The Republican. [volume] (Oakland, Md.) 1877-current, 1895-04-18
LANGUAGES IN AMERICA.



to the English.
Although the population of the
United States is made up of greater
number of diverse natonalites than
that of any other country in the world
mo large country is more homogeneous
In respect to language than ours. The
people who have come here from abroad
have brought many languages; but
none but English has shown on the
soil of the United States degree of vi
tality which has promised TO make il
permanent
In Pennsy lvania the Germans, who
began to immigi0te about 1850, have
succeeded in perpctuating dialect of
the German tongue up to the present
time. But it is gradually disappear
ing and its place is being taken by
English. The Dutch language in New
York city, and the dialect of German
long spoken by colonists in New York
state, the Mohawk Dutch" so called
have already disappeared.
Early in the present century French
was the language of Louisiana, and il
is still spoken by many people in that
PtstNts nun lItn tongue. 700 IL ulSdD-
pcaring. The people who speak it are
giving up the struggle against Eng
lish. English is taught in the public
schools of Louisiana. The children in.
troduce it even under the parental
roof, and to them French has become a
foreign idiom, They think in English
and speak it in their play, and their
parents are drawn into the current in
spite of themselves
The same process is taking place with
the newer corners to the United States
the Germans and Scandnavians in
the northwest, the French Canadians
an New England, the Italians in the
eastern cities, and the people of other
nationalitics scattered through the
country,
In some regions in the northwest, in
deed, the German and Scandinavian
tongues are spoken aS their mother
tongue by many children born on
American soil, and are taught to them
in private schools, In some districts
these languages may even be perpct-
nated from generation To generation.
But with by far the greater part of the
foreign-born population, the use of
English is steadily displacing that of
the languages formerly spoken.
That these languages melt away, in
the use of our people, before the Eng
fish tongue, is due in part to the fact
that English is the language of com
merce, and the only one in which bust
mess can be transacted on any but the
smallest scale; but it is due i'll much
larger part TO the influence of the pub
lie schools.
These schools, which are, in the
greater part of the country, free, at
tract the children of the newly arrived
population, Here they learn English
at once, and soon come to use il in
preference To any other tongue. If all
the children in the country attend
the public schools, ALI European lam
guages but English would soon disap-
pear in two or three generations
It is admitted, however, that, should
any large number of the children now
speaking foreign languages be with
drawn from the public schools, and re-
ccivc their daily instruction in other
schools and in other languages than
English, the effect would be To perpet-
nate those tongues, and by that means
To build up definitely an element un-
like the rest of the population. This
is one of the dangers attending the
establishment on Il large scale of other
schools than the public schools,
IL is conceivable that, in certain
states, part of the community might
he formed b.. this means into Il perma-
nent nationality differing from the
EngliSh-Spealling Americans, as the
Greeks, the Bulgarians, the MbanianS
and other races differ from the Turk
ash population in the Ottoman empire,
or as the diverse and often hostile races
OF India differ from one another,
II is by means of a somewhat similar
Isolation, with instruction in their own
schools or with no instruction at ALL
that the spanish Americans in Texas,
New Mexico aud Arizona have been
able To resist the assimilation TO which
other nationalities have largely yielded,
Any general separation into distinct
castles, such as is seen in some parts of
the southwest, would certainly be an
unfortunate and dangerous state OF
affairs, against which all proper intlu-
enee should he brought 70 bear. 80
Youths Companion,