  The Swift Burst Alert Telescope (BAT) survey of Active Galactic Nuclei (AGN)
is providing an unprecedented view of local AGNs (<z> = 0.03) and their host
galaxy properties. In this paper, we present an analysis of the optical spectra
of a sample of 64 AGNs from the 9-month survey, detected solely based on their
14-195 keV flux. Our analysis includes both archived spectra from the Sloan
Digital Sky Survey and our own observations from the 2.1-m Kitt Peak National
Observatory telescope. Among our results, we include line ratio classifications
utilizing standard emission line diagnostic plots, [O III] 5007 A luminosities,
and H-beta derived black hole masses. As in our X-ray study, we find the type 2
sources to be less luminous (in [O III] 5007 A and 14-195 keV luminosities)
with lower accretion rates than the type 1 sources. We find that the optically
classified LINERs, H II/composite galaxies, and ambiguous sources have the
lowest luminosities, while both broad line and narrow line Seyferts have
similar luminosities. From a comparison of the hard X-ray (14-195 keV) and [O
III] luminosities, we find that both the observed and extinction-corrected [O
III] luminosities are weakly correlated with X-ray luminosity. In a study of
the host galaxy properties from both continuum fits and measurements of the
stellar absorption indices, we find that the hosts of the narrow line sources
have properties consistent with late type galaxies.
