HON. GEORGE E. SANGMEISTER
in the House of Representatives
TUESDAY, APRIL 24, 1990

Mr. SANGMEISTER. Mr. Speaker, each year the Veterans of Foreign Wars of the United States and its Ladies Auxiliary conduct the Voice of Democracy broadcast scriptwriting contest. This year more than 137,000 secondary school students participated in the contest competing for the 12 national scholarships totaling $56,000, which was distributed among the top 12 winners. The contest theme this year was `Why I Am Proud of America.'

The winning contestant from each State came to Washington, DC, for the final judging as a guest of the Veterans of Foreign Wars.

I am proud to announce that Steven Connor Cortes from Park Forest, IL, was the first place winner for the State of Illinois in the Voice of Democracy broadcast scriptwriting contest. Mr. Cortes is a senior at Marian Catholic High School in Chicago Heights, IL. I am submitting Mr. Cortes' speech for the Record so that others may benefit and be inspired by this young man's words.
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(BY STEVEN C. CORTES)
I am in love with a lady in New York. We have met only once, yet I am in awe of her. She is beautiful, yet strong, old yet forever young. She is the Statue of Liberty, and she represents the reasons Why I Am Proud of America.
The Statue of Liberty, majestic and beautiful, stands as a symbol of the greatness of America. I am proud of America because America is a great nation, the greatest in the world. However, this greatness is not deprived from our national wealth or prestige. No, America's greatness emanates from its people * * * its spirit. Dwight D. Eisenhower stated it well when he said, `America is great because America is good.' You can see the goodness of America everywhere, in South Carolina, where volunteer groups are helping the victims of Hurricane Hugo rebuild their shattered homes * * * in Northern California, where neighbor is helping neighbor recover from a devastating earthquake. America's goodness is evident in the inner-cities, where volunteers are teaching their fellow Americans to read and write and providing food and shelter for the less fortunate.
I am proud of America because we welcome immigrants from around the world and allow them to share in our opportunity. Opportunity * * * America still is the land of opportunity * * * a country where no dream is too big, and dreams can become a reality. In America's free enterprise system, a person is rewarded and judged by merit, not birthright or status. Because of this opportunity, we have become a nation of vision * * * a bold nation of men and women striving to defy the odds and achieve success * * * such as Walt Disney, who as a boy in Chicago held two jobs to help support his poor family, but through hard work and visionary spirit rose to achieve unparalleled success in the entertainment industry.
The American people are champions of the underdog, this is the country where a man, like Abraham Lincoln, can go from a log cabin to the White House where a poor ghetto kid can become a head of a corporation, and an immigrant can share in the American Dream. I am proud of America because the American Dream is still a reality. The American Dream says that anyone who is willing to work can share in the prosperity that is America.
I am also proud of America because we are free people * * * free to determine our own destiny, free to express ourselves, free to exercise our religious beliefs. We are free from the tyranny and oppression which so much of the world endures. We enjoy these freedoms because we are a democracy, a nation in which the people rule the government, not the other way around.
This past summer, we all witnessed with great admiration the students of Beijing, China, as they raised an effigy of the Statue of Liberty, and quoted Patrick Henry while demanding freedom and democracy from their communist government. Then, we were horrified when the Chinese Army slaughtered thousands of those innocent demonstrators in Tiananmen Square. The difference between China and the United States is that those brave Chinese students have no rights. I am proud that in America we have rights to protect us from tyranny. I am proud that in this, the 200 year anniversary of the Bill of Rights, the Constitution still protects our personal liberty.
We owe much of our liberty to the Fathers of our country, men like George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, and Ben Franklin, patriots who fought and died for our independence and created our government, truly they did pledge, in the words of the Declaration of Independence their `lives,' their `fortunes,' and their `sacred honor.'
In the intervening years and wars, countless brave veterans from Saratoga to Normandy, from Yorktown, to Iwo Jima have renewed this pledge and paid the price for freedom. Often that price was their lives.
The Statue of Liberty symbolizes the goodness, the opportunity, and the freedom of America, I am proud of the United States, and I thank God daily that I was born an American. May we all, young and old, rich and poor, black and white, pledge `our lives our fortunes, and our sacred honor' to defend and advance the cause of mankinds greatest hope * * * the United States of America.