lenged. In the countries from which many new citizens came, individual freedom has been utterly destroyed. Despotism and tyranny have again asserted themselves to an extent which a few years ago we would have thought impossible. We who still enjoy freedom and have faith in righteousness stand appalled that so many people can be drawn to the support of government which is so ruthless of private rights, so inconsiderate of moral principles, which makes a strategy of terror, a science of cruelty, and an art of deception.

It is absolutely necessary for us to understand the issue before the world today, if we are to save our sacred rights and hand them on to those who succeed us. All that makes life worth while to free men is at stake. It is not mere strife between individual leaders or separate nations. It is a head-on collision between two different conceptions of social organization. The issue is despotism or democracy.

When we mention democracy we do not mean so much the form of government as an attitude toward life. And that attitude is primarily religious. The democratic way of life recognizes that something in man is divine; and therefore that man is sacred to man, and that all men are equal before the law. It recognizes that because man is a social being he must have government, but it believes, however, that the law which should govern is found not in the will of a dictator, but in the common reason and conscience of men.

Americanism is not based upon place, nor race, nor language, nor sect― it is a way of life, the democratic way. It cannot prevail against the organized force and propaganda that assail it unless those who enjoy its benefits have a burning enthusiasm for it, unless those who believe in it are willing to be evangels, patriots, and, if necessary, martyrs. Such patriotism will unify our diverse elements and enable us to present a united front to the regimented forces that challenge us. We must discard our apathy and cynicism. The inspiration of our forebears for liberty and freedom must move us as it moved them.

To acquire your citizenship you have taken an oath of allegiance. You have sworn that you will support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, both foreign and domestic. What you as new citizens have promised to do, it is certainly encumbent upon all citizens to do. New citizens would surely not be expected to do more than those citizens who have lived longer in the noble tradition of our Constitution. For our own benefit and the benefit of this Nation and all the world there is nothing better that we can do. In defending our Constitution, we defend the democratic way of life.

SUGGESTED ADDRESS TO NEW CITIZENS BY A NATURALIZED

CITIZEN 3

EVA LIPS

It is not for my own sake-for I had become an American in Washington years ago but for the sake of future citizens and future "final hearings" that I wish to suggest a few words a future judge might say to those eager to receive the sacred inspiration. Not presumptuousness, prompts me to do so, but the love for my country and the love for those men and women who have served, as I did, seven full years for the privilege of becoming Americans and who appear at the final hearing like chastened souls entering Paradise after a long stay in Purgatory.

Fellow Americans!

Let the judge, who has found your applications righteous and your eager. ness to achieve American citizenship genuine, be the first to congratulate you on this great day in your lives. The family of one hundred and thirtytwo million whom you have shunned no obstacle to join welcomes you as their own. This day to which you have looked forward for so long is indeed one of overwhelming importance.

It was not you but fate that chose for you the day and the place of your birth. But it is you alone who have proudly and independently decided that you wished to spend your present and your future lives in the community of this mightiest nation on earth, whose very existence is built upon the immortal ideal of democracy.

From this day on, the far-away countries which you once knew have sunk into the oceans surrounding our continent. America does not ask you any longer: "Where do you come from?" But rather takes you into her arms with the question: "Will you be a good fellow citizen?" Whether you originate from ancient Persia, whether from the West Indies, from England, or from one of the unhappy nations of the European continent who are tortured by hatred and jealousy—your country does not care. We all, even the ancestors of Washington, the Father of our Nation, once came from somewhere else, voluntarily, proudly, and with the resolution to be free and to stay free.

The United States offers you so much that you will have little reason to look back upon a life which lies behind you like the outgrown clothes of your childhood. The time of narrowness is over. The wealth and the resources of your country are immeasurable. Did you not even cover the area of our one state of Texas? is seventeen times larger than Germany? That all Italy comprises merely about three-quarters of the size of California?

Excerpts from REBIRTH IN LIBERTY. New York. 1942.

know that France does That the United States

Our nation does not consist of one or three or ten states like these, but of forty-eight! And they are not fighting each other as are the diminutive states of Europe. They are united! Do you realize what that word means? Do you understand the greatness of our government which rules, in independence and in peace, these free and happy states; that it is a government of the people, by the people, for the people which grants to you Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Happiness? No other government on earth includes human happiness in its fundamental principles.

This happiness is now yours. Remember the men who have fought for it in your behalf. Realize the responsibility of being free!

I know you are proud as I am to be fully recognized children of the mightiest nation on earth. You are ready as I am, I see it in your scintallating eyes, to defend the soil and the ideals of this our nation with all you possess. In a world torn by hatred, in a world of destruction, our country, our hemisphere are God's reservoir of construction. But greater than the immensity of our soil is the greatness of our ideals-ideals which have brought you here. Whoever dares to challenge these ideals will perish under our united reaction.

Pray to your God that He make you worthy of this citizenship. Wherever His Heaven may be, whatever the shape of the Paradise you believe in— you are free to worship in liberty on the soil of America.

During the many years of your American lives, you have been reborn into a new, better form of existence. You have learned a new language; new customs, new holidays have become yours. You have learned to celebrate Thanksgiving with an American turkey on your table; you understand now the meaning of our Fourth of July. Whenever you are in despair or grief, the image of Abraham Lincoln who died in the service of this your country will strengthen you, because it is he who helped build our "new nation, conceived in liberty"; it is he who symbolizes your and my America. THE MEANING OF AMERICA FOR ITALIAN-AMERICANS +

UGO CARUSI, Former Commissioner, Immigration and Naturalization Service

The hands that built America belonged to people of more than sixty nationalities. They were working hands and artistic hands. The minds that moved those hands had one great idea in common: Democracy and all the decent principles of life for which Democracy stands.

Let no one make you believe that we of Italian origin or ancestry are a group separated from other Americans. We, definitely, are not. We are part of this land. We constitute the largest foreign-born group in this country. We are proud of that fact, for it means that we can do more for

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* Excerpts from a radio address delivered at Cleveland, Ohio.

the United States. As much as we love the soil from which we sprang― what human being does not bear a natural love for his native soil-we love this country, where we have transplanted our roots, above all. Here is our present and our future. Here our family trees have grown and prospered. Some of those trees have borne valuable fruit. In the field of American culture, we are contributing immeasurably to this country of ours, just as in other days we have contributed a great deal to its material development with the work of our hands and our building skills. Our immigrants helped develop this nation into the richest on earth, rich in material wealth and rich in humanitarianism.

They brought color and variety to this country, and our culture began to blossom with the nourishment of old-world contributions. The process is still going on, and those who understand its workings are rightly proud of the results it has produced and of the tremendous possibilities still ahead. A well-known student of immigrant groups has stated that in the very diversified character of our population lies the hope for a great universal culture. He points out that we should encourage our various nationality groups to preserve the cultural traits that distinguish them from other groups and he suggests as a motto "Let's make America safe for differences." What he means, of course, is let us take advantage of the contributions our foreign-born groups bring to this Nation. Let us not stifle them, for they represent a rich heritage that has taken many centuries of history to accumulate.

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our

Another student of America, now an official in the State Department, has put this idea in another way. In a recent article he wrote: American ideal should be expressed not in terms of a 'melting pot' with its somewhat mournful implication of uniformity, but rather in terms of an orchestra, in which each racial group, like an orchestral choir, contributes its special, different tone to the rich ensemble of the whole."

Some of you may say: That is a pretty idea, but how about those Americans who don't see America that way, who think that their kind should constitute the entire orchestra. There are those people in this country, it is true. They represent prejudices that do not fit in with the American way of life. They are the people who still do not know what true Americanism means, and I am glad to say that they are a small— though noisy-minority.

Most of us came to this country for more bread or more liberty. Some had the thought that some day they would return to their homeland. Only a few ever went back. Most of us developed a lasting love for this adopted land. We probably all have different explanations for our love. Some of us love it because we have established our homes here; some because our children were born here and had opportunities for advancement they would never have had in any other land.

One American of Italian origin said he loved America because he could go from Boston to Brooklyn without anyone asking him why he wanted to make the trip and how long he was going to stay. Offhand this might seem to be a small reason, but this man had breathed the foul air of oppression and the freedom of travel was something fine and precious to him. Another, who had also lived under a dictatorship, said he loved America because here he could say what he liked without having to look over his shoulder to see if anyone was listening. A third, whose mother had recently died in an American city, said that when you bury someone you love in this country's soil you yourself belong to that soil forever.

These are a few, simple, homely illustrations, it is true, but they can be multiplied by the hundreds, and all together they reflect the force which has drawn millions to these shores, has instilled in their hearts a love for America which no power can remove, and has made them proudly say, "This is my home."

ADDRESS TO NEW CITIZENS 5

FRANCIS J. WILCOX

The preamble of the Declaration of Independence sets forth in language, which cannot be improved upon, the essential religious basis for our government. "We hold these truths to be self-evident; that all men are created equal and endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights and that among these are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness." This phrase is basically a religious principle for it presupposes the creation of man by a Supreme Being. It presupposes this Supreme Being gave to each indi vidual certain rights which are above the power of man or government to interfere with. It gives the only sound reason for the sanctity of liberty or freedom and that is that the individual has a spiritual background and a spiritual quality which makes him and his individual dignity more important than any expediency or efficiency which might be produced by the interference with liberty. Without this religious concept, it is all too easy to accept the pragmatic test of the modern-day search for efficiency and it is all too easy to surrender temporarily or permanently such individual dignity for the purpose of achieving this efficiency, but if man clings to the importance of the principle laid down by the founding fathers of our country, one realizes that the search for efficiency is not paramount to the sanctity of freedom and one's heart responds with clarity and force to the appeal of the individual dignity of man.

Excerpt from the remarks on the occasion of Citizenship Day, Eau Claire, Wisc., May 18, 1940.