Presidents' Day

Celebrated the Monday between...

Lincoln's Birthday (February 12) and Washington's Birthday (February 22)

President's Day is a commemoration of the two most revered presidents in American history, namely George Washington, the first American president, and Abraham Lincoln, the sixteenth American president.  George Washington was a great general in the American Revolutionary War.  His success brought him great respect.  Abraham Lincoln was the man who kept our country in one piece, and then after the American Civil War, he issued the Emancipation Proclamation, which was an executive order to free all slaves.

Parenthetically, many people think the Civil War was about slavery.  It was not.  It was about the right of a state to secede from the nation.  First North Carolina seceded from the nation, then one by one the rest of the South seceded, forming a confederacy.  The powers in Washington decided that it was illegal for a state to secede, and war ensued.  Slavery was a side issue, which became a motivating factor during the war (after the war had already begun).

President's day is the second Monday in February.

Picture by Leon 2007