Young Celebrates 250th Birthday of the U.S. Marine Corps
**Click here or above to watch Senator Young’s floor speech.**
WASHINGTON – U.S. Senator Todd Young (R-Ind.), a Marine veteran, spoke on the Senate floor about the 250th Birthday of the U.S. Marine Corps, officially celebrated on November 10, 2025.
“Whether on land, sea, or air…in war or peace…in the service or after it…For 250 years, the U.S. Marine Corps has not just trained warriors but made citizens. There are no fiercer defenders of our freedom. No greater examples of the virtues that make our republic function,” said Young.
In his remarks, Young spoke about a photo of three young Indiana University students who swore the oath to defend their country in March 1942.
To watch the full floor speech, click here.
Senator Young’s full remarks are below:
On the campus of Indiana University, a tablet placed on the floor of the Student Union pays tribute to the men and women who served in the Civil War.
Over 80 years ago, in March 1942, three young Hoosiers stood over that marker, raised their right hands, and joined those ranks.
When the oath began, they were college students, in the last days of childhood.
When it was complete, they were Marines, the first to fight for their country…
They joined a long line of American heroes dating all the way back to the Revolutionary War.
On November 10, 1775, when America contemplated a difficult amphibious assault of the British supply hub in Nova Scotia, the Continental Congress called for the raising of a regiment to execute the difficult expedition.
A special breed of warrior capable of fighting on land and sea.
Just the type of men, “acquainted with maritime affairs,” as the Continental Congress phrased it, were to be found at Tun Tavern, a brewhouse on Philadelphia’s waterfront.
On the same day the colonial government passed its resolution, they commissioned Samuel Nicholas to raise this force.
Not long after, he walked through the tavern’s door and appointed its owner Robert Mullan chief recruiter.
Together, with the lure of high adventure, mugs full of cold beer, and the call to defend their homes, they enlisted two battalions of men.
They were the first members of the United States Marine Corps.
Beginning on that day in Philadelphia, to countless days like the one on the campus of Indiana University, millions of men and women have answered their nation’s call.
For two hundred and fifty years, from the shores of Nassau to the walls of Abbey Gate, they have defended our flag, our way of life, and freedom’s friends, far from its shores…
They have been asked and often done the impossible.
Because of their daring, their relentlessness, and their ingenuity…
…the United States Marine Corps will always be synonymous with danger….
…danger to any foe that would threaten the American people.
A history of vanquished foes can testify to this:
Barbary Pirates, whose strongholds Leathernecks marched across the African desert to conquer.
British Redcoats mowed down during the Battle of New Orleans, when Marines formed the center of the city’s defense under General Jackson.
Mexican cadets, who watched as Marines stormed the Halls of Montezuma and raised the stars and stripes over Chapultepec Castle.
German soldiers driven from Belleau Wood by the greatly outnumbered, 4th Marine Brigade.
Japanese troops who bombarded Marines as they landed on the black sands of Iwo Jima…
…and then listened from their bunkers as the Americans cheered while six members of the 5th Marine Division planted their flag at the summit of Mount Suribachi.
The al-Qaeda insurgents killed and captured in Fallujah when the Marines fought from street to street, house to house.
These and countless other battles were won at terrible cost; tens of thousands Marines killed or wounded in action; widows and widowers, sons and daughters left behind.
The history of the Marine Corps is one of incredible heroism and great sacrifice.
But to reduce the Marine Corps only to those virtues, is to understate its importance in American history.
Marines are not simply warriors, but, as Ronald Reagan once said, the ideal of “soldierly virtue.”
On the wall of my office hangs my Mameluke – the curved saber a Marine carries at his side.
Its history began on “the shores of Tripoli” when that band of Marines took the Libyan port city of Derna.
For this victory, they were awarded a mameluke from an Ottoman prince. Two decades later it officially became part of an officer’s dress uniform.
Today its use is largely ceremonial. But if used wisely, it becomes a tool with multiple purposes; like the Marine who carries it.
Marines are not just taught the virtues that make men and women soldiers — courage under fire and physical strength — but also the ones that make them good citizens once their service has ended.
This photograph captures the moment in 1942 when those three young Indiana University students swore the oath to defend their country.
The lives of the men in it, on the battlefield and off of it, demonstrated what it means to be a Marine.
They were honorable.
Three years after the picture was snapped, the man at its center wandered Okinawa, searching for souvenirs to send home.
He was there as part of the American assault on the island, a precursor to attacks on the Japanese mainland.
“The death and destruction leave bad taste in my mouth and strike me deeply as the horrible part of the war,” Lieutenant Maurice “Pat” David wrote his family in Nashville.
But the cause was just, he wrote.
The bodies of old women and young girls murdered by the Imperial Japanese Army proved it.
He encouraged his parents not to worry about his safety.
But months later he was severely wounded, returned to the states and later awarded a Purple Heart.
Through his service in the Corps, Lieutenant Col. David attended law school in Washington, DC.
Then he served as a legal officer before retiring from the Marine Corps after 22 years of service.
He then returned home to Indiana, settling in Columbus with his wife and daughters.
Lt. David served his country with honor during his time in the Marine Corps. He did the same for his community after it concluded.
He was elected a Superior Court Judge, practiced law for nearly 20 years, and, after retiring, served as a senior judge in Southern Indiana.
As a lawyer, he was dedicated to his clients.
As a judge, he treated the attorneys before him thoughtfully, reasoning they were clients as well.
When he died in 2016, it was after living a life defined by what he learned in the Marines Corps: integrity, devotion to justice, service for a cause greater than oneself.
They were courageous.
The man to Lt. David’s right in the photo was Leonard Alford, of Garrett, Indiana.
A year after he stood at the memorial plaque in Bloomington, Alford sat in a tent staring at the Pacific Ocean.
“I know you have been worried because you have not heard from me,” he wrote to his parents from an island he was not at liberty to name.
He had earned a Silver Star, leading the men of the 4th Marine Raider Battalion in battle on New Georgia as his men fought across the Solomon Islands.
Afterwards, they were redesignated the 2nd Battalion, 4th Marines and Alford was made company captain.
Members of the original 4th Marine Regiment were lost on Bataan and Corregidor.
“We hope to be able to keep their good name,” he shared with his family.
Because of Captain Alford’s courage they did.
Two years later, when Captain Alford was awarded a second Silver Star, which was turned to Gold, it was posthumously.
In the closing weeks of the Okinawa campaign, he led a charge towards one the island’s remaining Japanese strongholds.
Under heavy fire, ignoring his safety, he steadied the Marines, insured their advance and sacrificed his life for the success of the campaign and the freedom of his country.
They were committed.
The last man in the photo was Corporal John Irwin Murray, Hartford City.
In the years after the photo was taken, he remained on campus, drilling with Pershing Rifles.
After graduation he trained on Parris Island.
Corporal Murray spent sixteen months on Guadalcanal and Guam; then he was deployed to China with the 6th Marines Division.
After the war, he settled in California where he married and raised a family and worked as an accountant and a teacher.
Unlike the two other Marines in the photo, there is very little public information about Corporal Murray’s life – occasional updates in the Indiana University alumni magazine on his time in the Marines, his letters home from the Pacific lamenting how few other Hoosiers he met there.
He lived a meaningful civilian life, without fanfare.
Commitment to duty doesn’t demand glory or a long military career—it’s about showing up when needed and then quietly contributing to society afterward.
Our service continues in the everyday work of building communities and supporting families.
Corporal Murray represents something essential about the Marine Corps:
Most of us who serve will return to become good citizens, neighbors, and workers, carrying a sense of duty into ordinary American life.
That’s not less important than the other two paths; it’s an expression of the same commitment.
Whether on land, sea, or air… in war or peace…in the service or after it…For 250 years, the U.S. Marine Corps has not just trained warriors but made citizens.
There are no fiercer defenders of our freedom.
No greater examples of the virtues that make our republic function.
As we celebrate this great anniversary throughout the month of November, we thank and salute the men in that photo, and every member of the Corps, always faithful, for their service and for their sacrifices.
It is impossible to imagine America without the Marines.