December 2, 1913: President Woodrow Wilson delivers his State of the Union Address before a joint session of Congress, at the U.S. Capitol Building in Washington. He gives written copies to the Speaker of the House of Representatives, Champ Clark of Missouri; and to his Vice President, Thomas R. Marshall, in his role as President of the Senate.
The speech itself was unremarkable. He stated, "The country, I am thankful to say, is at peace with all the world, and many happy manifestations multiply about us of a growing cordiality and sense of community of interest among the nations, foreshadowing an age of settled peace and good will." Nor was the speech unusual for length: It was just over 3,500 words, and took 28 minutes to read. It recent years, the Address is usually twice that long, or longer; but, at the time, a major Presidential speech lasting under half an hour was no big deal.
The timing might seem odd to modern eyes: Prior to the 20th Amendment to the Constitution of the United States in 1933, with its fixed date of January 3, Congress tended to take the Summer off, and then reconvene in early December. So, until then, Presidents would send their "Annual Message to Congress" to Congress in early December. Since then, it's usually done in late January or early February, at 9:00 PM Eastern Time, and usually on a Tuesday, though sometimes on a Wednesday.
A new President, in his 1st few weeks on the job, will usually give an address before a joint session of Congress, but this 1st one is not generally called "The State of the Union Address." A few outgoing Presidents have given such addresses, but none has since Gerald Ford in 1977.
What was unusual about the message was that it was delivered in person at all. That hadn't happened in 113 years.
In the Constitution, Article II, Section 3, Clause 1, spells out this particular duty of the President: "He shall from time to time give to the Congress Information of the State of the Union, and recommend to their Consideration such Measures as he shall judge necessary and expedient."
But the Constitution doesn't say how it shall be done. On the TV show The West Wing, series creator and main writer Aaron Sorkin had his fictional President's White House Director of Communications, Toby Ziegler (played by Richard Schiff), say, "The President could simply buy Congress a subscription to The Wall Street Journal, and fulfill the Constitutional obligations."
George Washington delivered the 1st regular annual message before a joint session of Congress on January 8, 1790, at Federal Hall in New York, then the provisional U.S. capital. He did so every year thereafter, as did John Adams.
In 1801, Thomas Jefferson discontinued the practice of delivering the address in person, regarding it as too monarchical, similar to the British monarch's "Speech from the Throne" before Parliament. That was his official reason. In reality, he never felt good about public speaking: He made only 2 public speeches as President, his Inaugural Addresses. Like some other Presidents -- George H.W. Bush comes to mind -- he was much more at ease speaking to small groups than to large audiences.
Jefferson has often been regarded as the best writer among Presidents, and sent his Annual Message by mail. Every President followed him -- even Theodore Roosevelt, who loved public speaking as much as any President ever has, though he was also a renowned writer -- until Wilson. Every President since has delivered it live, except for Herbert Hoover. (Richard Nixon delivered one in writing in 1973, and Jimmy Carter in 1981, but each had otherwise done it live.)
The part that usually bugs me about the ceremony is that the House's Sergeant at Arms introduces the President, and he takes his own sweet time in shaking hands and taking on the way to the rostrum, and then soaks in the standing ovation (from his own Party, at least), and then the Speaker of the House starts the process all over again by saying, "I have the high honor and distinct privilege of presenting to you the President of the United States." And then there's another ovation. And people wonder why the speech lasts so long: It's not always the fault of the President or his writers.
In the days of the written message, the best-remembered one is from 1823, when James Monroe delivered the Monroe Doctrine, defining American foreign policy in ways that still matter today. Notable moments in the spoken version have included:
* 1941: Franklin D. Roosevelt discussing what he called the Four Freedoms.
* 1944: FDR proposing what he called the Second Bill of Rights.
* 1964: Lyndon Johnson introducing what he called the War On Poverty.
* 1975: Gerald Ford actually telling the American people the truth, saying, "The State of the Union is not good." Two years later, leaving office, he was able to say, with some truth, "The State of the Union is good."
* 1984: Ronald Reagan delivered the Address on February 6, his 73rd birthday, and Congress sang "Happy Birthday" to him.
* 1994: Bill Clinton saying, "The State of our Union is strong," but also telling Congress that if they sent him legislation on health care reform that didn't cover every American citizen, he would veto it and force them to start over. He even held up a pen as a prop. The threat failed.
* 1998: Clinton delivering the Address mere days after the exposure of his affair with former White House intern Monica Lewinsky, acting as though nothing out of the unusual was happening, and winning back some of the American people.
* 1999: Clinton delivering the Address while his Impeachment trial, connected with the affair, was ongoing in the Senate, again acting like it was just another SOTU.
* 2002: George W. Bush calling Iraq, Iran and North Korea "an axis of evil." It wasn't true.
* 2020: Donald Trump delivering it having already been impeached by the Democratic-controlled House, and acquitted by the Republican-controlled Senate.
Since 1966, the opposing party has delivered a televised response. Usually, it's either a leader of that party in either house of Congress, or someone that party would like to set up as a potential opponent for the incumbent's re-election. The latter has never, ever worked: Although Ford, George H.W. Bush and Clinton did it and later became President, none did so in the term in which they delivered the response; and the only responder to ever even be nominated in the year in question has been Bob Dole in 1996, and he lost to Clinton solidly.
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December 2, 1913 was a Tuesday. There were no scores on this historic day: Baseball season was over, football was in midweek, professional basketball barely existed, and the seasons of the National Hockey Association and the Pacific Coast Hockey Association started a few days later.
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