101 STAT. 2058
PROCLAMATION 5594—DEC. 22, 1986
CHALLENGER, lost her life on January 28, 1986. May all Americans commemorate Sharon Christa McAuliffe and her brave companions. May we also express our gratitude to everyone who continues the legacy of devotion and excellence that she and the rest of America's teachers have given us through the years. The Congress, by Public Law 99-480, has designated September 1986 through May 1987 as "National Year of the Teacher" and January 28, 1987, as "National Teacher Appreciation Day" and authorized and requested the President to issue a proclamation in observance of this year and of this day. NOW, THEREFORE, 1, RONALD REAGAN, President of the United States of America, do hereby proclaim the school year of September 1986 through May 1987 as National Year of the Teacher and January 28, 1987, as National Teacher Appreciation Day. I invite the Governors of every State, employers, community leaders, school superintendents, principals, educators, students, parents, and all Americans to observe these events with appropriate educational activities to recognize the importance of teachers in American schools. IN WITNESS WHEREOF, I have hereunto set my hand this twenty-second day of December, in the year of our Lord nineteen hundred and eighty-six, and of the Independence of the United States of America the two hundred and eleventh. RONALD REAGAN
Proclamation 5594 of December 22, 1986
National Day of Prayer, 1987 By the President of the United States of America - .. '••.'.' A Proclamation In 1952 the Congress of the United States, resuming a tradition observed by the Continental Congress from 1776 to 1783 and followed intermittently thereafter, adopted a resolution calling on the President to set aside and proclaim a suitable day each year as a National Day of Prayer. At the time the resolution was adopted, Americans were dying on the battlefield in Korea. More than 125,000 of our young men had been killed or wounded in that conflict, the third major war in which our troops were involved in a century barely half over. Members of Congress who spoke for the resolution made clear that they felt the Nation continued to face the very same challenges that preoccupied our Founders: the survival of freedom in a world frequently hostile to human ideals and the struggle for faith in an age that openly doubted or vehemently denied the existence of the Almighty. One Senator remarked that "it would be timely and appropriate for the people of our Nation to join in this service of prayer in the spirit of the founding fathers who believed that God governs in the affairs of men and who based their Declaration of Independence upon a firm reliance on the protection of Divine Providence." ....• ^ -,;i;'-.' • ^; • - •,<v • •..::
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