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Show I Speai For Democracy .... By Carolyn Whiting FDITOH'S NOTE The fol- oration won Miss Car-10 Car-10 Whiting- of Neola. Union Senior co-ed, first place HThe recent Uintah Basin. "I b For Democracy" contest, Mored by the Vernal Cham-J Cham-J of Commerce . . . rve listened, learned, hoped now I speak for Democracy. Z pondered, thought prayed r Democracy, for mysels. tho,e rt, me and those recently elect-A elect-A to lead us in democracy. l istened? You bet I listened' i listened to a watch tick. One symbolized America and tr constant moving forward to a bigger, greater, peace-living "listened to the whistle of a ..oin reminiscent of America's Shine age and I watched shrilly force itself onward to the future as confident and "! forcefully as wp Americans j ave pushed ourselves forward passing by the covered wagon and pony express; as we have forced ourselves past many other oth-er nations of the world. I stopped by a deserted back yard and listened to a neighbo--hood ball game: "S-t-e-e-r-i-k-e three yer out' ( Eh corn says who? "Kill the umpire! ! ''You heard" im. Yer out'" and with it I heard the yells and screams .of many such Americans go up from gigantic ankee Stadium "the Babe just hit a homer and we love him for it." Listen I hear it! Do vou hear it? Just faintly, but I'm sure it's it if you'll only close vour eyes with me and listen there it is "By the dawn's earlv light" that s it! That's my America-its America-its throbbing now and you look up through tears to join the rest in "Oh say, does that star-spangled star-spangled banner yet wave, o'er the land of the free and the1 home of the brave " I What did I learn? Well, first I learned that it was easier to stand up than to .keep falling j down and since I learned tb.it, I looked over those people who colonized for us, and realized that they, too, stood up stood up against oppression and denied de-nied tyrants over them stood up and died that we might live in a nation free of dictatorship, and I, too, can echo Patrick Henry with "Give me libertv or give me death!" . I learned other things, too. That Columbus discovered this country in . 1492 that the Pilgrims Pil-grims paid a price unequaled to settle in a strange country I learned that gold miners paid any price, even to death, just to get a chance at California and that Iwo Jima and Okinawa are also a part- of this nation a part that will be remembered as long as an American exists. I learned that Democracy was discovered. You bet it was! It was found in a back alley and on New York's Fifth Avenue-it Avenue-it was found in Valley Forge, on Heartbreak Ridge. Bataan and at the Alamo. Great-grandfather found it in the inscription on the State of j Liberty a little darkie found it in Lincoln's Emancipation Act a soldier found it in the rotation rota-tion plan. ' No, it isn't hard to find. Just look you'll see it and it's sti1! being discovered as long as we keep looking. Did I say I honed? Well now. that's the way I remember it. Sure I hoped. Hoped the sun would shine. Hoped it would rain so Dad would have enough "spuds" to feed seven kids this winter. Hoped Brother Johnnv would be home for Christmas this year even if he did hav only "one leg left. That's it. Hope! ! It was the hopes and dreams and hard work of our ancestor? that made America and it's hope that even now is keeping us together. Hope for peace. Hope that the lives that were given for ours will be well remembered that peace may come as a result. Hope that prejudice, hatred, and discrimination will soon be forgotten; that the Catholic, Protestant Pro-testant and Jew may be united as one. I pondered, too. Like all young people of today, I stopped to debate what can I do to become be-come a part of America? What is there left to do? Well now, Florence Nightingale was no genius. Horace Mann was just another person interested in the same things my parents are I better education, a brighter tomorrow to-morrow for the young people. i John Wesley was just a God- fearing man with a new idea, a brlghtef promise for renewed I hope. ! And what about Stephen Foster, Fos-ter, O. Henry and Will Rogers And then we asked what we could do to be a part of America. Amer-ica. So then I thought thought of Frances Scott Key, who lived to see the flag again, as proud and confident as ever. . . Thought oi Betsy Ross, who made that flag who placed thirteen white stars in a blue field on thirteen red and white stripes . . . Thought of that flag with 48 stars now, each standing for what it feels is democracy that flag that has been made just exactly ex-actly what it's people make that is sorrowful when its people are flies free when they are (Continued On Page 6) j I Speak For . Democracy ... - (Continued From Page 5) light-hearted proud when they love it broken hearted when abused. I thought of other things, too Plymouth Rock, Pearl Harbor, The ' Declaration of Independence Indepen-dence penned in defiance by the inspired hand of Thomas Jefferson, Jef-ferson, designed to mark a path for Americans to follow. Did I say that I prayed? What American hasn't? Of coarse, I prayed prayed for another day, another chance to prove that we as Americans can speak up And as Lincoln started . . . "Four score and seven years ago our fore-fathers brought upon up-on this continent a new nation . . ." I, too, can speak for Democracy. |