United States
There is an aristocratic tinge to the social usage of the title “colonel", which today designates the southern gentleman, and is archetypal of the southern aristocrat. States conferring this title as an honor include Kentucky, Tennessee, Mississippi, South Carolina, Georgia, Oklahoma, Louisiana, New Mexico, North Dakota, and Alabama. In 2005 Illinois allowed for the Governor of the State to make appointments to the Governor's Regiment of Colonels, but no such appointments have been made. Many states have provisions in their articles or bills concerning state defense forces which allow the governor to grant honorary membership of the officer ranks. While the honorary colonel of this usage has no actual military role, the title did evolve from the military.
The highest honor of Tennessee is “Colonel, Aide de camp, Governor’s staff". Those who receive this award are recorded by the Secretary of State of Tennessee with those who have been commissioned into the State Guard and Tennessee National Guard. This distinction went to only American citizens or Tennessee residents until Governor Phil Bredesen awarded it to the first non American, a Canadian, Cory Ward Dingle of British Columbia for his contributions to the People of Tennessee.
Kentucky’s famous colonelcy evolved from the personal bodyguards of the governor and now confers its recipients as honorary members of the governor’s staff. Like Tennessee, Georgia’s honorary titles give its members a rank as Aides-de-camp to the Governor's staff and is codified in the Official Code of Georgia Annotated 38-2-111, while the Alabama honor specifically makes one a lieutenant colonel in the state militia.
The Colonel is also often a shorthand reference to Colonel Sanders, the founder of KFC, who was an honorary Kentucky colonel. Another famous "colonel" was "Colonel Tom Parker", the manager of Elvis Presley whose title was granted by Jimmie Davis, the governor of Louisiana.
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Famous quotes related to united states:
“... when we shall have our amendment to the Constitution of the United States, everyone will think it was always so, just exactly as many young people believe that all the privileges, all the freedom, all the enjoyments which woman now possesses were always hers. They have no idea of how every single inch of ground that she stands upon to-day has been gained by the hard work of some little handful of women of the past.”
—Susan B. Anthony (1820–1906)
“When Mr. Apollinax visited the United States
His laughter tinkled among the teacups.
I thought of Fragilion, that shy figure among the birch-trees,
And of Priapus in the shrubbery
Gaping at the lady in the swing.”
—T.S. (Thomas Stearns)
“The real charm of the United States is that it is the only comic country ever heard of.”
—H.L. (Henry Lewis)
“An alliance is like a chain. It is not made stronger by adding weak links to it. A great power like the United States gains no advantage and it loses prestige by offering, indeed peddling, its alliances to all and sundry. An alliance should be hard diplomatic currency, valuable and hard to get, and not inflationary paper from the mimeograph machine in the State Department.”
—Walter Lippmann (1889–1974)
“Ethnic life in the United States has become a sort of contest like baseball in which the blacks are always the Chicago Cubs.”
—Ishmael Reed (b. 1938)