TBO.com - TBO is Tampa Bay Online

Highlands Today

Should Americans Learn Spanish?

ADVERTISEMENT

By Raleigh Whiteman | Highlands Today

Published: October 4, 2007

Americans and our country are between a rock and a hard place with a war that is likely to be unending and the immigration of millions who have no intention of becoming Americans. It is very likely that soon English will become the secondary language taught in the United States.

Personally I believe it would be wiser to teach those who will be fighting this war on terrorism the language and customs of those places where they will likely spend several years. Their chances of survival may be improved if they are able to understand the language and customs of those who they will be fighting. Over here, in several years, we will likely learn and assimilate many of the words and phrases used by the majority who will be around us speaking the new American brand of their Hispanic language.

Copying Teddy

I heard recently that President Bush is studying the history and biography of one of Americas most honored presidents, Theodore Roosevelt, the 26th president. President Bill Clinton awarded Roosevelt the Medal of Honor posthumously for his charge up San Juan Hill, Cuba, during the Spanish-American War. Roosevelt's eldest son, Brigadier Gen. Theodore Roosevelt, Jr. received the Medal of Honor for heroism at the Battle of Normandy in 1944. The Roosevelt's thus became one of only two father-son pairs to receive this honor.

Roosevelt also received the Noble Peace Prize for the peace treaty he negotiated between Russia and Japan in 1905. Bush may even be trying to get the prestigious Noble Peace Prize with his war against the terrorism and in trying to settle the differences in the religious sects of Islam.

Good Idea Then And Now

Roosevelt coped with immigration also and expressed the following quote in 1907, 100 years ago.
"In the first place we should insist that if the immigrant who comes here in good faith becomes an American and assimilates himself to us, he shall be treated on an exact equality with everyone else, for it is an outrage to discriminate against any such man because of creed, or birthplace, or origin. But this is predicated upon the man's becoming in very fact an American, and nothing but an American.

There can be no divided allegiance here. Any man who says he is an American, but something else also, isn't an American at all. We have room for but one flag, the American flag, and this excludes the red flag, which symbolizes all wars against liberty and civilization, just as much as it excludes any foreign flag of a nation to which we are hostile. We have room for but one language here, and that is the English language, and we have room for but one sole loyalty and that is a loyalty to the American people."

Point Of No Return

Roosevelt, perhaps, was not experiencing these problems of those who were immigrating back then, as they were expected to learn, and most were learning the English language and becoming naturalized. Also there were not some 16 million illegally over here in 1907. But this does indicate that the problem of language and number of immigrants have been growing for more than 100 years.

So the oxymoron of being between a rock and a hard place means just that, the United States is stuck in a very tough place to get out of.

Raleigh Whiteman, of Lake Placid, is a contributing writer to Highlands Today. You can reach him on the Internet at rwwhiteman@comcast.net.

Share this:

Loading Comments...

Email Print

ADVERTISEMENT