On November 11, 1889, President Benjamin Harrison issued the proclamation admitting Washington into the Union as the forty-second state. The milestone followed the Enabling Act of February 22, 1889, which authorized Washington, Montana, North Dakota, and South Dakota to draft constitutions and establish state governments as steps toward admission. Washington’s proclamation completed the admission process for the territory that autumn.
Washington’s territorial history had begun in 1853, when Congress separated it from Oregon Territory. Local advocates had favored the name “Columbia,” but Representative Richard H. Stanton proposed “Washington,” honoring the first president, to avoid confusion with the District of Columbia—an explanation that carried an enduring irony of its own.
The final steps toward statehood came during the summer and fall of 1889. Seventy-five delegates met in Olympia from July 4 through August 22 to frame a constitution. On October 1, voters approved it by 40,152 votes to 11,879 and elected the new state’s officers, including its first governor, Elisha P. Ferry. Harrison’s proclamation followed on November 11, formally completing Washington’s admission to the Union.
The public celebration came a week later. On November 18, Ferry and the other newly elected state officers were inaugurated in Olympia, marking the installation of Washington’s state government. For an account illustrated with photographs of Ferry’s inauguration, that ceremony provides a fitting closing scene: the public observance of a transition legally completed seven days earlier.
