[Weekly Compilation of Presidential Documents Volume 30, Number 43 (Monday, October 31, 1994)]
[Pages 2172-2173]
[Online from the Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]

<R04>
Proclamation 6751--Thanksgiving Day, 1994

October 27, 1994

By the President of the United States

of America

A Proclamation

    As the end of another year draws closer, we are again filled with 
thankfulness for the blessings of a fruitful land. For more than 200 
years, Americans have welcomed autumn's harvest with gratitude and 
goodwill. On Thanksgiving Day, we set aside our daily routines to 
acknowledge the bounty and mercy of Divine Providence. With full hearts, 
we bask in the warmth of family and community gatherings, and we reflect 
on the challenge, responsibility, and privilege that are ours as 
citizens of these United States.
    It is our great fortune to live in a country of abundance and 
promise--a land of freedom for all. Still only a few generations removed 
from our Nation's founders, we continue to blaze a trail toward 
stability and justice. Aspiring to lift ourselves closer to God's grace, 
we remain determined to ease the pain of the many people who know only 
poverty and despair. Clearly, ours is an unfinished journey.
    Our destination must be to create the means for every one of us to 
prosper, to enjoy sound education, meaningful work experience, 
protective health care, and personal security. It is our responsibility 
to prompt the national conscience so that by fostering virtue, wisdom, 
and moral values, we rejoice in our growth as a people.
    Our challenge is to give assistance and encouragement that are 
equitable and just and that alleviate human suffering. Our 
responsibility is to nurture the processes of peace and equal human 
rights everywhere with compassion and concern. And like other pioneers 
before us, it is our privilege to be able to aim toward lofty goals.
    Across this land as people gather together with loved ones to savor 
the bounty of the Thanksgiving Holiday, I invite each family, each 
religious congregation, each community and city, to celebrate your 
experience of the American heritage. Reach out in friendship and 
cooperation to the people of your hometown. Take responsibility for 
bringing harmony and hope, peace and prosperity to all of the 
inhabitants of our world. Share the privileges of freedom and the 
challenge of working for a better world.
    Now, Therefore, I, William J. Clinton, President of the United 
States of America, by virtue of the authority vested in me by the 
Constitution and laws of the United States, do hereby proclaim Thursday, 
November 24, 1994, as a National Day of Thanksgiving. I urge the 
citizens of this great Nation to continue this beloved tradition and to 
strengthen it by gathering in their homes and places of worship to 
express their heartfelt gratitude for the many blessings of our lives.
    In Witness Whereof, I have hereunto set my hand this twenty-seventh 
day of October, in the year of our Lord nineteen hundred

[[Page 2173]]

and ninety-four, and of the Independence of the United States of America 
the two hundred and nineteenth.
                                            William J. Clinton

[Filed with the Office of the Federal Register, 11:20 a.m., October 28, 
1994]

Note: This proclamation was published in the Federal Register on October 
31.