{"id":12913,"date":"2018-10-10T10:10:47","date_gmt":"2018-10-10T15:10:47","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.thedustininmansociety.org\/blog\/?p=12913"},"modified":"2018-10-10T10:11:27","modified_gmt":"2018-10-10T15:11:27","slug":"d-a-king-in-insider-advantage-georgia-todaywhat-is-republican-brian-kemps-position-on-allowing-voters-to-decide-on-official-english","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.thedustininmansociety.org\/blog\/2018\/10\/10\/d-a-king-in-insider-advantage-georgia-todaywhat-is-republican-brian-kemps-position-on-allowing-voters-to-decide-on-official-english\/","title":{"rendered":"D.A. King in Insider Advantage Georgia today: What is Republican Brian Kemp\u2019s position on allowing voters to decide on official English?"},"content":{"rendered":"

Insider Advantage Georgia<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n

October 10, 2018\u00a0by D.A. King<\/a><\/span> | Oct 10, 2018<\/span> | The Forum<\/a> | 0 comments<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n

What is Republican Brian Kemp\u2019s position on allowing voters to decide on official English?<\/strong><\/p>\n

Candidate policy differences in the race for Georgia governor may not extend to allowing Georgia voters to decide if the state constitution should be amended to make English the official language of government.<\/p>\n

A December 2015 Rosetta Stone poll<\/a> showed that a bipartisan 76% of Georgians support making English Georgia\u2019s constitutional official language. The idea is English as official, not \u201cEnglish only\u201d as goes the portrayal by dishonest opponents.<\/p>\n

Last week, Democrat candidate Stacey Abrams promised to oppose constitutional official English in the General Assembly as governor and boasted of fighting against allowing voters to answer an official English ballot question when she was in the legislature.<\/p>\n

It is surprising that there doesn\u2019t seem to be a quote or position from Republican gubernatorial candidate Brian Kemp on the voter-popular issue.<\/p>\n

All concerned should be aware that Georgia has a 1996 statute<\/a> in place that makes English the official language, but also says officials can ignore that directive. So, they do exactly that.<\/p>\n

Introduced by state Senator Josh McKoon, in 2016 SR 675<\/a> passed the Georgia senate with every Republican member voting \u201cYEA.\u201d It was not allowed a vote on the House floor. McKoon\u2019s Resolution created a ballot question voters would have considered that year which read:<\/p>\n

\u201cShall the Constitution of Georgia be amended so as to provide that English is the official language of the State of Georgia?\u201d<\/p>\n

If such amendment shall be ratified as provided in said Paragraph of the Constitution, it shall become a part of the Constitution of this state.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Readers who are not closely involved in Gold Dome politics are likely asking why they have not already been permitted to vote on making official English part of the state constitution. It helps to know that the Georgia Chamber of Commerce and the Metro Atlanta Chamber of Commerce are vehemently opposed to that idea.<\/p>\n

It may also help to know that in metro-Atlanta\u2019s DeKalb School District alone, administrators are dealing with students from 180 different countries who speak 140 different languages<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Without a constitutional mandate that English is the official language of government, readers can make their own predictions on how long it is before the angry marches in the streets begin with the demand that government in Georgia accommodate every imaginable language with the cry that \u201cdiversity is our strength.\u201d<\/p>\n

It seems like something a Republican candidate for Georgia governor would comment on.<\/p>\n

D.A. King of Marietta is president of the Georgia-based Dustin Inman Society. \u00a0 \u00a0<\/em>Here.<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Insider Advantage Georgia October 10, 2018\u00a0by D.A. King | Oct 10, 2018 | The Forum | 0 comments What is Republican Brian Kemp\u2019s position on allowing voters to decide on official English? Candidate policy differences in the race for Georgia governor may not extend to allowing Georgia voters to decide if the state constitution should […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thedustininmansociety.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12913"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thedustininmansociety.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thedustininmansociety.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thedustininmansociety.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thedustininmansociety.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=12913"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/www.thedustininmansociety.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12913\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":12918,"href":"https:\/\/www.thedustininmansociety.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12913\/revisions\/12918"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thedustininmansociety.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=12913"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thedustininmansociety.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=12913"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thedustininmansociety.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=12913"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}