Monday was President’s Day, a holiday that I for the most part ignore. In my youth we celebrated Washington’s and Lincoln’s Birthdays. In 1971 Congress passed the Uniform Monday act, which would merge these two holidays and create three and four day weekends for Federal Employees.
Now as I stated we celebrated Washington’s and Lincoln’s Birthdays when I was growing up. I wasn’t born until 1979, meaning that despite this silly act from Congress at least some States and school districts understood the absurdity of President’s Day.
Are we to celebrate Presidents as foul and disruptive as President Andrew Johnson, the first President to be impeached? What of Presidents who seem utterly ineffectual, or even worse detrimental to the long term efficacy of the United States, Presidents like Woodrow Wilson for instance.
There are a great many that have simply been forgotten and yet we celebrate them all, not just the great ones, all of them.
Even then we forget the Presidents who predated George Washington. Oh yes we had them by the way.
The elected Presidents Of the Continental Congress were:
- John Hanson 1782
- Elias Boudinot 1783
- Thomas Mifflin 1784
- Richard Henry Lee 1785
- John Hancock 1786
- Nathan Gorman 1787
- Arthur St. Clair 1788
- Cyrus Griffin 1789
All predated President George Washington.
These however were the first elected Presidents of the United States, two Presidents preceded them. Samuel Huntington and Thomas Mckean.
The Continental Congress had preexisted prior to the Revolutionary war, but since the Articles of Confederation were not yet drafted the title of President of Congress did not mean the leader of the then 13 Colonies, to be later changed to the 13 States under the Constitution.
Samuel Huntington was in fact the last President of the Continental Congress, during his tenure the Articles of Confederation were ratified making him the first Official President of the Confederated States. His predecessor, John Jay, is arguably one of the most influential founders of our nation and the Constitution that would later replace the Articles of Confederation. Jay, along with Alexander Hamilton, and James Madison penned the greatest arguments to drop the Confederation in favor of a more perfect Union with the drafting of the Federalist Papers (everybody who thinks they have an educated opinion on how the United States should run should read this document).
Thomas Mckean was elected among his peers to replace President Huntington when the late President was forced to resign due to health reasons.
When President Mckean’s term was up the electoral process for the President began, thus bringing President Hanson and the 7 who followed him prior to President George Washington.
