[Congressional Record Volume 144, Number 108 (Tuesday, August 4, 1998)]
[House]
[Page H7004]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]


[[Page H7004]]
                     CITIZENSHIP FOR CHONG HO KWAK

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under the Speaker's announced policy of 
January 21, 1997, the gentleman from Pennsylvania (Mr. Gekas) is 
recognized during morning hour debates for 5 minutes.
  Mr. GEKAS. Madam Speaker, to all who are within the sound of our 
voice this morning, I want to express my appreciation to a number of 
people for the moment that we are about to embrace here on the floor of 
the House.
  Very shortly now we will be considering a special bill, a private 
bill in which the Congress of the United States will confer a benefit 
on one of our fellow citizens. I say one of our fellow citizens 
advisedly because that is exactly why the Congress has had to act in 
this extraordinary way, to pass a bill that confers a benefit directly 
on one individual.
  Here is what happened. Chong Ho Kwak, a Korean immigrant, came to our 
country legally, worked and supported his family, did all of the things 
necessary to become an American citizen, focused on becoming an 
American citizen because that was the light of his life, to finally 
gain the status that everyone in the world yearns to have, the status 
of being a bona fide American citizen.
  So he studied English, he studied the history of our country, he 
engaged in the special classes that are set for people who want to 
become citizens with all that that entails, and then, when the time 
came to take the test, nervous as he was, he went to the appointed 
place and presented himself for the purpose of undergoing the 
examinations that are necessary before one becomes a citizen. He passed 
them royally and was ecstatic, as was his family.
  He passed the exams and he was ready now to take the oath of 
citizenship for the greatest honor that would ever be bestowed on him 
in his own mind, and in those of us who recognize how important that is 
for a person eager to become an American citizen.
  Then, a tragic thing happened. About two months before the scheduled 
event for the naturalization ceremony in which he would take his oath, 
he, Mr. Kwak, while operating his small grocery store, was attacked and 
robbed, shot in the head, and rendered unconscious, of course, and was 
relegated to a hospital where he still lingers in a coma from which he 
has never been able to revive himself and which has engendered much 
sympathy and much newsprint, as it were, covering that tragic event and 
all of its consequences.
  The young thugs who attacked him got very little reward, were 
sentenced, and even as we speak are probably finishing out their 
sentences as the court might have dealt out to them, but Mr. Kwak is 
sentenced for the rest of his life to a long-term care facility, barely 
able to exist, let alone live a normal life.
  Well, now what has happened? He was not able to take the oath of 
naturalization because of his condition. We asked the Immigration and 
Naturalization Service to outline a special circumstance for this 
individual and to permit him to be conferred a citizen of the United 
States, even without taking the oath, because of the circumstances. He 
could not raise his arm and do the natural things that are required to 
undertake an oath of naturalization.
  The INS refused to do this, saying that the book by which they 
conduct their naturalization actually requires, and there is no 
straying from it, according to them, no veering away from it, that he 
must take the oath. We pointed out that we have attended many 
naturalization services where an infant, a young child is held in the 
arms of a parent who is an American citizen and the citizenship is 
conferred on this youngster who could not know what the meaning of the 
oath of office that was undertaken by his parent. Is that not similar, 
we said. Here is an individual who, because he was shot in the head, 
would not be able to understand the oath of allegiance to the United 
States, but nevertheless all of us who know that he passed the 
examination and was that split second short of being able to become an 
American citizen.
  Madam Speaker, we will conduct a bill at 10 o'clock this morning 
which will confer citizenship on Mr. Kwak.

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