Election Day is tomorrow. While Election Day happens every year, presidential elections only occur every four years. Depending on their age of your little one, he or she might not have even been alive during the last presidential election; and there may only be four more presidential elections until they’re participating in it! Children might not be voting quite yet, but this year is a great opportunity to start teaching them some interesting facts about Election Day in the United States.

  1. Election Day was established by Congress in 1845.
  2. Election Day is always the Tuesday of or after November 2nd.
  3. Congress chose a day in November for Election Day because the harvest work was always done by then.
  4. Additionally, congress chose November 2nd for Election Day since many business owners did books for the previous month on the first of each month.
  5. Tuesday may seem like a weird day for Election Day. Congress chose this day because in 1845, many people had to travel quite a ways to vote. Since many families did not travel on Sundays, voting on Tuesday gave them all of Monday to travel if necessary.
  6. James Monroe received every electoral vote but one in 1801. The only reason he didn’t receive every vote is because a New Hampshire delegate wanted George Washington to be the only president elected unanimously.
  7. In the 1700s and early 1800, votes were often counted by raising hands or speaking out loud.
  8. It wasn’t until 1890 that secret ballots were commonly used.
  9. in 1872, Victoria Woodhull became the first woman to run for president.
  10. At age 43, John F. Kennedy was the youngest president to be elected to office.
  11. In the 1872 election, President Grant ran against a dead opponent, Horace Greeley, who died during the election process.
  12. In 1997, Texas passed a law that allowed American astronauts in space to electronically cast their ballots in federal elections.