After the 2020 amendment, the United States Semiquincentennial Commission’s total membership rose to 36.
The original commission had 33 members when it was sworn in at Independence Hall in November 2018. The amendment, enacted on December 31, 2020, changed the number of nonvoting ex officio federal officials and added a member designated by the chief justice of the United States.
Those administrative changes increased the overall membership to 36. The amendment also allowed the commission to accept congressional funding and changed the requirement that meetings be held in Philadelphia, while retaining a requirement for at least one annual meeting there.
The number 36 should not be applied retrospectively to the 2018 ceremony. Thirty-three was the original group; 36 is the amended total. The distinction matters because both figures appear in accounts of the commission’s structure and history.