E pluribus unum. “Out of many, one.” So says America’s traditional motto as it appears on our great seal — and has since Congress approved its inclusion in 1782.
On Oct. 31, the U.S. Supreme Court heard oral arguments in cases reconsidering the legal and constitutional status of affirmative action. This reconsideration entails a broader one regarding what makes us Americans.
The motto recognizes that differences always have existed among our citizens. Americans have held to different religious creeds, including great diversity among Christian sects but also a Jewish population, which we know in part from President George Washington’s famous letter to the Hebrew congregation in 1790. William Penn’s Pennsylvania is a shining, colonial example of this plethora of religious groups as well.
