Opinion ID: 1640383
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Applying Section 36.01

Text: Driver's license tests are perhaps the most common experience through which the State and its citizens interact and of necessity engage in substantial written and oral communication with one another. [18] If State officials truly are to maintain English as the official language of this State, can it seriously be questioned but that the State should communicate with its citizens in English, at least where there is no compelling reason for it not to do so? Is opinion testimony from a witness necessary to enable this Court to decide whether the State's communications with its citizens for purposes of something so basic and universal as a driver's license test, in a language other than English, is in tension with the constitutional mandate given by the people of Alabama to their State officials to observe and maintain English as the State's official language? Concomitantly, if State officials truly are to take all steps reasonably necessary to insure the preserv[ation] and enhance[ment] of English as the common language of this State, can it seriously be questioned but that the State should communicate with its citizens in English, again, where there is no compelling reason for it not to do so? Is any testimony truly necessary to establish that the State's communications with its citizens for purposes of something so common as a driver's license test in a language other than English is inconsistent with the clear and simple mandate to State officials to take all steps reasonably necessary to insure the preserv[ation] and enhance[ment] of English as the common language of this State? Does not the ordinary understanding of these terms and the sense that such words convey to the popular mind, Hagan, 160 Ala. at 562, 49 So. at 423, call for a negative answer to these questions? It may be that the constitutional provision before us today does not come equipped with a simple litmus test that makes its interpretation and application to the acts and omissions of State officials easily discernible in every case. One need look no further, however, than the myriad United States Supreme Court and other federal court decisions over the last 140 years attempting to sort out the meaning and effect of the Equal Protection and Due Process Clauses of the United States Constitution in order to be assured that the enforceability of a constitutional provision does not depend upon the inclusion in it of easily applied, textual standards. As to the particular case before us, my consideration of the foregoing questions leads me to the conclusion that the judgment of the trial court should be reversed, and this cause remanded for the entry of a summary judgment in favor of the plaintiffs.