Packing nation's hopes, Obama rides to D.C.

Invoking founding fathers
While talking about the future, Obama reflected on the past, echoing the words of the Declaration of Independence, Lincoln and President John F. Kennedy. He cited the founding fathers who risked everything with no assurance of success in Philadelphia in the summer of 1776:

"They were willing to put all they were and all they had on the line — their lives, their fortunes and their sacred honor — for a set of ideals that continue to light the world: That we are equal. That our rights to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness come not from our laws, but from our maker. And that a government of, by, and for the people can endure."

The president-elect's triumphant day started with a sober discussion of the country's future with 41 people he met during his long quest for the White House. Preparing to board the train, Obama said that "what's required is a new declaration of independence — from ideology and small thinking, prejudice and bigotry."

Obama disembarked briefly in Baltimore to address a chilled-but-hearty crowd of more than 40,000, echoing his earlier remarks and alluding to the patriots who defended nearby Fort McHenry against the British and inspired the poem that became "The Star-Spangled Banner."

"We are here today not simply to pay tribute to those patriots who founded our nation in Philadelphia or defended it in Baltimore, but to take up the cause for which they gave so much," he said.

Pressing the inaugural theme of service and community, event planners also called for canned food drives in Wilmington and Baltimore to coincide with his stops.

Hard work ahead
Back in Washington, members of his administration looked beyond the inauguration to the details of governing.

Video   Unparalleled security awaits inauguration Jan. 17: The swearing-in of President-elect Barack Obama will be the most carefully guarded inaugural event ever. NBC’s Pete Williams reports. Nightly News

Obama adviser Valerie Jarrett addressed the U.S. Conference of Mayors and asked for help pushing through legislation to jump-start the moribund economy.

Although Obama's path tracked Lincoln's and took on the same overtone of high security, it wasn't the journey of virtual secrecy that the 16th president-elect took so long ago on the eve of the Civil War. Lincoln was smuggled under cover of darkness from one train station to another to avoid a feared assassination attempt.

The FBI has been planning its inauguration mission since June. Large trucks, a bomb-detecting robot, canisters with hundreds of gallons of water to disrupt a car bomb and other emergency response equipment stretch down a block near the FBI's Washington Field Office.

John Perren, a special agent in charge of counterterrorism, said there was no credible intelligence warning of any attack.

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