HOLIDAY. A religious festival; a day set apart for commemorating some important event in history ; a day for exemption from labor. Webster, Diet (Webster applies holyday especially to a religious, holiday to a secular festival.) In England they are either by act of legislation, or by ancient usage, and are now regulated by the Bank Holiday Act of 1871, extended by, the act 38 Viet. c. 13. Fasts and thanksgiving days are also occasionally appointed by the crown. See Wharton, Diet.; 2 Burn. Eccl. Law 308.
In the dark ages, the church repressed the blood-feuds during certain seasons. These were "holy days" (holidays) in which the avenger of blood could not challenge the ac cused to battle. Jenks, Hist. E. L. 157.
In the United States there are no estab lished holidays of a •religious character hav ing a legal status without legislation, and the lack of precision in the earlier statutes on the subject has given rise to much confu sion and a great variety of definition. It has been said that a legal holiday is, em vi termini, dies non juridicus; Lampe v. Man ning, 38 Wis. 673; but this case does not warrant so broad a statement; 29 Am. L. Reg. 139. One thing which seems to be ab solutely settled is that a legal holiday does not have the legal relations of Sunday, which was clothed with the idea of sanctity and is in its very nature dies non juridicus. Legal holidays are, however, merely the cre ation of statute law, and the lack of uni formity in the statutes of the several states makes the term itself very difficult of exact definition. The various definitions of the term holiday are collected in an article on the subject in 29 Am. L. Reg. 137, the writer of which thus states the conclusion reached after a critical examination of them : "Legal holidays as distinguished from the first day of the week are those days which are set apart by statute or by executive authority for fasting and prayer, or those given over to religious observance and amusements, or for political, moral or social, duties or anni versaries, or merely for popular recreation and amusement under such penalties and prohibitions alone as are expressed in posi tive legislative enactments."
The earlier statutes had for their object, mainly, the regulation of commercial paper falling due on days which were by general consent observed as holidays. Under such statutes it is simply provided that such pa per payable upon the day named shall be due and payable on the day before or the day after. The difference in the statute law of several states as to this point is stated infra. As in the statutes, the day is specified and they are construed with exactness, there is little in the way of decision on this subject. It has been held that usage at a bank known to the parties to a note is sufficient tb make a holiday such as to change the day for de manding payment, at least so far as to au thorize a tender by the endorser on the fol lowing day ; President of City Bank v. Cut ter, 3 Pick. (Mass.) 414. In most of the states it is the rule, and such is the general commercial usage, to allow only two days of grace where the third would fall on a holiday, and to authorize demand of payment and protest on the day next preceding it. The question when a note falling due on a legal holiday which happens to be Sunday is legally payable is to be determined as in the case of any other note falling due on Sunday. This is sp by general usage without special provision by statute. In New Jersey a note falling due on the 30th of. May, Deco ration Day, when Sunday, cannot be present ed and protested for nonpayment until the following Tuesday ; Hagerty v. Engle, 43 N. J. L. 299. Where paper is drawn without grace, payment may not be demanded until the next day ; Commercial Bank of Kentucky v. Varnum, 49 N. Y. 269; as in the case with respect to Sunday ; Salter v. Burt, 20 Wend. (N. Y.) 205, 32 Am. Dec. 530; Avery v. Stew art, 2 Conn. 69, 7 Am? Dec. 240.