On 24 September 1789, 220 years ago, the House passed the conference report on the Bill of Rights, which included the text of what became the First Amendment. But what is not known, is that the House 220 years ago on the 25th of September, passed a resolution calling for a national day of Thanksgiving for the U.S. Constitution. On Friday 25 September 1789, a Joint Committee requested that the President of the United States "recommend to the People of the United States, a day of public thanksgiving and prayer, to be observed, by acknowledging, with grateful hearts the many signal favors of Almighty God, especially by affording them an opportunity peaceably to establish a Constitution of Government for their safety and happiness." This request for thanksgiving came the day after the House accepted the Senate’s modifications on the proposed amendments to the Constitution and approximately six months after Congresses first session began on 4 March 1789. On 28 September 1789, the Senate concurred with the House and "agreed to the resolution desiring the President of the United States to recommend a day of general thanksgiving."
President Washington heeded Congress’s request and on Wednesday, 14 October 1789 the Massachusetts Sentinel published Washington’s General Thanksgiving Proclamation. "While there were Thanksgiving observances in America both before and after Washington’s proclamation, this represents the first to be so designated by the new national government.

Washington wrote the following:

"I do recommend and assign THURSDAY, the TWENTY-SIXTH DAY of NOVEMBER next, to be devoted by the people of these States to the service of that great and glorious Being who is the beneficent author of all the good that was, that is, or that will be; that we may then all unite in rendering unto Him our sincere and humble thanks for His kind care and protection of the people of this country previous to their becoming a nation; for the signal and manifold mercies and the favorable interpositions of His providence in the course and conclusion of the late war; for the great degree of tranquility, union, and plenty which we have since enjoyed;-- for the peaceable and rational manner in which we have been enable to establish Constitutions of government for our safety and happiness, and particularly the national one now lately instituted;-- for the civil and religious liberty with which we are blessed, and the means we have of acquiring and diffusing useful knowledge;-- and, in general, for all the great and various favours which He has been pleased to confer upon us."