In response to last night's
Darkstream on the inevitable failure of conservatism, a Voxiversity
supporter observes that the duty of the immigrant to refrain from interfering
in the affairs of his new residence dates back to the days of ancient Rome.
I’ve been reading Quintus Curtius’ translation of Cicero’s On Duties.
Cicero devotes just one sentence to the duties of foreigners, and he gets right
to the heart of the matter: “But the business of the foreigner or the
foreign-resident of a country is to keep to his own concerns; he has no reason
to probe into things beyond this and by no means should inject himself into the
affairs of his host nation.”
The significance of this wise advice can be
seen in way that the failure of the United States to impose this duty of
non-interference in its affairs on its foreign residents, particularly the
Jewish and Irish immigrants of the 19th and 20th centuries, has proven fatal to
both its place in the world and its future prospects.
A failure to learn from the past is a near-guarantee of failure in the future. Imagine how much better off the American people would be if those it permitted to immigrate had simply refrained from injecting themselves into the affairs of their host nation.
A failure to learn from the past is a near-guarantee of failure in the future. Imagine how much better off the American people would be if those it permitted to immigrate had simply refrained from injecting themselves into the affairs of their host nation.