Over the past 20 years, a number of proposed Constitutional amendments designed to enforce the use of English in the governmental, commercial and social arenas of American life have come before Congress. To date, the First Amendment and public opinion have prevailed, preventing passage of such a law. It is reasonable to assume that an increasingly pluralistic society will produce further attempts to legislate English as an official language, but the law of the United States, the spirit and intent of the Constitution, invalidates the argument that immigrants should be forced to learn English in order to remain in the country. Many of the chief claims put forth by the pro-English-language faction are spurious and, as such, discredit their position. But it is the right to free speech that provides the strongest argument against requiring immigrants to learn English.
It is a measure of the legal weakness of the pro-English-language position that those who put forth such an argument must resort to politics and to assertions that either cannot be proven or have been debunked. One of the most persistent of these claims is that non-English-speaking immigrants simply do not show an interest in learning English and, as such, should be forced to learn it if they desire to stay in the United States. However, it is demonstrably true that immigrants do seek to learn English despite the fact that they are not legally required to do so.
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Immigration trends indicate that “both immigrant adults and children are learning English – often quickly – despite the multiple challenges they face at both the personal and societal level” (Tse, 2001). Indeed, immigrants perceive that the path to success in the U.S. lies in the acquisition of steady employment and through commercial gain. Consequently, they see the English language as the key to their fortunes in their adopted country. Immigrants use the power of individual liberty to improve their lives, which certifies the genius of the Constitution as perceived by America’s Founding Fathers. There is no need to require immigrants to learn English – they use the opportunity to learn it own their own because it is in their interest to do so.
The pro-English position is rooted in a kind of hollow, thoughtless patriotism that fosters the xenophobic, isolationist outlook that has characterized America’s view of foreigners for hundreds of years. Fortunately, a growing multicultural perspective is gradually undermining this self-restricting position. This growing multiculturalism “has successfully championed the primacy of racial and ethnic identities over more national attachments” (Renshon, 2007). The willingness of immigrants to learn English, to adopt it as their language, is a manifestation of this burgeoning multiculturalism. Ultimately, it is this socio-cultural hybridization that has always made America strong, not emotionally based attachments to the affectations and symbols of America and Democracy. It is the Constitution that safeguards diversity and strengthens the nation in ways that shrill patriotism can never do. The Constitution, and the First Amendment, not only provide legal protections; they help maintain a liberated environment that has encouraged so many immigrants to learn English on their own, without the compulsion of legal authority.
Some observers claim that the move toward making English the nation’s official language is only a symptom of fears and insecurities over immigration and other problems. “Official English obviously has a lot to do with concern about immigration, perhaps especially Hispanic immigration” (King, 1997). It has been project that Spanish will overtake English as the most widely spoken language in many parts of the country, particularly in Texas and the Southwest. Seen in this light, the move toward legislating the learning and use of English is comparable to efforts in the last century to prevent Catholics from gaining the presidency and other high elected offices. It is a political tradition in America to try and turn back the clock, to adopt a conservative position when it comes to social change. But the Constitution has proven to be the most successful means of protecting positive social change.
Many backers of “official English” have contended that the “English language is the bulwark of our national unity” (Schiffman, 2001). It must also be argued that the right to free speech and the right to choose are equally indispensable to national unity. Thus, the right of immigrants to choose to learn English must be protected in order to preserve this foundational principle of American Democracy. Coercion is contrary to the spirit and intent of the First Amendment, and should not be employed to force immigrants to learn English. It is a vitally important First Amendment point, the preservation of which holds dire consequences for the nation’s future. Thus, it is crucial that any subsequent efforts to legislate official English be defeated.
- King, Robert. “Should English be the Law?” The Atlantic, April 1997.
http://www.theatlantic.com/past/docs/. - Renshon, Stanley. “Becoming American: The Hidden Core of the Immigration Debate.” Center
for Immigration Studies. http://www.cis.org/Becoming American-ImmigrationDebate, January 2007. - Schiffman, Harold. “The Language Policy of State Drivers’ License Testing: Expediency,
Symbolism, or Creeping Incrementalism?” South Asian Regional Studies, University of Pennsylvania, 2001. http://ccat.sas.upenn.edu/. - Tse, Lucy. Why Don’t They Learn English? Separating Fact from Fallacy in the U.S. Language
Debate. New York: Teachers College Press, 2001.
