State of The Union
At some time during the first two months of each session, the President customarily delivers the State of the Union Address, a speech in which an assessment is made of the state of the country, and the presidents' legislative agenda is outlined. The speech is modeled on the Speech from the Throne, given by the British monarch. There is a major difference, however. The President is the principal author of his State of the Union message, while the Speech from the Throne is customarily written by the Prime Minister.
The Constitution of the United States requires that the president "shall from time to time give to the Congress Information of the State of the Union," but does not specify whether the information should be given in a speech or a written report.
The first two presidents, George Washington and John Adams, delivered the speech in person before both houses of Congress, but that practice was discontinued under Thomas Jefferson, who deemed it too monarchical and sent written reports instead. Written reports were standard until 1913, when Woodrow Wilson reestablished the practice of personally attending to deliver the speech. Few Presidents have deviated from this custom since.
Read more about this topic: Joint Session Of The United States Congress
Famous quotes containing the words state of, state and/or union:
“When the Revolutionaries ran short of gun wadding the Rev. James Caldwell ... broke open the church doors and seized an armful of Watts’ hymnbooks. The preacher threw them to the soldiers and shouted, “Give ‘em Watts, boys—give ‘em Watts!””
—For the State of New Jersey, U.S. public relief program (1935-1943)
“[T]he Congregational minister in a neighboring town definitely stated that ‘the same spirit which drove the herd of swine into the sea drove the Baptists into the water, and that they were hurried along by the devil until the rite was performed.’”
—For the State of Vermont, U.S. public relief program (1935-1943)
“Our age is pre-eminently the age of sympathy, as the eighteenth century was the age of reason. Our ideal men and women are they, whose sympathies have had the widest culture, whose aims do not end with self, whose philanthropy, though centrifugal, reaches around the globe.”
—Frances E. Willard 1839–1898, U.S. president of the Women’s Christian Temperance Union 1879-1891, author, activist. The Woman’s Magazine, pp. 137-40 (January 1887)