[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 150 (2004), Part 9]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Page 11581]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                              FALLEN HEROS

                                 ______
                                 

                               speech of

                          HON. ROBERT MENENDEZ

                             of new jersey

                    in the house of representatives

                         Thursday, May 20, 2004

  Mr. MENENDEZ. Mr. Speaker, on Memorial Day, America honors those who 
gave their lives to keep this country free and bring the world peace by 
defending the helpless, promoting democracy throughout the world and 
protecting the freedoms and liberties we enjoy as Americans. Those who 
defend this country, after all, are men and women from every town and 
every walk of life.
  These honored dead have not died in vain, as Abraham Lincoln solemnly 
pledged during the most divisive war this Nation had yet faced. We have 
a long, proud history of service and sacrifice given by those men and 
women who quit the safety of everyday life and friends ``to hazard all 
in freedom's fight.'' Today, we have such men and women deployed in 
Afghanistan, Iraq, and elsewhere around the world, and we hold them and 
their families in our thoughts and prayers.
  The oath to defend the Constitution has been sworn by every soldier, 
sailor, flyer, and Marine, living and dead. On Memorial Day, we recall 
those who gave everything to preserve the security and liberty of those 
they loved and those they never knew. I would hope this day is only one 
of many on which the living remember and salute those who served our 
Nation in uniform and now lie at eternal rest.
  We have honored their graves and their lives since the end of our own 
Civil War. In 1866, spontaneous rites of remembrance were held in 
Carbondale, Illinois, in Columbus, Mississippi, and Waterloo, New York. 
The families of the men killed in that war came together to place 
flowers by their gravestones. The veterans joined this practice, 
honoring their fallen comrades with their own recollections of courage 
and devotion on battlefields. Ever since then, veterans and their 
families have led the observance of Memorial Day.
  On this day, it is a time for us to remember our family members, our 
loved ones, our neighbors, and our friends who have given the ultimate 
sacrifice by visiting the cemeteries where they lie beneath small flags 
of red, white, and blue. It is also a time to renew our promise to the 
widows, widowers, and orphans of those lost in war. And it is time to 
renew our fight for our veterans because those still living deserve the 
benefits that have been promised to them by a grateful nation.
  On Memorial Day 2004, as our young men and women are fighting 
overseas in Iraq and Afghanistan, our country dedicates a World War II 
Memorial in Washington, D.C., finally paying tribute to those who 
fought over a half century ago. In fact, the 60th Anniversary of the 
invasion of Normandy by the Allied forces (known as D-Day) is June 6, 
2004. This new Memorial honors the 16 million who served in the armed 
forces of the United States during World War II, the more than 400,000 
who died, and the millions who supported the war effort from home. 
Symbolic of the defining event of the 20th Century, the Memorial is a 
monument to the spirit and sacrifice of the American people. On this 
day, we honor them and the many others who died in service to our 
country, and the contributions all of them have made for us.
  Service of this country in uniform has been, since the beginning, one 
of the greatest sources of unity and equality, in our national life. 
More than half a century ago, President Franklin Roosevelt reminded the 
American people that, ``Those who have long enjoyed such privileges as 
we enjoy forget in time that men have died to win them.'' I hope on 
this Memorial Day, we as a Nation, and each of us as individuals, will 
take to heart President Roosevelt's reminder that it is the sacred duty 
and great privilege of the living to honor and remember those who have 
died to protect the American ideals of freedom and democracy. The men 
and women who have died in service to America and to all of us deserve 
no less.

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