| From our firm's newsletter and be reminded of how fortunate we are. WHY IMMIGRATION MATTERS (Part I) This is the first of a two part article which reviews the relevance of immigrants to our country. It is no coincidence that the image most associated with the United States of America, the Statue of Liberty, is in its essence an immigrant image. After asking to be sent the world’s immigrants who long for freedom, the statue’s inscription famously declares: “[I] lift my lamp beside the golden door." I submit to you that the door is golden because of those who pass through it. President John F. Kennedy, wrote of America that it is "…a society of immigrants, each of whom had begun life anew, on an equal footing. This is the secret of America: a nation of people with the fresh memory of old traditions who dare to explore new frontiers...." America is, in other words, dynamic rather than static; fueled by the dreams and drive of those who are still to come as well by those who have been here for a few generations. There is no area of American life that is untouched by immigration, past or current. The list of foreign born Americans who shape our nation is awe inspiring. In business there is Bjarne Stroustrup, Danish born inventor of C++; Andrew Grove, Hungarian born founder of Intel Corp.; Jenny Ming, Macau born CEO of Old Navy; John Kenneth Galbraith Canadian born economist and Liz Claiborne, Belgian born fashion designer. In Sports we see Mario Andretti, Wayne Gretzky, Martina Navritalova and Sammy Sossa, all of whom were born abroad. In the arts there are Yo-Yo Ma, Michael J Fox, Gloria Estefan, Ann Margret, Zubin Mehta, Sidney Portier, Elizabeth Taylor, William Shatner, Arnold Schwarzenegger, Billy Wilder, Neil Young and Eddie van Halen. The lists above are a tiny random subset, picked in no particular order, to demonstrate that many of those who we daily see as the most integral parts of American culture are foreign born. The refugee remains one of the oldest and most compelling images of immigration. After all, Moses, Jesus, and Mohamed were all refugees, although not of course to America. Among the displaced who came to our shores were Isabel Allende, Vladimir Nabakov, Reinaldo Arenas, Madelaine Albright and Henry Kissinger. The United States not only continues to offer a safe place where families can reunite, but a place where one is able to achieve one’s highest potential without the burden, of iron hierarchies, totalitarian governments, belief based misogyny, or tribal bigotry. As long as the United States provides a place where those who come are welcomed and allowed to flourish it reaps the benefits of each of those achievements and itself remains the world’s overachiever. So, why are we so fortunate? So, why do they come? Perhaps it is because the United States, unlike most countries who find their identity within the strictures of history binding them to place, time and ethnicity, is primarily an idea – an idea that all who come will be presented with a level playing field allowing them to explore their talent and to flourish to the best of their ability. Tellingly, this idea resides not just with the current inhabitants of the United States as a geographic location, but in the hearts and minds of countless others from the most diverse geographic locations who hold the idea of the U.S.A as a treasured aspiration and who might one day help shape her identity for that generation. |
