Yniguez

These consolidated appeals require us to consider an important area, of constitutional law, rarely reexamined since a series of cases in the 1920s in which the Supreme Court struck down laws restricting the use of non-English languages. See Meyer v. Nebraska, 262 U.S. 390 , 43 S.Ct. 625 , 67 L.Ed. 1042 (1923); Bartels v. Iowa, 262 U.S. 404 , 43 S.Ct. 628 , 67 L.Ed. 1047 (1923); Yu Cong Eng v. Trinidad, 271 U.S. 500 , 46 S.Ct. 619 , 70 L.Ed. 1059 (1926); Farrington v. Tokushige, 273 U.S. 284 , 47 S.Ct. 406 , 71 L.Ed. 646 (1927). Here, once again, the state has chosen to use its regulatory powers to try to require the exclusive use of the English language.

Specifically at issue in this case is the constitutionality of Article XXVIII of the Arizona Constitution. Article XXVIII provides, inter alia, that English is the official language of the state’ of Arizona, and that the state and its political subdivisions — including all government officials and employees performing government business — must “act” only in English. Arizonans for Official English and its spokesman Robert D. Parks 1 appeal the district court’s declaratory judgment that Article XXVIII is facially over-broad in…