Built on a creed
On belief in America, where a baby sleeps, and what Ronald Reagan got dead right about immigration
On his way out the door -- literally, on the penultimate day of his Presidency -- Ronald Reagan offered memorable remarks as he presented the Presidential Medal of Freedom one last time. Knowing it really was his final word on matters as the chief executive, Reagan said, “Other countries may seek to compete with us; but in one vital area, as a beacon of freedom and opportunity that draws the people of the world, no country on Earth comes close. This, I believe, is one of the most important sources of America’s greatness. We lead the world because, unique among nations, we draw our people -- our strength -- from every country and every corner of the world. And by doing so we continuously renew and enrich our nation.”
■ Reagan could not have been more right. And his faith in the matter wasn’t selfless, it was a belief in America’s national interest itself: “This quality is vital to our future as a nation. If we ever closed the door to new Americans, our leadership in the world would soon be lost.”
■ We use the word “believe” quite a lot to describe America, because this is a nation with a creed: All people are created equal and endowed with rights that cannot be taken away; government exists to secure liberty now and in the future, and acts only by consent.
■ That is not a creed which belongs to one ethnic group, one religious faith, or one place of birth. It has been said that Americans are born every day all over the world, it just takes time for some of them to get here. And it emphatically does not matter from what groups they might originate; all that matters is what is in the individual’s heart and mind.
■ It takes someone really stupid to think that American values are transmitted by the soil beneath one’s baby crib. They are values of the heart and mind. Moreover, they are universal values in the proper sense that they appeal to those who give them serious thought and consideration. But because they are values produced by persuasion, not by blood or birth, it remains an enduring struggle to spread them.
■ Ideally, some day they will be functionally universal, too -- a whole world sharing and securing the same values by choice. Until then, it is America’s job to be, as Reagan put it in his farewell address, “a beacon, still a magnet for all who must have freedom, for all the pilgrims from all the lost places who are hurtling through the darkness, toward home.”
