Constitution of Government by David Barton

Every step by which they have advanced to the character of an independent nation seems to have been distinguished by some token of providential agency. We ought to be no less persuaded that the propitious favorable smiles of Heaven can never be expected on a nation that disregards the eternal rules of order and right which Heaven itself has ordained.

Following his address, the Annals of Congress reported that: The President, the Vice President, the Senate, and House of Representatives, &c., then proceeded to St. Paul’s Chapel, where Divine service was performed by the chaplain of Congress. Several months later, Congress contemplated whether it should request the President to declare a national day of thanksgiving. The Annals of Congress for September 25, 1789, record those discussions: Mr. Elias Boudi not said he could not think of letting the session pass over without offering an opportunity to all the citizens of the United States of joining with one voice in returning to Almighty God their sincere thanks for the many blessings He had poured down upon them. With this view, therefore, he would move the following resolution:

Resolved, that a joint committee of both Houses be directed to wait upon the President of the United States to request that he would 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 Constitution of government for their safety and happiness. Mr. Roger Sherman justified the practice of thanksgiving, on any signal event, not only as a laudable one in itself but as warranted by a number of precedents in Holy Writ: for instance, the solemn thanksgivings and rejoicings which took place in the time of Solomon after the building of the temple was a case in point.

This example he thought worthy of Christian imitation on the present occasion; and he would agree with the gentleman who moved the resolution. Mr. Boudi not quoted further precedents from the practice of the late Congress and hoped the motion would meet a ready acquiescence approval. The question was now put on the resolution and it was carried in the affirmative. Strikingly, this request from Congress to the President was made the same day that Congress approved the final wording of the First Amendment. This clearly demonstrates that the same body which framed that Amendment did not believe that it was a violation for Congress to call for a national religious time of Thanksgiving. The Congressional resolution was delivered to President Washington who heartily concurred with its request. On October 3, 1789, he issued the following proclamation: