Obama's Lincolnesque Thanksgiving proclamation

By Chuck Springston
President Barack Obama's 2013 Thanksgiving proclamation quoted Abraham Lincoln. Image: White House.gov.
President Barack Obama's 2013 Thanksgiving proclamation quoted Abraham Lincoln. Image: White House.gov.
President Barack Obama reached back 150 years to find words for his Thanks-giving proclamation this year.

     “When we join with friends and neighbors to alleviate suffering and make our communities whole,” Obama said, “we honor the spirit of President Abraham Lincoln, who called on his fellow citizens to ‘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, tranquility, and union.’”    
      Those words were in a statement Lincoln issued Oct. 3, 1863, establishing a nationwide annual Thanksgiving Day. He proclaimed the last Thursday in November a time for “citizens in every part of the United States” to observe a “day of Thanksgiving and Praise to our beneficent Father who dwelleth in the Heavens.”
     President George Washington had proclaimed a day of thanksgiving for Nov. 26, 1789, but issued only one other thanksgiving proclamation during his eight years in office. Neither John Adams nor Thomas Jefferson offered thanksgiving proclamations. James Madison proclaimed two days of thanksgiving, both connected to the War of 1812.
     There were no other thanksgiving proclamations by U.S. presidents until the Lincoln years. Since 1863, every president has issued an annual Thanksgiving Day proclamation. In 1941, Thanksgiving Day was officially set in law as the fourth Thursday of November.

    Related: Abe Lincoln and the politics of Thanksgiving

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