Bill Text: IL HR0360 | 2015-2016 | 99th General Assembly | Introduced
Bill Title: Recognizes the Armenian Genocide of 1915 and declares April 24, 2015 as a "Day of Remembrance for the Holy Martyrs of the Armenian Genocide of 1915".
Spectrum: Bipartisan Bill
Status: (Introduced - Dead) 2015-04-24 - Added Co-Sponsor Rep. Donald L. Moffitt [HR0360 Detail]
Download: Illinois-2015-HR0360-Introduced.html
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1 | HOUSE RESOLUTION
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2 | WHEREAS, The 20th Century has witnessed unspeakable acts of | ||||||
3 | murder and chaos, from
the Holocaust, to the massacres in | ||||||
4 | Rwanda and Bosnia, the genocidal campaign against the
Armenian | ||||||
5 | people symbolizes one of the first in our modem age; and
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6 | WHEREAS, Between the years 1915-1923, nearly one and a half | ||||||
7 | million Armenian men,
women, and children were massacred by the | ||||||
8 | Ottoman Turkish government; and
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9 | WHEREAS, The United Nations defines the term genocide as | ||||||
10 | any of the following acts
committed with intent to destroy, in | ||||||
11 | whole or in part, a national, ethnic, racial, or religious | ||||||
12 | group,
including killing members of the group; causing serious | ||||||
13 | bodily or mental harm to members of
the group; deliberately | ||||||
14 | inflicting on the group conditions of life calculated to bring | ||||||
15 | about its
physical destruction in whole or in part; imposing | ||||||
16 | measures intended to prevent births within the
group; or | ||||||
17 | forcibly transferring children of the group to another; and
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18 | WHEREAS, The segregation and degradation of the minority | ||||||
19 | Christian Armenian
population by the Turkish government began | ||||||
20 | with Ottoman rule in the mid-l800s; the brutality
escalated | ||||||
21 | during the reign of the Young Turks, immediately following the | ||||||
22 | First World War; and
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1 | WHEREAS, In 1939, the monster, Adolf Hitler, cited the | ||||||
2 | Armenian genocide as
justification for the genocide he himself | ||||||
3 | was about to lead, asking, "Who after all, speaks today
of the | ||||||
4 | annihilation of the Armenians."; and
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5 | WHEREAS, The attempted extermination and forced | ||||||
6 | displacement of the Armenian
people not only extinguished | ||||||
7 | precious lives, but also uprooted a centuries-old culture from | ||||||
8 | their
ancient homeland; and
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9 | WHEREAS, The people of Armenia have witnessed the eastern | ||||||
10 | conquests of Alexander
the Great, fought the legions of Rome | ||||||
11 | and Sassanid Persians, halted Arabian expansion, supplied
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12 | emperors to the throne of Byzantium, became the first nation to | ||||||
13 | adopt Christianity in 301 CE,
and established their language's | ||||||
14 | alphabet barely a century later in 406 CE; and
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15 | WHEREAS, A century ago this year, Armenian heritage came | ||||||
16 | under threat once more, as
thousands of their monasteries and | ||||||
17 | churches were desecrated or destroyed, national institutions
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18 | and schools, razed to the ground, and the surviving Armenian | ||||||
19 | people, scattered across the world; and
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20 | WHEREAS, Despite the wreckage, the Armenian people | ||||||
21 | endured, building a new and
sovereign nation in the eastern |
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1 | half of their homeland; and
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2 | WHEREAS, The 21st Century world continues to face | ||||||
3 | terrifying crimes against humanity
even at this very hour, as | ||||||
4 | forces of repression and barbarism seek to roll back the | ||||||
5 | progress of our
age; and
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6 | WHEREAS, These forces of terror include the Islamic State, | ||||||
7 | Boko Haram, the regional
tentacles of al-Qa'ida, al-Nusrah | ||||||
8 | Front, al-Shabaab, Hizballah, and Hamas, along with far too
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9 | many more; and
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10 | WHEREAS, The great champion and prophet of liberty, Dr. | ||||||
11 | Martin Luther King Jr.
powerfully noted that, "He who passively | ||||||
12 | accepts evil is as much involved in it as he who helps
to | ||||||
13 | perpetrate it. He who accepts evil without protesting against | ||||||
14 | it is really cooperating with it."; and
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15 | WHEREAS, We must learn and boldly speak of, the often | ||||||
16 | heartbreaking but invaluable
lessons of our common human past, | ||||||
17 | as well as teach them to our children and our grandchildren
in | ||||||
18 | order for this world to finally be free of hostility and | ||||||
19 | violence; therefore, be it
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20 | RESOLVED, BY THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES OF THE | ||||||
21 | NINETY-NINTH GENERAL ASSEMBLY OF THE STATE OF ILLINOIS, that |
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1 | we, and all other
people of human decency, who speak today of | ||||||
2 | the near annihilation of the Armenian people, and
indeed of all | ||||||
3 | those who continue suffering under the heel of tyranny across | ||||||
4 | the world; and be it further
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5 | RESOLVED, That on this lOOth anniversary year of the | ||||||
6 | Armenian
genocide, we commemorate the nearly one and a half | ||||||
7 | million precious lives lost and honor the
rich, ancient | ||||||
8 | heritage of the Armenian people by dedicating April 24th, 2015 | ||||||
9 | as the Day of
Remembrance for the Holy Martyrs of the Armenian | ||||||
10 | Genocide of 1915.
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