George Washington issued the first national Thanksgiving proclamation in the United States in 1789.
Washington’s proclamation was dated October 3, 1789, and called on Americans to observe a day of public thanksgiving and prayer on November 26. He issued it at the request of Congress, which had passed a resolution asking the president to recommend a day of thanksgiving. The proclamation praised the conclusion of the Revolutionary War and the establishment of the new constitutional government.
The observance was not yet an annual national holiday. Presidents issued occasional thanksgiving recommendations, but practices varied by state and year. Abraham Lincoln made Thanksgiving a recurring national observance during the Civil War when he proclaimed a nationwide day in 1863.
The modern federal holiday is celebrated on the fourth Thursday of November. Its origins therefore combine older harvest and religious traditions with presidential proclamations and later congressional legislation. Washington’s 1789 document is the key early national precedent.