8/03/00 9:40 a.m.
GOP Practices Politics of Exclusion
Spanish-only speech is politically correct, but poor politics.

By Jim Boulet, Jr., Executive Director English First

onight's Republican Convention features a first: an entire speech to be given in Spanish, by California state legislator Abel Maldonado.

This sort of thing is unfortunately all too typical of the thinking of Republican campaign consultants. These folks seem positively embarrassed about any issue that might invite criticism.

Thus, the 2000 Republican Platform no longer speaks in support of making English America's "official language." Instead, English is urged to become America's "common language" (a legally meaningless term).

This attempt to cleverly finesse the issue brought the GOP what it deserved: a scolding from the Washington Post on July 29:

Bush's efforts to establish a pro-immigration tone to appeal to Hispanic votes suffered a minor setback when the family subcommittee added language declaring "we support the recognition of English as the nation's common language."

The politically correct may see official English as a threat to the American way of life. But most folks think official English is an idea which just makes sense. In particular, a goodly number of rank-and-file Democrats think official English would be a fine idea.

Take Mrs. Verna K. Echols, the wife of a Methodist minister and a proud English First member. Mrs. Echols was a Clinton-Gore delegate to the 1992 Democratic Convention and served on the 1996 Democratic Convention Rules Committee. She ran as a Bradley delegate this year. Isn't the Bush-Cheney ticket interested in winning her vote this November?

The message this Spanish-only address sends to Mrs. Echols and so many other Americans is essentially: "Don't bother to listen to this speech. Feel free to leave the room."

Not only will this Spanish-only speech turn off Democrats and Republicans alike, but outside of Abel Moldonado's family and friends, few Spanish-speakers can be expected to tune in.

The failure of this strategy can be seen simply by flipping through the pages of magazines like Hispanic. You will find relatively few ads in Spanish and no articles written in that tongue.

There is good reason for this lack of Spanish. According to the 1990 Latino National Political Survey, fully 62% of the Mexican Americans asked said they were either fluent only in English or considered themselves better in English.

Sadly, the GOP could have sent a much stronger message to Hispanic voters. They even have the man who could deliver that message scheduled to speak at this convention. Unfortunately that man, Everett Alvarez, Jr., will merely lead the convention in the Pledge of Allegiance on Tuesday night.

Everett Alvarez was the first American pilot shot down in Vietnam. Everett Alvarez is also a proud American of Hispanic descent.

Had Everett Alvarez been allowed to formally address the convention he might have begun: "Mis amigos hispanios, I want to speak to you in the language of our country." From there he might have gone on to say, as he did in his book, Code of Conduct:

I was . . . always proud of being a Mexican-American, while I was growing up in Salinas and in the service, but I never considered it an element in my relations with other people or my work. If we had let being Mexican or Italian or black or whatever matter while we were in prison, the North Vietnamese would have splintered our group. And believe me, they tried, especially working on me and Fred Cherry, a black Air Force pilot. They wanted us to feed their propaganda machine with material about mistreatment as members of oppressed minorities. . . . Both Fred and I maintained that we were Americans and proud of our country, under all pressure and against all temptation, and our fellow-captives accepted us as such. It is not a position from which I will ever retreat.

Everett Alvarez wrote of his outrage at the suggestion that he take advantage of his ethnicity in order to achieve a government post:

I was just sent over as a candidate for a job because I'm supposed to be Hispanic. I really resent that. I didn't spend eight-and-one-half years of my life as a prisoner of war because I was Hispanic. I didn't get beat up because I was Hispanic. I was an American fighting man.

Everett Alvarez also strongly believes that immigrant children need to learn America's language:

I am proud of being living proof that America is a country in which a person can overcome economic disadvantages and ethnic stereotypes. . . . I believe that education is the key to a successful and happy life in an open society. With that in mind, I oppose the movement to make Spanish (or any other foreign tongue) a second coequal language in American schools. This is a hindrance rather than a help to the young people who will eventually have to make their way in an English-speaking society.

Of course, with opinions like these being expunged from the Republican platform, it is not unexpected that the Republican Convention planners chose to take another road.

The problem with this Spanish-only road is that it will inevitably lead to other battles. Right now in Canada, Stockwell Day, the head of the new (and fairly conservative) Canadian Alliance, is criticized for being imperfectly bilingual, even as he gives speeches in both French and English.

The Spanish-only road also invites complaints from those who prefer to speak other tongues. A future GOP convention may well feature speeches in Korean, Farsi, Mandarin Chinese, Cantonese Chinese, Vietnamese, and Urdu, in addition to Spanish. Perhaps one day the Republican National Convention will look just like a meeting of the United Nations, with each delegate wearing a headset in order to hear a translation of the proceedings.

This Spanish-only road was blazed by the Democrats at their 1988 National Convention. Rev. Jesse Jackson described the Statue of Liberty as "not restricted to English-only." That was just the warm-up. The Democratic presidential nominee, Governor Michael Dukakis, addressed the delegates in Spanish for a portion of his acceptance speech. Despite all this outreach, the Dukakis ticket went down to resounding defeat in November.

Perhaps the vast majority of Americans who support official English should be grateful that one Spanish-only address from the convention rostrum is all that must be tolerated (or ignored) this year. After all, in 1998 many of the Republican Party's political consultants argued (incorrectly) that making Spanish-only Puerto Rico America's 51st state would magically move every Hispanic voter, be he Mexican-American, Cuban-American or Puerto Rican, into the Republican column. Thus pro-English Republicans can console themselves with the thought that things could be much worse than they will be in Philadelphia this week.

Someday, one of the major political parties will realize that today's legal immigrants still want to learn English, and that they especially want their children to learn English. The party that stands up once again for the uniquely America vision of a nation of immigrants united by a common tongue will not only win elections. That political party will also be doing the right thing.