From Canada to U.S.

I am a naturalized US citizen, born and raised in Canada. In elementary school, my classmates and I probably spent more time learning about the United Empire Loyalists who packed up their wagons and moved to the British colony of Upper Canada during the American Revolution than about the brave American patriots who rebelled against a king. In civics class, we compared and contrasted Canada’s parliamentary system with the U.S. system of checks and balances based on three co-equal branches of government.

I could not know then that as an adult I would fall in love with and marry an American. So here I am, having now spent more than half my life in the United States. Not having grown up here, I will always see the “American experiment” more in shades of grey than in black and white. Yet I greatly admire and respect many of the values embodied in the U.S. Constitution, including but not limited to free speech, the freedom to peaceably assemble, and the right of every person to due process.

And so last week I eagerly joined the crowd at the large No Kings rally in Downtown Pittsburgh, one of thousands of such rallies around the country. America won its independence from a king in 1776, and if I have any say in the matter, it isn’t going back. As Ben Franklin said: “A republic, if you can keep it.” A nation grounded in the rule of law, not the whims of a monarch.

Eleanor Mayfield
Squirrel Hill