Ernest Istook: “Mr. Speaker, as a principle sponsor, I think it is good that we talk about what it means for a nation, for Hungary, to…”

“Mr. Speaker, as a principle sponsor, I think it is good that we talk about what it means for a nation, for Hungary, to celebrate 1,000 years as a Nation. Many of us recall when the United States of America celebrated its bicentennial in 1976. That was for 200 years. We have not yet made it quite to 225 or 250 or 500, much less 1,000 years that Hungary is celebrating. When one looks at the history when they came into the Carpathian Basin and they decided that they wanted to establish permanency, and they wanted to be a key part of Europe, and they had the crowning of Saint Stephen as the first king of Hungary, and founded the state that has endured despite the Nazi occupations, the Soviet occupations. We, who have visited Hungary both before and after the Iron Curtain came down, see the marvelous resiliency of a people who could not be suppressed, who retained everything that they could, that made an example before the world in 1956 as the first nation to try to throw off the yoke of Communist oppression and domination.”