Inaugural Finery

In response to the letters (Jan. 27) protesting the lavish display and flagrant misuse of money to stage the President’s inauguration, I would like to remind those objectors that since time immemorial the populace has adored having their heads of state elegantly feted. So why should the United States have our President celebrate his second term in office in sackcloth and ashes?

I would venture a guess that each of your letter writers has, at one time or another, been a victim of Reaganomics--lost a good paying bureaucratic job, probably--and is venting his bitterness by denouncing the very rite of swearing in and installing the President for a second term as out of place and inappropriate.

Pomp and ceremony and display of fine clothes, jewels, furs and other finery have historically been an integral part of inaugural festivities, not only in the United States but also in most of the free world. I imagine only in the Soviet Union or Cuba would one find the austerity and utilitarianism your letter-writers admire. Perhaps they would like to move to those countries and be subject to that type of restrictive government.

MARY R. McCORMICK

Los Angeles