Thanksgiving Greetings

ASPPA Connect wishes its readers a happy Thanksgiving. Thank you for your support! ASPPA Connect will not be appearing on Friday, Nov. 23; however, it will be back to business as usual on Monday, Nov. 26.

Most people are very familiar with the Thanksgiving proclamations George Washington and Abraham Lincoln issued every autumn during their tenure. But all of their fellow presidents have done likewise, issuing proclamations calling on their fellow citizens to consider the many blessings for which we as a people and a nation should give thanks, and exhorting them to set aside time to do so.

Following are excerpts from some of the other Chief Executives’ Thanksgiving proclamations.

Ulysses S. Grant, 1874

The blessings of free government continue to be vouchsafed to us; the earth has responded to the labor of the husbandman; the land has been free from pestilence; internal order is being maintained, and peace with other powers has prevailed. It is fitting that at stated periods we should cease from our accustomed pursuits and from the turmoil of our daily lives and unite in thankfulness for the blessings of the past and in the cultivation of kindly feelings toward each other.

Benjamin Harrison, 1878

The recurrence of that season at which it is the habit of our people to make devout and public confession of their constant dependence upon the Divine favor for all the good gifts of life and happiness and of public peace and prosperity exhibits in the record of the year abundant reasons for our gratitude and thanksgiving. Exuberant harvests, productive mines, ample crops of the staples of trade and manufactures, have enriched the country. The resources thus furnished to our reviving industry and expanding commerce are hastening the day when discords and distresses through the length and breadth of the land will, under the continued favor of Providence, have given way to confidence and energy and assured prosperity. Peace with all nations has been maintained unbroken, domestic tranquility has prevailed, and the institutions of liberty and justice which the wisdom and virtue of our fathers established remain the glory and defense of their children.

Chester A. Arthur, 1882

The blessings demanding our gratitude are numerous and varied. For the peace and amity which subsist between this Republic and all the nations of the world; for the freedom from internal discord and violence; for the increasing friendship between the different sections of the land; for liberty, justice, and constitutional government; for the devotion of the people to our free institutions and their cheerful obedience to mild laws; for the constantly increasing strength of the Republic while extending its privileges to fellow-men who come to us; for the improved means of internal communication and the increased facilities of intercourse with other nations; for the general prevailing health of the year; for the prosperity for all our industries, the liberal return for the mechanic’s toil affording a market for the abundant harvests of the husbandman; for the preservation of the national faith and credit; for wise and generous provision to effect the intellectual and moral education of our youth; for the influence upon the conscience of a restraining and transforming religion, and for the joys of home — for these and for many other blessings we should give thanks.

Theodore Roosevelt, 1901

No people on earth have such abundant cause for thanksgiving as we have. The past year, in particular, has been one of peace and plenty. We have prospered in things material, and have been able to work for our own uplifting in things intellectual and spiritual. Let us remember that, as much has been given us, much will be expected from us, and that true homage comes from the heart as well as from the lips, and shows itself in deeds.

William Howard Taft, 1912

The year now drawing to a close has been notably favorable to our fortunate land. At peace within and without; free from the perturbations and calamities that have afflicted other peoples. rich in harvests so abundant and in industries so productive that the overflow of our prosperity has advantaged the whole world; strong in the steadfast conservation of the heritage of self-government bequeathed to us by the wisdom of our fathers and firm in the resolve to transmit that heritage unimpaired but rather improved by good use, to our children and our children’s children for all time to come, the people of this country have abounding cause for contented gratitude.

Woodrow Wilson, 1919

Our gratitude can find no more perfect expression than to bulwark with loyalty and patriotism those principles for which the free peoples of the earth fought and died. During the past year we have had much to make us grateful. In spite of the confusion in our economic life resulting from the war we have prospered. Our harvests have been plentiful, and of our abundance we have been able to render succor to less favored nations. Our democracy remains unshaken in a world torn with political and social unrest. Our traditional ideals are still our guides in the path of progress and civilization.

Calvin Coolidge, 1923

We have been blessed with much of material prosperity. We shall be better able to appreciate it if we remember the privations others have suffered, and we shall be the more worthy of it if we use it for their relief. We will do well then to render thanks for the good that has come to us, and show by our actions that we have become stronger, wiser, and truer by the chastenings which have been imposed upon us. We will thus prepare ourselves for the part we must take in a world which forever needs the full measure of service. We have been a most favored people. We ought to be a most generous people. We have been a most blessed people. We ought to be a most thankful people.