McCormick messenger. (McCormick, S.C.) 1902-current, June 06, 1940, Image 6
McCORMICK MESSENGER, McCORMICK, S. C., THURSDAY, JUNE 6. 1940
■.tWB-M. '1 '
Urges a Citizenship Recognition Day
As the Opening Ceremony in the 1940
Celebration of National Flag Week
DISPLAY IT
r
respect it
APOSTROPHE TO OUR NATIONAL FLAG
BY WILLIAM T. KERR, PHILADELPHIA
Founder and National President,
American Flag Day Association
Pride of all America
Admired by all the World!
Floating o'er every school house.
On every hill-top.
In every valley and plain.
Liberty's School.Master!
Tyranny's scourge at all times
In every clime and nation.
Laughing to scorn the teachings
of Monarchy's "Divine rlght w !
Setting at naught the claims
of princes and potentates!
Standard of Freedom
. civil and religious!
Emblem of a United people,
the greatest and grandest Nation
sun e'er sfcone o'er:
knowing no master. Fearing no king.
Kneeling to none but Almighty God!
Marking the pathway for
Other nations to tread!
The beacon light of civilization!
■OLD GLORY" We salute thee!
There Is no stain on any stripe
In all thy years of life!
The lustre of thy stars
Shines out more brightly
as Time rolls on!
Born June 14, 1777
Midst Cannon's roar
and blast of musketry!
Standard of Washington!
of Lincoln!
and all the long line of
America’s Patriots
who gave their lives In war
and spent their strength In peace
for Righteousness.
Foreign foes throughout great wars
fell neath they withering glances
While mistaken brethren who
for a time forgot thee
Now love thee all the more!
•••••
Proudly aloft thou wavest, welcoming
freedom-loving seekers but crying
■Back" to every foe of America's greatness,
■Our free Institutions, handiwork
"of our Illustrious forefathers /
"Must not be destroyed,
HANDS OFF!"
Beautiful starry banner! there Is
none fairer or grander Anywhere.
We rejoice with thee on
this thy natal day.
Long may thy stripes and stars
Fly to the breeze, bidding
defiance to thy foes,
proclaiming Liberty!
Long may thou vigil keep
O'er millions patriots homes,
Stamping Indelibly, deep
Into the minds of all,
THAT FREE AMERICA,
Than which there Is
None greater now
In.all the earth.
WILL YET GREATER BE,
when every son and
daughter of thy soil,
and every other In our midst
shall know naught save
ONE GOD!
ONE PEOPLE!
ONE LANGUAGE!
AND
ONE FLAG "OLD GLORY"!
Yours and mine.
••••*
TEACH ITS HISTORY*.
PROCLAIM IT TO ALL
in Picture, Song and Story,
LET NONE FORGET ITS COST
In blood!
and tears!
and untold sacrifice.
'OLD GLORY" SPEAKS:
"Americans, WHAT you are I AM, Don't let the red Flag of
Communism or Anarchy Supplant Me .
By ELMO SCOTT WATSON
(Released by Western Newspaper Union.)
PURRED on by what William T. Kerr, founder and, since
1898, national president 2^ e American Flag Day associa
tion, calls “the affronter^ of all the forces of un-American
ism, those groups who support Atheism, Communism, Bolshev
ism, Nazism, Fascism and other foreign isms,” the association
is urging every community in the United States to celebrate
Flag Week this year with patriotic programs and is suggesting
a new Flag Week feature — the observance of a Citizenship
Recognition Day.
The plan for this observ- ^
ance is as follows: On the
Saturday preceding Flag Day,
that is, on June 8, each com
munity will hold a patriotic
parade with the American
Legion, Veterans of Foreign
Wars, Boy Scouts and all pa
triotic, fraternal, civic and
service organizations partici
pating. After the parade there
will be a meeting at which
will be assembled all the
young men and women who
have become or will become
of voting age this year and all
adults who in 1940, prior to or
on June 8, have become Amer
ican citizens through natural
ization.
During the program, or at its
conclusion, every one present will,
repeat the pledge taken by the
new citizens or “The Pledge to
the flag” used in the public
schools—“I pledge allegiance to
the flag of the United States
and to the Republic for which
it stands, one nation, indivisible,
with liberty and justice for all.”
In this public recognition no dis
tinction is to be made between
the youth born on American soil
and those who will become citi
zens by naturalization of them
selves or their parents. The spirit
of the occasion will be “We are
all Americans.”
The recognition of naturalized
new citizens is not a new thing,
since federal judges in various
communities, notably in the East,
have done it with small groups in
their courts at the time the for
mer aliens became American cit
izens. But a general community
assembly of newly made, foreign-
born citizens and the youth of vot
ing age, particularly associating
it with Flag Day, is an innova
tion. In presenting this plan for
a Citizenship Recognition Day,
the president of the American
Flag Day association points out
that no other time seems so ap
propriate as during the celebra
tion of Flag Week with its climax
of the nation-wide observance of
Flag Day.
“Native Americans who be
come of voting age are accus
tomed to taking their voting priv
ilege as a simple matter of
course, a kind of inheritance,”
says Mr. Kerr. “They do not
seem to realize that they have,
perhaps through no particular
merit of their own, received the
highest American privilege, mak
ing them the political equal of
the most favored person in the
land. Holding a Citizenship Rec
ognition Day offers an opportu
nity for emphasizing their re
sponsibilities as citizens which so
many of us overlook.”
A Greater Significance.
In view of the present situation
in Europe—the extinguishment of
human liberties and the oppres
sion of smaller nations by the
armed might of totalitarian gov
ernments—citizenship in a nation
“with liberty and justice for all”
should mean more than ever be
fore. For this reason the cele
bration of Flag Week this year has
an even greater significance than
in years past and 1940 seems an
appropriate time for inaugurat
ing an observance of Citizenship
Recognition Day as an integral
part of it.
If, as has been suggested, it is
observed on Saturday, June 8, it
will be the opening event in the
celebration of Flag Week along
with the patriotic-religious serv
ices in synagogues on that day,
to be followed by similar services
in churches on Sunday, June 9.
Chief among the latter is the an
nual service held at one of the
principal Revolutionary war
shrines—the chapel at Valley
Forge in Pennsylvania. Many
Sunday schools will also hold loy
alty Flag Week programs in con
nection with the observance of
Children’s Day on June 9.
The American Flag Day asso
ciation, the proponent of a nation
wide Citizenship Recognition Day,
is the pioneer organization
formed to popularize the observ
ance of the birthday anniversary
of our flag. It was founded in
Pittsburgh in the midst of the
Spanish-American war and Mr.
Kerr was elected its president, an
office he has held ever since. An
employee of the freight traffic de
partment of the Pennsylvania
railroad, he has devoted all of his
spare time to promoting the ob
servance of Flag Day and to hav
ing it designated as a national
holiday.
When Mr. Kerr was a young
boy, a railroad engineer told him
the story of Betsy Ross and the
early history of our flag. Inspired
by this and aided by his mother
and his father, a veteran of the
Union army in the Civil war, he
began making plans for a move
ment to recognize officially the
birthday of the flag on a nation
wide scale. The eventual result
was the organization in 1898 of
the American Flag Day associa
tion, a non-partisan, non-sec
tarian, non-racial, non-profit asso
ciation, devoted solely to the pa
triotic work of honoring the Stars
and Stripes on its birthday.
A Legal Holiday?
Since that time it has worked
persistently to popularize the cus
tom of displaying the flag on June
14 and to have Flag Day made
a legal holiday. Some resistance
has been encountered, according
to Mr. Kerr, because some busi
ness men think that we have too
many holidays in this country.
They point out that June 14 lies
between Memorial Day on May
30 and Independence Day on July
4 so that two legal holidays within
a little more than a month should ■
be sufficient.
However, Mr. Kerr and his as
sociates believe that the observ
ance of the birthday of our flag is
justified by its historic signify
icance—the formal adoption of v
the Stars and Stripes as the em
blem o£ the new nation on June
14, 1777. “We are learning a
new understanding and new ap
preciation of the flag,” says Mr.
Kerr. “We are not looking upon
it as a waving banner that leads
us into battle, nor an emblem
of war, but more as a symbol of
achievement, progress, helpful
ness and friendship. In the light
of events in recent years the
waving of our flag has come to
signify the glories of peace and
the joys of friendship rather than
the accomplishment of war.”
As the result of the efforts of
this association, in 1938 Flag Day
was made a legal holiday in
Pennsylvania, the state which,
because of the action of the Con
tinental congress 163 years ago,
can be regarded as the “birth
place of Old Glory.” Massachu
setts and Connecticut have stat
utes requiring their governors to
issue Flag Day proclamations but
these two and Pennsylvania are
the only commonwealths which
officially recognize Flag Day.
The national observance of the
day—though not as a legal holi
day—is due to President Wood-
row Wilson who on May 13, 1916,
issued a proclamation designat
ing June 14 of each year as Flag
Day. It has been so observed
since that time. Although vari
ous persons have, from time to
time, been designated as the
“originator” of Flag Day, it is
doubtful if that title can justly be
awarded to any individual, since
several Americans have contrib
uted to the idea. Undoubtedly
the work of Mr. Kerr, since the
founding of the American Flag
Day association in 1898, greatly
stimulated popular interest in the
celebration and he, therefore, has
a claim to some share in the title.
Where Statues Wore Hats!
Mystery of Easter Island
Science Finds Creators of Intricate Script
Were ‘Long-Eared’ Artists.
O N EASTER DAY, 1722, the
Dutch Admiral Roggeveen
landed on a small Pacific island,
which he named after the day.
He must have thought that he was
landing in a nightmare, for the
shores were ringed with gigantic
stone statues, wearing tall red
hats, and standing on high plat
forms with their backs to the sea.
And the whole island was literally
covered with statues 1 They still
stand there today.
Later visitors made further odd
discoveries. It seemed that the
inhabitants had suffered a devour
ing national passion for sculpture.
Hardly a boulder or an outcrop of
rock had not been turned into an
enormous bust, a fantastic head
One Step
The sublime and ridiculous are
often so nearly related that it is
difficult to class them separately.
One step below the sublime makes
the ridiculous, and one step above
the ridiculous makes the sublime
again.—Thomas Paine.
with enormously long ears. At
the same time, they discovered
wooden tablets and other objects
covered with a complicated script.
This started a series of the most
extraordinary theories, including
suggestions that Easter island had
been occupied by Red Indians,
Egyptians, and the lost tribes of
Israel. But nobody managed to
put forward a reasonable explana
tion of how this diversity of races
got there, or went away when
their work was done!
Long-Eared Artists.
Then science took a hand. First
of all, local legends were investi
gated, and the islanders told of a
migration in the past from a dis
tant island in the west. Proof
came from one of the Gambler
islands, over a thousand miles
away, in the form of another
legend. It told of a defeated chief
setting sail to find a new home
for his people. Local legend also
told of two distinct races inhabit
ing Easter island, the “long ears”
and the “short ears.” And here
again, science found the proof; for
skulls found on Easter island show
Gems of Thought
'T'AKE warning by the mis-
-*• fortunes of others, that oth
ers may not take example from
you.—Saadi.
Life is a series of surprises, and
ivould not be worth taking or keep
ing if it were not.—Emerson.
The winds and waves are al
ways on the side of the ablest
navigators.—Gibbon.
Better by far that you should
forget and smile than that you
should remember and be sad.—
Christina Rossetti.
We win by tenderness; we con
quer by forgiveness.—Frederick W.
Robertson.
that migrants came, not only from
the Pacific islands, but also from
the Australasian islands.
The “long ears” were the art
ists. It was their tribal custom
to stretch the lobes of their ears,
and they wore hats for ceremonial
purposes. They were the cre
ators of the intricate script which
cannot be read, but, defeated by
the “short ears,” they have faded
'away and left no one to tell their
story.
So far science can speak with
authority, but science cannot say
why the islanders who migrated
to Easter island should have pro
gressed so far beyond those of
their race who inhabit other
islands. |
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