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The following is one of my favorite thoughts on
the issue of immigration. It's from President Theodore Roosevelt in a letter to
the American Defense Society in 1919, 10 years after his presidency.
"In the first place we should insist that if the immigrant who comes here in
good faith becomes an American and assimilates himself to us, he shall be
treated on an exact equality with everyone else, for it is an outrage to
discriminate against any such man because of creed, or birthplace, or origin.
But this is predicated upon the man's becoming in very fact an American, and
nothing but an American...
There can be no divided allegiance here. Any man who says he is an American,
but something else also, isn't an American at all. We have room for but one
flag, the American flag, and this excludes the red flag, which symbolizes all
wars against liberty and civilization, just as much as it excludes any foreign
flag of a nation to which we are hostile...We have room for but one language
here, and that is the English language...and we have room for but one sole
loyalty and that is a loyalty to the American people."
--Theodore Roosevelt, 1919
Only two things are infinite, the universe and human stupidity, and I'm not
sure about the former.
- Albert Einstein
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