Thread: Americanizing America's immigrants

Deroy Murdock: Americanizing America's immigrants
By DEROY MURDOCK

Mar 10, 2007

VOTERS in Beverly Hills elected city council members this month. Americans from Bangor, Maine, to Bellevue, Washington, would fume if they saw the ballot. It appeared in English, Spanish and Farsi.

That's right. U.S. citizens just days ago cast ballots published in the official language of Iran, the nation that nicknamed America "the Great Satan."

This bizarre outrage highlights a bigger problem: What will America do with the millions of immigrants -- illegal and otherwise -- who pour in, across the veritable open field that is our southern frontier, and through the international airports that replaced Ellis Island? Whether this parade should be accelerated, slowed, or stopped, America's immigrants should be Americanized.

As this English-Spanish-Farsi ballot vividly demonstrates, American officials and elites expect so little of immigrants that voting, studying, and even publishing official documents in foreign tongues are increasingly routine. As this multicultural "gorgeous mosaic" has replaced the traditional melting pot, it has fueled many Americans' immigration-related anxieties.

GOP Presidential hopeful Rudy Giuliani said last month he wants to see "Americanization as part of immigration." Once our dangerously unguarded borders are tightened -- through low-tech fencing to high-tech surveillance tools -- how should America handle immigrants who already are here?

America should renew its commitment to English in civic life. Speaking other languages at home and in cultural festivals like Cinco de Mayo and Chinese New Year adds color and variety to the American scene. But if we cannot communicate among ourselves in the town square, a self-imposed, Balkanesque bedlam will engulf this land.

Consequently, bilingual ballots should vanish. Immigrants are supposed to understand English before being naturalized. So, why are those who supposedly are fluent in English voting in other idioms? Farsi ballots suggest that American candidates should campaign in Farsi. If American immigrants from Iran don't speak English, how will they follow the ongoing Presidential race? Must Hillary Clinton or John McCain start stumping in Persian?

Bilingual education also should be limited to two years per student, maximum, just as federal welfare benefits are limited to two years per recipient. Such classes should be truly bilingual, aimed at quickly moving students into mainstream English classes. Today's "bilingual" education usually involves endless monolingual instruction, typically in Spanish, from which Hispanic students rarely emerge.

As Americanization advocate John Fonte suggests, the Bush administration immediately should reverse President Bill Clinton's Executive Order No. 11366. It requires that Uncle Sam publish all federal documents in Chinese, Spanish, and Vietnamese. As Fonte, a Hudson Institute senior fellow, told the Federalist Society last April 24:

"The Bush administration has pushed beyond even Clinton, requiring state DMVs to have foreign-language speakers available for voter registration in languages other than English." This is grotesque and must stop.

Fonte also would end the dual allegiance that naturalized immigrants lately have been permitted. As Fonte reports, Manuel de la Cruz took the Oath of Allegiance in which he declared, "... I absolutely and entirely renounce and abjure all allegiance and fidelity to any foreign prince, potentate, state, or sovereignty of whom or which I have heretofore been a subject or citizen ..." Then, on July 4, 2004, this naturalized American won a state senate seat in Zacatecas, Mexico. De la Cruz should decide if he is Mexican or American. Ditto for dual citizens. U.S. citizenship should not be multiple-choice, with fealty to other flags. If the U.S. ever battled Iran, for instance, for which nation would dual Iranian-Americans cheer?

Finally, through civic education, immigrants should discover and embrace America's ideals of constitutionalism, individual liberty, personal responsibility, limited government, and free enterprise. They also should understand U.S. history and respect the key individuals who shaped this nation.

In 1794, President George Washington outlined his expectations of immigrants: "... by an intermixture with our people, they, or their descendents, get assimilated to our customs, measures and laws: in a word soon become one people."

This is "Americanization," an admirable term every American should applaud.

America revolves not around common blood or collective faith, but communal beliefs. Those who arrive and wish to stay should comprehend, absorb, and revere these ideas and the history, traditions, and institutions they inspired.

This is no more radical than the words on American coins: E Pluribus Unum.

New York commentator Deroy Murdock is a media fellow with the Hoover Institution on War, Revolution and Peace at Stanford University.

http://www.unionleader.com/article.aspx ... c65681626e

But if we cannot communicate among ourselves in the town square, a self-imposed, Balkanesque bedlam will engulf this land.

Not being able to communicate is why I never visit my sister in California. I lived there for 17 years, all four of my children were born there, we left in 1976 when it was still part of the USA. My Sister, her Salvadorian husband, their children and grandchildren still live there. She said she had to learn Spanish to survive, no one speaks English, she misses her culture. She advised me not to visit, that I would hate it now, everything is dirty, lots of violence, drugs and is definitely part of Mexico. That I wouldn't want to leave the house alone, I wouldn't understand anything anyone said or be able to read most the signs, it could be very dangerous. The only time I see her is when she visits me, which isn't often.

Sounds like some areas of Miami. My daughter was friends with a Cuban guy and they were going to become more than friends. She changed her mind as his mother did very little in trying to learn English. It seemed like my daughter would have to learn Spanish to be able to communicate with her. My daughter was smart enough to see the writing on the wall and stopped seeing him. Many non Hispanics marry Hispanics and have that language problem which causes stress on the marriage. They often complain that they sit over at the relatives house and they only speak Spanish and the spouse will do that with friends at home as well.
As for others, if they have younger kids who get involved with things such as sports outside the Hispanic community they have no choice but learn or improve what little English they do speak. I coach boys baseball through the Police Athletic League and have noticed two things. First of all one of our best players is driven to practice and games by the grandparents. The grandfather does home renovation work and therefore speaks English fluently but his wife spoke some English and often needed some translation last year. Her grandson also played football in the summer so again she was exposed to more English. This year when I spoke to her I was surprised how much English she learned and was using. She was amazing. We have also have a Puerto Ricn father whose 3 sons play baseball and one is a really amazing catcher. He is trying to help the team at practices but has found that the language barrier is making it difficult so he is now learning to learn English. He is really trying hard and is starting to use more English and what floored me is that he actually apologizes to me and other coaches for not being able to speak English well.