 However, the only contemporaneous source that fully reproduced Washington's oath completely lacks the religious codicil.The first newspaper report that actually described the exact words used in an oath of office, Chester Arthur's in 1881, repeated the "query-response" method where the words, "so help me God" were a personal prayer, not a part of the constitutional oath.The time of adoption of the current procedure, where both the chief justice and the president speak the oath, is unknown.