One of America's Newest Americans

Yesterday, June 25th, 2003, I was sworn in as an American citizen. I have held a US green card since 1989 and I started the process to become a citizen last September. It feels great to finally become a full fledged, Red, White and Blue US citizen.

"I hereby declare, on oath, that I absolutely and entirely renounce and abjure all allegiance and fidelity to any foreign prince, potentate, state or sovereignty, of whom or which I have heretofore been a subject or citizen; that I will support and defend the Constitution and laws of the United States of America against all enemies, foreign and domestic; that I will bear true faith and allegiance to the same; that I will bear arms on behalf of the United States when required by the law; that I will perform noncombatant service in the armed forces of the United States when required by the law; that I will perform work of national importance under civilian direction when required by the law; and that I take this obligation freely without any mental reservation or purpose of evasion; so help me God."

I gladly renounced my former Canadian citizenship and am grateful to become a citizen of the greatest country on earth!!

I Pledge Allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the Republic for which it stands, one Nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.

My wife (natural born in the US) and I have been living in Hawaii for the last 8 1/2 years running our own small family business. I am excited about the prospects of participating in upcoming elections for the first time. It drove me crazy during the Clinton years not to be able to cast my vote against him.

Welcome. I thought you might enjoy this, since I doubt you heard anything like it at your own naturalization ceremony.

In 1944, an "I Am an American Day" ceremony was held in Central Park among the attendees of which were a large number of new citizens. They were addressed by Judge Learned Hand of the Second Circuit Court of Appeals:

"We have gathered here to affirm a faith, a faith in a common purpose, a common conviction, a common devotion. Some of us have chosen America as the land of our adoption; the rest have come from those who did the same. For this reason we have some right to consider ourselves a picked group, a group of those who had the courage to break from the past and brave the dangers and the loneliness of a strange land.

"What was the object that nerved us, or those who went before us, to this choice? We sought liberty; freedom from oppression, freedom from want, freedom to be ourselves. This we then sought; this we now believe that we are by way of winning.

"What do we mean when we say that first of all we seek liberty? I often wonder whether we do not rest our hopes too much upon constitutions, upon laws and upon courts. These are false hopes; believe me, these are false hopes. Liberty lies in the hearts of men and women; when it dies there, no constitution, no law, no court can even do much to help it. While it lies there it needs no constitution, no law, no court to save it.

"And what is this liberty which must lie in the hearts of men and women? It is not the ruthless, the unbridled will; it is not freedom to do as one likes. That is the denial of liberty, and leads straight to its overthrow. A society in which men recognize no check upon their freedom soon becomes a society where freedom is the possession of only a savage few; as we have learned to our sorrow.

"What then is the spirit of liberty? I cannot define it; I can only tell you my own faith. The spirit of liberty is the spirit which is not too sure that it is right; the spirit of liberty is the spirit which seeks to understand the mind of other men and women; the spirit of liberty is the spirit which weighs their interests alongside its own without bias; the spirit of liberty remembers that not even a sparrow falls to earth unheeded; the spirit of liberty is the spirit of Him who, near two thousand years ago, taught mankind that lesson it has never learned but never quite forgotten; that there may be a kingdom where the least shall be heard and considered side by side with the greatest.

"And now in that spirit, that spirit of an America which has never been, and which may never be; nay, which never will be except as the conscience and courage of Americans create it; yet in the spirit of that America which lies hidden in some form in the aspirations of us all; in the spirit of that America for which our young men are at this moment fighting and dying; in that spirit of liberty and of America I ask you to rise and with me pledge our faith in the glorious destiny of our beloved country."

Again, welcome.

Welcome to the gang Justice:

I have you beat by a few years. Sadly my vote was not enough to prevent the Zipper from becoming President. Perhaps if you and I combine our votes we can prevent Hitlery from becoming Fuhrer. Unless of course Karl Rove convinces W to grant citizenship to the 80 million illegal Mexicans living in this country. In which case, of course, we're screwed.

I have a cousin in Thunder Bay, Ontario whom I am trying to convince to immigrate to no avail. Oh well, it only proves that brains is not genetic.

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