President's Day: Remembering The Immigrant Past Of American Presidents (SLIDESHOW)

This year, President’s Day celebration is filled with irony.

We celebrate the nation's leaders at a time when anti-immigrant rhetoric, harsh anti-immigration laws and record high deportation numbers, put the fundamental idea of America as a melting pot and as a nation built on waves of immigrant energy to the test.

To honor the presidents of our country, we must inevitably celebrate immigration and commemorate the fact that they, too, have an immigrant past. Some of this country's most important and influential people are first and second generation Americans, born into families who's ancestry reaches back to other nationalities.

We've created this list to celebrate the immigrant past of our nation's leaders. Please share your thoughts in the comments below.




LEARN ABOUT THE IMMIGRANT PAST OF SOME U.S. PRESIDENTS:

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Comments

[spytheweb]

12:35 AM on 02/25/2012

But they are not illegal aliens.

[Alva Vargas]

08:47 PM on 02/22/2012

There's a big difference between our founding fathers being immigrants and from another era and the recent invasion of illegals who disrespect our laws and make a mockery of them for decades for personal gain, greed, and gluttony. What would our founding father's say?

[OdinsEye]

06:04 PM on 02/21/2012

"This year, President’s Day celebration is filled with irony. "

Ironic since there is no federal holiday called Presidents Day. See Title 5 US Code 6103.

[Ed Baker]

02:59 PM on 02/21/2012

To all the liberals on this board - please don't feel free to speak for me and my fellow Native Americans.

We don't support illegal immigration. We've learned our lessons. We allowed Europeans to come by the ship load. We have no country anymore and live on tiny little reservations.

Many tribes like my own don't see the "Latinos" as anything other than white people. You are all Europeans to us. Even African Americans are "black white men" in our language.

So - let me make this as clear as I possibly can - DON'T SPEAK IN OUR NAME.

[Acorn Tree]

06:39 PM on 02/21/2012

guess you shoulda used that land for something

[Ed Baker]

10:27 AM on 02/22/2012

Well we did, and still do - Our lifestyle required much more territory since our impact on the environment was so slight.

[Alva Vargas]

08:49 PM on 02/22/2012

I appreciate your comment, thanks! Integrity and our laws are lost in the plight to give a bunch of criminals rights they don't deserve and are not entitled to!

[Ed Baker]

10:31 AM on 02/23/2012

I have no problem with LEGAL immigration. I own two homes in Los Angeles - I have friends from all over the world. It's just not fair to those who actually obey the law and wait, and pay, and come here legally......

[Ed Baker]

02:52 PM on 02/21/2012

Since they were all born here, none of them were immigrants. Our Constitution forbids the election of anyone who is not born an citizen of the US.

[nee]

08:02 AM on 02/21/2012

No one is "anti-immigrant" and LEGAL immigrants don't get deported. ILLEGAL ALIENS and those who hire them however are the problem.

[Contact1972]

03:01 AM on 02/23/2012

You are incorrect. Due to DOMA, legal immigrants are getting deported.

[nee]

08:15 AM on 02/23/2012

Getting deported for what? Of course LEGAL immigrants can be deported if they do something ILLEGAL.

[BrokeInSoCal]

05:08 AM on 02/21/2012

...and they all spoke English. What a stupid article.

[UKLLee]

01:21 AM on 02/21/2012

"Thomas Jefferson, third president of the U.S., was born on April 13, 1743 in Shadwell, Goochland County, Virginia."

"Andrew Jackson, seventh president of the U.S. was born on March 15, 1767 in the Waxhaws area on the border between present-day North and South Carolina."

"Buchanan was the first member of his father's family to be born on American soil."

"He was born on October 5, 1829, in North Fairfield, Vermont."

Gee, these guys don't sound much like "immigrants" to me...

[Ed Baker]

02:53 PM on 02/21/2012

No person except a natural born Citizen, or a Citizen of the United States, at the time of the Adoption of this Constitution, shall be eligible to the Office of President; neither shall any Person be eligible to that Office who shall not have attained to the Age of thirty-five Years, and been fourteen Years a Resident within the United States.

[Consequence]

10:54 PM on 02/20/2012

Big difference.

The word "LEGAL" came before the word "IMMIGRA NT" for them.

[llwlknsn]

09:14 PM on 02/20/2012

Except for Chester Arthur and Obama, all of our Presidents were either grandfathered in, or were the children of naturalized PARENTS. That they were immigrants shows that this country has been a draw for bright individual since its beginning. That this issue much like the illegal alien issue is twisted and taken out of context to promote the ethnic agenda is not surprising. Obama is not a natural born citizen. Rubio is not a natural born citizen. Jindahl is not a natural born citizen. Romeny is questionable as to his claim of NBC.

What I do not understand, is that in over 300 million people in this country, neither party can find candidates who are clearly qualified for the Presidency. WE are at a very dangerous tipping point that cannot be dismissed for political expediancy. Natural born citizen has to do with the expected natural allegiance that a President gives to his Country and its people. Global citizens of dual citizenship need not apply. EVER.

[OdinsEye]

06:07 PM on 02/21/2012

"Rubio is not a natural born citizen."

Yes, he is.

"Jindahl is not a natural born citizen"

Yes, he is.

Both were born in the US, making them natural born citizens by federal law.

[BlairCase]

05:30 PM on 02/22/2012

Rubio, Jindahl and Romeny were all born in the United States. This makes them "natural born citizens," a phrase that simply means they are citizens by birthright. Their parents' citizenship doesn't matter. Thousands of people who have never resided in the United States but were born in U.S. hospitals are eligible to run for U.S.president even though their parents were not U.S. citizens. (They would have to move to the U.S. and live here long enough to meet residency requirements.)

[Elecktra001]

08:30 PM on 02/20/2012

I don't see the irony the author alludes to. Yes, these great leaders came from families who immigrated here. But these great men all considered themselves to be American without any hyphens, unlike many illegal-immigrants and their anchors these days.

[mira chancleta]

09:53 PM on 02/20/2012

Part of the reason for this is that when immigrants came here generations ago, they came with a ONE-WAY ticket...the homeland was far away and they did not want to return in failure and HAD to succeed and worked hard to make a go of their new homeland.

Today, many of these ROUND-TRIP "immigrants" are here, then they are there, then they come back again and the journey is often a bus ride to the border and short walk across it. There is no need to succeed 'cause this after all is the land of the "Gringo" and Uncle Sam is a joke in their eyes.

And to make matters worth, they have large enough social and cultural reference group HERE to cushion them from the Gringo's world, so they recreate the barrio and all that goes with that disaster.

And here you have the situation today, worsening by the day.

[Ed Baker]

02:54 PM on 02/21/2012

The illegals from Mexico are not immigrants - they are colonists.

They hate American culture and they want the territory that Mexico signed over to the US back in Mexico.

[hlasv3]

10:45 PM on 02/21/2012

So they can make it a toilet just like the one they left.

[Winter Skye]

07:52 PM on 02/20/2012

Yeah, like Obama.

[matcyn]

06:52 PM on 02/20/2012

If you are not an American Indian, then technically you are "AN IMIGRANT"

[guavass]

07:22 PM on 02/20/2012

what if you are mixed? Indian and European

[Winter Skye]

07:55 PM on 02/20/2012

No. A NATIVE-born American is someone born on American soil. So yeah, I am a NATIVE American but thanks anyway.

[Norski]

04:16 PM on 02/20/2012

Laws made by common consent must not be trampled on by individuals.
GEORGE WASHINGTON

There never was a law yet made, I conceive, that hit the taste exactly of every man, or every part of the community; of course, if this be a reason for opposition, no law can be executed at all without force, and every man or set of men will in that case cut and carve for themselves; the consequences of which must be deprecated by all classes of men, who are friends to order, and to the peace and happiness of the country.
GEORGE WASHINGTON

Let me not be understood as saying that there are no bad laws, nor that grievances may not arise for the redress of which no legal provisions have been made. I mean to say no such thing. But I do mean to say that although bad laws, if they exist, should be repealed as soon as possible, still, while they continue in force, for the sake of example they should be religiously observed.
Abraham Lincoln

No man is above the law and no man is below it; nor do we ask any man's permission when we ask him to obey it. Obedience to the law is demanded as a right; not asked as a favor.
Theodore Roosevelt

[Norski]

04:12 PM on 02/20/2012

Does this Author realize that this opinion piece highlights the disingenuousness of those who support people who live in the USA illegally? The use of the term "anti-immigrant" instead of "anti-illegal immigrant" or the more correct "pro-enforcement of our immigration law" reflects a very unfortunate agenda. If one can create enough unreasoned fear among legal immigrants and their supporters, maybe they too will help shield those who break our immigration law.

One must ask if the damage to the sensibilities of Legal Immigrants is worth the price. How can one sow such discord and fear in people who abide by the law in the narcissistic pursuit of a shield of protection from the consequences of breaking our immigration law? How can one be so cold hearted as to characterize people who ask for nothing more than the enforcement of our laws as bent on brutalizing innocent Legal Immigrants who abide by the law?

This endless mind game that claims we could, because of a quirk of fate, possibly deport the next Thomas Jefferson is a monumental conceit that never acknowledges the fact that such a quirk of fate has a very low probably of actually happening. And it never acknowledges the opposite, that we could be also be deporting the next John Wayne Gacy. To dwell on such possibilities is ridicules.

[guavass]

07:27 PM on 02/20/2012

I'm in this country without proper documentaion and my 3 brothers are coming soon. as soon as we get settled in, we'll send for our cousins. i laugh at "your immigration law"

[llwlknsn]

09:23 PM on 02/20/2012

Don't worry laughing boy. We will get around to you.

[trailerguy]

11:07 PM on 02/20/2012

Ice, Ice Baby

[llwlknsn]

09:23 PM on 02/20/2012

Of course the author knows that is the real point of the peice. That's why it was written.