Category: Good Citizenship

The huddled masses gathered at a nondescript Charlotte business park just before Independence Day to help renew America. Sixty people from three dozen countries, seemingly of every hue, color, age, and background, became flesh-and-blood representatives of e pluribus unum as they sat together on folding chairs in a fluorescent-lit conference room while a middling official […]

My elementary school handed out good citizenship awards at quarterly, school-wide assemblies. The yellow cardstock certificates commemorated the recipients’ exhibition of those behaviors the school deemed proper for responsible young people: obedience, respect for authority, and adherence to the rules. In other words, to be a good citizen was to be compliant. At no time […]