Official English Legislation to be Considered by U.S. House Subcommittee

H.R. 997 to be heard Wednesday; U.S. English, Inc. Chairman to Testify

U.S. English, Inc. Chairman Mauro E. Mujica has been invited to testify Wednesday in front of the Education Reform Subcommittee of the House Committee on Education and the Workforce as the subcommittee considers H.R. 997, the English Language Unity Act. This hearing marks the first time since the 104th Congress that official English legislation has received committee consideration.

The English Language Unity Act is one of the most widely supported bills in the 109th Congress. With 161 bi-partisan co-sponsors covering 39 states, H.R. 997 has broad support from the nation’s leaders. This support echoes public sentiment, which found that 84 percent of Americans support making English the official language of the United States, according to a June 2006 Rasmussen poll.

The upcoming hearing is the latest in what has been a very busy year for official language issues on Capitol Hill. In May, the Senate passed an amendment that would make English the national language of the United States by a vote of 62-35. In June, Chairman Mujica testified in front of the Senate Judiciary Committee in opposition to the bilingual ballot provisions of the Voting Rights Act. Most recently, a House amendment to strike the multilingual ballot mandates of the Voting Rights Act received the support of more than 40 percent of the House.

In addition to the testimony from Mujica, the committee will also hear testimony from Paul McKinley, a State Senator from Iowa, the most recent state to pass official English legislation on the state level. Currently, the hearing is scheduled for 12:30 p.m. on Wednesday in room 2175 of the Rayburn House Office Building.

U.S. English, Inc. is the nation's oldest and largest non-partisan citizens' action group dedicated to preserving the unifying role of the English language in the United States. Founded in 1983 by the late Sen. S.I. Hayakawa of California, U.S. English, Inc. (www.us-english.org) now has more than 2 million members.