Why America Made Christmas A Federal Holiday

A holiday can be more than a date off work; it can be a quiet pact about what a free people hold in common. We dig into Christmas as both a religious feast and a civic tradition, exploring why Congress recognized it in 1870 and how that choice still shapes American public life. With Dr. James Stoner of LSU, we trace the legal and cultural threads that turned a holy day into a shared civic rhythm—touching the Constitution’s “Sundays excepted” clause, early fights over Sunday mail, and the way new technology like the telegraph altered the balance between constant commerce and communal rest.

We walk through the expansion of federal holidays and what that reveals about democratic change, from Decoration Day and Armistice Day to Martin Luther King Jr. Day and Juneteenth. Along the way, we examine court decisions that let nativity scenes share space with reindeer and trees, clarifying why mixed displays pass constitutional muster. We also confront the paradox of commercialization: how retail seasons inverted Advent’s old timetable yet helped translate Christmas into a cultural practice legible in public spaces without state endorsement of belief.

By the end, we offer a clear takeaway for a pluralist republic approaching America 250: government should not manufacture virtue, but it can avoid standing in the way of the institutions and customs—families, congregations, neighborhoods—that cultivate generosity and civic friendship. If our calendar is a mirror, it reflects more than markets and laws; it reflects our choices about rest, memory, and the freedoms that let diverse traditions flourish side by side.

If this conversation gave you fresh perspective, follow the show, share it with a friend, and leave a review so more listeners can find it. What should our civic calendar honor next?

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Chapters

• 2:20 Christmas As Civic Tradition
• 3:50 Introducing Dr. James Stoner
• 4:18 Why Congress Acted In 1870
• 6:02 Regulating Time And The Common Good
• 8:06 Sunday In Law And Constitution
• 10:46 Sunday Mail And The Telegraph Shift
• 12:55 How Federal Holidays Expanded
• 14:51 Thanksgiving’s Civic-Religious Bridge
• 16:56 Majorities, Pluralism, And New Holidays
• 19:25 Christmas Displays And The Courts
• 21:51 Commercialization And Seasonal Inversion
• 23:58 Ganulin v. United States And The Poem
• 26:06 Puritans, Massachusetts, And Bans On Christmas
• 27:47 Lessons For America 250
• 28:51 Closing And Holiday Wishes

Transcript

SPEAKER_00: 1:34

This is a day filled with meaning. For some, a celebration of faith, for others, a season of family, tradition, and warmth. But beyond all of that, Christmas holds a unique place in American civic life. It is one of our oldest federal holidays and the only religious holiday recognized on our national calendar. That raises an important question. How does a nation committed to the separation of church and state come to recognize Christmas as a public holiday? The very issue was tested in court in Ganylan versus the United States when a federal employee challenged the constitutionality of Christmas as a national holiday. The court ultimately upheld it, explaining that while Christmas has its religious origins, its civic observance, a day of rest, generosity, and community, has become part of the broader American civic and cultural landscape, recognizing the cultural aspect of the day, the court said, does not amount to establishing a religion. So as we explore Christmas today, we're looking not only at a church holiday, but at a civic tradition, one that reflects how Americans find common ground and shared values, even when those values come from different places. Welcome back to Civics in here. Today we're welcoming back a repeat guest, Dr. James Stoner from LSU, a trusted voice on American political thought, and a repeat guest. Dr. Stoner has been on a couple of times. He always brings clarity to how civic traditions take shape, which makes him the perfect person to help us explore why Christmas became a federal holiday and what it means to our national story. Professor Stoner, welcome back. Christmas is the only religious holiday recognized as a federal holiday. Why do you think Congress chose to make that official in 1870? And what does that decision tell us about American civic identity at that time?

SPEAKER_01: 3:27

Well, thanks, Liz. And uh it's great to be back on the on the program. The uh, you know, 1870, what uh Congress does is pass a bill establishing four days that federal workers can have off. So that would be, if I got it right, Christmas, New Year's, the 4th of July, Independence Day, and Thanksgiving. And Thanksgiving actually didn't have a settled date at that point, but that would be a little more confusing. And apparently the law gave Christmas, provided that Christmas would be a day off, under its date, December 25th, rather than stressing the name of the holiday. And you know, I guess the the first thing to say is I'm not an anthropologist, but every society regulates time or has a certain rhythm to time that people share. And we don't think always about everything that's included in the common good. But one thing that the common good includes that isn't about money is well, not at least not directly about money, is simply a kind of order to time and an order to the way people live. And you know, ours is hardly a highly regulated society in that way. There are banking hours that are established by most states. There are holidays established by most states, but and most importantly, and I'll talk about this in just a moment, Sundays are usually days off from business. And some states still have restrictions, used to be called blue laws, on what kind of commerce could be conducted on Sundays. I mean, nowadays with our computers, we're used to 24-7 access to everything, and and and we're able, if you live online, to live continuously without without any kind of recognition of time. And that's part of the way in which the technology is fighting against. I mean, if the technology is allowed to rule, it's fighting against sort of human customs, human, and maybe against human needs that those customs filled. 24-7, after all, uh are the hours of a slave. And it's totally fine for the technology to be our slave. That's what it ought to be. It oughtn't to be our governor, but it doesn't mean that the fact of sort of constant access to whatever you want whenever you want it is something that wouldn't undercut the common, the common, certain common practices and commonness of custom that that helps constitute a society and a civic society. So that's that's sort of my first thought on it. If you go back to an old work of political philosophy like Plato's Laws, you'll actually find the provision that every day ought to have some kind of festival, it ought to have something recognized by the city. And the remnant of that you can find in some religions, like uh Catholicism, every day is dedicated to a saint or some particularly important uh event in the Christian story. But uh but those aren't all established by as holidays in our law by any means, although in some very Catholic countries, uh August 15th, the Feast of the Assumption, is a national holiday or or the like. And in fact, Catholics are obliged still, even in non-Catholic countries, to go to Mass on those days. Uh but uh but the basic the basic issue about the regulation of time really comes up with the regulation of the time of the week, uh, and that is the recognition of Sunday. You know, Sunday is mentioned in the Constitution, and it's mentioned in in this sort of typical American way, in this very indirect way, when in the passage that describes how a bill becomes a law or provides how the bill can become a law, uh, the president has 10 days to sign a bill into a law before it becomes a law automatically, even without a signature. And and then the Constitution adds, Sunday's accepted. So there is this indirect, kind of curious, but nevertheless perhaps significant recognition of Sunday. And that's because at the common law, which all the states uh accepted as their unwritten law at the time of the writing of the Constitution, of the declaration and all that, uh by common law, Sunday was not a day of business. And any business transacted on Sunday was not valid. I mean, I remember still as a boy, my father taught me not to date a check on Sunday. You had to date it on Monday, even if you wrote it on Sunday or date it the Saturday before, because any check that was dated on Sunday in the old days would have been an invalid contract because you wouldn't weren't allowed to make a valid contract on Sundays. So that was in the background of the law. And I'm sure that's what uh the founders had in mind when they said Sundays accepted, that it was not a day that legal business could take place at the time. Now, obviously, it recognizes that the overwhelming majority of people were Christian. And of course, the keeping of Sunday as the Christian Sabbath is uh was itself something that was done differently in different states uh at the time, and certainly became different over time as some of the Christian denominations even uh became what I guess the most famous are the Seventh-day Adventists who denied the moving of the seventh day from Saturday, as it was in Jewish law and in the Ten Commandments, to Sunday, the first day, in recognition of um the uh the resurrection of Christ, according to the Christians. And so it was the Catholic Church or the Christian Church in the early days that moved the notion of a day of worship from they kept it every seven days, but they changed the day. And so, and and then that's what that's what gets written into the law or into the unwritten law in England and carried over to the colonies and the like. So, so these customs are all there in the background. But the question of Sundays exception uh became a big controversy in the early years under the Constitution concerning delivery of the mail. And in 1810, uh a bill was passed that allowed for the post offices to be open on Sundays. Curiously, in those days, people would pick up their mail at the post offices typically, and the idea was well, everybody came to town for church, so we ought to have the post office open so they can pick up the mail and go back to the farm or whatever it was. But it became controversial over time, and there were certain postmasters who would refuse to open up on Sunday and and and the like. And this led to debates in Congress for about 20 years. And according to one interesting source I found, it was really resolved only by the invention of the telegraph. So people could get telegraphs, electronic, operate 24-7, apparently, and or at least, yeah, on on whenever the telegraph office was open, and nobody I guess it was run by private companies, so it wasn't a matter of law. The post office was federal, so you know the law would would oblige the post office, or could oblige federal law, could oblige the post office. So the other would be subject to state law, of course, but uh but then people could get the news they needed for Monday morning business without having the mail open on Sunday. And so Sunday delivery in the 1850s basically stopped. And to this day, the mail is not delivered on Sundays. And so, I mean, where there still is mail delivery, which in most places there still is, although I just saw a note this morning, in fact, that one country has delivered mail service, uh, is stopping mail service. Maybe it was Denmark or something like that, home delivery of mail on the grounds. I guess not many people are using paper mail. But in any event, that's a kind of background controversy and would have been known about still and remembered by some somebody or another when the 1870 law was passed. But again, the law is probably passed in 1870 because the federal government's grown much bigger suddenly after after the Civil War. And there are enough employees that it becomes a real issue of uh what days one works. And and and I suspect that's the reason why that's the dating of the law. And it's kind of curious which days. I mean, it's it's what's happened is there are now 12 federal holidays, apparently, basically one a month. And and those have been added over the years, right? So Memorial Day gets added after the Civil, significantly after the Civil War. It sort of grows up in the North as Decoration Day, uh, what we now call Veterans Day begins Armistice Day after World War I. So interestingly, these holidays generally commemorate some sort of civic, something that we had in common as citizens, as American citizens. But Independence Day was there on the first on the first on the first list as well. And Thanksgiving Day. And you know, I always think Thanksgiving is the kind of interesting one in this regard. Is it a religious holiday or not a religious holiday? Well, good question, uh, you ask. Uh I I was once on uh at a conference with um uh Professor Walter Burns, who was a great scholar of American constitutionalism and of the Bill of Rights, and he was he how did he put it? He was he he was talking about the reference to the laws of nature and nature's god in the Declaration of Independence. And and he he may have been talking about holidays, I forget what it was, but he would say, How can there be some sort of civic ceremony recognizing nature, nation, nature's god? You know, I mean, nature's there every day. So how would you have a sort of holiday for nature's god in contrast to the holidays that are recognized by the different faiths? But my thought immediately was, well, of course, it's Thanksgiving. That's a recognition of the benefits. And if they come from nature, if they come from uh a God who's a creator of nature, a creator, after all, is mentioned in the Declaration of Independence, uh, with you know the paragraph right after the mention of nature's God, that would seem to somehow fit with even our just secular or or I don't know if it's secular, it's it's it's our our our sort of civic and cultural understanding that there is some greater power to whom we to whom we owe thanks. And so Thanksgiving, days of Thanksgiving were proclaimed in the early days. Maybe you've done another time talking about this, so I won't say anything more about it, but it is a kind of precedent because in a way it shows the difference of Christmas. Because I mean it's recognized, as many holidays are recognized, as a way of accommodating the religious practice or the customary practice of people. I suppose New Year's is cust is is reflecting, New Year's is a holiday from the beginning, reflecting just the customary practice of people to uh celebrate on that day. It must have already been a major day of celebration. And I suppose, in a sort of strict sense, Christmas was probably added for the same reason in 1870. Uh uh it was sort of a secular moment there. This you know kind of goes through these religious revivals and then it goes through more secular moments. And if you're following that kind of wave, I think the 1870s people would say, well, it was more secular time on the whole. And it was probably just a recognition that uh you don't want people to come to work or or or drink themselves out of work on uh New Year's or Christmas, and we'll just include both of them. And then we have the civic holidays of uh of Independence Day commemorating uh the decoration, and Thanksgiving Day recognizing, let's say, at least nature's God. And yes, and and I and so I guess that would be my my general view of of how it comes about. I don't think any of the other holidays that have been added have a particular religious connection. Uh they tend to ref they tend to reflect, as all holidays actually do in a democracy, the the votes of the majority. And so in general, there's I think a kind of recognition that you you need to accommodate people's other practices when you can, and they're outside of the of what the majority does, but you recognize what the majority recognizes and celebrates. And so, you know, as as majorities as politics develops, new holidays get added. Martin Luther King Day was added in the 1980s, Juneteenth was added a few years ago. And these are obviously it recognizing political realities that these these holidays came about. Although Juneteenth had been celebrated for years in Texas, as Thanksgiving had originally been in Massachusetts and so forth. These had all been, many of these holidays have sort of state origins. Uh, needless to say, Memorial Day has an origin that applied in the northern states and not the southern states. I mean, I remember when I first moved to Louisiana discovering that Memorial, actually, still today, Memorial Day is not an official holiday in Louisiana. It's designated some years by the governor. The governor has a certain number of days he can designate as holidays, and uh meaning that state employees don't have to go to work. That's all the holiday would be. State employees don't have to work. Of course, there's no compelling of anyone else to celebrate anything, right? Or go to marches or do anything in particular. That comes up by the voluntary actions of citizens and society. But in in the South, or at least in Louisiana, it's still not a holiday, and the governor designates it only on years. I think it has he usually gives everybody the week off between Christmas and New Year's, but sometimes, depending on which day of the week Christmas falls, you don't have to get Christmas Eve and Christmas and so forth. And and so so consequently that he has an extra day, and then he'll designate Memorial Day. I remember that was once done, and I thought, oh, the Civil War is finally over. Uh in the South, but it turned out it was just a one-year thing, and we're back at work on Memorial Day. So, because the South actually, every state had its own Memorial Day, and they difficult state to state, and that too reflects the actually it reflects why the South lost the war in part because uh they didn't have it together and certainly weren't together in that way afterwards, although they were about some notorious things. The the question, the question of Christmas, I guess, also in constitutional law has come up especially concerning Christmas displays at state property or at state buildings. Again, it's not about the whole society because the federal government hardly governs our whole society or everything about our society, even today, even despite the wishes of some, and and even the states don't. That's why the holiday is just the employees of the governments don't have to work, or other kind of business isn't recognized or allowed. The courts are closed or things of that sort. And but the the controversies over the displays were settled by a series of cases in the 1980s, and they seem to have held. And generally, what was held is you could include some religious element in a display, provided there were secular elements as well. And so you can't just put up a crush scene, a scene of the manger and Jesus and Mary and Joseph, and Jesus and the manger and Mary and Joseph and the wise men and the shepherds and the camels and the angel and all of that. But you can do that as long as you have Santa Claus and reindeer and other Christmas trees and things of that sort. I mean, if you press too deeply on the meaning of the Christmas tree, you'll find a kind of religious route to it, uh, and the the especially the replacement of the old oak, which was worshipped by the druids with the evergreen. And who is it, St. Bonaventure, one of them, who went to the Germans and uh cut down the oaks. And so there is this actual religious meaning to that, but that's treated as a secular thing. And of course, it was partly the American genius, and I mean by genius not brilliance necessarily, just its particular character, to develop this kind of commercial, commercialized Christmas. We're a Christ, we're we're a commercial society. And as a commercial society, if you can commercialize something, it becomes sort of built into our quasi-civic identity. And and and so, of course, that's the story of Christmas to so many people, anyway. To a Catholic, it's a bizarre thing because the Christmas season, as commemorated by the song 12 Days of Christmas, the Christmas season begins on Christmas and runs for 12 days after to Epiphany, although even the church now moves Epiphany. Don't get me started on that. We're civics broadcast. I won't get started on that. But but but this is supposed to be an advent. The the season before Christmas is Advent, and that's actually a time of penance, or it's supposed to be stuck quite lent, but it's a kind of little lent for the believing uh Catholic. And so everything's kind of reversed now because the Christmas season is the shopping season. It runs from the day after Thanksgiving, now a little before that, but basically the day after Thanksgiving, which has now been declared. This holiday, Black Friday, and so to speak, holiday, and and that runs through through Christmas Day, and then everything comes down. And it's not true in every place, right? Depends on whether still a Catholic influence, and then they, as in Louisiana, where they'll keep the decorations up for the few weeks after until Marty grow up, but but uh carnival, but uh but but uh but they go they still go up early because that's been the secularized way. And so I think that that's been the way the courts have dealt with it. There's a case that I will mention, if I can get the name of it in front of me, so I don't forget, that called Ganulin VUS. It was decided in 2001, and it's a case where someone challenged Christmas as a federal holiday. And the judge who decided the case cited this case, Lynch v. Donnelly, the one that uh allowed for these mixed displays at Christmas, and and said, Christmas, Christmas is recognized as a holiday, it's a day off for government government employees. It's as long as there's a secular purpose that can be recognized, for example, recognition of uh, I don't know, I guess, I guess recognition of the exercise of religious liberty by the people could be a secular purpose. And and so, or at least of the majority, or at least of the customs of the majority. And and and then what the judge did is the judge wrote a little poem that was written in the style of the Grinch stole, the Grinch who stole Christmas as a way of settling things. And and and it ends with with a couple, it's very witty. No one is uh I'll read you a couple lines from it. No one one is never jailed for not having a tree, for not going to church, for not spreading glee. Uh right. So it's it it it's uh uh it's emphasizing that it's not about forcing people to take the day off, it's just about giving the day off. Uh an extra day off is hardly high treason, it may be spent as you wish, regardless of reason. The court having read the lessons of lynch, that's that case of the case, the the displays, the court having read the lessons of lynch refuses to play the role of the Grinch. There is room in this country and in our hearts too for different convictions and a day off, too. So the judge treated it in a kind of light-hearted way, and and that's sort of where the law stands now on that. Now, would it change if the country is no longer majority Christian? That might be seen in the lifetime of some of you who hear this, and and I think the answer would be it would depend on the it would depend on the votes of majorities. You know, the irony is that in Massachusetts, which we think of as the place where if there's anyone's going to make a claim that America's a Christian nation, that's where it starts. In Massachusetts, there was actually a law against the celebration of Christmas in colonial days, because the Puritans despised Christmas. They thought it was all about eating and drinking and being merry. And and this was was was not promoted by the Puritan reading of the Bible. And you know, the phrase comes from one of the it's one of the parables, I think, of where the whole point is that those who eat, drink, and be merry don't remember that tomorrow they die. And and and but the Puritans forbade the celebration of Christmas. And it wasn't until the 19th century that it it came to be accepted in Massachusetts. They had their Thanksgiving, but Christmas, ironically, I mean, was not a holiday there. And so it has this curious story. Uh, it really does fit in with the complexity of the American story and the way in which it mixes together these different traditions, but recognizes traditions without pretending, as Plato's laws did, that the that the government or the state or the law can really settle for people how to live, even how to live together, even though it the law can protect their efforts to do so.

SPEAKER_00: 25:51

So, Dr. Stoner, as we approach America 250 in 2026, what lessons do you think the civic side of Christmas, this you know, spirit of generosity and unity and community, can really offer us about strengthening our constitutional democracy today?

SPEAKER_01: 26:10

Well, you know, I don't want to say that the purpose of the holiday is to inculcate those virtues. I mean, those are virtues, but the lesson isn't all if there's a lesson in this particular question of the uh of the holidays, I guess it would be to say to wreck for the state to remember not to get in the way of those practices and institutions and customs of the people that support our virtues and the virtues that you know the the we we need for civil for a strong civic formation, but which we recognize, and I think this is a secret of American strength, cannot be formed by the state or by state propaganda or even by state curricular insistence, but have to be really supported by the beliefs of the people. And if there are beliefs, even religious beliefs that point in that direction, it would seem to me to be a smart thing not to get in the way of those, even though we've agreed in the religious test clause and in the First Amendment not to make that the business of the state to promote. Or, in fact, I mean, as Tocqueville recognized, if religion is strong in America, it's precisely because the state doesn't promote it, but simply allows it to achieve its natural strength.

SPEAKER_00: 27:49

I love that. Dr. Stoner, thank you so much. I feel like I could just listen to your stories all day, but we always appreciate you having you on as a guest and Merry Christmas and Happy New Year.

SPEAKER_01: 28:02

Same to you. Bye-bye.

SPEAKER_00: 28:15

The court will address plaintiff seasonal confusion, erroneously believing Christmas merely a religious intuition. Whatever the reason, constitutional or other, Christmas is not an act of big brother. Christmas is about joy and giving and sharing. It is about the child within us. It is most about caring. One is never jailed for not having a tree, for not going to church, for not spreading glee. The court will uphold seemingly contradictory clauses. 826 decreeing the establishment and Santa, both worthwhile clauses. We are all better for Santa, the Easter bunny too, and maybe the great pumpkin, just to name a few. An extra day off is hardly high treason, and maybe spent as you wish, regardless of the season. The court, having read the lesson of lynch, refuses to play the role of the Grinch. There is room in this country and in all of our hearts, too, for different convictions and a day off, too. From all of us at the Center for American Civics and the School for Economic Thought and Leadership at Arizona State University, we wish you a happy and healthy holiday season.