05/17/2026
History of May 17th, National Day of Prayer, Fasting and Humility
Source: Journal of the Continental Congress
In mid-March 1776, New Jersey Delegate William Livingston, a 52-year old brigadier general in the colonial militia and member of the Continental Congress, submitted a resolution calling for a national day of fasting in support of America’s defense against what he called “the warlike preparations of the British Ministry.” Three-and-a-half months before approving the Declaration of Independence, lawmakers agreed to Livingston’s bill setting aside May 17, 1776, for a day of prayer and reflection.
Livingston’s resolution called on Americans everywhere—“with united hearts”—to abstain from food and work and to meditate on the meaning of sacrifice in support for the cause of independence. “In times of impending calamity and distress; when the liberties of America are imminently endangered by the secret machinations and open assaults of an insidious and vindictive administration,” the resolution began, “it becomes the indispensable duty of these hitherto free and happy colonies, with true penitence of heart, and the most reverent devotion, publickly to acknowledge the over ruling providence of God.” Livingston asked Americans to pray for peace and to pray that Britain’s leaders withdraw their troops. But should England persist with the war, Livingston sought divine intervention “to crown the continental arms, by sea and land, with victory and success.” He called for prayers “to bless our civil rulers, and the representatives of the people, in their several assemblies and conventions; to preserve and strengthen their union, to inspire them with an ardent, disinterested love of their country; to give wisdom and stability to their counsels; and direct them to the most efficacious measures for establishing the rights of America on the most honourable and permanent basis.” Congress had Livingston’s resolution printed for public distribution in the Pennsylvania Gazette.
This was the second time in as many years that the Continental Congress voted to set aside a day for reflection in support of America’s revolutionary campaign. The first had occurred a year earlier in June 1775, when the Continental Congress appointed John Adams and Robert Treat Paine of Massachusetts and William Hooper of North Carolina to a committee to draft “a resolve” naming July 20 that year “as a day of humiliation, fasting, and prayer.” In fact, every year from 1775 to 1783 the Continental Congress approved days of fasting, prayer, or thanksgiving. Fasting days were almost always scheduled for the spring, and days of thanksgiving set during the fall or winter.
Before the war, individual colonies occasionally called for similar observances. But the proclamations offered in the Continental Congress marked something new in American history: the creation of national holidays and observances. “We have appointed a continental Fast,” John Adams wrote to his wife Abigail in June 1775. “Millions will be upon their Knees at once before their great Creator, imploring his Forgiveness and Blessing, his Smiles on American Councils and Arms.”
“Calling in the Aid of Religion”
By the time the Continental Congress announced its first nationwide fast in 1775, the practice had been in use in British North America for decades. This was especially the case in Adams’s home region of New England, where residents regularly observed fasting days in the spring and days of thanksgiving in the fall. Within New England’s society, one historian has noted, these customs functioned as “solidarity rituals.”
For much of the eighteenth century, British North America had seen its share of conflict with French and Spanish forces, as well as with American Indian nations. Back then, as would be the case during the war for independence, colonial leaders proclaimed days of fasting and reflection during moments of peril.
In 1747, for instance, during one of Britain’s many wars with France in the mid-eighteenth century, members of the governor’s council in Pennsylvania declared a day of fasting. Although most of the fighting took place elsewhere, Pennsylvania officials eagerly sought to remind residents about what was at stake. Having never announced a general fast day, however, the councilmen turned to someone familiar with the practice who also happened to be one of America’s most prolific authors (and a future Delegate to the Continental Congress): Benjamin Franklin. “Calling in the aid of religion, I propos’d to them the proclaiming a fast, to promote reformation, and implore the blessing of Heaven on our undertaking,” Franklin later remembered. The Pennsylvania officials, he said, “embrac’d the motion; but, as it was the first fast ever thought of in the province, the secretary had no precedent from which to draw the proclamation. My education in New England, where a fast is proclaimed every year, was here of some advantage.” Franklin said he drafted the announcement “in the accustomed stile,” beseeching Pennsylvanians to pray for the end of the conflict and “for our Defence and Security in this Time of Danger.” The council had Franklin’s proclamation printed in both English and German in order reach the many immigrant families in the colony.
On the eve of the Revolution in the mid-1770s, colonial leaders continued to turn to fasts and prayers in defense of American interests. In 1774, when British forces invaded Massachusetts, the legislatures of both Connecticut and Virginia approved a day of fasting and prayer in solidarity with the people of Boston. In Virginia, Thomas Jefferson worked alongside Patrick Henry and other members of the house of burgesses to craft a resolution calling for a day of fasting to denounce the belligerence of the Crown. Afterward, the “lethargy” among his fellow Virginians that had so concerned Jefferson had been replaced by what he called a “shock of electricity.”
“Vigorous Exertions” and “Signal Success”
In late June 1776, as John Adams reassured allies back home that it was just a matter of time before the Continental Congress declared America’s independence, he was also busy expressing confidence that on matters of religion, Congress would live and let live. Adams, who as a New Englander took days of fasting and thanksgiving perhaps more seriously than most, only had a few spiritual requirements of America’s elected leaders: “I am for the most liberal Toleration of all Denominations of Religionists but I hope that Congress will never meddle with Religion, further than to Say their own Prayers, and to fast and give Thanks, once a Year. Let every Colony, have its own Religion, without Molestation.”
During the war, the Continental Congress did, in fact, announce fasting days or days of thanksgiving at least once a year. Days of fasting and prayer came up in 1775, twice in 1776, 1778, 1779, 1780, 1781, and 1782. Congress considered days of thanksgiving in 1777, 1778, 1781, 1782, and 1783.
Each congressional proclamation announcing a day of fasting or thanksgiving was unique. At times, Congress appointed a specific day; in other instances, lawmakers left it up to the states to decide when to observe the fast. After lawmakers approved a day of fasting and prayer in December 1776, for instance, Maryland observed the requirement in February 1777.
Over time, Congress’s fasting and thanksgiving proclamations became a window into how continental forces fared during the Revolution. During moments of struggle, lawmakers called for fasts and for prayers. Some fasting days took on extra urgency. In March 1779, for instance, just three months after the British captured Savannah, Georgia, Congress appointed a three-man committee to set “a day of fasting, humiliation, and prayer” and to draft “an earnest address to the inhabitants . . . to rouse them to vigorous exertions on the present critical situation of public affairs.”
But following key military victories, Congress readily sought to inspire gratitude and confidence. In the fall of 1777, following America’s victory over the British at the Battle of Saratoga, Congress approved the nation’s first day of thanksgiving. Just two weeks after the campaign ended, lawmakers set aside December 18 to give thanks for the military’s “signal success” in New York. A year later, in 1778, lawmakers set December 30 for a day of thanksgiving and asked Congress’ chaplains “to prepare and report a recommendation” regarding the details of the observation. With Congress out of session on December 30, Delegate Samuel Holten of Massachusetts observed the national thanksgiving by attending a public service and dining at a nearby tavern with Continental Congress president John Jay of New York as well as General George Washington and about 60 others. Few thanksgiving proclamations, however, were as meaningful as the one Congress announced in October 1781 to celebrate America’s “most signal success” just days after the British surrender at Yorktown.
“With Grateful Hearts and United Voices”
On May 17, 1776, John Adams wrote to Abigail about the state of things in Congress. A few months earlier, lawmakers had appointed the seventeenth for America’s national day of fasting, prayer, and humility, and Adams was in a reflective mood. That morning, he heard a sermon about “the Sign of the Times” from Reverend George Duffield, a Presbyterian minister who would later serve as one of the Continental Congress’s chaplains. Duffield, Adams wrote, “concluded that the Course of Events, indicated strongly the Design of Providence that We should be separated from G. Britain.” As lawmakers inched closer to declaring independence, Adams confessed that he felt humbled by his responsibilities. “When I consider the great Events which are passed, and those greater which are rapidly advancing, and that I may have been instrumental of touching some Springs, and turning some small Wheels, which have had and will have such Effects, I feel an Awe upon my Mind, which is not easily described.”
If lawmakers intended the fast to remind Americans about the goal of the Revolution and of its necessary sacrifices, it seemed to be working for Adams. “I have Reasons to believe that no Colony, which shall assume a Government under the People, will give it up,” Adams continued. “There is something very unnatural and odious in a Government 1000 Leagues off. An whole Government of our own Choice, managed by Persons whom We love, revere, and can confide in, has charms in it for which Men will fight.”
John Adams could not have known it at the time, but the fighting would last for another seven years before the people won the right to their own government. On September 3, 1783, Adams, along with Benjamin Franklin and John Jay, negotiated the Treaty of Paris, ending the conflict and recognizing American independence.
When word of the treaty reached Congress a few weeks later, lawmakers responded in a familiar way: they named December 11 as a day of “public thanksgiving” in which “all the people may then assemble to celebrate with grateful hearts and united voices, the praises of their Supreme and all bountiful Benefactor.”
The war had opened with what John Adams called a “continental Fast”—a nationwide day of solemnity that the Continental Congress hoped would focus the nation’s attention on the singular goal of independence. It closed many years later with what another Delegate called a “Continental Thanksgiving”—a new, distinctly American celebration of freedom, sacrifice, and union.
Source: Journal of the Continental Congress
Illustration: John Adams
