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Thursday, May 02, 2002

By Steve Levin, Post-Gazette Staff Writer

The disparate elements of American society were on stage yesterday morning in an eighth-floor courtroom at the federal court building.

	Najiba Tursonzadah, who left Afghanistan 11 years ago, pledges allegiance during a naturalization ceremony yesterday in the courtroom of U.S. District Judge D. Brooks Smith. She now lives in Greenfield. (John Beale, Post-Gazette)

At the center of attention were 54 newly naturalized citizens -- a polyglot of colors, religions, creeds, shapes and sizes who had been born in 29 different countries but whose dreams, study and work had brought them together to take this final step in becoming American citizens.

Occupying the other seats in the high-ceilinged, red-carpeted courtroom were family, security officers, reporters, lawyers, a judge in the midst of a controversial nomination for a seat on a federal court of appeals, Boy Scouts, a representative from the League of Women Voters and a regent from the local chapter of the Daughters of the American Revolution.

As if that weren't enough pageantry and splendor, it was also Law Day, established in 1958 by presidential proclamation as a day for Americans to appreciate their liberties. The ceremony was sponsored by the Allegheny County Bar Association.

Thanh-Huyen Tran appreciated everything about it, down to the miniature American flag she and the other new citizens received.

She is originally from Hanoi, Vietnam, where her father was a high-level army officer fighting against French interests in the 1940s and 1950s and in the Vietnam War in the 1960s and early 1970s, a conflict he still calls "The War Against America." Tran can remember the U.S. bombing of Hanoi in 1972 when she was 2 years old.

Now 32, and living in Shadyside with Joshua Mindel, her husband of nearly six years, she works at Carnegie Mellon University while studying in an accounting certification program at the University of Pittsburgh.

"My parents know I'm going to be an American," she said. "They're happy."

U.S. District Judge D. Brooks Smith presided over the naturalization ceremony, saying that "this is one of the only fun things we do in district court." He has been nominated by President George W. Bush for a 3rd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeal seat, but his confirmation has been delayed by, depending on your sight lines, partisan pettiness or, among other things, his former membership in an all-male club.

Smith said he hoped their culture from their past would enrich the lives of their new fellow citizens. His most pointed remarks, though, dealt with the rigors of citizenship, the highest purpose of which was jury duty.

Najiba Tursonzadah was a medical doctor in her native Afghanistan. She left 11 years ago for the United States because she feared for her life under the Taliban regime. She lives in Sharpsburg.

"All my kids were born here," she said of her two sons and two daughters. Her youngest, Salim, 2, and her husband, Rasul, accompanied her yesterday.

"After Sept. 11, it was important to me to get my citizenship. I'm very happy because this is my future."

She hopes to hear soon about a job application at a local hospital. In the meantime, she said, she'll put her new American flag on top of her TV.

"Because," she said, "I am always looking at the TV and now I will see the flag and know I am a citizen."