Election Day

In 1792 Congress set the date for presidential electors (the electoral college) to meet, but it left some leeway in the time period for appointing electors. The act designated the first Wednesday in December of election years for electors to meet and cast their votes for president and vice president. But the act permitted states to appoint the electors any day within thirty-four days before the December date on which the electors were to convene and vote.

Problems arose because of the lack of a specific day for choosing electors. States selected electors on different dates, sometimes influencing the choices in neighboring states that had not yet made their appointments.

Congress moved to rectify the situation with an act in January 1845 that said electors must be selected on the “Tuesday next after the first Monday in the month of November of the year in which they are to be appointed.” The same Tuesday in November of even-numbered years became House of Representatives election day under an act of Congress in 1872. After the Seventeenth Amendment mandated popular election of senators in 1913, Congress amended the act to include Senate elections.

The sponsor of the 1872 Uniform Federal Election Day Act, Rep. Benjamin Franklin Butler, Massachusetts Republican, argued during floor debate that Indiana, Ohio, and Pennsylvania held an “undue advantage” in electing their representatives in October. He recalled that in 1840 the news from Pennsylvania and other states that had already held House elections settled the November presidential election “as effectively as it was afterward done.”

The legislative history of the 1845 and 1872 acts indicates that Congress weighed several factors in choosing the month and day for all federal elections. November was selected because weather is temperate then, and, with the harvest in, farmers were more likely to vote. The first and last days of the month met objections because they might complicate the closing out of business [Page p148]accounting books. As to the day, religious objections ruled out Sunday and possibly Monday as well, because Monday voting might require Sunday travel to the polls in large states. Tuesday and Wednesday were acceptable. Thursday was dismissed because it was Britain's election day. Friday was the end of the work week, and Saturday was shopping day.

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