Proclamation 5641—Mother's Day, 1987

For more than 70 years, we Americans have set aside the second Sunday in May to honor our mothers and tell them of our love. No matter how often we express these tributes of the heart throughout the year, we choose to do so in a special way on Mother's Day.

That is because we know and can never forget all that our mothers have given us every day, year by year, in love and courage, in toil and sacrifice, in prayer and example, in faith and forgiveness. There is no love like a mother's—she who carries the child that God knits in the womb, she who nourishes and guides, she who teaches and inspires, she who gives of her heart and soul and self for the good and the happiness of her children and her family.

As mothers help give their families a stability rooted in love, steadfastness, devotion, and morality, they strengthen our communities and our Nation at the same time. Mother's Day is a wonderful time for each of us to give thanks for America's mothers and for all they mean and have meant to our country and our history. It is also a time to thank our own mothers; and whether we may do this in person still, or by loving memory, let us do it with all the love and thanks and prayer we possess.

In recognition of the contributions of mothers to their families and to our Nation, the Congress, by a joint resolution approved May 8, 1914 (38 Stat. 770), has designated the second Sunday in May each year as Mother's Day and requested the President to call for its appropriate observance.

Now, Therefore, I, Ronald Reagan, President of the United States of America, do hereby request that Sunday, May 10, 1987, be observed as Mother's Day. I urge all Americans to express their love and respect for their mothers and to reflect on the importance of motherhood to the well-being of our country. I direct government officials to display the flag of the United States on all Federal government buildings, and I urge all citizens to display the flag at their homes and other suitable places on that day.

In Witness Whereof, I have hereunto set my hand this twenty-eighth day of April, in the year of our Lord nineteen hundred and eighty-seven, and of the Independence of the United States of America the two hundred and eleventh.

RONALD REAGAN