|
By William Fisher
Esther, my late mother-in-law, was an immigrant from Poland. When she arrived at Ellis Island as a teen-ager just before the First World War, she spoke Polish but could not read that or any other language.
The reason was that, when she was eight years old, she was sent off to a far-away village to work in a bakery so she could send money home to help support her family.
She knew how to sew, so she got a job in a New York sweatshop making garments. She worked about ten hours a day and got paid on a piecework basis.
Not unusual, so far. Millions of immigrants had similar experiences in their new Land of Opportunity.
After a few years in America, Esther had heard enough English to speak the language, albeit with a thick Eastern European accent and a very limited vocabulary. She could count to ten, but couldn't read a word. She got to work by counting the subway stops.
Still not so unusual.
But then came World War Two, and Esther decided she had to become an American. Not just a resident, but a full-fledged American citizen.
But she'd have to pass the citizenship exam, which meant she would need to know about how our country came to be, about our Founding Fathers, about our Constitution, about our government.
And that meant learning to read.
So over the next couple of years, Esther's two young daughters spent endless hours teaching their mom to read - and write - English. Together they read elementary school textbooks on civics and American history, memorized the Bill of Rights, and learned about the three branches of our government. The daughters gave their mom homework assignments to write - in English. They took her to night school civics classes. They even bought her one of those Berlitz taped language courses, put it under her pillow and left it on all night so the knowledge would osmose while Esther slept.
So, when the long-anticipated day came, a very nervous Esther answered all the judge's questions correctly. Then she stood before him in the courtroom in Brooklyn with a group of other immigrants, raised her right hand, and took the oath of citizenship.
So maybe she didn't exactly have the encyclopedic Constitutional knowledge of a Senator Robert Byrd, but she was a citizen!
It was, she told me years later, the proudest moment of her life.
So why am I telling you all this?
Because, as you will know unless you've been in a long sleep, there's a huge immigration debate going on our country now. It's mostly about how to protect our borders, what to do with the 10-12 million immigrants already living among us, and how to handle the millions more who come to our country to work. Congress is considering - some would say stonewalling - legislation that's supposed to address all these issues.
One of the features of that legislation is a requirement that immigrants learn to read, write and speak English, learn about our Founding Fathers, our Constitution, our history, our branches of government. But they'll have to learn all this not to become citizens, but simply to pass the test allowing them to remain in the US.
Maybe this is such a good idea that we ought to extend it to those lucky folks who were born American citizens.
But passing the "stay in America" test is likely to be a huge problem for our citizens. It is unlikely to win any votes for candidates for public office.
|
|
