Bill could force conformation
State English-only bill to get new life
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40
By Devona Walker
Published: March 19, 2008
State Rep. Randy Terrill, R-Moore, wants voters to make English the official language of the state, putting a stop to bilingual driver's license testing and "press one for English and two for Spanish” voice recordings at all state agencies.
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Swift approval expected
It could be heard in a House committee as early as next week. Terrill says it might be on the governor's desk for approval in two weeks.
"We made a strategic decision not to send this through as a stand-alone bill, not for lack of support in the House. But it would have been difficult, if not impossible, to get it out of the Senate,” Terrill said, adding he was fearful it would either be killed or altered in a way that might soften the existing House Bill 1804 law.
House Bill 1804, commonly referred to as one of the strictest immigration enforcement laws in the nation, prohibits illegal immigrants from obtaining driver's licenses or public services. It criminalizes transporting or harboring them. It requires state agencies to verify the citizenship status of all new hires.
The purpose of the "official English” proposal, according to Terrill, is to stop the state from having to provide taxpayer services in any other language but English. It seeks to avoid the costs, conflicts and burden associated with "bilingualism,” he said. It would also force immigrants to conform.
"I would think it would be incumbent upon us as Americans to encourage all immigrants to assimilate — meaning learning the English language, our culture and our history,” Terrill said.
Is English hard to learn?
Greg Nguyen, a small-business owner, and his mother, Nhung Le, came to this country as Vietnamese refugees shortly after communists took over their native country.
"I don't know about the Mexicans. But I know that Asians, we try very hard to learn English. My parents, even my grandparents, they have all taken classes to learn,” he said. "My parents have been here, my mother as long as I have. They speak just enough to get by.
"They try to do their best to make people understand them. When you are older, it's just harder to learn.”
The Vietnamese government stripped them of their property and imprisoned his father.
Father Gaio Nguyen fought alongside U.S. soldiers in Vietnam. He remained a captive of the newly-empowered North Vietnamese government for six years before escaping.
"They took everything,” Gaio Nguyen said. "But here, if you work hard, you can succeed. Here, you don't have to worry about the government taking something away.”
What would the bill do?
The official English proposal would not govern language spoken between individual citizens nor would it prevent business owners from advertising in foreign languages.
It also includes numerous exceptions, specifically for American Indian languages and in cases where it would be to the state's advantage to offer a translator, specifically if the non-English-speaking person has been victimized by a crime.
Thirty states around the nation have similar statutes.
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Related Topics:
U.S. State Government, U.S. Government, Culture and Lifestyle, Language and Linguistics, Politics, World Politics, English Language, Immigration, Vietnamese Politics, Asia-Pacific Politics
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A prison is designed to keep people confined to a small space, not a country where the influx of people needs to be controlled to keep the criminals and other unwanted individuals out. Do you feel that the bases for the armed forces such as Tinker, Vance and Lawton are, in fact, prisons to keep people IN? The very people sworn to fight for freedom are, to your way of thinking, incarcerated to prevent freedom while they fight for it. Convoluted, to say the least.
Which of course he didn't say in a Native American language...
It's stupid that every sign, paper, books, etc is printed in both english and spanish. Even the ATM machines, phone, cable, and every company i know has you pressing either 1 for english, or 2 for spanish. What about other languages like chinese, italian, french, and japanese. It's even more disgusting that in some parts of OKC, especially in the southern parts of town, there are signs that are printed in spanish only. How do I suppose to know what it says when I can't speak spanish.
Mexico official language is spanish, Italy is italian, Jamaica is english, and China is chinese. The US should and MUST make english the official language of the country. If you don't want to learn english, then you should leave or don't come here at all. I don't want to learn a language; nor do I want to communicate with someone who doesn't speak english. If you do, then I will have a hard time understanding what you want and will have to use hand signals ( I am not making that up; I have dealt with such people in the past ). So please, make english the official language.
I have no problem with people speaking as many languages as they choose but I am sick to death of trying to appease special interest groups. This is America. When I frequent a business and cannot understand or be understood, I won't be back. If you can't read the roadsigns, you shouldn't be driving. If you want to become American, that includes adopting the language that has been part of the culture since the Constitution, Bill of Rights and Declaration of Independence were written and signed... in ENGLISH.
Perhaps we should incorporate every known language into official signs, papers, contracts, laws and menus so as to appease the whiners.
So in cases where it benefits the state, it's okay; in cases where it benefits the individual, no, no,no!
And "specifically" in cases where someone is a victim of a crime, BUT not where they are a suspected perpetrator of the crime? So they get their "rights" read in English only? Sounds like a randy winner to me.