A century ago, Khalil Gibran wrote a love poem to Lebanon, 'You have your Lebanon, I have my Lebanon.' He spoke of his affection for the Lebanese people’s generosity and hospitality and Lebanon’s beauty in contrast to its bickering politicians who sought only their own aggrandizement. I saw in this poem parallels between the contradictions at play in Lebanon and those in my country, the United States of America.
Today, many Americans are living in fear and despair, watching their president, seemingly unchecked, tearing down some of democracy’s foundations and gutting essential social and economic programs. They ask: “How could this be happening?” and “Can our country survive this onslaught?”
But while some have felt hopeless, others are driven to respond. A week ago, seven million Americans took to the streets in 2,700 cities and towns to demonstrate their resolve to save America’s democracy and arrest the drift toward authoritarianism.
It is a reminder that two Americas have always defined our history: one pushing to restrict democratic freedoms and the other working to expand them.
America was born with the original sins of genocide against native peoples, the forced enslavement of Africans, and the annexation and subjugation of Spanish-speaking peoples of the Southwest. As the country grew and attracted immigrants, these newcomers— Irish, Italians, Central Europeans, Jews, or Arabs—were often met with discrimination, repression, and even violence.
This, however, was only one part of America’s story. For every racist, segregationist, anti-immigrant bigot, there were abolitionists who fought slavery, and organized movements that championed immigrants, labor, and civil rights for Blacks, Latinos, and Native peoples. For every xenophobe like Fr. Coughlin or Pat Buchanan, or segregationist like Bull Connor or George Wallace, there was a Martin Luther King, Caesar Chavez, and Jesse Jackson. Despite persistent bigotry and waves of recurring anti-immigrant bigotry, what remains are the core of Dr. King’s “I have a dream” speech and the spirit of the Statue of Liberty’s words welcoming the “tired and poor, yearning to be free.”
This is my family’s story. While my father’s mother and siblings immigrated to America after World War I, he was delayed and then unable to secure a visa because Congress determined that there were too many immigrants from the Mediterranean region. Eager to reunite with his family, he got a job on a ship sailing to Canada and then crossed into the US without documents in 1923. He received amnesty in the 1930s and became a citizen in 1943.
Four decades later, as a deputy campaign manager for Jesse Jackson’s presidential campaign, I had the opportunity to place his name in nomination at the 1984 Democratic Convention. Reflecting on my personal history and the broader American story, I noted: “I am the son of an illegal immigrant who is nominating for president the great grandson of a slave. Nowhere but America could this happen.”
These two Americas are always with us—and we must never forget either one. If we forget the threats to freedom, we let down our guard and become vulnerable to assaults when they come. But if we forget America’s promise and the heroes and movements who in every generation have fought and won, then we lose hope and fail to meet the challenges before us.
To those who despair that what’s happening today is” un-American,” efforts to gut voting rights, curtail immigration, use of military force to violently expel migrants and threaten freedom of speech and assembly, we must respond: We've been here before, risen up to confront these threats to liberty, and won.
In just my lifetime, we have witnessed other dark periods: the hysteria and repression of the McCarthy era’s manufactured anti-Communism scare; the racism and violence that followed the civil rights movement; the assassinations of John and Robert Kennedy and Dr. King; the deeply polarizing Vietnam war; the national trauma of 9/11 and the anti-Arab and anti-Muslim hate crimes and government repression that followed; and the disastrous failed wars against Afghanistan and Iraq. Each time, we rose to meet these challenges.
Given our history, I feel confident that in the face of today’s xenophobia, racism, repression, and hate, we will rise again. Like Gibran, we will assert: “You have your America, I have my America.”
A century ago, Khalil Gibran wrote a love poem to Lebanon, 'You have your Lebanon, I have my Lebanon.' He spoke of his affection for the Lebanese people’s generosity and hospitality and Lebanon’s beauty in contrast to its bickering politicians who sought only their own aggrandizement. I saw in this poem parallels between the contradictions at play in Lebanon and those in my country, the United States of America.
Today, many Americans are living in fear and despair, watching their president, seemingly unchecked, tearing down some of democracy’s foundations and gutting essential social and economic programs. They ask: “How could this be happening?” and “Can our country survive this onslaught?”
But while some have felt hopeless, others are driven to respond. A week ago, seven million Americans took to the streets in 2,700 cities and towns to demonstrate their resolve to save America’s democracy and arrest the drift toward authoritarianism.
It is a reminder that two Americas have always defined our history: one pushing to restrict democratic freedoms and the other working to expand them.
America was born with the original sins of genocide against native peoples, the forced enslavement of Africans, and the annexation and subjugation of Spanish-speaking peoples of the Southwest. As the country grew and attracted immigrants, these newcomers— Irish, Italians, Central Europeans, Jews, or Arabs—were often met with discrimination, repression, and even violence.
This, however, was only one part of America’s story. For every racist, segregationist, anti-immigrant bigot, there were abolitionists who fought slavery, and organized movements that championed immigrants, labor, and civil rights for Blacks, Latinos, and Native peoples. For every xenophobe like Fr. Coughlin or Pat Buchanan, or segregationist like Bull Connor or George Wallace, there was a Martin Luther King, Caesar Chavez, and Jesse Jackson. Despite persistent bigotry and waves of recurring anti-immigrant bigotry, what remains are the core of Dr. King’s “I have a dream” speech and the spirit of the Statue of Liberty’s words welcoming the “tired and poor, yearning to be free.”
This is my family’s story. While my father’s mother and siblings immigrated to America after World War I, he was delayed and then unable to secure a visa because Congress determined that there were too many immigrants from the Mediterranean region. Eager to reunite with his family, he got a job on a ship sailing to Canada and then crossed into the US without documents in 1923. He received amnesty in the 1930s and became a citizen in 1943.
Four decades later, as a deputy campaign manager for Jesse Jackson’s presidential campaign, I had the opportunity to place his name in nomination at the 1984 Democratic Convention. Reflecting on my personal history and the broader American story, I noted: “I am the son of an illegal immigrant who is nominating for president the great grandson of a slave. Nowhere but America could this happen.”
These two Americas are always with us—and we must never forget either one. If we forget the threats to freedom, we let down our guard and become vulnerable to assaults when they come. But if we forget America’s promise and the heroes and movements who in every generation have fought and won, then we lose hope and fail to meet the challenges before us.
To those who despair that what’s happening today is” un-American,” efforts to gut voting rights, curtail immigration, use of military force to violently expel migrants and threaten freedom of speech and assembly, we must respond: We've been here before, risen up to confront these threats to liberty, and won.
In just my lifetime, we have witnessed other dark periods: the hysteria and repression of the McCarthy era’s manufactured anti-Communism scare; the racism and violence that followed the civil rights movement; the assassinations of John and Robert Kennedy and Dr. King; the deeply polarizing Vietnam war; the national trauma of 9/11 and the anti-Arab and anti-Muslim hate crimes and government repression that followed; and the disastrous failed wars against Afghanistan and Iraq. Each time, we rose to meet these challenges.
Given our history, I feel confident that in the face of today’s xenophobia, racism, repression, and hate, we will rise again. Like Gibran, we will assert: “You have your America, I have my America.”
A century ago, Khalil Gibran wrote a love poem to Lebanon, 'You have your Lebanon, I have my Lebanon.' He spoke of his affection for the Lebanese people’s generosity and hospitality and Lebanon’s beauty in contrast to its bickering politicians who sought only their own aggrandizement. I saw in this poem parallels between the contradictions at play in Lebanon and those in my country, the United States of America.
Today, many Americans are living in fear and despair, watching their president, seemingly unchecked, tearing down some of democracy’s foundations and gutting essential social and economic programs. They ask: “How could this be happening?” and “Can our country survive this onslaught?”
But while some have felt hopeless, others are driven to respond. A week ago, seven million Americans took to the streets in 2,700 cities and towns to demonstrate their resolve to save America’s democracy and arrest the drift toward authoritarianism.
It is a reminder that two Americas have always defined our history: one pushing to restrict democratic freedoms and the other working to expand them.
America was born with the original sins of genocide against native peoples, the forced enslavement of Africans, and the annexation and subjugation of Spanish-speaking peoples of the Southwest. As the country grew and attracted immigrants, these newcomers— Irish, Italians, Central Europeans, Jews, or Arabs—were often met with discrimination, repression, and even violence.
This, however, was only one part of America’s story. For every racist, segregationist, anti-immigrant bigot, there were abolitionists who fought slavery, and organized movements that championed immigrants, labor, and civil rights for Blacks, Latinos, and Native peoples. For every xenophobe like Fr. Coughlin or Pat Buchanan, or segregationist like Bull Connor or George Wallace, there was a Martin Luther King, Caesar Chavez, and Jesse Jackson. Despite persistent bigotry and waves of recurring anti-immigrant bigotry, what remains are the core of Dr. King’s “I have a dream” speech and the spirit of the Statue of Liberty’s words welcoming the “tired and poor, yearning to be free.”
This is my family’s story. While my father’s mother and siblings immigrated to America after World War I, he was delayed and then unable to secure a visa because Congress determined that there were too many immigrants from the Mediterranean region. Eager to reunite with his family, he got a job on a ship sailing to Canada and then crossed into the US without documents in 1923. He received amnesty in the 1930s and became a citizen in 1943.
Four decades later, as a deputy campaign manager for Jesse Jackson’s presidential campaign, I had the opportunity to place his name in nomination at the 1984 Democratic Convention. Reflecting on my personal history and the broader American story, I noted: “I am the son of an illegal immigrant who is nominating for president the great grandson of a slave. Nowhere but America could this happen.”
These two Americas are always with us—and we must never forget either one. If we forget the threats to freedom, we let down our guard and become vulnerable to assaults when they come. But if we forget America’s promise and the heroes and movements who in every generation have fought and won, then we lose hope and fail to meet the challenges before us.
To those who despair that what’s happening today is” un-American,” efforts to gut voting rights, curtail immigration, use of military force to violently expel migrants and threaten freedom of speech and assembly, we must respond: We've been here before, risen up to confront these threats to liberty, and won.
In just my lifetime, we have witnessed other dark periods: the hysteria and repression of the McCarthy era’s manufactured anti-Communism scare; the racism and violence that followed the civil rights movement; the assassinations of John and Robert Kennedy and Dr. King; the deeply polarizing Vietnam war; the national trauma of 9/11 and the anti-Arab and anti-Muslim hate crimes and government repression that followed; and the disastrous failed wars against Afghanistan and Iraq. Each time, we rose to meet these challenges.
Given our history, I feel confident that in the face of today’s xenophobia, racism, repression, and hate, we will rise again. Like Gibran, we will assert: “You have your America, I have my America.”
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