Thanksgiving History
Thanksgiving Proclamation
[New York, 3 October 1789]
By
George Washington, the
President of the United States of America, a Proclamation.
Whereas it is the duty of all Nations to acknowledge the providence of Almighty God, to obey his will, to be grateful for his benefits, and humbly to implore his protection and favor-- and whereas both Houses of Congress have by their joint Committee requested me to recommend to the People of the United States a day of public thanksgiving and prayer to be observed by acknowledging with grateful hearts the many signal favors of Almighty God especially by affording them an opportunity peaceably to establish a form of government for their safety and happiness.
Now therefore I do recommend and assign Thursday the 26th day of November next to be devoted by the People of these States to the service of that great and glorious Being, who is the beneficent Author of all the good that was, that is, or that will be-- That we may then all unite in rendering unto him our sincere and humble thanks--for his kind care and protection of the People of this Country previous to their becoming a Nation--for the signal and manifold mercies, and the favorable interpositions of his Providence which we experienced in the course and conclusion of the late war--for the great degree of tranquility, union, and plenty, which we have since enjoyed--for the peaceable and rational manner, in which we have been enabled to establish constitutions of government for our safety and happiness, and particularly the national One now lately instituted--for the civil and religious liberty with which we are blessed; and the means we have of acquiring and diffusing useful knowledge; and in general for all the great and various favors which he hath been pleased to confer upon us.
And also that we may then unite in most humbly offering our prayers and supplications to the great Lord and Ruler of Nations and beseech him to pardon our national and other transgressions-- to enable us all, whether in public or private stations, to perform our several and relative duties properly and punctually--to render our national government a blessing to all the people, by constantly being a Government of wise, just, and constitutional laws, discreetly and faithfully executed and obeyed--to protect and guide all Sovereigns and Nations (especially such as have shewn kindness unto us) and to bless them with good government, peace, and concord--To promote the knowledge and practice of true religion and virtue, and the encrease of science among them and us--and generally to grant unto all Mankind such a degree of temporal prosperity as he alone knows to be best.
Given under my hand at the City of New York the third day of October in the year of our Lord 1789.
George Washington
The date and location of the first Thanksgiving celebration is a topic of
modest contention. The traditional "first Thanksgiving" is the celebration
that occurred at the site of Plymouth Plantation, in 1621. The Plymouth
celebration occurred early in the history of what would become one of the
original thirteen colonies that became the United States. The celebration
became an important part of the American myth by the 1800s.
This Thanksgiving, modeled after celebrations that were commonplace in
contemporary Europe, is generally regarded as America's first.
Elementary
school teacher Robyn Gioia has argued that the earliest attested
"thanksgiving" celebration in what is now the United States was celebrated
by the Spanish on
September 8,
1565 in what is now Saint Augustine, Florida.
Today, Thanksgiving is celebrated on
the second Monday of October in Canada and on the fourth Thursday of
November in the United States.
The original feast in 1621 occurred sometime between September 21 and November 11. Unlike our modern holiday, it was three days long. The event was based on English harvest festivals, which traditionally occurred around the 29th of September. After that first harvest was completed by the Plymouth colonists, Gov. William Bradford proclaimed a day of thanksgiving and prayer, shared by all the colonists and neighboring Indians.
In 1623 a day of fasting and prayer during a period of drought was changed to one of thanksgiving because the rain came during the prayers. Gradually the custom prevailed in New England of annually celebrating thanksgiving after the harvest.
During the American Revolution a yearly day of national thanksgiving was suggested by the Continental Congress. In 1817 New York State adopted Thanksgiving Day as an annual custom, and by the middle of the 19th century many other states had done the same.
In 1863 President Abraham Lincoln appointed a day of thanksgiving as the last Thursday in November, which he may have correlated it with the November 21, 1621, anchoring of the Mayflower at Cape Cod. Since then, each president has issued a Thanksgiving Day proclamation. President Franklin D. Roosevelt set the date for Thanksgiving to the fourth Thursday of November in 1939 (approved by Congress in 1941)
Abraham Lincoln's successors as president followed his example of
annually declaring the final Thursday in November to be Thanksgiving. But in
1939, President Franklin D. Roosevelt broke with this tradition. November
had five Thursdays that year, and Roosevelt declared the fourth Thursday as
Thanksgiving rather than the fifth one. In 1940 and 1941, years in which
November had four Thursdays, he declared the third one as Thanksgiving.
Although many popular histories state otherwise, he made clear that his plan
was to establish it on the next-to-last Thursday in the month instead of the
last one. With the country still in the midst of The Great Depression,
Roosevelt thought an earlier Thanksgiving would give merchants a
longer period to sell goods before Christmas. Increasing profits
and spending during this period, Roosevelt hoped, would help bring the
country out of the Depression. At the time, advertising goods for Christmas
before Thanksgiving was considered inappropriate. Fred Lazarus, Jr., founder
of the Federated Department Stores (later Macy's), is credited with
convincing Roosevelt to push Thanksgiving back a week to expand the shopping
season.
However, many localities had made a tradition of celebrating on the last
Thursday, and since a presidential declaration of Thanksgiving Day was not
legally binding, it was widely disregarded. Twenty-three states went along
with Roosevelt's recommendation, 22 did not, and some, like Texas, could not
decide and took both weeks as government holidays. Critics termed
Roosevelt's dating of the holiday as "Franksgiving".
Proclamation of Thanksgiving
Washington, D.C.
October 3, 1863
President Abraham LincolnThis is the proclamation which set the
precedent for America's national day of Thanksgiving. During his
administration, President Lincoln issued many orders like this. For example,
on November 28, 1861, he ordered government departments closed for a local
day of thanksgiving.
Sarah Josepha Hale, a prominent magazine editor, wrote a letter to
Lincoln on 28, 1863, urging him to have the "day of our annual Thanksgiving
made a National and fixed Union Festival." She wrote, "You may have observed
that, for some years past, there has been an increasing interest felt in our
land to have the Thanksgiving held on the same day, in all the States; it
now needs National recognition and authoritive fixation, only, to become
permanently, an American custom and institution." The document below sets
apart the last Thursday of November "as a day of Thanksgiving and Praise."
According to an April 1, 1864, letter from John Nicolay, one of President
Lincoln's secretaries, this document was written by Secretary of State
William Seward, and the original was in his handwriting. On October 3, 1863,
fellow Cabinet member Gideon Welles recorded in his diary that he
complimented Seward on his work. A year later the manuscript was sold to
benefit Union troops.
By the President of the United States of America.
A Proclamation.
The year that is drawing towards its close, has been filled with the
blessings of fruitful fields and healthful skies. To these bounties, which
are so constantly enjoyed that we are prone to forget the source from which
they come, others have been added, which are of so extraordinary a nature,
that they cannot fail to penetrate and soften even the heart which is
habitually insensible to the ever watchful providence of Almighty God. In
the midst of a civil war of unequaled magnitude and severity, which has
sometimes seemed to foreign States to invite and to provoke their
aggression, peace has been preserved with all nations, order has been
maintained, the laws have been respected and obeyed, and harmony has
prevailed everywhere except in the theatre of military conflict; while that
theatre has been greatly contracted by the advancing armies and navies of
the Union. Needful diversions of wealth and of strength from the fields of
peaceful industry to the national defence, have not arrested the plough, the
shuttle or the ship; the axe has enlarged the borders of our settlements,
and the mines, as well of iron and coal as of the precious metals, have
yielded even more abundantly than heretofore. Population has steadily
increased, notwithstanding the waste that has been made in the camp, the
siege and the battle-field; and the country, rejoicing in the consiousness
of augmented strength and vigor, is permitted to expect continuance of years
with large increase of freedom. No human counsel hath devised nor hath any
mortal hand worked out these great things. They are the gracious gifts of
the Most High God, who, while dealing with us in anger for our sins, hath
nevertheless remembered mercy. It has seemed to me fit and proper that they
should be solemnly, reverently and gratefully acknowledged as with one heart
and one voice by the whole American People. I do therefore invite my fellow
citizens in every part of the United States, and also those who are at sea
and those who are sojourning in foreign lands, to set apart and observe the
last Thursday of November next, as a day of Thanksgiving and Praise to our
beneficent Father who dwelleth in the Heavens. And I recommend to them that
while offering up the ascriptions justly due to Him for such singular
deliverances and blessings, they do also, with humble penitence for our
national perverseness and disobedience, commend to His tender care all those
who have become widows, orphans, mourners or sufferers in the lamentable
civil strife in which we are unavoidably engaged, and fervently implore the
interposition of the Almighty Hand to heal the wounds of the nation and to
restore it as soon as may be consistent with the Divine purposes to the full
enjoyment of peace, harmony, tranquillity and Union.
In testimony whereof, I have hereunto set my hand and caused the Seal of
the United States to be affixed.
Done at the City of Washington, this Third day of October, in the year of
our Lord one thousand eight hundred and sixty-three, and of the Independence
of the Unites States the Eighty-eighth.
By the President: Abraham Lincoln
William H. Seward,
Secretary of State
Source: Selected Works of Abraham Lincoln, edited by Roy P. Basler.
Proclamation of Thanksgiving
Josiah Bartlett - 1793
Josiah Bartlett was Governor of New Hampshire. In 1793, just a few years
after the First Amendment was ratified, he issued a Thanksgiving Day
proclamation. Remember how you hear that our early founders were atheists or
deists? Read the proclamation and decide if he sounds like a deist.
For one thing, he refers to "...the knowledge of and reverential love and
regard to the One God and Father, of all,..." He also closes by using,
"...in the year of our Lord, one thousand, seven hundred and ninety
three..."
The many favors the inhabitants of this State
have been made the subjects of in the court of the current year, call for a
public return of sincerer gratitude and praise to that Being from whom all
our mercies flow; – And the Legislature having appointed Thursday the Twenty
First day of November next, to be observed as a day of public Thanksgiving
throughout this State:
I have thought fit, by and with the advice
of Council, to issue this Proclamation, exhorting the people of every
denomination to dedicate said day to the duties of thanksgiving and praise,
and to devote a reasonable part thereof in their respective places of public
worship in a social manner, with grateful hearts and united voices in
returning our most humble and hearty thanks to Almighty God for the
unmerited favors He has been graciously pleased to confer upon us in the
course of the present year now drawing to a close.
In a particular manner, that He was
graciously pleased to appear for us in the course of the summer past when,
by reason of a severe and early drought, the hope of the husbandman seemed
likely to be cut off and we were threatened with a great and general
scarcity of the necessary fruits and of the field, that in the midst of
judgment He remembered mercy and by sending plentiful showers of rain, the
decaying and almost dying fruits of the earth were greatly revived; and that
He has been pleased so to order the latter part of the season, that we are
still blessed with a competent supply of the most of the necessary fruits of
the field.
That He had been pleased to continue to us
the inestimable blessings of civil and religious liberty.
That notwithstanding the tumults and
confusions of the contending nations, we still enjoy the blessing of peace
and good government.
That we have been favored with a general
measure of health, and that no waiting and pestilential disease has been
suffered to prevail among us.
And together with our thanksgiving, let us
entreat the Father of Mercies, to continue us the blessings we now enjoy,
and bestow upon us all further needed favors.
That it would please Him still to have
these United States under His Holy protection and guidance – that He would
inspire those who have the management of all our public affairs with all
that wisdom, prudence and integrity that is necessary to the faithful
discharge of their important trusts, that all their determinations may tend
to promote the real happiness and prosperity of this great and rising
Republic, and that all people may be disposed to afflict in carrying such
determinations into effect.
That it would please God to over-rule the
tumults and confusions among the nations, in such a manner as shall subserve
to His own Glory and the best good and happiness of mankind, and that in His
own due time, He would calm the angry passions of the contending nations and
say to them, peace, be still.
That God would be pleased to look down with
an eye of compassion upon the whole human race, and dispel those clouds of
ignorance, superstition and bigotry that overspread so great a part of the
world, and that the knowledge of and reverential love and regard to the One
God and Father, of all, and a true benevolence and good will to their fellow
men, may pervade the hearts, and influence the lives of all mankind, and all
Nations, Languages and Tongues be brought to join in singing, Glory to God
in the highest, on Earth Peace and good will to men.
It is recommended and expected, that all
persons abstain from all servile labor and such recreations as are
unbecoming the solemnity of said day.
Given at the Council Chamber in Exeter, the
Fifth day of October, in the year of our Lord, one thousand, seven hundred
and ninety three and of the Sovereignty and Independence of the United
states of America the Eighteenth.
Josiah Bartlett.
