corral inside a subterranean stretch of Third Street NW which quickly earned a legacy as the “Purple Tunnel of Doom,” after the tickets held by the thousands who were left there to wait.

With the sun creeping up behind the Capitol dome, the inauguration zone glowed in the kind of light that patriotic hymnals tell of. But it was not to last. As more and more spectators filed in and as the United States Marine Band took its position at the base of the massive podium, the painterly dawn was replaced by chilly, overcast skies with the sun bleeding through a gray haze.

The scene was more sleepy than security-heavy at 7 a.m., on the National Mall, with early birds trickling in from the entrance at 18th street and Constitution Avenue NW. By 10:30, the non-ticketed zone stretching from the National Air and Space Museum was packed with thousands of spectators decked out in Obama buttons and winter hats, waving American flags passed out by volunteers. And, strangely, most reported few to no encounters with a security checkpoint.

Barbara Skinner, 55, and Janey Thompson, came all the way from Columbus and Starksfield, Miss.. This was their first time in D.C.

“We wanted to be a part of the history,” said Skinner, who was on the Mall since 5 a.m. “It’s a dream come true.” They had to slog through a line of traffic to get in, but no bag check.

Paula Kimberling flew here from Pasadena, Calif., and also got on the Mall about 4:30 a.m. without any security worker frisking her bag. She was here for Obama’s first inauguration, too, and remembers security being a lot heavier then.

“They wouldn’t let us in until 5:30 then, and they checked our bags in a couple places,” she said. “This time, we walked right in.”

And Beth Kirton-Crane, who lives in Tyson Corner, Va. and was also here last time, said she was worried her bag would be too big, but no one stopped her. “We walked right in,” she said.

Even the civil disobedience was tamped down. Though the National Park Service issued permits for thousands of protesters, they were barely visible, save a few of the loudest rabble-rousers. One protester holding an upside down flag “to protest socialism” was carted off by security when a bystander complained about his backpack.

“He don’t look very friendly,” she said.

Meanwhile, a vocal anti-abortion protester who is a common sight at congressional hearings and Capitol Hill rallies managed his way into one of the closer-in ticketed pens today. He stirred up whoops and jeers after climbing a tree and proceeding to scream “Abortion!” at the top of his lungs. And no matter how rowdy or incomprehensible he got, the guy was allowed to remain in his perch the whole morning.

Finally, as the crowd dispersed, the police got him to come down. Initially the ladder officers put up just pushed him to climb higher. Meanwhile, people watching said all manner of things, chanting at and jeering back at him from below. “Come on down Mitt!” they joked. “His mother should have aborted him!”

Loudmouthed, tree-scaling dissenters aside, the mood remained largely festive.

Cherie Love Foster flew in for the inauguration from northern California with her husband. The mother of four kids, Foster, a second-grade teacher, said as soon as Obama was elected in 2008 and she saw the 2009 inauguration, she wanted to be a part of the ‘energy and spirit of this presidency.’ She and her husband, she said, are paying $900 a night—”It’s like my son’s college tuition,” she said—to stay at a Hilton. They’ve been in D.C. since Thursday. They got up at 3 a.m. to come down to the Capitol, and got a front-row seat in their section. Foster, who was wearing a long fur coat to stay warm, capped her outfit with a bright red hat with an oversize bow she bought at Macy’s two days ago, just for the occasion.

Near the front of the U.S. Capitol’s lawn seating sat Anne Seymour, a former Obama campaign volunteer who today was festooned in apparel and accessories bearing the president’s name and photo. She’s sported no fewer than 12 pins, including several that she said are “vintage” from Obama’s 2008 run.

“It’s history that we got a wonderful person reelected,” Seymour said. Seymour, who works as a crime victims’ advocate in D.C., added that she’s hopes Obama’s second term will include passage of new gun control laws.

With Seymour were about 20 of her friends from around the world, including Sue McDiarmid, a New Zealand native who flew in from Los Angeles.

“There’s nothing like this [in New Zealand],” she said. “It’s a celebration of freedom in a grand style.”

Seymour says she bought Obama-branded scarves for all her friends. “You can never have too much Obama cha-cha.”

There were moments of celebrity-spotting, too. A small crowd hovered around the actress Angela Bassett as she stood for an interview with CNN. A sighting of the singers Katy Perry and John Mayer—an apparent couple—kept people buzzing for an hour.

Marlon Wayans, right, with the singer will.i.am. (Alexis Hauk)

Marlon Wayans and will.i.am, the singer from the Black Eyed Peas, were also spotted in the crowd, scrambling over a low concrete barrier as they looked for their seats.

After hours of idling about, arguing to get one’s seat back and pacing in the cold—enough to warm one’s extremities but not so vigorously as to alarm the cadres of soliders and police officers guarding area—the inaugural program finally crawled open about 11 a.m. when the Marine Band tuned up. Copeland and Sousa standards boomed out of loudspeakers, the entire world seemed to hush under an elegiac “Amazing Grace,” and it is a near-certainty that this article will not be the only one to report that the band’s version of “Yankee Doodle” was jaunty.

Members of Congress got few cheers as they took their seats up on the podium; even with so many out-of-towners, the frosty reaction to the legislative branch was surely welcome to all D.C. residents in the crowd. Former President Jimmy Carter entered to mild applause, while Bill Clinton got hearty cheers.

For the principals, the Sousa compositions seemed almost a bit too obvious. Biden’s family entered to “The Beau Ideal”; the vice president has a son named Beau, the Delaware attorney general, who walked on with Hunter and Ashley Biden. Malia and Sasha Obama arrived to the tune of “The Fairest of the Fair.” Joe Biden himself trounced in to the beat of “El Capitan,” a bouncy march that suited the genial vice president just perfectly.

Up on the podium, senators and representatives were as much tourists as anyone down below, albiet with much better sight lines. One imagines the chatter that was going on up there. Sen. Orrin Hatch (R-Utah) stood out in a white cowboy hat, while John McCain (R-Ariz.) hid his face behind a giant pair of aviator sunglasses that wouldn’t look out of place on a developing world despot. Bill Nelson (D-Fla.) looked ridiculous in a bright orange trucker’s cap.

Sen. Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.), the chairman of the Joint Congressional Committee on Inaugural Ceremonies, emceed the program, calling it a “celebration of our great democracy.

The National Mall fills out, though not nearly to its 2009 capacity. (Benjamin R. Freed)

In opening remarks that reflected on the construction of the Capitol dome in war-riddled 1863, Schumer said a presidential inauguration is “a perfect moment to renew our collective faith in America’s future.”

Myrlie Evers-Williams, the widow of the slain civil rights activist Medgar Evars, delivered the first opening prayer at a presidential inauguration to be given by a layperson.

“This golden dome reflects the premise of this nation, indivisible with liberty and justice for all, Evers-Williams said. She also delivered the official program’s one obvious verbal gaffe when she called Obama the “45th president.”

Following a performance of “Battle Hymn of the Republic” by the Brooklyn Tabernacle Choir, Biden repeated for ceremony the oath he officially took yesterday. Supreme Court Associate Justice Sonia Sotomayor once again presided over Biden’s oath.

The singer James Taylor was next with a performance of “America the Beautiful.” It was typical James Taylor—inoffensive and boring acoustic plucking that would be a lot more tolerable on a warm Tanglewood evening accompanied by a bag of weed.

Spectators cheer as President Obama is sworn in for a second time. (Getty Images/Mario Tama)

Finally, just about 11:50 a.m., President Obama and Michelle Obama exited the Capitol and made their way to the rostrum to cheers and applause that rode an echo wave to the back of the crowd in the middle reaches of the National Mall. Chief Justice John G. Roberts, again repeating for show what was made official yesterday, administered the oath, making sure not to botch any of the words like he did in 2009. The Marine Band fired up “Hail to the Chief” as Obama prepared to deliver what will likely be the last speech he will ever give to a live audience this large.

In a 2,095-word speech that ran about 15 minutes, Obama harkened several times to the forging of the Declaration of Independence in an appeal for the more progressive tack he is expected to take in his second term.

“The patriots of 1776 did not fight to replace the tyranny of a king with the privileges of a few or the rule of a mob,” Obama said. “They gave to us a Republic, a government of, and by, and for the people, entrusting each generation to keep safe our founding creed.”

In making his case for the role of government, Obama mentioned several specific policy items he struggled to move forward in his first term, along with newer additions to his platform. “No single person can train all the math and science teachers we’ll need to equip our children for the future, or build the roads and networks and research labs that will bring new jobs and businesses to our shores,” he said.”We must make the hard choices to reduce the cost of health care and the size of our deficit. But we reject the belief that America must choose between caring for the generation that built this country and investing in the generation that will build its future.”

Obama added that he plans to address the effects of global climate change and referenced again a renewed focus on gun control in the wake of last month’s school shooting in Connecticut. He also became the first president to push for marriage equality in an inaugural address.

“We, the people, declare today that the most evident of truths—that all of us are created equal – is the star that guides us still; just as it guided our forebears through Seneca Falls, and Selma, and Stonewall,” he said.

The president wrapped his remarks about 12:10 p.m., giving way to the singer Kelly Clarkson, who—backed by the U.S. Marine Band—delivered a bold, brassy performance of “America (My Country ‘Tis of Thee).” Richard Blanco, the poet selected for the day, followed with “One Today,” a thoughtfully meandering composition written for the occasion.

The morning was capped off by the singer Beyoncé, tapped to perform the national anthem. Given her celebrity lustre and well-awarded vocal range, expectations in the crowd were high, so it was a letdown when a pre-recorded audio track blared out of the speakers while members of the Marine Band pantomimed their notes. Clarkson’s turn was done live.

Few begrudged Beyoncé as they shuffled out of the National Mall and Capitol seating areas and back across Pennsylvania Avenue for the slow march home. “That’s a little disappointing,” Stefani Zinerman, a Brooklyn resident, said. “But it is the age of technology. You do what you need to do.”

As for seeing the president, though? Zinerman gushed. “Despite people thinking of him a divisive manner, he is appealing to the best of ourselves,” she said. “Lots of ‘we can do this together’.”

Authorities briefly closed Federal Center SW due to overcrowding. (Rebecca Fishbein)

With hundreds of thousands of people pouring out, some Metro stations that had handled the morning rush so well became overwhelmed. Federal Center SW, L’Enfant Plaza and Metro Center all experienced temporary closures when platforms overcrowded.

But on a thinned-out Green Line platform at the Chinatown station, transit police imported from around the United States managed to keep order in an unfamiliar subway. One officer, on duty from Minnesota, chuckled when he heard inauguration-goers complain about the weather. “This is balmy for me,” he said. “It’s minus-47 back home with the wind chill.”

Heading home, many spectators looked exhausted after a day that, for some, began in the middle of the night. Paulette McCurdy, in from Connecticut, leaned as far back as she could in her seat on a Greenbelt-bound train. She woke up about 3 a.m. in order to be on the Mall by 4:45, her reward for all the hours she spent volunteering last year for Obama’s campaign and some local congressional races. (“I worked off an entire dress size” canvassing neighborhoods, she said.) She missed the 2009 swearing-in, so today was a must-see.

“When am I going to see a black president inaugurated again in my lifetime?” McCurdy asked. “I had to make this one.”

And even though she seemed ready to take a nap right there on Metro, McCurdy’s day wasn’t nearly over. “Don’t forget: I have a six-hour drive ahead of me.”

With additional reporting by Martin Austermuhle, Rebecca Fishbein, Sriram Gopal, Alexis Hauk and Eddie Kim.