Mar. 2025

Some alert readers (ARs) may be interested to learn there was no St. Patrick’s Day in Ireland in 1752; nor anywhere else in the British Isles; nor in any of the British colonies in North America. The reason was the Calendar (New Style) Act 1750, which officially replaced the Julian Calendar, which had been promulgated by Julius Caesar, with the Gregorian Calendar, which had been introduced by Pope Gregory XIII in 1582.

It’s not that the British didn’t realize that the Gregorian Calendar was much more accurate. The problem was that Protestant Britain didn’t want to follow a calendar from the Vatican. After 170 years of willful error, the Brits finally swallowed their pride and succumbed to this narrow exercise of papal authority.

In 1752 two things happened immediately as the result of this calendar conversion. First, New Year’s Day was moved from March 25 to January 1. Second, eleven days in September were eliminated. The day after Wednesday, September 2nd was Thursday, September 14th. The year 1752 did not just lose these eleven days in September.

It also lost another 84 days in January, February and March, when New Year’s Day was moved forward. The last day of the year was now December 31, 1752, not March 24. St. Patrick’s Day, 1753 was actually 354 days after St. Patrick’s Day, 1751. So no one was deprived of the right to celebrate St. Patrick’s Day. It just couldn’t be done in 1752.

No St. Patrick’s Day in Ireland in 1752.

It wasn’t just the calendar year 1752 that lost days in January, February and March. The same thing happened to Franklin D. Roosevelt’s first term as president. As some ARs may recall, the 20th Amendment of the U.S. Constitution changed the date of the presidential inauguration from March 4th to January 20th. (My father marched in the inaugural parade on March 4, 1933 as a member of a Georgetown ROTC unit.)

As a result of the 20th Amendment, FDR’s first term was shortened by 43 days and ended on January 20, 1937. It’s not that he was shortchanged. Despite this abbreviation of this first term, he still served three complete terms and part of a fourth, longer than any other U.S. president.

As most ARs who are beer drinkers know, one of FDR’s first priorities after taking office was legalizing beer en route to repealing prohibition completely. On March 22, 1933 he signed the Cullen-Harrison Act, which amended the Volstead Act to allow the production of so-called mild beer. The law went into effect on April 7, 1933, the anniversary of which has been cause for celebration at Schlafly Bottleworks and throughout the beer drinking world.

At this point I invite ARs to do the math. Beer became legal 34 days after FDR took was sworn in on March 4th. If the 20th Amendment had been ratified earlier, he would have been sworn in on January 20th. The Cullen-Harrison Act could have taken effect 34 days later, on February 23rd. Not only would there have been plenty of legal beer for St. Patrick’s Day 22 days later, but also for Mardi Gras weekend, which started the next day.

Tom Schlafly
Chairman
Schlafly | The Saint Louis Brewery