photo by Laura Lai
by Laura Lai/Comment
Last week was the Constitutional
Week in the United States. A whole week to celebrate the American Constitution!
And how to celebrate it better than granting citizenship to new Americans and
organize naturalizations ceremonies at the White House and across the country?!
In
my opinion, the history of the formation of the United States of America is the
most beautiful political story of the modern times. In the context of the whole
history of humankind, I find the story of the formation of the United States
from its independence fight to the building of its institutions and the
challenges of multiculturalism to a world superpower, as the most fascinating
story to read after the story of the Old Testament.
During
this Constitutional Week, on the 17th of September 2019, the
Americans celebrated the Constitutional Day and the Citizenship Day. This was
an opportunity and an invitation to reflect upon the meaning and importance of
citizenship.
It was at the end
of July 2019, when the U.S. President Donald Trump went to Virginia to
celebrate 400 years since the first (continuing) legislative assembly of an
elected 22-representative on the 31st of July 1619 in Jamestown (to
see the video, click here). It was the time when the U.S. was still a
colony and from this self-governing initiative unfolds a fascinating 400-year
democracy and state building. Nowadays, when a reform of the immigration policy
looks more imperative than ever, Donald Trump said about the granting of
U.S. citizenship that:
‘We don’t give them [immigrants] a permit, we
give them a history, a heritage, a name, a future of limitless possibilities
and potential.’
I can’t agree more with this
point of view. In practice, the granting of citizenship by the host country is
an honor that the society – who was there before, paid taxes and raised the
country – grants the new comers. I cannot agree more that this is an
acknowledgement on behalf of the society which forms the state of all struggles
and all efforts of the new comer: to learn the language, to respect the laws,
etc. And by applying and accepting the new citizenship is not like applying and
accepting a permit, but the new comer takes an oath of loyalty to its choice
country, whatever the reason might have been for that choice. The former
general attorney of Virginia and the current director of the U.S. Citizenship
and Immigration Services declared that:
‘We believe that US Citizenship
is the greatest honor and privilege in the world. The Constitution ‘secures the
blessings of liberties’ so that we can live in freedom, both individually and
as a nation, by protecting our rights and providing for a common defense.’
In theory the concept of
citizenship is a complex concept. And relating it to liberties, freedoms and
common duties, means focusing on what the concept of citizenship means, its
boundaries and also its fundamentals.
Although
complex, when citizenship is defined in terms of rights given by the state to
its citizens, in order to freely gather, freely speak, etc. and duties from the
citizens to respect the character of the state (usually secular) and its laws,
citizenship as such is grounded on liberal values. Furthermore, it is always a
state that grants citizenship. Therefore, the state’s boundaries are the limits
within which the citizenship is exercised and it is in relation to the state
that the citizenship is legally defined. The recent global action of school
children and youngsters from all over the world to ‘go on strike’ in order to
call on the political leaders to do more on global change, is more like an
action of world’s citizens on a precise topic. It can be some sort of
attitude-related citizenship that is difficult to be defined. Anyway, the
fundamentals of citizenship were and still are: loyalty, patriotism, different
forms of civic participation (voluntary work, etc.). From the point of view of
the fundaments of citizenship, I also agree with Aristotle who said that ‘a
good person is not necessarily a good citizen’. And I think that a good citizen
is not necessarily always a good person (ex. citizens in jail for different
felonies committed against members of the society). (to be continued)
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