An Unusual Ceremony

THE PRESIDENCY

Whatever the time, place or local custom, nearly all weddings exert the same powerful tug: they draw all but the young back through the years to luxuriate, if only briefly, in their own memories. Last week millions of Americans took this trip to reverie, propelled by the nationalized nuptials of Luci Baines Johnson, the first daughter of an incumbent President to marry in 31 years, and Patrick John Nugent, the boy from Waukegan, Ill., who brashly wooed and won her.

In this sophisticated age, there was no poet to sing, as Walt Whitman did for Nellie Grant in 1874: "O bonnie bride! Yield thy red cheeks today unto a Nation's loving kiss." Instead, the bride and groom were greeted outside the church by anti-Viet Nam pickets. Inside though, there were no Republicans or Democrats, no hawks or doves, no Northerners or Southerners—only guests at a solemn ceremony. No TV or radio was allowed within, but millions of people throughout the U.S. kept a sort of vigil while the couple knelt inside the National Shrine of the Immaculate Conception, under the gaze of a huge mosaic of a stern Christ in red robes, and vowed to each other: With this ring I marry you and pledge to you my ever faithful love.

The 700 guests who heard the traditional "What God has joined together let no man put asunder" constituted one of the most distinguished guest lists in U.S. marital history. They included all the members of the Cabinet, the Supreme Court Justices and leaders of Congress, plus a liberal sprinkling of the merely wealthy and famous. But there was also a goodly number of quite ordinary citizens from Texas and Illinois, a particularly fitting assortment for the marriage of the President's daughter to a nonEstablishment young man.

Hand in Hand. Luci's last days as Miss Johnson and her first as Mrs. Nugent were, like Luci herself, a beguiling blend of the gay and the sentimental, the hectic and the religious, the Texan and the presidential. There were parties every day, starting with a reception for the diplomatic corps, progressing through a Western-style cookout to a black-tie dinner dance on the wedding eve, where President Johnson sentimentally declared in a toast that he was "as proud as a man can be when his youngest daughter is doing the most wonderful thing in the world: beginning a life with the man she loves."

In the midst of all this, Luci gave a party for 60 White House staff members of all stations, including Vice Admiral George Burkley, the chief physician, and Electrician Trophes Bryant, the unofficial keeper of the presidential kennels. She had stayed up the night before until 3 a.m., autographing color photographs of herself and Pat to be used as gifts for the staff. One sample, for Assistant Chef Nick Salvador: "With deep appreciation for yummy fried eggs and homemade toast, but most of all for your delightful sense of humor, your ever-smiling face and your friendship." At dawn, when the President of the U.S. went to the kitchen for an early snack, he found Luci there, too wound-up to sleep.