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By 7 a.m. this morning, 150,000 Americans were expected to have filed past the former president's casket Date published: 6/11/2004
WASHINGTON-- The line was hun- dreds deep and three hours long when dawn broke over the U.S. Capitol. Full of people who drove all night from Illinois or Tennessee, or rose in the black of early morning to come in from the Washington suburbs, the line zig-zagged across the front of the Capitol, stretching down the hill and snaking back and forth across the grass to 3rd Street. "So impressive," murmured Ron Kaufman, surveying the crowd at around 7:30 a.m. "President Reagan was always much more popular than his policies," added Kaufman, who was former President George H.W. Bush's political director and also served in Reagan's administration. But yesterday was not about the administration insiders like Kaufman, who was just another observer watching the orderly, slow-but-steady movement of the line as thousands of regular people inched their way forward for a few minutes of history. "He was the first president I voted for. We always had a special bond," said Linda Glenn of Cecil County, Md. "I don't know that I would make the trip for another president." Ronald Reagan, the 40th president, died Saturday. He was 93. It was a three-hour wait, even for those who began it at 4 or 5 a.m. By afternoon, the wait to spend a few moments in the Capitol Rotunda with Reagan's flag-draped casket was topping four hours. Or, as one man put it as he emerged from the Capitol and whipped out his cell phone, "Four hours for 21 seconds." But those 21 seconds were historic--the first state funeral in Washington for a former president since Lyndon Johnson's death in 1973, and the chance to say goodbye to an icon. Eric Johnson, a teacher, drove in from New Jersey "to pay my respects and say that I was there." "I teach history, and he's a big reason why I do it," Johnson added. "I don't think you'll see this for Carter or Ford." Larry and Julie Alexander drove all night from Illinois, entering the line around 5 a.m. "He was the first president I voted for. He's the reason I became a Republican," Larry Alexander said. Over and over, people said they'd come to pay their respects to a man they saw as warm, funny, good-hearted and strong.
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