Should the United States make English the national language?

I think there has never been a major push for English to become the official language b/c historically we have done a much better job at assimilating immigrants. While the first generation of immigrants rarely gained mastery of English, their children did by attending mandatory government run schools that forced them to use only English. This system broke down in the 1960's and 1970's as the multicultural movement got underway. The whole idea of requiring new residents to learn English was seen as imperialistic and dismissive of cultural diversity.

So today we have 3rd generation immigrants (grandchildren of immigrants) in some sections of this country who have zero English language skills and b/c they live in ethnic ghettos they get along fine - as long as they have no hope of being more than extremely low wage servants. :-(

Where we go from here is hard to predict - we have a growing Spanish speaking minority that may - over the coming generations - turn us into a truly multi-lingual society or we may continue a divide we see in other historic multi-ethnic states where the ruling elites and their supporters use one language while the peasant classes use another. I would hope that we go back to what has worked for well over 100 years, i.e. mandatory English immersion classes for non-English speaking student, but I'm historian, not a fortune teller - I only say what we have done in the past and make semi-educated guesses about how we will handle the future.

BTW - the only stupid question is one that goes unasked. :-)