AN AMERICAN CREED
(Note from WTR: My fellow conservatives in exile, please feel free to swipe this and post. Let this be our guidepost and encouragement as the nation stumbles blindly into Change.)
*By Dean Alfange
*Originally published in This Week Magazine. Later printed in The Reader’s Digest, October 1952 and January 1954.
The Honorable Dean Alfange was an American statesman born December 2, 1899, in Constantinople (now Istanbul). He was raised in upstate New York. He served in the U.S. Army during World War I and attended Hamilton College, graduating in the class of 1922.
An American Creed
I Do Not Choose to Be a Common Man
It is my right to be uncommon—if I can.
I seek opportunity—not security. I do not wish to be a kept citizen, humbled and dulled by having the state look after me.
I want to take the calculated risk; to dream and to build, to fail and to succeed.
I refuse to barter incentive for a dole. I prefer the challenges of life to the guaranteed existence; the thrill of fulfillment to the stale calm of utopia.
I will not trade freedom for beneficence nor my dignity for a handout. I will never cower before any master nor bend to any threat.
It is my heritage to stand erect, proud and unafraid; to think and act for myself, enjoy the benefit of my creations and to face the world boldly and say, “This I have done.”
I Do Not Choose to Be a Common Man
It is my right to be uncommon—if I can.
I seek opportunity—not security. I do not wish to be a kept citizen, humbled and dulled by having the state look after me.
I want to take the calculated risk; to dream and to build, to fail and to succeed.
I refuse to barter incentive for a dole. I prefer the challenges of life to the guaranteed existence; the thrill of fulfillment to the stale calm of utopia.
I will not trade freedom for beneficence nor my dignity for a handout. I will never cower before any master nor bend to any threat.
It is my heritage to stand erect, proud and unafraid; to think and act for myself, enjoy the benefit of my creations and to face the world boldly and say, “This I have done.”
*By Dean Alfange
*Originally published in This Week Magazine. Later printed in The Reader’s Digest, October 1952 and January 1954.
The Honorable Dean Alfange was an American statesman born December 2, 1899, in Constantinople (now Istanbul). He was raised in upstate New York. He served in the U.S. Army during World War I and attended Hamilton College, graduating in the class of 1922.
posted by white trash republican at Thursday, November 06, 2008
1 Comments:
just FYI on Alfange
http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=950DE3DA153EF934A15753C1A96F948260
October 27, 1989
Dean Alfange, Liberal Leader, Is Dead at 91
By GLENN FOWLER
LEAD: Dean Alfange, a lawyer who ran unsuccessfully for governor of New York in 1942 as a candidate of the American Labor Party and who two years later was a leader in forming the Liberal Party, died of cancer on Tuesday at his home in Manhattan. He was 91 years old.
Dean Alfange, a lawyer who ran unsuccessfully for governor of New York in 1942 as a candidate of the American Labor Party and who two years later was a leader in forming the Liberal Party, died of cancer on Tuesday at his home in Manhattan. He was 91 years old.
Mr. Alfange changed his affiliations among the state's parties, holding nominations or appointments through the Democrats and Republicans, as well as the Liberals and the American Labor Party.
In 1940, after several years as a leader of the American Labor Party, he was made chairman of the Democratic foreign-language speakers' bureau in President Franklin D. Roosevelt's third election campaign. Mr. Alfange was born to Greek parents in Istanbul, Turkey, which was then called Constantinople, and had close ties to immigrant groups.
In 1941 he ran for Congress on the Democratic ticket in the Silk Stocking district on the East Side of Manhattan and lost to JosephClark Baldwin, a Republican. The next year, when Thomas E. Dewey won his first term as governor, Mr. Alfange ran third, as the Labor Party nominee, behind the Democrat, John J. Bennett. Promotion of Quarter Horses
When a conflict between pro-Communist and anti-Communist factions in the American Labor Party widened in the 40's, Mr. Alfange led a walkout that resulted in the formation of the Liberal Party.
In the early 70's, Gov. Nelson A. Rockefeller named him to head a division of the State Racing and Wagering Board devoted to promoting quarter-horse racing. The effort failed, and the board was abolished when Hugh L. Carey became governor in 1975.
Mr. Alfange came here as an infant and was raised in upstate New York. After serving in the Army in World War I, he went to Hamilton College, where he was elected to Phi Beta Kappa. After receiving a law degree from Columbia University, he opened a practice in Manhattan.
Mr. Alfange was active in ethnic organizations and had been national president of Ahepa, a Greek-American civic group. He was president of the La Guardia Memorial House, a settlement house in East Harlem, for more than 40 years.
Surviving are his wife, the former Thalia Perry, and a son, Dean Jr., of Leverett, Mass.
Post a Comment
<< Home