H5game8

Diversity isn’t a flaw in the American experiment, Darryl Davis writes. It’s the founding blueprint, and real estate professionals have a role to play as doorkeepers of the American dream.

Inman Connect

Invest in yourself, grow your business—real estate’s biggest moment is in New York!

As real estate professionals, I believe it’s in our core to help families achieve the American dream. But it’s worth asking: Whose dream was America built for?

Because in this country’s DNA and in its mottos, monuments, money and most sacred documents, there’s a message we can’t afford to forget: America was built by immigrants, strengthened by immigrants, and still depends on immigrants to thrive.

TAKE THE INMAN INTEL INDEX SURVEY

Right now, in a climate where immigrants are being targeted, blamed, and attacked, the real estate industry has a moral obligation to be on the right side of history. We are in the business of housing, opportunity, and upward mobility. We help people put down roots and find stability. For generations of newcomers, buying a home is the first real step into American life.

If the American dream has a front door, YOU, the real estate professional, are holding the key.

So let’s remember what this country is — not the political version being argued on cable news, but the actual, historical version carved in stone and stamped in metal.

‘Out of many, one’: The Founders’ original vision

One of the earliest mottos of the United States is E pluribus unum — Latin for “Out of many, one.” Proposed in 1776 by John Adams, Benjamin Franklin and Thomas Jefferson for the Great Seal, it was adopted in 1782. Originally, it meant 13 colonies becoming one nation, but over time, it came to mean something bigger: Many people, one nation.

The founders literally put this message in our hands; the motto is printed on U.S. coins, embedded in the Great Seal, and even hidden in microprint on the $5 bill. This wasn’t poetic decoration. It was a declaration: America is supposed to be built from many, not one.

Immigration isn’t a side story. It is the story

From 1892 to 1954, 12 million immigrants were processed through Ellis Island alone. Today, two-fifths of Americans may be descended from someone who walked through that building.

On the island stands the American Immigrant Wall of Honor, etched with nearly one million immigrant names — the only national monument where you can officially memorialize your family’s immigrant story.

We literally built a wall in New York Harbor, not to keep people out, but to carve their names in and say, “You belong here.” That is who we are.

Every historian, and even critics of immigration, agree on a basic fact: immigration is one of the defining forces in American history. America didn’t “add” immigrants to a finished product. Immigrants were the product.

If we want to be intellectually honest, indigenous peoples were here first. Enslaved people were forced here, and, along with immigrants, built the rest. That is the real foundation of America: not a slogan, but the mechanics of how the nation grew.

The Statue of Liberty: America’s open-arms landmark

No symbol expresses this more powerfully than the Statue of Liberty. Emma Lazarus’s 1883 poem — “Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses yearning to breathe free…” — was added to a bronze plaque inside the pedestal in 1903.

Her poem literally renames the statue: “Mother of Exiles.” She turned the statue into a beacon for those without a home. The symbols Americans chose for themselves say, “We welcome the stranger.”

The Constitution: Immigration woven into our law

The 14th Amendment makes it crystal clear: Anyone born on U.S. soil is a citizen. In 1898, the Supreme Court reaffirmed this in United States v. Wong Kim Ark, ruling that a man born in San Francisco to Chinese parents was unquestionably a U.S. citizen, even during the era of anti-Chinese exclusion laws.

Birthright citizenship has stood for over a century. This is not a loophole. It is a constitutional philosophy: Once you are here, you belong.

‘What is past is prologue’

Outside the National Archives, a place I have visited almost every Fourth of July for the last decade, is a statue engraved with Shakespeare’s words: “What is past is prologue.” In that spot, it’s a warning: Don’t rewrite the future without understanding the past. And our past is immigrant-heavy, messy, and essential.

The truth is simple: Aside from Native Americans, every one of us came from somewhere else. The first Europeans to colonize America were the Spanish, followed by the English, French and Dutch, all immigrants. Even the Founding Fathers came from immigrant families. Immigration isn’t an interruption in American history; it is American history. That’s not a political opinion — that’s a high-school-level fact.

Yet today, ideas like “reverse migration” float around — attempts to rewrite the moral DNA of our nation. America has never defined patriotism by ancestry, purity or exclusion. Our founders stamped “Out of many, one” into our money and monuments because they understood that America’s strength comes from its mixture.

Pushing people out doesn’t make America stronger — it makes America smaller.

Why this matters to us

So why did I write this article for our industry? Because housing is where the American promise meets real life. You and I help families, including immigrant families, take their first step toward stability, wealth, community and dignity. Buying a home is not just financial. It is emotional. It is belonging.

When political winds shift toward fear, exclusion and division, we cannot pretend this has nothing to do with us. We help people become part of America. Every closing is an act of inclusion. Every key handed over is an extension of “Out of many, one.”

Every immigrant homeowner strengthens our neighborhoods, our markets and our nation. We cannot build careers helping people achieve the American dream and stay silent while some are told they don’t deserve it.

The blueprint is clear

Immigrants are not on the margins of America’s story; they are the story. They are the raw material this country was built from. Remove them, and the whole structure collapses. Diversity isn’t a flaw. It’s the founding blueprint.

If America is a home, then we — the real estate industry — are its doorkeepers. This moment in history calls on us to stand for the same principles engraved in our monuments, carved in our marble, stamped on our currency and written into our Constitution: Out of many, one.

Darryl Davis is the CEO of Darryl Davis Seminars. Connect with him on Facebook or YouTube.

Topics: leadership Show Comments Hide Comments Sign up for Inman’s Morning Headlines What you need to know to start your day with all the latest industry developments Sign me up By submitting your email address, you agree to receive marketing emails from Inman. Success! Thank you for subscribing to Morning Headlines. Read Next real estate farming