During a solemn ceremony Wednesday in the Rose Garden outside the White House, U.S. President Barack Obama – flanked by his daughters Sasha and Malia – took part in one of the most sacred of presidential obligations.
He pardoned a Thanksgiving turkey.
Ok, so that may have been overstating things a little bit.
Still, the fact remains that the annual pardoning of a turkey (so as to spare them the fate of ending up on someone’s plate for Thanksgiving) has become one of the more unique traditions associated with the holiday.
Obama pardoned “Popcorn,” who shared the stage with the president on a cold, drizzly day.
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An alternate turkey, named Caramel, also received a pardon, though it did not have the benefit of a face-to-beak meeting with the president.
Obama said presidents have many awesome and solemn responsibilities, however “this is not one of them.”
The president was in a joking mood during the event, remarking that Thanksgiving “was a tough time to be a turkey,” and that the competition (featuring over 80 turkeys) to be selected for the pardon was “the real life Hunger Games.”
It’s commonly believed that the tradition dates back to the administration of President Harry S. Truman, however that’s not entirely accurate.
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While Truman did begin the tradition of a president being presented with a turkey from the National Turkey Federation, according to the Truman Presidential Library no evidence exists that Truman ever spared a turkey he received.
In 1963, then-President John F. Kennedy spared a Thanksgiving turkey just four days before his assassination. However, Kennedy did not invoke a pardon to do so — rather, he simply sent the undersized poultry back to the farm, remarking “Let’s just keep him.”
In 1987, President Ronald Reagan joked that he had pardoned a turkey that had earlier been sent to a petting zoo, as way to distract from the Iran-Contra affair and the question of whether Reagan would pardon Oliver North.
Reagan’s successor, George H. W. Bush, finally instituted the “turkey pardon” as an official tradition, which has remained ever since.
–With files from the Associated Press
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