According to projections distributed by the Census Bureau one quarter of the U.S. population will be of Hispanic origin in 2050. At this point in time those of said descent constitute twelve percent of the population. This anticipated ascension of Hispanic ethnicity is great for America - the world’s melting pot and the Land of Opportunity – as we benefit greatly as a nation by being in a constant state of flux.

All is not rosy, though, with this population swing. The Hispanic immigrants - both legal and illegal - and their offspring bring with them a strong sense of culture and family which necessitates their use of the Spanish language. This creates the potential for a major cultural clash with Americans at large as the vast majority of the nation favors the English language.

That being said, law must be enacted now to instate English as the official and singular national language. Failure to address the matter has the ability to really shake up the United States, both economically and socially, further down the road.

One need only look North to see the economic impact unleashed upon a nation by a disparity of languages. Canada follows a two-language system and pays for it dearly. The Canadian Taxpayers Federation states that the English/French bilingualism costs the nation some $1.8 billion annually. According to studies conducted by the Crown itself, Canadian consumers pay another $100 million annually to foot the bill for bilingual labeling and packaging. Therefore, Canadians are paying $2 billion per year to support two languages.

Through number crunching we can apply Canada’s plight to the United States. Their approximate bill of $2 billion Canadian converts to about $1.5 billion American. Canada’s costs hold true for a population of 31.9 million. Our nation is considerably more populated at 293.6 million. With our nation being over nine times larger our cost should increase at the same rate, so bilingualism has the potential to cost Americans $13.8 billion per year.

The flaws of bilingualism do not end there. Unless a national language is enacted in the near future the damage to society itself could be even greater than dollars alone. Americans as a whole are a close-minded and ethnocentric lot. This makes them defensive of the normative traditions of Americana. If the growth of the Spanish language remains unchecked it could, throughout the United States, become as prevalent as it currently is in certain areas of Florida and California. This will undoubtedly frustrate the English-speaking masses to become – whether consciously or subconsciously – quite prejudiced and hateful in their ways. Race conflicts like we had up until the late-1960’s could actually reappear, this time with the Hispanics being the battered souls. One can easily envision this hatred becoming even more intense than that which had been directed at blacks due to the fact that many might look at the Hispanics as "invaders" due to the pervasiveness of clandestine movement across borders that accounts for the estimated 11 million illegal aliens residing in the United States.

The scenarios of despair spawned by multilingualism here may actually come to fruition thanks to government inaction. Our government states it cannot move upon linguistic legislation because many political scientists and thoroughbred patriots assume that a national language is against the tenets of American governance and the rights of the people. They argue that the freedom of speech is one of the key components of our Nation’s value system and legislation along these lines would corrupt everything that our founding fathers fought for.

Perhaps, in its truest sense, instituting a national language may be un-American. But, in order to prevent economic and social unrest, and to maintain the integrity of all peoples and all systems, it is necessary to make English not only the language of choice but the language of law.