Thread: Revolutionary War hero becomes honorary US citizen

Originally Posted by Yonderis

I should be ashamed of myself...

...

I never knew Dennis Kucinich was Polish. I always thought of him as the Cleveland City Councilman who got caught mooning people out his car window going down, I believe it was 117th in Cleveland! lol

Originally Posted by PatrioticMe

Originally Posted by Yonderis

I should be ashamed of myself...

...

I never knew Dennis Kucinich was Polish. I always thought of him as the Cleveland City Councilman who got caught mooning people out his car window going down, I believe it was 117th in Cleveland! lol

ROFLMAO!!! Part of my (considerably aged) self seems to remember reading something about that.

Well, he's still showing his...

..."moon".

Some just never grow up.

What about the thousands of other men and women who died fighting in the American Revolution before they could become citizens? No offense to General Pulaski, but these Congressional Resolutions are so thoughtless and self-serving they make me want to puke.

Originally Posted by Yonderis

Originally Posted by PatrioticMe

Originally Posted by Yonderis

I should be ashamed of myself...

...

I never knew Dennis Kucinich was Polish. I always thought of him as the Cleveland City Councilman who got caught mooning people out his car window going down, I believe it was 117th in Cleveland! lol

ROFLMAO!!! Part of my (considerably aged) self seems to remember reading something about that.

Well, he's still showing his...

..."moon".

Some just never grow up.

I can't help thinking this "honorary citizen" thing was just for show~just to get his face at the window for a change! lol What possible other good can this accomplish?

It was clearly to pander to his personal ethnicity and diminish further the value of US citizenship. I have no problem with a resolution honoring General Pulaski. Americans have been honoring the man for over a couple of hundred years without the help of the US Congress or Dennis Kucinich. But conveying honorary citizenship to him is just absurd.

Honorary citizen of the United States

From Wikipedia

A non-United States citizen of exceptional merit may be declared an Honorary Citizen of the United States by an Act of Congress or by a proclamation issued by the President of the United States pursuant to authorization granted by Congress.

Seven people have had this honor bestowed upon them, only Winston Churchill and Mother Teresa during their lifetime:

General Lafayette, a Frenchman who was an officer in the American Revolution. On 28 December 1784 the Maryland General Assembly honored Lafayette. He was made an honorary citizen of Maryland again in 1823, as well as of Connecticut the same year. He was also recognized as an honorary citizen in a 2002 joint congressional resolution.[1]

Winston Churchill, British Prime Minister during World War II (1963)

Raoul Wallenberg, Swedish diplomat who rescued Jews in the Holocaust, posthumously (1981)

William Penn, 17th and 18th century English proprietor and governor of the English North American colony of Pennsylvania, posthumously (1984)

Hannah Callowhill Penn, second wife of William Penn and administrator of Pennsylvania, posthumously (1984)

Mother Teresa, Albanian Catholic nun, who founded the Missionaries of Charity in India (1996)[2]

Kazimierz Pułaski, a Polish soldier, member of the Polish-Lithuanian nobility and politician who has been called "The Father of the American Calvary,[3][4] posthumously (2009)[5]

For Lafayette and Mother Theresa, the honor was proclaimed directly by Act of Congress. In other cases, an Act of Congress was passed authorizing the President to grant honorary citizenship by proclamation.

Legal issues

Public Law 88-6 (1963) granted honorary citizenship to Winston Churchill.

Maryland's 1784 resolution stated that Lafayette and his male heirs "forever shall be . . . natural born Citizens" of the state; this made him a natural born citizen of the United States under the Articles of Confederation and as defined in Section 1 of Article Two of the United States Constitution.[6] In 1803 and 1804 President Jefferson offered to make him Governor of Louisiana.[7]

For the others, it is unclear what rights honorary citizenship bestows, if any. 7 FAM 1172 from the Foreign Affairs Manual of the State Department states explicitly that honorary U.S. citizens are not eligible for U.S. passports.

Honorary citizenship should not be confused with citizenship or permanent residency bestowed by a private bill. Private bills are, on rare occasions, used to provide relief to individuals, often in immigration cases, and are also passed by Congress and signed into law by the President. One such statute, granting Elian Gonzalez U.S. citizenship, was suggested in 1999, but was never enacted.[8]

Honorary citizenship of states and municipalities
A periodic segment on The Late Late Show documented host Craig Ferguson's progress in obtaining honorary citizenship of individual U.S. states and cities. A number of governors and mayors have granted him honorary state or city citizenship, including the states of Alaska and Nevada.[9] This campaign should not be taken seriously; according to the show, "honorary citizenship is legally meaningless." Ferguson obtained regular U.S. citizenship by the usual means of naturalization in 2008.[10]

Originally Posted by Judy

What about the thousands of other men and women who died fighting in the American Revolution before they could become citizens? No offense to General Pulaski, but these Congressional Resolutions are so thoughtless and self-serving they make me want to puke.

Agree. There was no "United States of America" yet to be a citizen of.

You can't tell me that taxpayer monies weren't wasted in Kucinich's endeavor to accomplish this. Wouldn't his time (and taxpayer monies) have been better spent representing today and issues facing his constituents today?

This kind of nonsense takes time in Congress to get it passed. WE pay these Congressmen/Congresswomen to waste time considering these bills and we shouldn't have to.

My attempt at humor about it is in no way meant to be disrespectful of what General Pulaski fought for. That was 230 years ago. This is today and there are issues facing us that are far more urgent than our history and posthumous citizenship 230 years after the fact.

Originally Posted by Yonderis

Originally Posted by Judy

What about the thousands of other men and women who died fighting in the American Revolution before they could become citizens? No offense to General Pulaski, but these Congressional Resolutions are so thoughtless and self-serving they make me want to puke.

Agree. There was no "United States of America" yet to be a citizen of.

You can't tell me that taxpayer monies weren't wasted in Kucinich's endeavor to accomplish this. Wouldn't his time (and taxpayer monies) have been better spent representing today and issues facing his constituents today?

This kind of nonsense takes time in Congress to get it passed. WE pay these Congressmen/Congresswomen to waste time considering these bills and we shouldn't have to.

My attempt at humor about it is in no way meant to be disrespectful of what General Pulaski fought for. That was 230 years ago. This is today and there are issues facing us that are far more urgent than our history and posthumous citizenship 230 years after the fact.

That money would have been better spent trying to get some jobs into this area~we've been going down in flames for decades.

honorary U.S. citizens are not eligible for U.S. passports.

That's O.K. Dead people seldom travel anyway.

Originally Posted by JohnDoe2

honorary U.S. citizens are not eligible for U.S. passports.

That's O.K. Dead people seldom travel anyway.

They don't pay Kucinich's salary either.