Cameron Pollack

Former President George H.W. Bush lies in state at the U.S. Capitol Rotunda on Dec. 3, 2018. The U.S. Capitol played host to a hushed stream of mourners, paying their respects to former President George H.W. Bush, whose flag-draped casket, attended by a military honor guard, laid in the center of the building's rotunda. Among some of the who paid their respects, there was a sense of longing for the "kinder, gentler" nation that Bush spoke of during his inaugural address. Credit: Cameron Pollack for NPR

United States Secret Service members sweep the U.S. Capitol Rotunda before the casket of Former President George H.W. Bush arrives on Dec. 3, 2018.

United States Secret Service members sweep the U.S. Capitol Rotunda before the casket of Former President George H.W. Bush arrives on Dec. 3, 2018.

United States Secret Service members sweep the U.S. Capitol grounds before the casket of Former President George H.W. Bush arrives on Dec. 3, 2018.

A television attached to a Capitol Police truck broadcasts live coverage of Former President George H.W. Bush in state at the U.S. Capitol on Dec. 3, 2018.

First Lady Melania Trump and President Donald Trump salute the casket of Former President George H.W. Bush as it lies in state at the U.S. Capitol on Dec. 3, 2018. Trump has had a frosty relationship with the Bush family. He called his 2016 GOP primary opponent Jeb Bush "low energy," criticized the leadership of President George W. Bush and recently mocked the elder Bush's "thousand points of light" volunteer program. President Trump still praised George H.W. Bush on Twitter as someone who "led a long, successful and beautiful life."

A military honor guard watches over the casket of Former President George H.W. Bush as it lies in state at the U.S. Capitol on Dec. 3, 2018. Credit: Cameron Pollack for NPR

A military honor guard prepares to watch over the casket of Former President George H.W. Bush as it lies in state at the U.S. Capitol on Dec. 3, 2018.

A military honor guard prepares to watch over the casket of Former President George H.W. Bush as it lies in state at the U.S. Capitol on Dec. 3, 2018.

A Marine Corps honor guard prepares to watch over the casket of Former President George H.W. Bush as it lies in state at the U.S. Capitol on Dec. 3, 2018.

Former President George H.W. Bush lies in state at the U.S. Capitol on Dec. 3, 2018.

The American flag flies at half staff at the U.S. Capitol on Dec. 3, 2018.

Yuri Nesen, 19, and Grace Rector, 19, both sophomores at Georgetown University, hold up a card commemorating former President George H.W. Bush after visiting his casket at the U.S. Capitol.

DeForest Mapp, a freelance writer and producer from Portsmouth, Va., said Bush governed with poise and and charm. "He was a president with conviction," Mapp said, and added that "right now the country is in dire need of someone in leadership that has the right temperament for that position."

A member of a military honor guard stands over Former President Bush’s casket in the U.S. Capitol rotunda on Dec. 3, 2018.

Xavier Creguer came from Michigan with his father Tom, a Gulf War veteran, to pay his respects. Tom said Bush "set out to make a difference, and he did that until his last breath." Creguer added "I think that's what we as Americans need to do, in our hometowns, in our back yards and across the world."

Suellen Wheatley-Wilkins, a 66-year-old retiree from Delaware, said she saw the late President Bush and his wife Barbara "as the parents of my generation." He just set such a standard for the entire country," she added.

Bush was the definition of establishment success: Yale graduate. Prosperous business career. Forty-first president of the United States. But to one admittedly biased observer, the elder Bush has always been shortchanged. "As a result of him being a one-term president, historians hadn't paid much attention to him," George W. Bush told NPR in a 2014 interview. He called his father "one of the greatest one-term presidents in the nation's history."

Yuri Nesen, 19, and Grace Rector, 19, both sophomores at Georgetown University, pose for a portrait after viewing former President George H.W. Bush’s casket at the U.S. Capitol.