Official English

Fact Sheets: About U.S. English

Why does a Hispanic immigrant run an organization that is dedicated to making English the official language of the United States? An immigrant from Chile, Mauro E. Mujica, an architect and international businessman, has been the Chairman/CEO of U.S.ENGLISH since 1993. Due to his first-hand experiences as an immigrant and the hardships that can result from immigrating to a new country, Mr. Mujica is committed to keeping our nation unified through a common language and helping immigrants succeed by learning English.

It was for these very reasons that then U.S. Sen. S.I. "Sam" Hayakawa of California founded U.S.ENGLISH in 1983 to continue his work in support of our nation's common language, English.

With more than 1.7 million members, U.S.ENGLISH is the nation's largest non-partisan, non-profit citizens' action group working to preserve the unifying role of the English language in the United States at both the state and federal levels. The organization maintains that having a firm grasp of English, the nation's common language, will boost an immigrant's chances for economic, academic and social success.

Following is a brief listing of activities undertaken by the organization in the last few years:

In August of 1996, U.S.ENGLISH was instrumental in getting H.R. 123, the "Bill Emerson English Language Empowerment Act of 1996" passed by the House of Representatives, and enjoyed a bipartisan vote of 259-169. Despite tremendous support from the majority of Americans and demands of U.S. ENGLISH supporters, the Senate failed to pass the bill. Currently, U.S.ENGLISH is working with members of the House of Representatives and Senate to help pass official English legislation in the 110th Congress. H.R. 997, the English Unity Act of 2007, was introduced in February by Rep. Steve King (R-IA).

U.S.ENGLISH also led the effort to pass the "English Language Fluency Act" to reform federal bilingual education policy. The act would have given flexibility to states, localities, and families to ensure that children learn English as quickly and as effectively as possible. U.S.ENGLISH supported Proposition 227, the "English for the Children" initiative approved by California voters in 1998. U.S. ENGLISH believes that official English legislation and bilingual education reform work hand-in-hand toward unifying our nation and helping non-English speakers to succeed.

Thirty states have made English their official language. Most recently Kansas, as well as Idaho, Arizona, Iowa, Alaska, Missouri, New Hampshire, Montana, South Dakota, and Wyoming have declared official English legislation with the help of U.S.ENGLISH.