On the second part of your post… What is different between now and the great waves of immigration of the past is how much “smaller” the Country is now. Sure past waves of immigrants kept in their ethnic neighborhoods, and so it was easy to maintain their Native language, however, once outside of those ethnic neighborhoods they had little chance of success or survival without learning English.

Now, with Nation wide foreign language television and many different radio stations, it is possible for at least a spanish speaking immigrant to go from one part of the Country to the other, and still be able to survive and be successful without having to learn English.

We will have to see how it turns out, but the more I see and the more I read, we are quickly sinking into a Nation where spanish is going to rival English.

I don’t believe anyone is in favor of “stamping” out a language. However, what people want is that when someone moves from their Native Nation to another one, they should have the decency to learn and use the language of their new Nation. It is a sign of respect.

Funny how liberals use the term “ugly American” to describe over zealous American Tourist who expect to be catered to in Foreign Nations, and who show a bit too much patriotism for these liberals. Yet these same liberals are in full favor of pandering and accommodating immigrants illegal or otherwise in their own language. They also want these same immigrants, illegal or otherwise to maintain their love of their Native Country. I suppose just another double standard by the left.

Second, on the other side of the debate, let’s not confuse making English the official language with adopting a policy that we won’t want to provide foreign language education. You teach people to be multi-lingual and still have an official language.

All that said, I believe that language argument is a red herring. Past waves of immigrants have gone through similar cycles. The first generation tends to stay cloistered within their ethnic community and doesn’t readily adopt the language and customs of their new country. The trend starts to change with the second-generation and really moves with the third generation.

In reading your post, I could not help but think about attempts to stamp out the Navajo language in Indian Schools in the late 1800s and early 1900s. Later, during WWII, the knowledge of the language proved invaluable to the defense of our country. Such irony. Perhaps I am thinking about this because of Ken burns’ The War which I am watching.

I believe that English should be our official language. English is the language of empowerment. In saying that, I do not want to stamp out other languages. Americans seem to believe that being uni-lingual is something to be proud of. Most educated people of the world find this concept bizarre.

Onevoice,

Please read my post again, it says not only businesses but illegal gang members…. This means I support going after businesses as well as illegals.

The laws are Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and EO 13166.
http://www.englishfirst.org/13166/13166doj102601Q&A.htm

The Department of Justice Guidelines on implementing these requirements can be found here: http://www.englishfirst.org/13166/13166dojguide.html

Guys, we’ve tried this bit about making it “illegal” to speak a language other than English before. Here’s what the Supreme Court said in when we tried it with German in 1923:

The desire of the Legislature to foster a homogeneous people with American ideals prepared readily to understand current discussions of civic matters is easy to appreciate. Unfortunate experiences during the late war and aversion toward every character of truculent adversaries were certainly enough to quicken that aspiration. But the means adopted, we think, exceed the limitations upon the power of the state and conflict with rights assured to plaintiff in error. The interference is plain enough and no adequate reason therefor in time of peace and domestic tranquility has been shown. … As the statute undertakes to interfere only with teaching which involves a modern language, leaving complete freedom as to other matters, there seems no adequate foundation for the suggestion that the purpose was to protect the child’s health by limiting his mental activities. It is well known that proficiency in a foreign language seldom comes to one not instructed at an early age, and experience shows that this is not injurious to the health, morals or understanding of the ordinary child.

more and cite to decision here:
http://changeservant.blogspot.com/2007/02/nebraska-1923-revisited.html

In an increasingly global economy, we should be trying to be more like every other country in the world which encourages its citizens to be bi-lingual or multi-lingual. Making a value out of being resolutely uni-lingual and proud of it makes little sense if we want our children to grow up to be able to compete on the world stage.

I have no problem with requiring a system like E-Verify provided that such a system is consitently accurate. According to the research done in Illinois when they passed their state law barring the use of E-Verify until it was shown to have few false positives, E-Verify (formerly Basic Pilot) has a 50% false positive rate. Having been through a situation where someone with a name similar to mine was on the terrorist watch list for air travel, I can attest to the inconvenience and hassle it is to be unfairly stuck on a list such as this. Imagine what it would be like if your livelihood depended on it? Again, do you for one moment believe that a vendor would wait for an appeals process for a time-sensitive government contract?

I know the actual costs of an office attending ICE training are covered by DHS, but the costs of overtime for other officers to fill their shifts while they’re in training aren’t covered. The additional personnel to process arrests aren’t covered. The costs of housing those awaiting deportation proceedings aren’t covered. Again, in principle, the 287(g) program is something we should be part of but not until we fully understand what the cost will be.

In principle, I really don’t disagree with most of your points. The devil, however, is in the details.

Just as you point out to The Patriot that blanket statements like “everything must be in English” can be counterproductive, so also are the implementation details of much of what you outline.

It’s very easy to say all of these things, for instance, will pay for themselves with the reduction in money flowing out to illegal aliens currently taking advantage of the system. But those figures are hard to quantify and won’t pay out in immediately evident ways. In fact, given the way many government programs work, you can expect that the bureaucrats in charge of these programs will find every way possible to hide such windfalls lest they see their program budgets slashed.

” Name Comments zip code e-mail address
1328. Ur mom man i think all of you need to shut the hell up, yea you got all this hate towards illegal but you sure dont complain when they fix your roads or your damn houses acting all tough on the internet like you about your words I would love to see any of yll go to Cali. and talk all this BS so before you start running at the mouth how bout you stop making them fix your roads do your dirty work that none of the americans want to do before you start complaining let them make their money, yea i think they should work towards being citizens but you cant go against every single person that is illegal what if they are trying to become legal, and by the way I’m a citizen so dont think this came from an illegal so check yourself before you talk all your BS”

I am delighted to see the thoughtful exchange and learned a few things! My concern about paying for this is where will it end. Once the states take ahold of something and begin to pay for it, there is no turning back. This may sound silly but is there some way to find out what federal laws the Commonwealth can adopt and which they can’t? I mean we have corresponding laws for kidnapping and bank robberies, which , thank goodness, which allow local authorities to make arrests.

So would it make sense to find those laws that VA can adopt or pass and then move forward with that information? There are a lot of things on the 14Point Program and I am not sure which of those have the most liklihood of sucess from a state legal perspective. I think VA can determine what is a felony so that covers a few. Since we can’t solve the incoming problem, we can only take care of VA.

Can’t agree more with #11.

Regarding seizure - I’m for it and for more of it. Same thing happens with drugs. Seize the car, seize the business, seize the rental property and seize the home from the bank and let the courts figure it out. If you are not willing to make sure you are doing business with illegals you will pay. That provides some real dollar resources back to the localities to help pay for this and might enourage e-verify for private industry, better checking on identities and so forth.