"Give me your tired, your poor,Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,
The wretched refuse of your teeming shore.
Send these, the homeless, tempest-tost to me,
I lift my lamp beside the golden door!"
When Emma Lazarus penned these words, she pointed to the real hunger that America itself longed to fill in the hearts of those who would call her home: Freedom.
Wealth, glory and power are not her legacy. Even when America was the land of nobodies, before she attained a global footing, she was storied for her singular aspiration: Freedom.
Millions pressed her borders, not because America promised them a life free of failure, hardship or suffering. They came in answer to her solitary promise: Freedom.
They came because America said,
“We hold these truths to be self evident:
that all men are created equal;
that they are endowed by their Creator
with certain inalienable rights;
that among these are
life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness”
If America forgets this, if her citizens trade this legacy for a pot of porridge, then the journey will have been in vain.
I have received few gifts in my life that are greater in their significance and value than the right to reside within the United States of America.
I offer this post in the hope that America will never forget
who she is, and what she has meant to the rest of the world.
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