[1] The amendment reduced the presidential transition and the "lame duck" period, by which members of Congress and the president serve the remainder of their terms after an election.
In September 1788, after the necessary nine states had ratified the Constitution, the Congress of the Confederation set March 4, 1789, as the date "for commencing proceedings" of the newly reorganized government.
The result of these scheduling decisions was that there was a long, four-month lame duck period between the election and inauguration of the new president.
Because Article I, Section 4, Clause 2 mandated a Congressional meeting every December, after the election but before Congressional terms of office had expired, a lame-duck session was required by the Constitution in even-numbered years; the next session was not required until the next December, meaning new members of Congress might not begin their work until more than a year after they had been elected.
[5] The long lame-duck period might have been a practical necessity at the end of the 18th century, when any newly elected official might require several months to put his affairs in order and then undertake an arduous journey from his home to the national capital, but it eventually had the effect of impeding the functioning of government in the modern age.
From the early 19th century, it also meant a lame-duck Congress and presidential administration would fail to adequately respond to a significant national crisis in a timely manner.
Under the Constitution at the time, these presidents had to wait four months before they and the incoming Congresses could deal with the secession of Southern states and the Great Depression respectively.
The change superseded the Twelfth Amendment's reference to March 4 as the date by which the House of Representatives must—under circumstances where no candidate won an absolute majority of votes for president in the Electoral College—conduct a contingent presidential election.
[10] Section 1 also specifies noon January 3 as the start and end of the terms of members of the Senate and the House of Representatives; the previous date had also been March 4.
[11] Section 2 moves the yearly start date of congressional sessions from the first Monday in December, as mandated by Article I, Section 4, Clause 2, to noon on January 3 of the same year, though Congress still can by law set another date and the president can summon special sessions.
[14][17] On February 15, 1933, 23 days after the amendment was adopted, President-elect Roosevelt was the target of an assassination attempt by Giuseppe Zangara.
While Roosevelt was not injured, had the attempt been successful, then vice president-elect John Nance Garner would have become president on March 4, 1933, pursuant to Section 3.