February 4, 1789

1788–89 United States presidential election

Presidential electors unanimously cast ballots for George Washington

The first Electoral College never met as a college: 69 electors voted in separate state meetings, and the country could not know the official result for two more months.

4 February 1789: ten states, ten meetings

On 4 February 1789 — the date fixed by the Confederation Congress's election ordinance — presidential electors met separately in ten participating states and cast their ballots under the original Article II system. There was no single national assembly.

Every elector who voted included George Washington on one of his two undifferentiated ballots, giving him 69 electoral votes out of 138 cast.

How Adams became vice president

Under the pre-Twelfth Amendment rules, electors did not mark separate ballots for president and vice president. Each cast two votes for persons, and the runner-up took the second office.

John Adams received 34 votes — the second-highest total — and so became vice president without anyone having voted for him for that office.

What “unanimous” conceals

Washington won every elector who actually voted, but New York failed to appoint its eight allotted electors, and three selected electors elsewhere — two in Maryland and one in Virginia — did not vote. North Carolina and Rhode Island had not ratified the Constitution and sent no electors at all.

Nor was the result confirmed that day. The sealed state returns travelled to New York, and the House and Senate did not officially count them until they met jointly on 6 April 1789.

Sources

Researched 23 Aug 2026 6 sources 3 audit passes

How this was checked

Researched from the web into a fact sheet, rewritten from that sheet, then audited against it by a different model. How the pipeline works →

What the sources leave uncertain

Calling Washington 'elected' on 4 February is conventional and defensible because that is when the electors voted, but no single national body met that day and the separate state results were not officially opened, counted, or declared until 6 April.
The election is often labeled the election of 1788–1789 because selection of electors began in December 1788 and continued in January 1789; the presidential electoral ballots themselves were cast on 4 February 1789.
'Unanimous' means every elector who actually voted cast one of his two ballots for Washington. It does not mean every authorized electoral position was filled or that all eligible citizens voted for him.