Why It Matters
Federal Election Day is set by statute, not the Constitution, and only Congress can change it, as detailed in a new Congressional Research Service (CRS) report. Neither the Constitution nor Congress grants the President or other federal officials authority to alter the date outside the regular legislative process.
The Big Picture
The first federal elections were held across a period spanning November 24, 1788, to June 22, 1789. In 1792, the 2nd Congress decided that presidential electors would vote on the first Wednesday in December and must be chosen in the 34 days leading up to that date.
In 1845, the 28th Congress set "the Tuesday next after the first Monday in the month of November" as the uniform date for states to appoint presidential electors, citing the goal of guarding against fraud in presidential elections.
Congress set the presidential, House and Senate elections to the same day in stages, from the 1845 act setting the presidential date to the 1914 act aligning Senate elections, a span of 69 years. In 1872, the 42nd Congress aligned House elections with presidential elections starting in 1876, and in 1914, the 63rd Congress aligned the popular election of Senators with the biennial House elections.
The report attributes the choice of the first Tuesday after the first Monday to several practical considerations: avoiding the harvest season and harsh winter weather; preventing Sunday travel for voters observing the Sabbath; and keeping Election Day off November 1, when merchants traditionally tallied their monthly books. These explanations are drawn from secondary sources, and the report does not present them as settled historical fact.
Election Day is not a federal holiday under federal law, though several states recognize it as a state holiday.
Two bills introduced this Congress address ballot receipt deadlines. S. 5355, the Ballots by Election Day Act, introduced Aug. 6, was referred to the Senate Committee on Rules and Administration; it would require most absentee and mail-in ballots in federal elections to arrive by poll closing on Election Day, with an exception for certain military and overseas voters.
A companion measure, H.R. 10,276, introduced Sept. 3, was referred to the House Committee on House Administration and would impose a similar receipt-by-Election-Day requirement. Neither bill proposes changing the date of Election Day itself.
The Bottom Line
S. 5355 was last documented as referred to the Senate Committee on Rules and Administration, and H.R. 10,276 was last documented as referred to the House Committee on House Administration.
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