San Fransanity: Independence Day Post: Happy Fourth of July!

Happy Independence Day to All!

"In the Year Of Our Lord"... Independence Day And Loyalty Day by James Fulford

Possibly because, as I write this, it is still only the Third of July, I couldn't find on the Obama White House website a presidential proclamation on the subject of Independence Day. However, in addition to various housekeeping proclamations, and more conventionally patriotic fare, I did find these proclamations on the first two pages:

You can make up your own jokes here. Kamehameha was the name of the first King of Hawaii, as well as of the last one, and the three in between—the Hawaiians weren't very inventive as far as names are concerned. This proclamation honors the first one:

"Two hundred years ago, King Kamehameha the Great brought the Hawaiian Islands together under a unified government. His courage and leadership earned him a legacy as the ‘Napoleon of the Pacific,’ and today his humanity is preserved in Ke Kanawai Mamalahoe, or ‘the Law of the Splintered Paddle.’ This law protects civilians in times of war and remains enshrined in Hawaii's constitution as ‘a unique and living symbol of the State's concern for public safety.’

“On this bicentennial King Kamehameha Day, we celebrate the history and heritage of the Aloha State, which has immeasurably enriched our national life and culture. The Hawaiian narrative is one of both profound triumph and, sadly, deep injustice. It is the story of Native Hawaiians oppressed by crippling disease, aborted treaties, and the eventual conquest of their sovereign kingdom. These grim milestones remind us of an unjust time in our history, as well as the many pitfalls in our Nation's long and difficult journey to perfect itself. Yet, through the peaks and valleys of our American story, Hawaii's steadfast sense of community and mutual support shows the progress that results when we are united in a spirit of limitless possibility." [link added.—JF]

Five minutes with Wikipedia will tell you that Kamehameha "brought the Hawaiian Islands together under a unified government" by the usual process of brutal conquest, not unmixed with treachery. The 1893 takeover by the US was much more civilized, but President Clinton insisted on apologizing for it in 1993. And apologies are still continuing under Obama, who was, we are assured, actually born in Hawaii.

But such apologies are typical of this administration. Obama did manage to proclaim Loyalty Day without apologizing for the Palmer Raids, the "Red Scare," or the Americanization campaigns of the early twentieth century:

Presidential Proclamation--Loyalty Day

However, in proclaiming Loyalty Day, Obama (or the speechwriter actually doing the writing) did manage to say, on the subject of the famous motto e pluribus unum, which represents the union of the Thirteen Colonies: "It became a cherished creed, representing the foundation of our national values. As a union of States and a Nation of immigrants from every part of the world…"

Aargh. I promise you, the Founders meant Massachusetts joining with Virginia, et cetera, not, for example, mass Hmong immigration.

If you've never heard of Loyalty Day, you might look back at an old Sam Francis column, from when Bush proclaimed Loyalty Day in 2003

"'Loyalty Day' is not new and has been proclaimed for at least the last two years as well, but I confess I'd never heard of it until now. For me as with most other Americans, every day is Loyalty Day, but then, given mass immigration and political leaders who see nothing wrong in dragging this country into war on behalf of other countries, maybe there's a need for it. "

Bush's proclamation was just as bad, and didn't impress Sam at all:

"'To be an American is not a matter of blood or birth,' the First Citizen gushed.’Our citizens are bound by ideals that represent the hope of all mankind. On Loyalty Day, we reaffirm our allegiance to our country and resolve to uphold the vision of our Forefathers.' Well, not quite."

Loyalty Day was an idea from the more confident and patriotic days of the 1930s and 1950s. Held on May 1st, it was intended to counterbalance the tendency of the wrong kind of immigrant to march on behalf of international communism on that day.

But yes, as Sam said, for most Americans every day is Loyalty Day, and so is every day Independence Day—in the sense that most Americans want their country to remain sovereign and independent.

But in the Obama administration, no day is ever really Loyalty Day, and no day is ever Independence Day—none of them are loyal to America as she is now, much less as she used to be, and none of them really want the United States to remain sovereign and independent.

Even so, the President's proclamations continue to be in the old form: "in the year of our Lord two thousand ten, and of the Independence of the United States of America the two hundred and thirty-fourth."

I keep expecting them to try and drop the words "in the year of our Lord".

And I hope that they never get to say "of the Independence of the United States of America the…last."

Obama Wrong - U.S. Not "A Nation of Immigrants" By Michelle Malkin

In his immigration speech on Thursday, President Obama heralded America as a "nation of immigrants" defined not by blood or birth, but by "fidelity to the shared values that we all hold so dear."

If only it were so. Left-wing academics and activists spurned assimilation as a common goal long ago. Their fidelity lies with bilingualism (a euphemism for native language maintenance over English-first instruction), identity politics, ethnic militancy and a borderless continent.

Obama blames "politics" for the intractable immigration debate. Whose politics? The amnesty mob has taken to ambushing congressional offices this week to scream at lawmakers to choose "reform" (giving a blanket path to citizenship to millions of illegal aliens) or "racism" (their description of any and every legislative measure to stiffen sanctions for and deter the acts of border-jumping, visa-overstaying and deportation-evading).

Is there no middle ground for all sides to agree that clearing naturalization application backlogs should take priority over expanding illegal alien benefits, or that tracking and deporting violent illegal alien criminals should take precedence over handing out driver's licenses to illegal aliens, or that streamlining the employee citizenship verification process for businesses (E-verify) and fixing outdated visa tracking databases should come before indiscriminately expanding temporary visa and guest worker programs?

Must every response to even the most modest of immigration enforcement measures be "RAAAAACIST"?

Further, as I've noted many times over the years when debating both Democrats and Republicans who fall back on empty phrases to justify putting the amnesty cart before the enforcement horse, we are not a "nation of immigrants." This is both a factual error and a warm-and-fuzzy non sequitur. Eighty-five percent of the residents currently in the United States were born here.

Yes, we are almost all descendants of immigrants. But we are not a "nation of immigrants." (And the Politically Correct president certainly wouldn't argue that Native American Indians, Native Alaskans, Native Hawaiians and descendants of black slaves "immigrated" here in any common sense of the word, would he?)

Even if we were a "nation of immigrants," it does not explain why we should be against sensible immigration control. The Founding Fathers were emphatically insistent on protecting the country against indiscriminate mass immigration. They insisted on assimilation as a pre-condition, not an afterthought. Historian John Fonte assembled their wisdom, and it bears repeating this Independence Day weekend:

George Washington, in a letter to John Adams, stated that immigrants should be absorbed into American life so that "by an intermixture with our people, they, or their descendants, get assimilated to our customs, measures, laws: in a word soon become one people."
In a 1790 speech to Congress on the naturalization of immigrants, James Madison stated that America should welcome the immigrant who could assimilate, but exclude the immigrant who could not readily "incorporate himself into our society."
Alexander Hamilton wrote in 1802: "The safety of a republic depends essentially on the energy of a common national sentiment; on a uniformity of principles and habits; on the exemption of the citizens from foreign bias and prejudice; and on that love of country which will almost invariably be found to be closely connected with birth, education and family."
Hamilton further warned that "The United States have already felt the evils of incorporating a large number of foreigners into their national mass; by promoting in different classes different predilections in favor of particular foreign nations, and antipathies against others, it has served very much to divide the community and to distract our councils. It has been often likely to compromise the interests of our own country in favor of another. The permanent effect of such a policy will be, that in times of great public danger there will be always a numerous body of men, of whom there may be just grounds of distrust;—the suspicion alone will weaken the strength of the nation, but their force may be actually employed in assisting an invader."
The survival of the American republic, Hamilton maintained, depends upon "the preservation of a national spirit and a national character." "To admit foreigners indiscriminately to the rights of citizens the moment they put foot in our country would be nothing less than to admit the Grecian horse into the citadel of our liberty and sovereignty."

As pro-amnesty extremists moan that "we didn't cross the borders, the borders crossed us" and illegal alien marchers haul foreign flags above Old Glory, President Obama pretends that the "common national sentiment" our Founding Fathers embraced still binds us all together.

Many of us still have faith in a strong, sovereign America—the unhyphenated, the law-abiding, the gratitude-filled sons and daughters and grandchildren of legal immigrants for whom such distinctions still matter.

But it's no thanks to the assimilation saboteurs who put "one world" over "one nation under God."