George Washington's Birthday, February 22, had been a popular, but unofficial, holiday long before it joined New Year's Day, Independence Day, Thanksgiving Day, and Christmas Day as our country's fifth legal holiday in 1879. A century later, the Monday Holiday Law shifted the observance to the third Monday of February, but no law changed the George Washington's Birthday holiday to Presidents Day. Advertisers, interstate politics, and popular neglect to mention that.
Whatever happened to "first in war, first in peace and first in the heart of his countrymen?" The sentiment of Henry Lee's eulogy of Washington didn't survive the Monday Holiday Law. After all, if you aren't celebrating Washington's actual birthday, then it's an easy step to lump in Abraham Lincoln, whose February 12th birthday was always close enough to Washington's to confuse school kids anyway. From there it's a slippery slope all the way to down to Millard Fillmore, James Buchanan, Andrew Johnson, Franklin Pierce, Warren Harding and your pick of a contemporary worst President.
Since there is no official Presidents Day federal holiday, it is impossible to tell if Presidents Day refers to Washington and Lincoln, or if it is meant to include all of our Presidents. While I greatly admire President Lincoln, we do ourselves a tremendous disservice when we forget why Washington deserved, and continues to deserve, his own holiday, even if he is no longer first (second, third or even fourth) in the hearts of his countrymen.
George Washington created our model, the world's model, of a democratically-elected, republican chief executive. He had no precedent, no guide other than his character. Following his 1783 defeat of the British in the Revolutionary War, Washington could easily have become the king or dictator of America (all too often the result of revolutions, before and since Washington), but he did not.
Instead General Washington, following the principles he and his Continental Army had fought for, surrendered his sword, the sword in the following photograph, to Congress, the elected representatives of the people.
Then, after becoming the first President under the Constitution adopted in 1789, Washington did it again. After serving two terms, Washington willingly relinquished his office when he could have been President for life. Our infant Constitution and the notion of republican representative democracy had taken root, and the model of the American Presidency was cast. No other President can make that claim and that is why our legal holiday is, and should always be, not Presidents Day, but George Washington's Birthday.
By George, I've done it: ten posts on our ten legal holidays. I started this mini-series quite inadvertently when my annoyance with popular indifference to the reasons for our legal holiday spurred posts on Memorial Day and Independence Day. When Labor Day came around, I realized I had to finish what I started; annoyance gave way to personal discovery. Huffington Post gave me a bigger platform for my words just before Columbus Day, and then came my holiday busy season: Veterans Day, Thanksgiving, Christmas, New Year's, and Martin Luther King. It's been an interesting journey, thanks for joining me on it.
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Washington's Birthday - Eighteen states (CT, FL, ID, IA, KY, LA, ME, MD, MI, MS, NV, NH, NJ, NY, NC, PA, RI, VT) and the District of Columbia
Presidents' Day - Five states (AK, HI, OK, TX, WV)
President's Day - KS, NE
Washington-Lincoln Day - CO, OH
Washington's and Lincoln's Birthday - MN, WY
George Washington's Birthday, Thomas Jefferson's Birthday (two separate holidays) - AL
Lincoln - Washington Presidents' Day - AZ
George Washington's Birthday and Daisy Gatson Bates Day - AR
Presidents Day - IL
Washington's Day - MA
George Washington's Birthday - IN
Lincoln's and Washington's Birthdays - MT
Washington's and Lincoln's birthday, President's day - NM
Birthday of George Washington - ND
Presidents' Day for the purpose of commemorating Presidents Washington and Lincoln - OR
George Washington's Birthday/President's Day - SC
The anniversary of the birthdays of Lincoln and Washington - SD
Washington Day - TN
Washington and Lincoln Day - VT
George Washington Day - VA
Presidents' Day to be celebrated as the anniversary of the births of Abraham Lincoln and George Washington - WA
The day of celebration for February 12 and 22 - WI
But then, my memory is not what it used to be.
Nope. There was proposal to do so in 1968 in Congress, but the proposal never made it out of committee.
False. It is only 11 states. Four more states have some variation of "Washington-Lincoln Day". Findlaw.com is pretty handy.
"and in eight states it is not a legal holiday at all."
Not a legal state holiday. Still a legal federal holiday.
I have been posting this eselwhere. It has some good references:
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There is no federal holiday called Presidents' Day.
I remember when the 1971 Uniform Monday Holiday Act moved the observance of Washington's birthday to the third Monday on February. I know a lot of people still think that the holiday was changed in either 1968 or 1971 to Presidents Day and was done to celebrate either Washington and Lincoln (whose birthday of 12 February was never a federal holiday, but was observed by many states), or to celebrate all presidents, but they are incorrect. The law simply moved the observed holiday of Washington's Birthday to the third Monday in February. The law did not rename or re-purpose the holiday.
I refer anyone wanting to learn more about this to read the excellent article at http://www.archives.gov/publications/prologue/2004/winter/gw-birthday-1.html as well as the federal government’s Office of Personnel Management (OPM) official federal holiday list at http://www.opm.gov/Operating_Status_Schedules/fedhol/2010.asp and to look up federal law Title 5 U.S. Code 6103 http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/5/usc_sec_05_00006103----000-.html .