English as the Official Language of the U. S. A.

Whose English?

Appalachian English - close to the way that the Colonists spoke

English as the Official Language of the U. S. A.

Whose English?

Map of American English dialects - Transcript Linguists draw their own maps of North America to mark different dialect areas. To use their terms, we've started in eastern New England ...

Supreme Court Declines to Hear Some 2,000 Cases

First Amendment

Comment by Nate Segal:

The Supreme Court of the United States just opened its new term (on Monday, October 5, 2009). According to the New York Times:

In ... some 2,000 ... cases that accumulated during the court's summer break, the court let stand rulings from lower courts without comment.
They refused to hear appeals concerning the Pledge of Allegiance, the Confederate flag and license plates bearing the words "Choose Life."

New York Times, Adam Liptak – Washington
"Justices Decline to Hear Some 2,000 Cases"
Tuesday, October 6, 2009, page A19

The Secretary of State of Illinois declined to offer some 60 specialty styles of plates including a style bearing the slogan "Choose Life." The state is not taking a stand on the abortion issue, so it can refuse to offer whatever styles it wishes to — including the other 60, or so.

In Florida, students must recite the Pledge of Allegiance unless they have written permission from their parents not to.

A Tennessee high school is forbidding the display of the Confederate flag "because of the disruptive potential of the flag in a school where racial tension is high and serious racially motivated incidents, such as physical altercations or threats of violence, have occurred" (case Barr v. Lafon, No. 08-1325).

That's Outrageous!

"Blow-hards and Buffoons: Their senseless rantings are poisoning political debate"

One of Reader’s Digest’s more popular features is “That’s Outrageous!” by Michael Crowley.

Robert P. Murphy writes,

When the feature spotlights government pork-barrel projects, absurd zoning restrictions on homeowners, or illogical regulations on small business, libertarians can applaud. (Retrieved September 30, 2009)

This following article contains a quote from Larry Sabato, co-author of our text book American Government: Roots and Reform.

Political Blood Sport

Thomas Jefferson must be apoplectic in the Great Beyond. He warned that only people who are "well-informed can be trusted with their own government." Well, look what's become of us.

I met up recently with two old friends in California, Jeff and Mary, who told me they are worried about terrorism. But it's not Osama bin Laden they fear — it's George W. Bush. These are otherwise sensible people: He's a doctor; she owns an antiques store. Which is why I was stunned to hear them predict that Bush will stage a terrorist attack this fall to ensure his reelection.

"Seriously?" I asked. Seriously, they said.

Maybe I shouldn't be surprised, not after seeing an "ad" on the website of the liberal advocacy group Moveon.org, that compared Bush to Adolf Hitler. That's the sort of vitriol that's "informing" the public today. And it's hardly confined to the Left.

During the Iraq war last spring, some conservatives said that liberals were secretly hoping Saddam Hussein would teach President Bush a lesson in humility. Fox News host Bill O'Reilly growled that "some Americans were rooting against their own country — that their ideology was so ingrained it was better for them if things went badly in Iraq, even though that would have caused more American casualties."

Welcome to the politics of America, 2004. Thoughtful debate has given way to angry, polarized arguments in which there is no compromise and no middle ground. Shades of gray, you ask? Stop being so wishy-washy! When it comes to abortion, you're either a baby-killer or a religious nut. Try to explain that women should have some abortion rights, but that a fetus is also more than just body tissue, and you're likely to get shouted down in midsentence. And good luck talking about affirmative action — whether you're pro or con — without being called a racist.

Politics have become a year-round blood sport — both for the partisan gladiators and for the media that cheers them on. For evidence, just scan the bestseller lists. There you'll find liberal filmmaker Michael Moore, whose book Dude, Where's My Country? hit No. 1 by taking aim at "screaming, foaming-at-the-mouth right-wingers."

Moore also calls George Bush "an appointed President [who] uses the dead of 9/11 as a convenient cover, a justification for permanently altering our American way of life."

From the other side comes conservative commentator Ann Coulter, who sold a half-million copies of her book Treason, arguing that liberals are "either traitors or idiots" who routinely "side with the enemy" and "aim to destroy America ... with their relentless attacks on morality and the truth."

Flip on the TV or radio and you'll find dozens of partisan talking heads in a nonstop shouting match of escalating nastiness. "The only thing that sells is the screamers," laments Larry Sabato, director of the Center for Politics at the University of Virginia. "Twenty years ago, there were a lot more shows with reasonable discussions. Today people just yell sound bites at one another. And if you don't, you're not used again."

Monopolizing the Truth

Communication might be easier if people at least believed one another. But in today's debate, everyone assumes their enemy fights with weapons of mass deception.

Comedian Al Franken's hit book purports to chronicle the Right's Lies and the Lying Liars Who Tell Them, while another recent book explains The Lies of George W. Bush.

Conservatives, meanwhile, are convinced that a left-leaning media establishment deliberately misinforms the public. Former CBS News producer Bernard Goldberg topped the bestseller list last year with Bias, a book that charges liberal journalists with distorting the news. Ann Coulter was in the thick of the fight again with her book bluntly titled Slander: Liberal Lies About the American Right. It's awfully hard to have a constructive debate when everyone thinks they have a monopoly on the truth.

And it's not just journalists and pundits who are stoking all this rage. It's the politicians themselves. Massachusetts Senator Ted Kennedy has flatly declared the case for war against Iraq "a fraud," while a fellow Democrat, Rep. Jim McDermott, suggested that the capture of Saddam Hussein was timed for maximum political benefit.

In response, House Majority Leader Tom DeLay, a Republican, called these remarks "moronic" and said that Democrats have "nothing to offer the public debate but rage, resentment and quackery." Even the business of government is being paralyzed. One Congressional committee meeting broke up last summer when an angry Democrat called a Republican "a little fruitcake" and challenged him to a fight; the committee chairman eventually summoned the Capitol Police.

Expect things to only get worse as election day approaches. After all, the media and politicians know that people love to watch a good tussle. But all this debate, with so little intelligence, comes at a steep price. Consider this: Some experts are expecting a big surge in new, young voters that could account for 10 percent of the electorate — and perhaps decide the Presidential contest. Hardcore liberal and conservative groups are spending big money to help bring out the youth vote.

But if young Americans do unplug their iPods and tune into politics, what will they make of a poisonous discourse that insults more than it informs? Some may just pop their headphones back on in disgust. The rest will go to the polls on election day, where they'll join the long lines of uninformed citizens.

From Reader's Digest - March 2004

(Retrieved September 30, 2009)

Comment by Nate Segal:

I recently heard the verb 'bloviate' to describe the speech of "blow-hards who opinionate."

Speech Is Costly, but Worthwhile

"The Privilege of The Grave"

by Mark Twain

as published in The New Yorker, December 22 & 29, 2008

Comments by Nate Segal

. . . there is hardly one of us but would dearly like to reveal these secrets of ours [certain views not suspected by his little world]; we know we cannot do it in life . . .

Mark Twain

I learned from our late parents to speak my mind freely, but I also learned some prices they paid.

Dad argued out loud, even with those who weren't interested, that the Cuban Revolution was good for the Cuban people. Overall, Cuba's elites – and American elites – exploited ordinary Cubans to the point of grinding poverty, he argued.

Our father was not afraid of Marxism in the third world. He seems to have not anticipated that Fidel Castro’s Cuba would support and promote unrest in Central America and in Southwest Africa (today's Namibia). And Dad spoke about this freely in a solidly Republican Congressional district.

Did our parents pay a price? He and Mom heard from neighbors that a man (or men) in suits visited neighbors and asked questions about our father. He believed that these were FBI men and that the FBI was conducting a low key investigation of our father for their files. Our father, however, only stopped talking about the Cuban Revolution within a few years when it became known that Castro was a vicious dictator.

I think that, overall, our parents didn’t pay much of a price for being outspoken. Mom and Dad grew up in Chicago, and we continued to live in Metropolitan Chicago. Unlike most people in Mark Twain’s time, Dad and our family could cultivate friends some miles away in various communities. Dad didn’t depend on serving only nearby people as their accountant either. America was also changing. Debates about Civil Rights and the Vietnam War were reaching us over the television and the less stuffy newspapers. By stuffy, I mean newspapers that espoused Twain’s idea of policy:

When an entirely new and untried political project is sprung upon the people, they are startled, anxious, timid, . . . they are waiting to see which is going to be the popular side.

Our father really paid very little attention to any price he paid by revealing his secret views. Neighbors rolled their eyes and generally considered Dad to be a harmless eccentric.

I believe that when I was growing up I came to believe, as Mark Twain notes, “Murder is sometimes punished, free speech always – when committed.” For a while, I was cautious about voicing opinions about politics and religion – two topics which Mark Twain mentioned in his article. But no longer. I also was and generally remain silent on the subject of money, but not because of what I learned from Dad. I believe that talking about my finances is liable to become embarrassing, either to the other person or to myself.

More or less, Dad let people know how well (or not well) he was doing. I chalk this up to our parents’ having grown up during the Great Depression. It was an expression of tranquility that any of their money concerns paled in the face of their privations during the Depression. It also seems to me that they were saying, to themselves as much as to anyone else, “We survived then; we’ll do fine now.”

Mom and Dad weren’t bashful to say, “We can afford to trade our starter house up to a larger and more expensive one, except that we might find ourselves ‘house poor,’” a hint of suspicion about how our former neighbors were living. Also, Mom and Dad said that they didn’t want to give up our yearly auto trip vacations. Eventually we visited most of the lower forty-eight states from the time I was nine years old until I graduated high school.

Keep in mind that our parents paid cash for everything. Credit cards (not revolving charge cards) were rare and unknown in our circles. Dad went to the bank once a year before the vacation and bought travelers checks, a sum that was immediately withdrawn from their personal bank account – and not a confidential amount, within the family.

So they courageously expressed what Mark Twain called “. . . unpopular convictions which common wisdom forbids . . . to utter.”

However, concerning political parties, Dad and Mom joined the Democrat Party with virtually no ongoing thought. Having lived through the Depression and benefitted from FDR’s New Deal, they expressed undying loyalty to President Roosevelt’s Democrat Party, no matter what policies the party adopted from the time of World War II through the time of Dad’s death in 2006.

In fact, Mom and Dad felt that I betrayed them when I voted for Republican candidates. (We had no sense of a “secret ballot” within or outside the family.) “Republican policies only benefit the rich. Republicans are selfish.” Mom and Dad certainly asserted their privilege of free speech, despite Twain’s maintaining that “[one] possesses it merely as an empty formality, and knows better than to make use of it . . .”

It was worth it to my sisters and me to hear our parents speak freely and frankly. I believe that it has served us well so we can engage in civil discourse and “agree to disagree.”

Legislating English as the Official Language of the U. S. A.

A thought to consider -

I believe that our Constitution prohibits Congress from establishing English as the official language of our nation.

People have the right to assemble as a group and speak their minds even in a way that is not comprehensible to many or even most other Americans.

There are so many precedents. At one time, there were a large number of "foreign language" newspapers published in New York City (and other cities). [need citation]

The Old Order Amish of Lancaster County, Pennsylvania, refrain from teaching and speaking English as much as possible. The State of Pennsylvania has come to terms, sometimes with difficulty, with the Amish lifestyle.

On the other hand, those who wish to refrain from learning to speak English cannot expect to receive public funds to teach their children in their language or to have public documents translated at taxpayer expense, for example.

We use our liberties at our own peril.

Amendment I - A Question

Is there a synergy between the clauses of the First Amendment? After all, the framers could have specified each as a separate amendment.

I believe that there is a synergy. Our political parties have been considered "peaceable assemblies" which "speak freely" and "petition our Government" by supporting candidates for election to public office. See Ginsberg, Benjamin, Theodore J. Lowi and Margaret Weir, We the People: an Introduction to American Politics (New York: W. W. Norton & Company, seventh edition, 2009).

France's Problem with Religious Expression in Public

I wrote:

"In general, rights in European nations resemble the rights of our First Amendment although there are significant exceptions."

France is an exception. It has serious issues about public displays of religious observance. The primary target today is France's Muslim citizens, of whom there are a rather large number.

An article by Steven Erlanger concerning French confusion about organized religion. "Burqa Furor Scrambles the Political Debate in France," The New York Times, Tuesday, September 1, 2009 — PARIS.

According to the article,

In France, the principle of citizens' rights, equality, and secularism has run up against the right of Muslim women to wear in public what is being called the burqa.

Actually, these Muslim women are wearing what is really a niqab. The niqab is a head scarf that also covers a girl's or woman's neck. Her face is completely visible.

Two women in this photo from Iraq are wearing a hijab.
Photo Copyright © 2009 USA Today, Wednesday, September 23, 2009

[According to a Muslim woman from Saudi Arabia studying at the UMKC campus, the New York Times has made a mistake. The photo which accompanies the Times article shows Muslim women marching together on a French street, and they are wearing hijabs, not niqabs. We see Muslim women on the UMKC campus wear the hijab.

[A niqab (according to this student) is a hijab with the lower part lifted to cover the mouth and nose. We might wear a winter scarf in this way to protect our breathing in the most frigid weather.]

The French are uncomfortable with organized religion since the 1789 revolution and the disestablishment of the Roman Catholic Church as the national religion.

Also, the French associate the niqab with the repression, servitude, and degradation of women.

France took from the philosopher Jean Jacques Rousseau the principle that no immediate group or affiliation should stand between the citizen and the state which represents the general interest.

In fact, it was not until 1901 that the French state allowed some unions or associations.

It seems that there is permanent demand for legislating against Muslims in France.

Switzerland and the Minaret

I wrote:

In general, rights in European nations resemble the rights of our First Amendment although there are significant exceptions.

An event in Switzerland has come to my attention. I doubt that this issue would arise in America.

A minaret of a mosque and a steeple of a church are pictured in Wangen bei Olten. In Switzerland, groups are at odds over whether minarets should be banned.

Amendment I

"Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press, or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances."

The first ten Amendments (Bill of Rights) were ratified effective December 15, 1791.

In my own words:

Congress:

• must not establish a national religion by any law, and
• must allow us to freely worship according to the beliefs of any religion, and
• must allow us to speak our minds freely and in public, and
• must allow all the media - including using the Internet - to publish and broadcast without censorship, as well as give us all free access to all the media - even foreign media, and
• must allow us to assemble peaceably, and
• must allow us to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.

This amendment broadly covers issues that have made the United States different from virtually all nations in 1791 and many nations even today.

In general, rights in European nations resemble the rights of our First Amendment although there are significant exceptions.

I've posted an item of how the Queen (or King) of England is the 'Supreme Governor of the Church of England.'

No president of ours would be the legal head of any religion or denomination. On the other hand, our presidents and all government officials may worship as they please, or not worship at all.

I've also posted an item showing the effort that our armed forces make to have chaplains for every religion, even when few of our service people belong to these religions.

I feel that both of these items demonstrate that: "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof."

Wedding of Charles, Prince of Wales and Camilla Parker Bowles

Members of the royal family of England must profess the Church of England's beliefs and be in good standing with the Church. Anglican precepts do not allow divorce. A member of the royal family may not marry someone who was divorced by civil law since they are still married according to Anglican precepts. Prince Charles, Prince of Wales, and Camilla Parker Bowles married April 9, 2005, in a controversial civil ceremony because Camilla had already been married but divorced according to civil law.

The groom's parents, Queen Elizabeth II and Prince Phillip, did not attend the disapproved civil wedding ceremony.

from Wikipedia, "Wedding of Charles, Prince of Wales and Camilla Parker Bowles", retrieved September 11, 2009.

* * *

Queen Denies 'Snub' over Wedding [by not attending]

The Queen's decision not to attend the civil marriage ceremony of Prince Charles and Camilla Parker Bowles is not a snub, Buckingham Palace insists

Lord St John of Fawsley, a constitutional expert who knows Prince Charles, said the Queen had made a "good decision" not to attend the civil ceremony. . . .

He said she had clearly shown her approval of the wedding but as Supreme Governor of the Church of England "does not want to go to a wedding at a register office."

BBC News, "Queen denies 'snub' over wedding", retrieved September 11, 2009.

Former Marine is First Buddhist Army Chaplain

By Bob Smietana - The (Nashville) Tennessean

Posted to the Air Force Times - online edition:  Thursday Sep 10, 2009 21:17:47 EDT

When Thomas Dyer heads to Afghanistan in December, the former Marine and one-time Southern Baptist pastor won’t take a rifle with him. He won’t take a Bible, either.

Instead, Dyer, a Tennessee National Guardsman from Memphis and the first Buddhist chaplain in the history of the Army, hopes to bring serenity and calm, honed by months of intensive meditation.

That preparation, he says, will help him bring spiritual care amid a war zone.

“We’re going to put it to the test,” Dyer said.

Dyer’s deployment is another step in the U.S. military’s attempt to meet the diverse spiritual needs of America’s fighting forces. It’s no easy task.

For one thing, the military chaplaincy is facing all the complications that have affected American religion over the past 40 years. The decline of mainline Protestants and their aging clergy. The ongoing Catholic priest shortage. The explosion of religious diversity. The emergence of people with no faith. The ease with which people move from one faith to another.

The military is trying to adapt to these changes, while trying to find ministers willing to serve in a war zone, and who can minister to American troops without offending Muslim allies.

Chaplains say they are up to it, saying their “cooperate without compromise” approach allows them to serve soldiers of any faith. But critics wonder if the whole enterprise is doomed to fail.

Military chaplains have cared for the souls of American troops since at least the 1700s. In 1775, the Continental Congress agreed to pay chaplains $20 a month. Gen. George Washington told his commanders to find chaplains of good character and exemplary lives to care for the souls of their troops.

The first chaplains served a mostly Protestant military. Chaplains today serve in a remarkably diverse environment.

The latest report from the Defense Department tracks 101 faiths for active-duty personnel, from 285,763 Roman Catholics to the one member of the Tioga River Christian conference. In between are Baptists, Jews, Buddhists, Bahai’s, Mormons and Wiccans. About a half a million active personnel are evangelicals. Almost 281,710 claim no religion.

No military has ever tried to meet such diverse spiritual needs, says Doris Bergen, a history professor at the University of Toronto. In World War II, the British army had thousands of Hindus and Muslims in its ranks, but only Christian and Jewish chaplains. “To build a military chaplaincy that reflects the incredible religious diversity of Americans, and that supports that diversity in a meaningful way — it’s uncharted

terrain,” Bergen said. “It’s completely brand new. You don’t really have any models to look to.” t really have any models to look to.”

That means chaplains such as Maj. Darin Olson at Fort Campbell maintain a delicate balance.

In chapel services, he’s a Nazarene minister. That means preaching about Jesus. Once services are over, he becomes an advocate for every faith group.

“I am here to guarantee the religious freedom of every soldier,” Olson said.

NO EVANGELIZING ALLOWED

To help meet with the religious needs at Fort Campbell, which straddles the Kentucky-Tennessee border, a new multi-faith chapel is under construction, to be used by smaller groups such as Jews and Wiccans. Funding is pending for another $15 million, 1,200-seat chapel also in the works. There are now seven chapels at the base — six at least 50 years old, the other built in 1990.

Staff Sgt. Clayton Wilhelm works as a chaplain assistant at Fort Campbell. A reservist, he spent parts of 2007 and 2008 in Iraq, and is now doing another year of active duty. He and other chaplain assistants set the chapels for worship services and order equipment for a variety of groups on base. Those include Catholics, Lutherans, Jews, Muslim, pagans, Greek Orthodox and other Protestants.

Wilhelm, a Southern Baptist, says he’s just doing his job. “There are some things I don’t agree with, but in my position, I am not allowed to not support someone because of my own beliefs,” he said.

Chaplains and their assistants also serve as a listening ear for soldiers, as they deal with stress.

Sometimes soldiers’ concerns are spiritual; other times they are more mundane.

Those small concerns become heavier to bear when soldiers are in war zones. If they are distracted by worries about their family back home or by religious concerns, then they can’t keep focused on their mission, Olson said.

“A soldier’s soul in combat is important,” he said. “A soldier who is not right with the Lord, or maybe the soldier is having marriage troubles back home, a soldier who feels that they are not able to talk to anyone — if they can talk to a chaplain, they are going to be a better soldier.”

Chaplain Steve Blackwell, a Tennessee native who now serves as an Army chaplain recruiter in Los Angeles, said a chaplain’s job is not to evangelize.

“The doctrine of the chaplain corps is to nurture the living, care for the wounded and honor the dead,” he said.

While they can share their faith with the willing, they are not allowed to push their faith on those who are not interested.

That’s important because the military can’t always match the denominations of chaplains with those of the troops they serve.

DIVERSITY IS A CHALLENGE

For example, Catholics make up 20 percent of the Army, but there is a shortage of Catholic chaplains. Only 7 percent of chaplains are priests.

So Catholic chaplains are constantly being deployed overseas, with little downtime. And servicemen and women don’t always have access to a priest when they need one. chaplains are constantly being deployed overseas, with little downtime. And servicemen and women don’t always have access to a priest when they need one.

“They come face to face with who they are and what they believe,” said Lt. Col. Carleton Birch, spokesman for the Army Chief of Chaplains Office. “And sometimes, often, they choose to become very serious about their faith. And if there is not a priest to service them, then a priest won’t be there at a critical time in their lives.”

By contrast, some faith groups are overrepresented among chaplains. For

example, there are 54 members of the Independent Fundamental Churches of America in the military, and 22 chaplains from the denomination. That’s one chaplain for every 2.5 church members. By contrast, there’s one imam per 353.5 Muslims, and one priest for every 1,086 Catholics. And there are no chaplains to serve the 3,214 Wiccans in the military.

Recruiting chaplains from diverse faiths is a challenge, in part because the recruiting system favors Christians and Jews.

A potential chaplain must have a master’s degree in religion. But some faiths, such as Buddhism and Wicca, don’t have seminaries, so they struggle to find chaplain candidates. Dyer qualified as a chaplain because already he had earned a master’s degree as a Baptist pastor before converting to Buddhism.

Chaplains also need to be endorsed by a civilian religious group. The Department of Defense has approved few non-Christian endorsement groups.

In the end, Bergen, the Toronto professor, wonders if creating a diverse chaplain corps is possible

“You need to have chaplains who can minister to everyone who is under their care,” she said. “So if you are injured or dying and you need counseling or you want to pray, there has got to be someone there. And whether they are Jewish or Buddhist or Catholic, or Wiccan, you have got to feel comfortable with them.”

Then there’s the E-word. Military regulations place strict limits on evangelism. Chaplains can’t try to persuade people to change their faith. But they can try to convert the unchurched, provided that a soldier lends them a willing ear.

Things get tricky when chaplains push their faith. Blackwell, the Army chaplain recruiter in Los Angeles, said a chaplain who pushes his faith too hard will eventually fail.

“I am as evangelical as they come,” he said. “And I am not going to shy away from the chance to lead someone to Jesus. But if someone comes in and they see every soldier as a potential convert, they are not going to last long as a chaplain.”

COMPASSION IS THE KEY

Back in Memphis, Dyer meditates and prepares to be deployed.

He’s already been in contact with soldiers overseas. Once word got out about the new Buddhist chaplain, he was bombarded with e-mails. He’s already done one wedding for a Buddhist soldier who has returned home, and offered spiritual direction over the phone with an overseas soldier.

Dyer said he’s ready for whatever comes. And he believes being knowledgeable about Christianity and Buddhism will make him a better chaplain. Most of all, he wants to be there.

“If I have a Church of Christ or more conservative soldier, he certainly does not need to know about dharma or things like that,” he said. “But if he is in pain, or his child back home is sick, I need to be compassionate and help him through that moment. We both need to forget at that moment that I am a Buddhist.” Church of Christ or more conservative soldier, he certainly does not need to know about dharma or things like that,” he said. “But if he is in pain, or his child back home is sick, I need to be compassionate and help him through that moment. We both need to forget at that moment that I am a Buddhist.”

Air Force Times, "Former Marine is First Buddhist Army Chaplain", retrieved September 11, 2009.