President Biden declared Thursday as a national day of mourning for Jimmy Carter.Credit…Dustin Chambers for The New York Times

When Jimmy Carter died on Dec. 29, President Biden declared that this Thursday would be observed as a national day of mourning. He called on Americans to “assemble on that day in their respective places of worship, there to pay homage to the memory” of Mr. Carter.

Mr. Biden also order that executive departments and agencies be closed for the day, with some exceptions, including for national security. The Postal Service has suspended mail delivery and closed post offices, and the New York Stock Exchange and Nasdaq will also be closed on Thursday.

The most recent national day of mourning for a president was in December 2018, after the death of George H.W. Bush. The custom has a long history. The government shut down on June 1, 1865, for a day of “humiliation and mourning,” six weeks after Abraham Lincoln was shot and killed. Citizens were asked to assemble in “their respective places of worship” to remember the fallen president.

Presidents who died in office after Lincoln were also honored, including James Garfield and Franklin Roosevelt. Lyndon Johnson’s first presidential proclamation announced a day of mourning for John F. Kennedy, three days after Kennedy was assassinated in 1963.

In more recent times, comparatively routine deaths of former presidents have also been marked by a day of mourning, including for Dwight Eisenhower in 1969, Harry S. Truman in 1972, Johnson in 1973 and Richard Nixon in 1994. Ronald Reagan was honored in 2004 and Gerald Ford in 2007.

Other notable figures have been commemorated with a day of mourning. The Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. and Robert F. Kennedy were each honored after being assassinated in 1968.