Tomorrow the US will be choosing its president
The choice is theirs to make. Yet, our association cannot be indifferent to this election. An association bearing the name of La Fayette, which aims as far as possible to help support the humanist values underlying Franco-American friendship from the beginning.
This election also concerns us, from the “small end of the telescope” as they say. Because the president elect will be the president of the United States in June 2012 when the Hermione will anchor in front of the Statue of Liberty.
The election on November 4, 2008 therefore symbolically marks the start of the countdown of the Hermione’s voyage to America.
For the Hermione-La Fayette association, a new adventure is commencing, a full-fledged adventure as stimulating and demanding as the adventure of rebuilding the Hermione which remains even today, as we know, a real gamble.
To succeed in this new adventure of the Hermione, we need to mobilise new support from new partners on both sides of the Atlantic among those who share our values, the values embodied by La Fayette in his commitment to the independence of the United States and the abolition of slavery.
We are eager for their participation and we want them to know their initiatives and proposals will be fully welcomed by our association.
Let us make the transatlantic voyage of the Hermione in 2012 a great celebration of Franco-American friendship.
Benedict Donnelly
President of the Hermione-La Fayette Association
November 3, 2008.
