From the archives, 1924: Labor paper reports Armistice Day was not a federal holiday

On Nov. 14, 1924, the Twin City Review, a Champaign labor weekly, reported on its front page that Comptroller General McCarl had given President Coolidge an opinion that Armistice Day was not a holiday. The paper said the ruling came just in time to dash government employees' hopes of a day off. McCarl's view was that only Congress could make Armistice Day a holiday and that a president lacked the power to do so. Hundreds of government clerks had hoped department heads would let them off, the paper said. It argued that the day, which marked an era of change in the world's governments, deserved a place among the nation's holidays.

Source: Twin City Review, Nov. 14, 1924, page 1, Library of Congress