Proclamation 5732—National Immigrants Day, 1987

Our national celebration of Immigrants Day is a moving reminder to us that America is unique among the nations. We are the sons and daughters of every land across the face of the Earth, yet we are an indivisible Nation. We are one people, and we are one in that which drew our forebears here—the love of "freedom's holy Light."

This year we most appropriately observe Immigrants Day on October 28, the 101st anniversary of the unveiling of the Statue of Liberty, the beloved statue Emma Lazarus called "Mother of Exiles," from whose "beacon-hand/Glows world-wide welcome." That welcome is America's welcome, which has ever beckoned millions upon millions of courageous souls to this land of freedom, justice, and opportunity.

Immigrants have always brought great gifts to their new home on these shores-the gifts of hardiness and heart, of intellect and hope. Two hundred years ago, immigrants were among the framers of a Constitution for these United States. They knew what they were about, for they began that charter of liberty and limited government with the words, "We the People" and created what a future President named Lincoln would call "government of the people, by the people, for the people."

One immigrant, J. Hector St. John de Crevecoeur, had described that people very well in 1782 when he wrote, "Here individuals of all nations are melted into a new race of man whose labors and posterity will one day cause great changes in the world." This prophecy came true, and immigrants helped, and are still helping, to make it so—immigrants to a country and a people one in mutual loyalty and one in steady devotion to "freedom's holy Light."

The Congress, by Senate Joint Resolution 86, has designated October 28, 1987, as "National Immigrants Day" and authorized and requested the President to issue a proclamation in observance of this event.

Now, Therefore, I, Ronald Reagan, President of the United States of America, do hereby proclaim October 28, 1987, as National Immigrants Day, and I call upon the people of the United States to observe that day with appropriate programs, ceremonies, and activities.

In Witness Whereof I have hereunto set my hand this sixteenth day of October, in the year of our Lord nineteen hundred and eighty-seven, and of the Independence of the United States of America the two hundred and twelfth.

RONALD REAGAN