[Congressional Record Volume 152, Number 78 (Friday, June 16, 2006)]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Page E1174]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




 TRIBUTE TO THE 100TH ANNIVERSARY OF FILIPINO MIGRATION TO THE UNITED 
                                 STATES

                                 ______
                                 

                         HON. KENDRICK B. MEEK

                               of florida

                    in the house of representatives

                        Thursday, June 15, 2006

  Mr. MEEK of Florida. Mr. Speaker, I want to take this opportunity to 
pay tribute to the more than three million Filipino-Americans and 
Filipino immigrants across the United States on the occasion of the 
100th Anniversary of Filipino Migration to the United States. This is a 
significant milestone in the storied tradition of Filipinos in our 
Nation ever since the first fifteen farm workers, called sakadas, were 
recruited by the Hawaiian Sugar Planters Association, arriving in 
Hawaii on December 20, 1906. They were to become the precursors to 
millions of other contract workers, who soon came to build America in 
the succeeding years.
  It was in 1919 that Filipino leader Pablo Manlapit organized the 
first labor union to demand higher wages and better working conditions 
for the farm workers of Hawaii. He was to be joined by other Asian farm 
workers, especially those coming from Japan. Though in 1920, some 
12,000 farm workers from the sugar plantations were cruelly evicted and 
thrown out of work; their rugged determination and gritty character 
typified their conviction that America must live by its creed of equal 
opportunity and simple justice for all.
  The downtrodden and the disenfranchised--these defined the miserable 
conditions to which those first immigrants were mercilessly subjected. 
What better way to memorialize those hardy spirits than to invoke their 
courage under fire during this Centennial of their epic journey to 
self-hood and recognition. They came to forge a better life and 
contribute to the building of America in Hawaii's sugar cane and 
pineapple fields, in the canneries of Alaska, and throughout the 
verdant farm lands of California and other west coast States.
  In his stirring novel, America is in the Heart, Carlos Bulosan, the 
Filipino writer par excellence, described the first Filipino 
immigrants' abject exclusion from American society when he wrote: ``I 
know deep in my heart that I am an exile in America . . . I feel like a 
criminal running away from a crime I did not commit. And this crime is 
that I am a Filipino in America.'' Despite this inglorious past, their 
pioneering efforts and resilient spirit were drawn by their genuine 
belief in America's spirit of idealism as the land of opportunity and 
promise.
  I am confident that under the aegis of this Centennial, America will 
join Filipino-Americans in recognizing the untold sacrifices of the 
early Filipino migrants whose faith in God and whose work ethic 
sustained them in their ordeal. In converging this celebration with the 
indomitable spirit of those pioneers, we hope to be enlightened and 
enriched by the messages they wrote through their silent struggles to 
be recognized and appreciated. It is on this historic occasion that I 
congratulate the National Federation of Filipino American Associations 
(NaFFAA), the Philippine-American Federation of South Florida 
(PhilAmFed) and other bona-fide groups for their steadfast efforts in 
sensitizing us to the contributions that Filipino immigrants gave and 
continue to give to buttressing America's stature as the envy of world 
today.
  Filipino-Americans in my District, and millions of others across this 
great Nation, may take heart in Mr. Bulosan's prophetic words: 
``America is not a land of one race or one class of men. We are all 
Americans that have toiled and suffered and known oppression and defeat 
. . . America is not merely a land or an institution. America is in the 
hearts of men that died for freedom; it is also in the eyes of men that 
are building a new world. America is a warning to those who would try 
to falsify the ideals of free men. All of us, from the first Adams to 
the last Filipino, native born or alien, educated or illiterate--We are 
America!''
  Indeed, this Centennial is a proud reminder of the nobility and quiet 
dignity of Filipino Americans whose predecessors migrated to America 
100 years ago, paving the way for countless others.

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