WHEREAS, The Tomb of the Unknown Soldier is located at Arlington National Cemetery and has, since 1921, provided a final resting place for the remains of an unidentified United States service member from World War I and, subsequently, remains from later conflicts; and

WHEREAS, In December 1920, New York Congressman and World War I veteran Hamilton Fish Jr. proposed legislation “to bring home the body of an unknown American warrior who in himself represents no section, creed, or race in the late war and who typifies, moreover, the soul of America and the supreme sacrifice of her heroic dead”; and

WHEREAS, The remains of an unknown service member from World War I were returned from France and on November 11, 1921, were carried in a procession through Washington, D.C., to Arlington National Cemetery where a state funeral was held before the remains were interred in the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier; and

WHEREAS, The Tomb sarcophagus is decorated with three wreaths on each side panel. On the front, three figures represent Peace, Victory and Valor. The back features the inscription: “Here rests in honored glory an American soldier known but to God”; and

WHEREAS, In August 1956, President Dwight D. Eisenhower approved the selection and interment of the remains of unknown service members from both World War II and Korea. The remains arrived in Washington, D.C., on May 28, 1958, and lay in state in the United States Capitol before they were interred in crypts beside the World War I sarcophagus; and

WHEREAS, On Memorial Day 1984, President Ronald Reagan presided over the interment ceremony for the remains of an unknown service member from the Vietnam War, but the remains were subsequently positively identified using DNA testing and exhumed. The crypt designated for the Vietnam War Unknown remains vacant and was rededicated to honor all missing service members from the Vietnam War; and

WHEREAS, According to the United States Defense POW/MIA Accounting Agency, more than 81,900 Americans remain missing from World War II, the Korean War, the Vietnam War, the Cold War, and the Gulf War and other conflicts; and

WHEREAS, Of those missing, more than 6,300 are from California, including 5,619 from World War II, 588 from the Korean War, 162 from the Vietnam War, and one from the 1986 strike over Libya; now, therefore, be it