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Washington, DC -- The U.S. House of Representatives voted Monday on a resolution introduced by U.S. Rep. Ron Klein (FL-22), that honors the life and heroism of Sir Nicholas Winton, who saved more than 600 children from their deaths during the Holocaust. The resolution, H.RES.583 is passed the House of Representatives by a voice vote Monday evening.
“One of my missions as the co-chair of the Congressional Task Force Against Anti-Semitism is to raise awareness of the atrocities of the Holocaust, the most infamous example of anti-Semitic hate,” said Klein. “This resolution demonstrates an extraordinary example of heroism during the Holocaust, and that even during the height of anti-Semitism, there can still be some good.”
Below is the text of the floor speech the Congressman will gave when he introduced the bill on the floor Monday afternoon:
“Mr. Speaker, I rise today to honor a true hero, Sir Nicholas Winton, who saved more than 600 children from their deaths during the Holocaust. Nine months before the outbreak of World War II, Nicholas Winton, then only 29 years old, used his business and personal connections, urgently working from the dining room table of a hotel room, and found safety for these hundreds of children.
“Nicholas Winton took the lead in raising the necessary funds to assure transportation for these children. He found them foster families and arranged for the necessary permits and documents. He saved their lives, since most of their families and contemporaries who remained in Czechoslovakia perished.
“These children grew up to be doctors, nurses, teachers, musicians, artists, writers, pilots, ministers, scientists, engineers, entrepreneurs, and a Member of the British Parliament, and today they and their children and grandchildren and great-grandchildren number over five thousand living in the United States, Canada, Australia, the Czech Republic, Britain, Germany and elsewhere.
“Nicholas Winton was later given a knighthood from Queen Elizabeth for services to humanity, but Sir Nicholas never sought credit for saving the lives of these children. In fact, his achievement went unrecognized for more than half a century, and until 1988, even his family never knew about it. For fifty years “Winton’s children,” as the survivors call themselves, did not know to whom they owed their lives. His story only emerged when his wife came across an old leather briefcase in an attic, and found lists of the children and letters from their parents.
“In 1939, as He scrambled to save hundreds of children, Nicholas Winton wrote in a letter:
‘There is a difference between passive goodness and active goodness, which is, in my opinion, the giving of one's time and energy in the alleviation of pain and suffering. It entails going out, finding and helping those in suffering and danger, and not merely in leading an exemplary life, in a purely passive way of doing no wrong.’
“The life of Sir Nicholas, now 93 years old, is certainly an example of active goodness. Just as we will never forget the horrors and death of the Holocaust, we must also never forget the examples of bravery and heroism that serve as our models still today.
“I urge my colleagues to support this resolution and to honor the life and accomplishments of Nicholas Winton, a hero to many and a model for all.”
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