Thanksgiving proclamations

PRESIDENTIAL PROCLAMATIONS ON THANKSGIVING

By Miriam Raftery

November 22, 2012 (San Diego’s East County)—The first Thanksgiving was held in 1621 in Plymouth Colony, Massachusetts. But it wasn’t until 1863 that President Abraham Lincoln declared Thanksgiving a national holiday amid the Civil War, with a proclamation in which he asked "the Almighty Hand to heal the wounds of the nation" and restore "peace, harmony, tranquility and union."

President Franklin D. Roosevelt, during the Depression in 1933 issued a Thanksgiving proclamation in which he urged, "May we seek guidance in more surely learning the ancient truth that greed and selfishness and striving for undue riches can never bring lasting happiness or good to the individual or to his neighbors. May we be grateful for the passing of dark days ... for the brighter day to which we can win through by seeking the help of God in a more unselfish striving for the common bettering of mankind."


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