In early October 1863, President Abraham Lincoln issued a proclamation.
"I do, therefore, invite my fellow citizens in every part of the United States, and also those who are at sea and those who are sojourning in foreign lands, to set apart and observe the last Thursday of November next as a Day of Thanksgiving and Praise to our beneficent Father who dwelleth in the heavens," he wrote.
Lincoln's proclamation, for the first time, officially established the date of America's annual Thanksgiving Day, though the tradition of giving thanks went back much further. Traced to a harvest feast shared by Plymouth settlers and Native American Wampanoag people in 1621, the custom of thanksgiving had persisted in the colonies and states for decades before Lincoln's time.?
Lincoln's call for unity was driven by his conviction that, despite what he called "a civil war of unequaled magnitude and severity," there were still blessings to be counted "by the whole American people."
We find these words resonant. A wartime president, despised in large swaths of the country to the point of armed conflict, called on all Americans to join together and acknowledge that even in the face of immense challenges, they had much to be thankful for.
Lincoln noted in his proclamation that even amid the war, many places were peaceful, laws were respected and people lived in harmony. Additionally, crops were still being grown, towns and cities were expanding and American industry was healthy and robust. Freedom, he expected, would continue to increase.?
Those words are applicable today.?
We remain a land of plenty. We are still a place where, for many, everything we need and most things we want are easily obtained. This is not true for everyone, of course, and our gratitude should fuel our service to them.
Our abundance still draws the huddled masses who, like those four centuries ago who risked a dangerous sea journey to arrive on these shores, undertake perilous treks to the United States in the hopes of a better life.
Even our intense political differences can be cast in a way that engenders gratitude. One does not devote intensity to something about which one does not care. Apathy would be a true cause for concern; we are thankful that people care enough about America to vigorously contest elections.? ?
We don't wish to whitewash our problems. We will certainly spend a hefty portion of the other 364 days of the year focused on those.
But on this one day, the fourth Thursday in November, we choose to join with Lincoln and call on our readers to consider our many blessings worthy of being "solemnly, reverently, and gratefully acknowledged as with one heart and one voice by the whole American people."