Europe Day 2013

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Post photo: Croatian Parliament | © Bernarda Kalamar on Getty Images

This year in Heilbronn, we European federalists can not only look back on 60 years of the Heilbronn District Association of the EUROPA-UNION Germany, but also on 60 years of European competition. In addition, we commemorate the 50th anniversary of the Ellysee Treaty, which took Franco-German friendship to a whole new level in 1963. Even after more than sixty years of European reconciliation and the creation of a common Europe, the European idea is far from obsolete; so in July of this year we can welcome the Republic of Croatia as the 28th member of the European Union.

This is a further step towards the United States of Europe, which should one day crown our vision of a federal, democratic and peaceful Europe as part of a world union. Although there are always setbacks in our unification process, and will continue to happen, and although we are in the middle of an existential crisis in the European Union and its member states, we have all already achieved an important goal together - we Europeans will no longer shoot at each other!

Separation efforts and distribution struggles are fought with civil means. This is truly a foundation upon which we can and must continue to build. After all the years of peace in Europe, it is no longer just about peace within Europe, which should also serve as a good example for our one world. In the meantime, it is increasingly about our Europe as a whole, both as a community of us Europeans and our ideas, our values ​​and our concept of life in an ever-changing world - only together, and then still as a minority in this world, will we be in the Be able to represent and uphold our interests and values. These values ​​are: peace, freedom, democracy, federalism, subsidiarity and solidarity. We have to build on these values, we have to use these values ​​of ours more to solve the current and future problems.

It is no longer enough just to call for more Europe; we must also want to live in Europe! Our values ​​are not one-way streets, nor are they billboards – we citizens of Europe must live them ourselves and, if necessary, sue our fellow citizens for them. We must not confuse solidarity with compassion or charity, or federalism and subsidiarity with centralism and egalitarianism. In short: more Europe no longer means Brussels, more Europe does not mean the abolition of the individual states, but more Europe means overcoming problems together that we cannot solve on our own, while leaving each political level to its own tasks; the federal idea should guide us here, because only with it will we be able to successfully lead a community of over 500 million people into the future.

Here in Heilbronn we European federalists have been living our idea of ​​a common Europe for over 60 years, we have been organizing the award ceremonies for the European competition in the city and district of Heilbronn for 60 years and for 24 years now we have been organizing the meeting point Europe in the heart of our city - our example how to peacefully unite to make an idea a reality.

“Anyone who thinks that the eternal question of war and peace in Europe will never arise again could be very wrong. The demons aren't gone, they're just sleeping."

Jean Claude Juncker, in Mirror online (March 10, 2013)

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