E. Ralph Hostetter
Tuesday Oct. 2, 2001

Was not our symbol of freedom the Statue of Liberty, placed at the entrance to the Port of New York in the latter part of the 19th century?

Standing quietly, "cries she with silent lips, 'Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses yearning to breathe free ... I lift my light beside the golden door.' "

And they came by the millions, mainly from Europe, through that "golden door."

They came, for the most part, with only the clothing on their backs, and with a family Bible.

They came to give of whatever talents and crafts they possessed. They came to learn the national language, English, not change it. They came to learn liberty's culture, not change it. And they assimilated with the American population of the day.

They came to become that which is still on the lips of freedom-seeking people around the world – Americans. Their names are enshrined forever on permanent tablets at their port of entry, Ellis Island, N.Y. Those same names can be found today in corporate board rooms, political offices, factories and churches across America.

This great melting pot provided the brains and the muscle to win two world wars and prevent the near annihilation of certain peoples in Europe.

The veterans of these wars did not ask for monuments, favor or reward. Their reward was the fulfillment of the dream that had kept their spirits alive in trenches and fox holes around the world – a home with the garden and the white picket fence and, most importantly, a family of their own. Americans were home at last. And then came the violent 1960s with the assassinations of President John F. Kennedy, Sen. Robert F. Kennedy and civil rights leader Martin Luther King.

Riots followed, bombings and murders of innocent people. Flag burning became almost a pastime as haters of America appeared on college campuses.

Later, many draft dodgers would flee to foreign countries. But the others, those good, solid Americans, joined the armed forces to fight a losing war, only to be spat upon on return from distant lands. Most of us looked on in dismay as our institutions were demeaned and, in some instances, bombed, all in the name of freedom of speech. And being good, loyal, God-trusting Americans, we fell back on that famous quote of Voltaire, "I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it."

And America turned a cheek.

Out of the '60s and succeeding decades, the American dumping ground of foreign "isms" and ideologies became larger and larger. And still American tolerance accepted it.

What came out of the dumping ground is best expressed in the lines of the Irish ballad, "Galway Bay":

"The strangers came and tried to teach us their ways, and scorned us for being what we are."

Out of these overfilled dumps came the stench of rotting ideologies and "isms" that had, for a century, failed miserably in Europe, achieving nothing more than filling the continent's graveyards with the human carnage of the innocents.

The banners of red and the symbols of peace of the 1960s gave way to today's banners of green as these destroyers of American culture regrouped.

Many good Americans were misled in the 1960s into believing that these red-banner dissidents truly believed in peace. In fact, these peace mongers were in reality giving aid and comfort to America's enemy, the Soviet Union, during the Cold War years. Jane Fonda can attest to this.

And today, in the garb of green, the armies of destruction of American culture march forth under banners proclaiming themselves as "environmentalists," protectors of all animals and "endangered species" and the creators of unity in America using the greatest destroyer of American unity, "multi-culturalism."

The scorn came from a seemingly faceless power born of a totalitarian instinct, bearing totalitarian initiatives abhorrent to a free society. These totalitarian initiatives proved effective in a God-trusting country that lives by the rule that there is good in everyone.

America's society was ripe for such an alien influence. These totalitarian initiatives brought us such movements as environmental and animal rights extremism, whereby America has been deprived of developing its own energy resources, making it dependent on OPEC for 60 percent of its oil.

These totalitarian initiatives brought us a clearly unconstitutional Endangered Species Act, the application of which robs Americans of their property rights.

These totalitarian initiatives have brought in a new form of censorship, politically correct speech which denies free use of our American language as guaranteed by the First Amendment.

These totalitarian initiatives have divided Americans, once united under the banner of "E Pluribus Unum," into hyphenated and, in many cases, quarreling ethnic groups, all in the name of multi-culturalism.

These totalitarian initiatives emboldened aethists and agnostic federal judges to join in denying our children their God-given and constitutional right to pray as individuals or groups of individuals on public school property.

These are but a few of the foreign totalitarian initiatives we suffer today.

And yet we turned the other cheek.

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