Tuesday, June 19, 2007

McCain on making English the official language: it is a "despicable influence"

I know McCain is not fond of official English legislation, but I didn't know he went this far...


"I'm not sure why McCain would go along with [the official English amendment to the immigration bill]. Back in 1988, when Arizona voters were being asked to approve an English-only proposition, then-Rep. McCain and two other Arizona congressmen sent a letter to then-Sen. Barry Goldwater, an honorary chairman for the drive. They asked Goldwater to remove his name from the effort, which they said was spreading a "despicable influence into Arizona."

When asked at the time about efforts to make English our official language, McCain said, "Our nation and the English language has done quite well with Chinese spoken in California, German in Pennsylvania, Italian in New York, Swedish in Minnesota and Spanish throughout the Southwest. I fail to see the cause for alarm now.""


From the Arizona Republic.

1 comment:

BillT said...

Demographics are cause enough. When I moved to Latin America, I learned Spanish.

Language and culture are inseperable. Nobody assimilates without American English. Nobody.