Washington’s Birthday | Images of Old Hawaiʻi

Only two Americans have been honored with individual federal holidays. The original intent was to recognize them on their birthdays.

Washington’s birthday holiday came about seventy years after his death. Martin Luther King died in 1968; King’s birthday was approved as a federal holiday in 1983, and all 50 states made it a state government holiday by 2000.

George Washington, the country’s first president, was born February 22, 1732 (Gregorian). He served as president from April 30, 1789 to March 4, 1797.

On January 31, 1879, the US House and Senate enacted a law authorizing February 22 as a legal holiday within the District of Columbia. In 1885, they made February 22 a paid holiday for federal workers.

Washington’s Birthday was celebrated on February 22 from 1879 until 1971. By 1890, Abraham Lincoln’s birthday was observed as a paid holiday in 10 states (in 1940, 24 states and the District of Columbia observed Lincoln’s Birthday), however it never officially became a federal holiday.

In 1951, a Californian named Harold Stonebridge Fischer formed the President’s Day National Committee with the intention of creating a holiday that would honor the office of the presidency, but no particular president.

He lobbied Congress, proposing March 4, the original Inauguration Day, as the date for “Presidents’ Day,” but the bill to make it happen became stalled in the Senate Judiciary Committee. (American Spectator)

Adopted in 1968 and effective January 1, 1971, Congress passed the Uniform Monday Holiday Act that moved certain federal holidays dates – Washington’s Birthday was moved to the third Monday in February.

There was debate on changing the holiday name to ‘Presidents’ Day’. An early draft of the enabling bill would have renamed the Washington’s Birthday holiday “Presidents’ Day” to honor both Washington and Lincoln, whose birthday is on February 12 and has never been a national holiday. (American Spectator)

Opponents were not convinced. It had been Illinois Representative Robert McClory – a representative from “the land of Lincoln” – who had attempted in committee to rename “Washington’s Birthday” as “President’s Day.” The bill stalled.

The Wall Street Journal reported: “To win more support, Mr. McClory and his allies dropped the earlier goal of renaming Washington’s Birthday [as] Presidents’ Day, [which] mollified some Virginia lawmakers. He also agreed to sweeten the package by including Columbus Day as a Federal holiday, a goal sought for years by Italian-American groups.”

“It was the collective judgment of the Committee on the Judiciary,” stated Mr. William Moore McCulloch (Ohio) “that this [naming the day “President’s Day”] would be unwise. Certainly, not all Presidents are held in the same high esteem as the Father of our Country.”

“There are many who are not inclined to pay their respects to certain Presidents. Moreover, it is probable that the members of one political party would not relish honoring a President from the other political party whether he was in office, no matter how outstanding history may find his leadership.” (Archives-gov)

President Richard Nixon did not, as a widely circulated Internet story claims, issue a proclamation changing the holiday’s name from Washington’s Birthday to Presidents’ Day. His Executive Order 115 on February 10, 1971, merely announced the new federal holiday calendar, as passed by Congress in 1968. (Archives-gov)

According to Prologue, the magazine of the National Archives, it was a local department-store promotion that went national when retailers discovered that, mysteriously, generic Presidents clear more inventory than particular ones, even the Father of His Country. Now everybody thinks it’s official, but it’s not. (The New Yorker)

So, while we celebrate “Presidents’ Day.” it really isn’t officially called that (at least at the national legislative level).

The Uniform Monday Holiday Act is still in effect – and is officially (federally) “Washington’s Birthday.” (Some States (including Hawai‘i) refer to it as “Presidents’ Day” and it is a State and Federal holiday.)

“In no other city in all the United States is Washington’s Birthday observed as it is in Honolulu. It is the one national holiday which the Hawaiian city has chosen above all others for its own, to celebrate as no other American city is able to do.”

“Nowhere else under the American flag does the twenty-second of February find smiling ‘skies, flower—scented breezes, and an enthusiastic and patriotic populace.”

“For the past six years the celebration of the day has centered in a great floral pageant in which all the nationalities of Honolulu’s most cosmopolitan population have vied with each other in doing honor to the memory of America’s first President and great statesman.”

“Each year has seen the efforts of the preceeding one surpassed, and the 1911 celebration gives promise of very far eclipsing all of the others.”

“The Floral Parade idea originated some eight or nine years ago, but it was not until 1906 that the date was finally set for Washington’s Birthday, and the parade became a regular institution.”

“The first parade was held on Thanksgiving Day, and was largely an automobile parade, made up of decorated motor cars, which at that time had come to be quite common in the city.”

“Each year the idea developed, however, until finally it was recognized as everybody’s celebration, and everybody felt that he had a definite part to play in making the show a success. From being simply a day’s diversion for a few of the city’s wealthy class, it has now come to occupy the most important place in the year’s calendar of holidays for every one in the Territory.”

“In fact, one day is now scarcely big enough to hold it, and last year the carnival feature (which has come to claim a prominent place, although not thought of in the earlier years) was inaugurated the evening before, as it will be again this year. The project of making the celebration cover the entire week will be carried out within the next year or two.”

“New Orleans has her Mardi Gras; Pasadena, her Tournament of Roses; and Portland, Oregon, her rose Festival, each rivaling in a manner the elaborate fiestas and pageants of the Old World.”

“But it remained for Hawaii, the ‘Paradise of the Pacific,’ to originate a celebration of an attractiveness not possible in any less favored part of the world.”

“Honolulu’s Floral Parade does not represent so large an expenditure of money as do some of the others, but nature has furnished the mid-Pacific Islands with things that money cannot buy in perfect weather, brilliant flowers, and a mixture of races working in harmony to produce a day of brilliant novelty and interest that cannot be duplicated.”

“For the past three or four years steamship facilities have been entirely inadequate to bring the crowds of tourists who turn Hawaii-ward with the coming of February, and their enthusiastic praise insures for succeeding years renewed interest in Hawaii from every country in the world.”

“It is such appreciation, too, that adds zest to the workers on each succeeding year – this and the healthy rivalry between the different branches – for the cost of Hawaii’s one great day, not alone in money, but in hard work for months before, is something that cannot be adequately expressed.”

“Citizens and visitors who are in Honolulu on the eve of February 22 (1911) – Washington’s Birthday – will find one of the principal downtown streets closed to public traffic, and two of the largest wharves similarly cut off for a time from public use …”

“… while big trans-Pacific liners scheduled to dock at those wharves will have to steam to a less convenient wharf at the other end of the harbor.”

“The closed street and the closed wharf will be alive with hustling humanity. Early in the evening – Honolulu time – a famous statesman will touch a button in Washington – the President of the United States, in the White House – and the button will ring in Honolulu.”

“ The current starting from the White House will be relayed by direct wires to a huge electric clock in Honolulu, and the timepiece will burst into illumination, showing the famous device of the Brotherhood of Elks – the clock that points to the hour of eleven, when Elks all over the world pause to remember kindly their absent brothers.”

“It will be eleven when the button is touched in Washington, and that will be about seven o’clock in Honolulu. This is the time for the opening of the Washington Birthday Carnival and Floral Parade season of festivities in Honolulu, and President Taft, being an Elk, has been asked to start the celebration.”

“Honolulu’s Floral Parade observance of Washington’s Birthday is only a few years old, and the Carnival features, undertaken by Honolulu Lodge, No. 606, B. P. O. E., are only two years old.”

“The Floral Parade was a brilliant success from the start, and has become a public institution, managed by public-spirited citizens year after year. and planned and looked forward to like the Mardi Gras in New Orleans.”

“A majority of the entries in the Parade are floats and decorated automobiles. Honolulu leads all American cities in the number of privately owned autos, in proportion to her size, and an increasing number of the Owners, from year to year, join in the pleasant competition for honors in beauty of decorations.”

“The custom of selecting “malihinis” for judges has been adopted in recent years. Malihini is Hawaiian for strangers, and usually in this connection means visitors, or tourists.

“Last year the floats of the nations were brilliant features of the parade. The Chinese and Japanese especially, with their native wealth in color decorations, put forth striking efforts. and the great Chinese dragon was a sight not to be forgotten.”

“The lodges, societies. clubs, and, in some cases, business organizations, had elaborate floats, while some of the private entries of individuals were of exquisite beauty. Society had its part, and some of the vehicles, carrying feminine beauty arrayed in harmony with the color scheme of the floral decorations, were dreams of beauty.”

“‘Pilikia’ had a prominent place in the parade. He was a frightful-looking monster, doomed to be overpowered and burned to death before the day was over. Pilikia, be it explained for the benefit of the malihini, is a Hawaiian word meaning trouble.”

“The god, or rather demon, of trouble, put together by James Wilder, was a monster of frightful mein. He lived through the parade, but when night came, in the presence of a vast crowd at Palace Square, he was tried and condemned to death.”

“Struggling and wailing, he was cast into a living volcano while the multitude howled with joy, and, by the terms of the allegory. Trouble was dead in Honolulu. It is understood that during the past year the monster reappeared, and if he can be captured he will be tried again.”

“The Carnival features last February were all in the block in front of the Young Hotel. The street was closed and turned over to the Elks, as it will be this February, and within their enclosure the enterprising members of Honolulu Lodge arranged and carried out an entertainment to which the principal exception taken was that the crowds were so large it was difficult to get in.”

“There were many of the features of a circus, with well-known citizens at the sideshows and booths, and society ladies doing their part, and there was a mock court in continuous session.”

“The judge was a fiery citizen of Honolulu named George A. Davis, and he was voted a brilliant success, acquittals of defendants being entirely unheard of during the whole session, and pleadings being assessed with Solomon-like wisdom.”

“This year, in addition to a repetition of this carnival feature, the Elks are to hold a water carnival and electric illumination on the waterfront. The illumination will rival that of the great battleship fleet, some of which lay at the wharves, which are to be reserved for the Elks’ use.”

“The aquatic features will be such as only Hawaii can show. The Elks have nearly a dozen committees at work upon their plans -and propose to make both features of the Carnival annual affairs, which, with the Floral Parade, will cause Washington’s Birthday to be easily the big holiday of the year in Hawaii.”

“That the big February fiesta in Honolulu is attracting attention elsewhere is shown not only by the hundreds of letters received inquiring about it, but in a much more substantial way by the fact that three excursion parties from the mainland – each in its own chartered steamer – will be in Honolulu during the Carnival week.”

“Definite news of the efforts of another party to come has been received, but it will probably be impossible to secure another steamer. The regular steamers will be crowded with Honolulu—bound passengers, and the interisland steamers will bring residents of all the islands of the group to Honolulu.”

Beginning with the Mid-Pacific Carnival in 1904, a series of multiethnic public celebrations and parades were created to attract tourists and showcase Hawaiʻi’s multi-ethnic culture. The Hawaiian Floral Parade was a part of this.

The Mid-Pacific Carnival, held in February, celebrated Washington’s birthday with spectacular and historic pageants and military parades featured. It was held at Aʻala Park in downtown Honolulu. Circus acts, sideshows and hula dancers entertained the public and included an annual Floral Parade. In 1916, Mid-Pacific Carnival merged into the Kamehameha Day Parade (and was later held in June).

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