Some years ago while still a resident of New York I received a fund-raising letter from then Governor Mario Cuomo that began with the salutation: Dear Fellow Italian-American...
I thought this was hilarious, I was born in India not Italy.
How had this happened I wondered? Most likely , the campaign’s computer staff had reached the inspired conclusion that people with surnames ending with a vowel had to be Italian, as in Mario Cuomo, and then, using this criteria they wrote a computer program to pull out all the New Yorkers whose surnames ended with a vowel. Ergo, one Sarwar Kashmeri, born in Bombay, popped up in this distinguished list of Italian-Americans.
Every Fourth of July my mind wanders back to the day, now 37 years ago when I became an American citizen. As I re-live that day I also think about the question of hyphenated Americans, as in Italian-Americans, Polish-Americans, or Indonesian-Americans. And I don’t know about you but I’ve never liked the concept of separating Americans by their country of birth. My distaste of this usage goes back to the day this wonderful country made me a citizen.
It’s a heady moment when former citizens of dozens of countries rise to be sworn in as newly minted Americans. I’ve never forgotten that experience. But there’s another thing about that day I’ve never forgotten. With my certificate of Naturalization (as the process of becoming a citizen is called) came a booklet titled “A Welcome to U.S.A. Citizenship.” It contains these lines:
“Today you have become a citizen of the United States of America. You are no longer an Englishman, Frenchman, Italian, or a Pole. Neither are you a hyphenated-American - a Polish-American, an Italian-American… henceforth, you are… a Citizen of the United States of America.”
The sentiment behind the lines impressed me even more than my certificate of naturalization. In these words I saw tangible proof that the hallowed phrase on the great seal of the United States: e pluribus unum, Out of many, one, isn’t just smoke and mirrors. It means something and is given a fresh breath of life and burnished with each new American citizen.
I wonder if in these politically correct times the citizenship packet still includes those lines. I hope it does. Because those lines contain the essence of what makes America unique. And it’s why I still draw back a bit when ever someone calls me an Indian-American. Often I reply, as graciously as I can, that I am not an Indian-American, actually I am an American who happens to have been born in Bombay.
