The first time I voted it was 1980 and I was 18. I read all the ballot questions, knew who I was voting for (Jimmy Carter, Pat Schroeder, etc.) and went to our polling place with my Mom.
I remember being rather embarrassed once there by the fuss that was made about me voting for the first time. It seemed every old lady from our church was a precinct worker.
Last night my husband, a newly minted American (he was one of the 5,189 people naturalized September 14, 2010 in Fenway Park) prepared for his first vote ever, he's 44. In doing so he began to fulfill his part of the "contract" of being an American.
He read through all the ballot questions, researched all the candidates, asked me questions about voting, what to expect, etc. We joked around a bit because for one office two brothers are running, one as a Republican and the other a Democrat and their websites both say they share the same values. We joked that either way one of them was going to hold the office.
Then this morning after I took our son to school, we both went to our polling place. We brought his documentation just in case he was challenged, and there were poll watchers there, which I don't ever remember being the case before.
Then at 8:30am ET he marked his first ballot ever, and shortly there after he put it in the scanner.
My ex-husband and I always went to the polling place together. I didn't realize how much I missed that, until after 22 years, it all came to an end today. It was/is an honor to walk through the doors and cast my ballot with him. (okay I'm getting emotional and puddling up - gotta stop that)
During his naturalization ceremony the judge, Nancy Gertner, who conferred on him citizenship status gave an amazing speech. For some reason we still haven't gotten it up on youtube, but I was so taken with it I wrote to the judge asking for a copy of it. In my letter I said that I would sending it to friends and family and posting it here.
Given how many people would try to take away, cage, intimidate this hard fought and hard won right from all Americans, the speech is a reminder of all that it means to be an American, and to participate in this obligation, duty, contract.
Do not stay home today. VOTE!
And please share her speech with others who may not vote today.
Judge Nancy Gertner
September 24, 2010 - Fenway Park, Boston, Massachusetts
NATURALIZATION CEREMONY
*******
It is an extraordinary honor to be addressing you today. I have been a judge since 1994. And this is one of the singular pleasures of the job.
This summer, my sister and I were cleaning out the safety deposit box of a relative recently deceased. We found an old form, dog-eared and in tatters but carefully, gently, lovingly placed in a bag next to other more routine papers. What was it? It was a "Certificate of Naturalization" from July 5, 1911, for my great grandfather, much like the certificates you will receive today. He had cherished it, as had his children, and his children’s children.
I am the granddaughter of immigrants. I suspect many of us on this stage can say the same thing. My father’s parents came from Poland; my mother’s from Austria. They came from small towns in Eastern Europe, with no money, no family here, and knowing no English. They went to Ellis Island in New York, which was their first encounter with this country. Their fear of the new experience backed up against their excitement at coming to a new world. They and their relatives had been victimized in Europe, had been through pogroms, and wars. My grandfather had finally fled when he was forced to join the army of a nation who had discriminated against, and oppressed, his family and the families of others. He was unwilling to participate in the obligations of citizenship, because his country had been unwilling to extend to him the full protections of citizenship.
There is a contract between our country and its citizens. It offers protection, freedom from discrimination, the opportunity for the pursuit of happiness, and in exchange, you agree to the obligations of citizenship -- to vote, to serve on a jury, to raise your voices about public issues - even when you disagree -- especially when you disagree. Yes, dissent is part of the bargain,criticism is part of the contract.
We are not a perfect country, but my grandfather and my other grandparents had more of a chance to succeed than they had had in Europe. My grandfather was able to earn a living; he was a cutter in the garment industry. It was not much, but it allowed him a better life than his parents had had. His children went to public schools, visited public libraries. He was not harassed and ostracized. He could practice his religion free of government interference and raise his children in it.
And then – only two generations later, a granddaughter would become a Judge of the United States District Court for Massachusetts.
And for his part, he cherished the obligations of citizenship. He voted in each and every election that he could from the date he qualified to vote in this country to his death. It made no difference what the weather was, how interesting the candidates, how ill he was. He relished serving on juries, participating in the most important decisions citizen’s can make -- about people’s liberty, their resources, their lives.
Again, the bargain was not perfect; this country was not perfect. He experienced discrimination because of his religion. Many of his friends changed their names so that they would not sound Jewish, pretended to be what they were not. My grandfather and other grandparents still feared the resurgence of antisemitism in this country and to tell the truth, never completely relaxed in it. In fact, I suspect that the reason I found the tattered Certificate of Naturalization in the safe deposit box, along with others, was just in case someone challenged him, when they heard his broken English, his pronounced accent. "I am a citizen," he would say, and produce the document.
We are not perfect. The Founding Fathers of our Constitution lived in a society with African American slaves, women citizens who had no rights, only white men with property could serve on juries. While George Washington, our country’s first president, wanted America to be an asylum for the "oppressed and persecuted of all Nations and Religions," the reality in the 1780s was otherwise. The Founding Fathers simply could never have imagined that one day we would have an African American president; a Supreme Court with an African American, with three women, an Hispanic Judge, or a District Court of Massachusetts as diverse as ours.
We are not a perfect country, but we are a country of principle, the principles on which our nation was established – liberty, democracy, equality, justice, and most of all, tolerance. We have struggled to make them real and we will continue to struggle through the civil rights movements for women, African Americans and other minorities, through campaigns for religious tolerance and tolerance of waves of immigrants, through demands for voting rights and equal protection of the law; and through the steady surge of reform and resistance that defines our democracy.
Today you enter into a contract with your new country. Your country provides you with a protection, but more than that, freedom from discrimination, a place in which to pursue your happiness and the happiness of your children and your children’s children. In exchange, you agree to the obligations of citizenship of this democracy. You agree to vote, to participate in juries, to encourage your children to do so. Even to dissent, to disagree with your government. There must be no passive citizens here; this republic only works when all of its members are engaged, are participants in public life.
Over 40 years ago, President Johnson signed the legislation that made it possible for people from so many different places to become citizens of the United States. And when he was signing the bill, he made some remarks that I think are equally applicable today. He said,
America was built by a nation of strangers from a hundred different lands or more. They poured forth into this land joining and blending into one mighty irresistible stream. The land flourished because it was fed from so many sources, because it was nourished by so many cultures and traditions of people. And from this experience, almost unique in the history of nations, has come America's attitude toward the rest of the world. We are who we are because of what we are
.
And because of who you are "stronger and safer in a world as varied as the cultures whom you represent."
We are not perfect, but with your help and participation we will change. We will eradicate discrimination because we so desperately need the participation of all of our numbers, of all of you.
The door to citizenship has been opened for you, and your children. You walk through it today, but as you do, remember: Don’t close it behind you. Don’t close this door to those who would do as you did.
This country is a country of immigrants. My parents, you, even the Founding Fathers. We came from elsewhere with our language, our culture, our religion, our traditions. And we have enriched this country, as I am certain you will also do.