The American Language by H.L. Mencken

Author:H.L. Mencken [Mencke, H. L.]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 0101-01-01T00:00:00+00:00

These changes, said Webster, “with a few other inconsiderable alterations, would answer every purpose, and render the orthography sufficiently correct and regular.” They would “diminish the number of letters about one sixteenth or eighteenth,” they would tend to “render the pronunciation of the language as uniform as the spelling in books,” and they would “facilitate the learning of the language.” The greatest argument, however, was the patriotic one:

A capital advantage of this reform in these States would be that it would make a difference between the English orthography and the American. This will startle those who have not attended to the subject; but I am confident that such an event is an object of vast political consequence.

The alteration, however small, would encourage the publication of books in our own country. It would render it, in some measure, necessary that all books should be printed in America. The English would never copy our orthography for their own use; and consequently the same impressions of books would not answer for both countries. The inhabitants of the present generation would read the English impressions; but posterity, being taught a different spelling, would prefer the American orthography.

Besides this, a national language is a band of national union. Every engine should be employed to render the people of this country national; to call their attachments home to their own country; and to inspire them with the pride of national character. However they may boast of Independence, and the freedom of their government, yet their opinions are not sufficiently independent; an astonishing respect for the arts and literature of their parent country, and a blind imitation of its manners, are still prevalent among the Americans. Thus an habitual respect for another country, deserved indeed and once laudable, turns their attention from their own interests, and prevents their respecting themselves.

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