[Federal Register Volume 67, Number 16 (Thursday, January 24, 2002)]
[Presidential Documents]
[Pages 3579-3580]
From the Federal Register Online via the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
[FR Doc No: 02-1971]


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  Federal Register / Vol. 67, No. 16 / Thursday, January 24, 2002 / 
Presidential Documents  

[[Page 3579]]


                Proclamation 7520 of January 18, 2002

                
National Sanctity of Human Life Day, 2002

                By the President of the United States of America

                A Proclamation

                This Nation was founded upon the belief that every 
                human being is endowed by our Creator with certain 
                ``unalienable rights.'' Chief among them is the right 
                to life itself. The Signers of the Declaration of 
                Independence pledged their own lives, fortunes, and 
                honor to guarantee inalienable rights for all of the 
                new country's citizens. These visionaries recognized 
                that an essential human dignity attached to all persons 
                by virtue of their very existence and not just to the 
                strong, the independent, or the healthy. That value 
                should apply to every American, including the elderly 
                and the unprotected, the weak and the infirm, and even 
                to the unwanted.

                Thomas Jefferson wrote that, ``[t]he care of human life 
                and happiness and not their destruction is the first 
                and only legitimate object of good government.'' 
                President Jefferson was right. Life is an inalienable 
                right, understood as given to each of us by our 
                Creator.

                President Jefferson's timeless principle obligates us 
                to pursue a civil society that will democratically 
                embrace its essential moral duties, including defending 
                the elderly, strengthening the weak, protecting the 
                defenseless, feeding the hungry, and caring for 
                children--born and unborn. Mindful of these and other 
                obligations, we should join together in pursuit of a 
                more compassionate society, rejecting the notion that 
                some lives are less worthy of protection than others, 
                whether because of age or illness, social circumstance 
                or economic condition. Consistent with the core 
                principles about which Thomas Jefferson wrote, and to 
                which the Founders subscribed, we should peacefully 
                commit ourselves to seeking a society that values 
                life--from its very beginnings to its natural end. 
                Unborn children should be welcomed in life and 
                protected in law.

                On September 11, we saw clearly that evil exists in 
                this world, and that it does not value life. The 
                terrible events of that fateful day have given us, as a 
                Nation, a greater understanding about the value and 
                wonder of life. Every innocent life taken that day was 
                the most important person on earth to somebody; and 
                every death extinguished a world. Now we are engaged in 
                a fight against evil and tyranny to preserve and 
                protect life. In so doing, we are standing again for 
                those core principles upon which our Nation was 
                founded.

                NOW, THEREFORE, I, GEORGE W. BUSH, President of the 
                United States of America, by virtue of the authority 
                vested in me by the Constitution and the laws of the 
                United States, do hereby proclaim Sunday, January 20, 
                2002, as National Sanctity of Human Life Day. I call 
                upon all Americans to reflect upon the sanctity of 
                human life. Let us recognize the day with appropriate 
                ceremonies in our homes and places of worship, 
                rededicate ourselves to compassionate service on behalf 
                of the weak and defenseless, and reaffirm our 
                commitment to respect the life and dignity of every 
                human being.

[[Page 3580]]

                IN WITNESS WHEREOF, I have hereunto set my hand this 
                eighteenth day of January, in the year of our Lord two 
                thousand two, and of the Independence of the United 
                States of America the two hundred and twenty-sixth.

                    (Presidential Sig.)B

[FR Doc. 02-1971
Filed 1-23-02; 8:45 am]
Billing code 3195-01-P