Federal employees take the third Monday in February off under a statute that calls the day Washington's Birthday, a slot the calendar keeps between February 15 and February 21.
Congress made George Washington's Birthday a District of Columbia holiday in January 1879, principally to create a bank holiday on February 22, and extended federal holiday coverage beyond the District in 1885. The Uniform Monday Holiday Act of June 28, 1968 moved the observance to the third Monday in February, effective January 1, 1971.
A search of the whole United States Code for the popular name of Presidents' Day comes back with two results, and both are the same committee note. The note is there to record a mistake. Run the same search for Washington's Birthday and it returns nine results across six titles.
That gap is the holiday. 5 U.S.C. 6103(a) lists eleven legal public holidays, and the February entry reads, in full, "Washington's Birthday, the third Monday in February."
The word Presidents does not appear in that section at all. No source read for this page documents who first used the popular name, or when. What the record holds instead is a long argument, conducted in statute books, committee reports and court rules, about what to call one Monday in February.
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Presidents’ Day ran on February 16. Here’s who celebrated with offers this year.
When Congress created the first federal holidays in 1870, it named only four. Washington's Birthday was not one of them.
The date arrived later, and not chiefly as a tribute. In January 1879 the day was added to the holidays observed in the District of Columbia. The Congressional Research Service records that the principal intent of that law was to make February 22 "a bank holiday."
In 1885 Congress extended holiday coverage to federal employees outside the District.
Congress approved Public Law 90-363 on June 28, 1968, as H.R. 15951. The enacted text moved the February observance to the third Monday and kept the name it already had. Section 2 set the change to take effect on January 1, 1971.
In April 1968 the House Judiciary Committee's report on the bill cited public opinion polling, as the Congressional Research Service records, putting it at "almost 93 percent of the persons polled supported the concept of uniform Monday holiday legislation, while a little more than 7 percent were opposed."
Senator Richard Durbin of Illinois put the popular name to the Senate twice. He introduced S. 2353 on July 24, 1998. The same measure came back as S. 429 on February 12, 1999.
Both were written to strike "Washington's Birthday" from 5 U.S.C. 6103(a) and put the popular name in its place. Neither received a vote.
The federal judiciary made the mistake itself. A 1998 restyling of the Federal Rules of Appellate Procedure replaced "Washington's Birthday" with "Presidents' Day" in the rules. In 2005 the Advisory Committee amended it back, explaining why in five words: "The amendment corrects that error."
The correction held. Rule 26(a)(6) now defines a legal holiday by listing the eleven federal holidays by name, Washington's Birthday among them.
TIMELINE
GOOD TO KNOW
The order that carried the Monday holidays into the executive branch defines "Holiday" purely by date: "the first day of January, the third Monday of February, the last Monday of May..." It is dated February 11, 1971, and is printed with the statute.
Enumerated across the 130 years from 1971 to 2100, the third Monday in February lands between February 15 and February 21, and on February 22 in none of them. In the 19 of those years when February 22 is itself a Monday, the holiday sits on February 15, a full week early.
S. 2353 asked the President to proclaim the week beginning the Sunday before the holiday as "United States Presidential History Week." That section died with the rest of the bill.
Ohio Revised Code section 1.14 identifies one of its holidays not by a name but by a citation: "The day designated in the 'Act of June 28, 1968,' 82 Stat. 250, 5 U.S.C. 6103, as amended."
Florida's legal-holidays statute puts Susan B. Anthony's Birthday on February 15, which is also the earliest date the February Monday holiday can reach.
WHY THIS DAY MATTERS
One payroll and one district: that is the federal holiday's reach.
Federal holidays are, in the Congressional Research Service's words, "only legally applicable to federal employees and the District of Columbia, as the states individually decide their own legal holidays." So the third Monday in February is a legal public holiday for one payroll and one district, and every state answers the question separately.
The Office of Personnel Management prints a footnote against the February holiday, noting that it "is designated as 'Washington's Birthday' in section 6103(a) of title 5 of the United States Code." Its stated policy is "to always refer to holidays by the names designated in the law."
The Congressional Research Service states it flatly: "Contrary to popular belief, neither the Uniform Monday Holiday Act, nor any subsequent action by Congress or the President, mandated that the name of the holiday observed by federal employees in February be changed from Washington's Birthday to Presidents Day." That correction sits inside R41990, its standing report on federal holidays.
GOOD TO KNOW
Of the 18 state codes read for this page, 13 give the day a name of its own, and those 13 carry 10 distinct names between them.
Code section 2.2-3300 names the third Monday in February "George Washington Day to honor George Washington (1732-1799), the first President of the United States."
RCW 1.16.050 sets "The third Monday of February, to be known as Presidents' Day and celebrated as the anniversary of the births of Abraham Lincoln and George Washington."
A.R.S. section 1-301 lists the day under a single combined name, "Lincoln/Washington Presidents' Day."
Code of Alabama section 1-3-8 makes the third Monday in February "George Washington's birthday and Thomas Jefferson's birthday," pairing Washington with a president born in April.
NMSA 1978 section 12-5-2 reads "Washington's and Lincoln's birthday, President's day, third Monday in February," with the apostrophe in the singular.
NRS chapter 236 states the split outright: "Washington's birthday is on February 22 but is to be observed on the third Monday in February."
Government Code section 6700 names February 12 "Lincoln Day" and lists the third Monday in February with no name at all.
Title 1, section 501 enumerates the state's legal holidays and lists no February holiday among them.
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Test your knowledge
Yes, under another name. Federal law makes the third Monday in February a legal public holiday called Washington's Birthday, and it applies to federal employees and the District of Columbia, with each state setting its own legal holidays.
COLOPHON
Celebrate the birth of our first president and the rich history of America on National Washington Day - a day to honor our past and look towards the future.
A cultural observance on March 4 commemorating the former U.S. presidential inauguration date, prior to the Twentieth Amendment shifting it to January 20 to shorten the lame-duck period.
Honor the legacy of our Forefathers on Forefathers' Day - a time to reflect on their sacrifices and contributions to our country.
