Your trivia hit for today ...WHO WAS THE FIRST PRESIDENT OF (what we now call) THE USA?

[awake]

Last edited Wed Jul 16, 2014, 04:35 PM - Edit history (2)

I suspect George Washington was your first guess.

After all, who else comes to mind?

But think back to your history books - The United States declared its independence in 1776, yet George Washington did not take Office until April 30, 1789.

So who was running the country during these initial years of our young country? It was the first eight U. S. Presidents. Some believe that in fact, the first President of the United States was one John Hanson, Others still say it was some one else.

I can hear you now - John who? John Hanson, was the first President of the United States.

John Hanson, first President of the United States.

Check Google for more detailed information. There was also a U.S. stamp made in his honor.

The new country was actually formed on March 1, 1781 with the adoption of The Articles of Confederation. This document was actually proposed on June 11, 1776, but not agreed upon by Congress until November 15, 1777. Maryland refused to sign this document until Virginia and New York ceded their western lands (Maryland was afraid that these states would gain too much power in the new government from such large amounts of land).

Once the signing took place in 1781, a President was needed to run the country. John Hanson was chosen unanimously by Congress (which included George Washington). In fact, all the other potential candidates refused to run against him, as he was a major player in the revolution and an extremely influential member of Congress.

As the first President, Hanson had quite the shoes to fill. No one had ever been President and the role was poorly defined. His actions in office would set precedent for all future Presidents. He took office just as the Revolutionary War ended. Almost immediately, the troops demanded to be paid. As would be expected after any long war, there were no funds to meet the salaries. As a result, the soldiers threatened to overthrow the new government and put Washington on the throne as a monarch.

All the members of Congress ran for their lives, leaving Hanson as the only guy left running the government. He somehow managed to calm the troops down and hold the country together. If he had failed, the government would have fallen almost immediately and everyone would have been bowing to King Washington.

Hanson, as President, ordered all foreign troops off American soil, as well as the removal of all foreign flags. This was quite the feat, considering the fact that so many European countries had a stake in the United States since the days following Columbus.

Hanson established the Great Seal of the United States, which all Presidents have since been required to use on all official documents. President Hanson also established the first Treasury Department, the first Secretary of War, and the first Foreign Affairs Department. Lastly, he declared that the fourth Thursday of every November was to be Thanksgiving Day, which is still true today.

The Articles of Confederation only allowed a President to serve a one year term during any three year period, so Hanson actually accomplished quite a bit in such little time. Seven other presidents were elected after him:

1. John Hanson
2. Elias Boudinot (1782-83),
3. Thomas Mifflin (1783-84),
4. Richard Henry Lee (1784-85),
5. John Hancock (1785-86),
6. Nathan Gorman (1786-87),
7. Arthur St. Clair (1787-88), and
8. Cyrus Griffin (1788-89),

...all prior to George Washington taking office.

So what happened? Why don't we hear about the first eight presidents?

It's quite simple - The Articles of Confederation didn't work well. The individual states had too much power and nothing could be agreed upon. A new doctrine needed to be written - something we know as the Constitution.

And that leads us to the end of our story.

George Washington definitely was not the first President of the United States. He was the first President of the United States under the Constitution we follow today.

And the first eight Presidents have been forgotten in history.

YOU HAVE TO BE A LOVER OF HISTORY TO APPRECIATE THIS!!

[Swede Atlanta]

1. Thanks for that trivia.....

Even as a history major I had never heard this nor, quite honestly, even thought about it. I was aware the Articles of Confederation were agreed as the first form of federal government but they lacked the required power to create a true "federation" of states and were jettisoned in favor of a stronger central government in the form of our current Constitution.

This is very interesting but it makes sense. Even when we were operating under the AoC there was an executive function.

Thanks...I'll use that next time I need to "get" someone for being uninformed.

[Wounded Bear]

2. Thanks for that...

You have informed me of some historical facts I didn't know, and while not a scholar, I've always thought of myself as pretty well informed about US History.

Great post!

[CherokeeDem]

3. Thank you.....

I was never taught this in school.. not public or at the university. I knew everything but the fact there were people designated as the president during that time.

Amazing..... thanks so much for posting this.

[littlemissmartypants]

4. Kicking. Thank you. nt

[Nye Bevan]

5. Snopes is your friend.

http://www.snopes.com/history/american/hanson.asp

[William769]

6. Thanks for that. Saved me from a whole lot of writing.

[ieoeja]

17. Worse yet, Hanson was the 9th such President, not first.

Peyton Randolph - September 5, 1774 - October 22, 1774
Henry Middleton - October 22, 1774 - October 26, 1774
Peyton Randolph - May 10, 1775 - May 24, 1775
John Hancock - May 24, 1775 - October 29, 1777
Henry Laurens - November 1, 1777 - December 9, 1778 - Articles of Confederation passed November 15
John Jay - December 10, 1778 - September 28, 1779
Samuel Huntington - September 28, 1779 - July 10, 1781 - Articles of Confederation ratified March 1
Thomas McKean - July 10, 1781 - November 5, 1781
John Hanson - November 5, 1781 - November 4, 1782
Elias Boudinot - November 4, 1782 - November 3, 1783
Thomas Mifflin - November 3, 1783 - June 3, 1784
Richard Henry Lee - November 30, 1784 - November 4, 1785
John Hancock - November 23, 1785 - June 5, 1786
Nathaniel Gorham - June 6, 1786 - November 3, 1786
Arthur St. Clair - February 2, 1787 - November 4, 1787
Cyrus Griffin - January 22, 1788 - November 15, 1788

[Hissyspit]

45. Oh, that John Hancock...

Had to have his ol' schnozolla in everything!

[MohRokTah]

7. One last bit of trivia on this.

The official title was "President of the Congress", not President of the United States.

It was provided for in Article IX, Section 5:

The united States, in congress assembled, shall have authority to appoint a committee, to sit in the recess of congress, to be denominated, “A Committee of the States,” and to consist of one delegate from each State; and to appoint such other committees and civil officers as may be necessary for managing the general affairs of the united states under their direction - to appoint one of their number to preside; provided that no person be allowed to serve in the office of president more than one year in any term of three years;

So really, all this president presided over was the Congress and the Committee of the States.

[Brewinblue]

8. Great American History Lesson

Thanks!

[navarth]

9. I thought it was P. T. Barnum......nt

[Jim Lane]

11. And I thought it was Jesus. Guess I ought to cut back on Fox News. (n/t)

[mountain grammy]

18. Hahaha........ good one!

[Squinch]

21. While you are there, see if you can find out which President got rid of all the pesky dinosaurs.

That guy should have a coin!

[MattBaggins]

32. I'm sure Fox news would insist it was Holy Saint Raygun

[Squinch]

35. I heard he was an expert dinosaur hunter.

But...um... no coin for him.

[Jim Lane]

38. No coin for Reagan -- but don't think they didn't try

For the ghastly details see: "Conservatives want Reagan to replace FDR on U.S. dimes".

This wasn't just some nutjob bloggers, either. According to the article (which is from 2003), the bill to put Reagan on the dime had 89 co-sponsors in the House of Representatives.

I haven't heard of it being brought up in the current House. Probably a lot of the Republicans are scared about getting a primary challenge if they vote to honor a President who raised taxes.

[Squinch]

48. Kicking FDR off the dime in favor of Reagan. What morons!

[Xyzse]

10. Thanks, I'd have to look this up a bit more.

[progressoid]

12. John Hanson was not the "first president of the United States."

John Hanson was not the "first president of the United States." John Hanson has not been purged from history books by a wave of revisionist historians who refuse to acknowledge his true importance to American history. The plain truth is that John Hanson was never considered "the first president of the United States," even in his own time. And John Hanson couldn't possibly have been the "first president of the United States," because neither the office of President of the United States nor the nation known as the United States of America was created until after he was dead.

When representatives of thirteen British colonies in North America, assembled in an organization known as the Continental Congress, declared in July 1776 that those colonies would henceforth be independent of Great Britain, they realized that unity would be necessary in order to sustain and win a war of independence (and to maintain that independence afterwards). Accordingly, they soon began debating the Articles of Confederation, a plan for a permanent union, which was approved and sent to each of the states (as the former colonies now called themselves) for ratification. Disputes over the several issues (including the western boundaries of some states) delayed the approval of the Articles of Confederation until 1781.

...

The key point here is that the Articles of Confederation did not create a nation called "the United States of America." They created, as stated in the first two articles, an alliance of thirteen independent and sovereign states who had agreed to "enter into a firm league of friendship with each other" while retaining their "sovereignty, freedom, and independence." The title of the confederacy so created was designated "The United States of America," but no nation with that name was created by the Articles of Confederation, any more than the formation of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization resulted in the establishment of a nation known as "NATO."

etc: http://www.snopes.com/history/american/hanson.asp

[Aristus]

14. Thank you.

I thought this misapprehension had been laid to rest years ago.

I admit to enjoying occasionally indulging in a bit of "I know something you only think you know..."

But I try to have my facts straight first.

Thanks for posting this.

[awake]

27. OK I stand corrected

John Hanson was a president before George Washington in what later became known as The United States

[Jim Lane]

31. Some people have made a similar argument about Jefferson Davis.

Did you know that the United States once had two Presidents who were both born in Kentucky? This is something I've heard alleged. The argument is that Davis, like Hanson, "was a president ... in what later became known as The United States."

Hanson at least wasn't a traitor, but neither of them deserves to be considered a President of the United States.

[awake]

29. Here is a quote from Wikipedia on John Hanson

"John Hanson (April 14 [O.S. April 3] 1721 – November 15, 1783) was a merchant and public official from Maryland during the era of the American Revolution. After serving in a variety of roles for the Patriot cause in Maryland, in 1779 Hanson was elected as a delegate to the Continental Congress. He signed the Articles of Confederation in 1781 after Maryland finally joined the other states in ratifying them.

In November 1781, he was elected President of the Continental Congress, and became the first president to serve a one-year term under the provisions of the Articles of Confederation. While George Washington is universally recognized by historians as the first President of the United States formed under the United States Constitution, some biographies of Hanson have made the unconventional argument that Hanson was the first holder of the office."

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Hanson

I now realize that they may be other views on this and I made small adjustments to my OP to reflect that point

[Al Carroll]

33. Snopes is not a good source on history

They do just fine debunking bad photoshop, but when it comes to history they foul up sometimes.

Snopes are just two amateurs on the net, that's it. They are not scholars, and sometimes as careless as the ones they skewer.

[progressoid]

37. Are they (and the sources they cited) wrong in this case?

[MoonchildCA]

13. He was president of the Continental Congress.

There was not yet a nation to be president of until the Constitution. We were just a confederacy of sovereign states.

[rateyes]

15. George Washington was the first POTUS.

Everybody knows that. We didn't become the USA until the Constitution was ratified by enough of the state legislatures.

[H2O Man]

16. Right.

I always assume that people are aware of this.

The Articles of Confederation, which are based largely upon Franklin's Albany Plan of Union, document the Haudenosaunee influence upon the more insightful of the Founding Fathers.

[tclambert]

19. What about Peyton Randolph, John Hancock, or Thomas McKean?

All were Presidents before Hanson. Peyton Randolph was President of the First Continental Congress. You could argue he didn't count because the colonies hadn't declared independence yet. John Hancock served as President of the Continental Congress when they ratified the Declaration of Independence, and as far as historians can tell, the phrase "united States of America" appears for the first time in the Declaration. When the Continental Congress ratified the Articles of Confederation, Samuel Huntington was serving as President. Samuel Johnston was the first one elected after ratification of the Articles, but he declined the office. Thomas McKean was elected President after that, but only served four months. Then and only then came Hanson.

So Hanson is ninth, sixth, third, or second, depending on how you count. Or none of those, since his title was not President of the United States. That title and the entire executive branch did not exist until the Constitution.


http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/President_of_the_Continental_Congress

[samsingh]

20. thanks for removing more ignorance

[ErikJ]

22. And the Confederate States Of Am. wanted to go back to Articles of Conf states rights.

They didnt want to pay their taxes to Washington which is why our army almost starved that winter.

In 1852 South Carolina declared itself independent per the Articles of Conf.
And this is why states rights is still so big in the South ..and the Tea Party.

http://avalon.law.yale.edu/19th_century/csa_scarsec.asp
.................
In pursuance of this Declaration of Independence, each of the thirteen States proceeded to exercise its separate sovereignty; adopted for itself a Constitution, and appointed officers for the administration of government in all its departments-- Legislative, Executive and Judicial. For purposes of defense, they united their arms and their counsels; and, in 1778, they entered into a League known as the Articles of Confederation, whereby they agreed to entrust the administration of their external relations to a common agent, known as the Congress of the United States, expressly declaring, in the first Article "that each State retains its sovereignty, freedom and independence, and every power, jurisdiction and right which is not, by this Confederation, expressly delegated to the United States in Congress assembled."
.......................

[awake]

50. Interesting I had not know about what South Carolina did years before the Civil War

Thanks for that info

[jeff47]

23. Your trivia isn't true.

First, the position "President of the United States" did not exist until the Constitution. Thus Hanson could not hold the position.

Second, the position Hanson held was President of the Congress.

Third, the country called "The United States of America" did not exist until the Constitution. The Articles of Confederation explicitly stated that the states were sovereign nations. Those states were essentially subcontracting some work to a common entity. The Confederation's Congress could not perform the basic tasks of a national government - it could not raise taxes, it could not raise an army, and it could not force the states to follow it's laws. Which is why it gave up in 1787.

[awake]

24. Thank you I have adjusted my title of the OP

[jeff47]

25. It's still not true.

Depending on how you want to count, he was 2nd, 7th or 9th. Plenty more details upthread and a link to Snopes debunking the story you quoted.

[cali]

26. Your adjustment is as misleading as the op.

and I say that as a lover of history.

[awake]

28. I made another adjustment base on feed back

I hope this clears up any lager issue about my wording of the OP.

"So who was running the country during these initial years of our young country? It was the first eight U. S. Presidents. Some believe that in fact, the first President of the United States was one John Hanson, Others still say it was some one else."

[Warpy]

30. Thank you so much for this

I vaguely knew Hancock was one of the presidents under the Articles of Confederation. I would think the descendents of the other seven would be working overtime to erase their names from US history because the Articles of Confederation had been such a botch and are still recognized as such by everyone outside the Federalist Society.

By the time the constitution finally got ratified and Washington sworn in as President, some of the states had been gearing up for war against their neighbors, something that would have broken the US into several small, weak, perpetually warring states and ripe for the plucking by European empires.

[Al Carroll]

34. The United States begins with the Declaration, not the Constitution

So the claim that Washington was the first president is nonsense.

http://www.archives.gov/exhibits/charters/declaration_transcript.html
"The unanimous Declaration of the thirteen United States of America...

We, therefore, the Representatives of the United States of America, in General Congress Assembled..."

The second bold is what Hanson was president of. Only by the most meaningless nitpick can one claim Washington was first, since the title has minor differences. That the presidency at first had little power doesn't change it from being a presidency.

The declaration establishes the US. Period.

As I said in the other post, Snopes does not have historians. It has two amateurs who are better off analyzing photoshop.

[awake]

36. Thank You for this further clarification

It does seem to be the case that the term United States of America was indeed use years before the current constitution.

[Jim Lane]

41. No, you're retroactively imposing our current usage.

You write that "the term United States of America was indeed use(d) years before the current constitution." It was used, but it was not used in our contemporary sense of a single nation. It referred, as the other critics of the OP have stated, to a confederation of 13 sovereign states, each of which retained its sovereignty.

A good indication of this is that, although the term was in use, it was considered a plural, and took plural verbs. Quite a few citations on this subject are collected at "Life in These, uh, This United States", by Benjamin Zimmer, who has taught at several universities and served as editor of American dictionaries at Oxford University Press. A good example is this passage from a history published in 1891:

The many histories are careful to distinguish between the Colonies and the States, but they have failed to impress the distinction, the immense and radical distinction, between the States and the United States. Early in the period of the Revolution there was, as just noted, a feeble incipiency of a Union in the Articles of Confederation, proposed in 1777 and ratified in March, 1781. For about a decade the states, under the technical name, "The United States of America," were a Confederacy; but when the Constitution was adopted the United States was. "They" gave place to "it." And as Mr. Fiske in his latest book, "Civil Government in the United States," has noted, the change from the plural to the singular was vital, though it has taken a War of Rebellion to make the difference unmistakable. The sovereign States were consolidated into a unit — a unit indeed with important limitations — when the Federal Constitution was adopted. The United States began not their but its history with the first inauguration of Washington as Chief Magistrate.

(from "The Making of a Nation," by G. H. Emerson, in The Universalist Quarterly and General Review, Vol. 28 (Jan. 1891), p. 49)

Interestingly, the Supreme Court was very slow to change. One law professor summarized his findings this way:

This survey examines use of the phrases “United States is” and “United States are” in opinions of the United States Supreme Court from 1790 to 1919. The familiar claim, popularized by Shelby Foote in the Ken Burns Civil War documentary, is that the Civil War marked a shift in usage from plural to singular. This survey demonstrates that in the Supreme Court this account of the timing of the change is not accurate. Although patterns of usage changed abruptly in the 1860s, justices continued to use the plural form through the end of the nineteenth century. Indeed, the plural usage was the predominant usage in the 1870s, 1880s, and 1890s. Only in the beginning of the twentieth century did the singular usage achieve preeminence and the plural usage disappear almost entirely.

(from "Supreme Court Usage and the Making of an 'Is'", by Professor Minor Myers)

All right, I may have gotten a little too bogged down in the details, but the basic point is that the eighteenth-century use of the term "the United States" cannot be read to imply the existence of a single, unitary country, even though that's the meaning today.

[tritsofme]

40. President of the United States is an office established by the Constitution

It is not particularly relevant that a similar phrase was used to describe earlier, essentially unrelated offices.

The positions of Speaker of the House or President Pro Tempore of the Senate are much better candidates for descendants of the office held by Hanson than that of POTUS.

[Jim Lane]

42. I disagree with your sniping at Snopes

I don't claim they're infallible, but I don't agree with dismissing them on the basis that they're not historians. My post #41 cites two authors with academic credentials on the related subject of how the term "the United States" was used, the point being that its usage before 1787 can't be assumed to mean the same thing we mean today.

You give a direct quotation using the phrase "the United States of America". I note, however, that you provide no quotation from that era that refers to Hanson as the "President of the United States of America". Others in this thread have explained that he was the President of the Continental Congress. It wasn't just a change in the powers of the office -- it was a different office.

[Roy Serohz]

39. It wasn't Jesus???

[Uncle Joe]

46. No, silly, he was the first President of Mexico. n/t

[Roy Serohz]

47. Ramirez!

How the hell could I forget that?

[TheKentuckian]

43. The current extraction scheme has had only one President, Ronald Reagan.

He has had numerous incarnation some more despicable than others and has come from both parties but Reagan has ruled the nation for over a generation.

[LiberalElite]

44. Very interesting what

history we don't learn in school. I'm passing this on. Thanks!

[Orrex]

49. Mm-bop!

[Rex]

51. He died before the USA was created, so no he was not the first POTUS.

None of the 8 were. You have to have a United States first.

[awake]

52. We celebrate every July 4 the birthday of the "United States Of America"

see post #34 above

I believe that most people would think that a country's birthday relates to when that country began, so it appears the USA had started before John Hanson died.

[Rex]

53. But he was never a POTUS.

We had to have a union first, he and his counterparts were in charge of a confederacy that didn't work out very well.

[awake]

54. A confederation is a form of a union

While not as strong of a union as a federation it is still a union.

From Wikipedia
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Confederation

A confederation, also known as confederacy or league, is a union of political units for common action in relation to other units.[1] Usually created by treaty but often later adopting a common constitution, confederations tend to be established for dealing with critical issues (such as defence, foreign affairs, or a common currency), with the central government being required to provide support for all members.

The nature of the relationship among the states constituting a confederation varies considerably. Likewise, the relationship between the member states, the central government, and the distribution of powers among them is highly variable. Some looser confederations are similar to intergovernmental organizations and even may permit secession from the confederation. Other confederations with stricter rules may resemble federations. A unitary state or federation may decentralize powers to regional or local entities in a confederal form.

[Rex]

55. See post #5

That is not to say the were not leaders of America, just not leaders of the United States of America.

EDIT - and technically we should be celebrating our Independence from Britain on July 2nd...but we don't.

[awake]

56. That is right we celebrate the Birth of USA on July 4

the 200th birthday was in 1976 and as has been shown the Term "United States of America" predates our currant constitution, John Hanson (along with others) was given the title President by the operating government of the time meaning he was a "President" of the "United States of America" before George Washington became the POTUS.

I agree the his powers were greatly limited and more like a "President" of the Senate or even weaker but none the less still a "President" in a government which tried to govern what was even at the time call by some the "United States of America"

[Rex]

58. We can say the were the unofficial POTUSes, before we had a working Union.

Their contributions are just as important as anything following the confederation of states.

The D of I was signed on July 2nd, yet I forget why they made it the 4th...just more trivia.

[Boom Sound 416]

57. John Hancock. Ha!

Pretty flamboyant signature for an insurance man.




Great post