English Only foes hope to lull Eric Crafton to sleep, then deliver a knockout punch

Pssssst. We'll let you in on a little secret. Foes of Eric Crafton's English Only initiative are waging a campaign to defeat the Jan. 22 referendum and save the city from yet another national embarrassment.

If you didn't know this—and not many people do only 16 days before early voting begins—then the game plan is working.

It's a rope-a-dope strategy, with the city's so-called progressives playing the tricky Muhammad Ali to Crafton's hapless George Foreman in the famous Rumble in the Jungle.

In the rope-a-dope gambit, as all boxing fans know, one pugilist puts himself in what appears to be a losing posture, laying in wait with a surprise knockout punch.

To this point, progressives are certainly playing their part well. Like Ali on the ropes, they look like big losers.

That's intentional, they say. They're actually working quietly in the trenches to win the referendum on whether to force Metro to conduct all business in English.

The idea is to lull the city's many xenophobes into a false sense of security so they stay home while everyone else pours to the polls to seize victory for a better day.

This strategy, risky as it may be, has the added benefit of being the cheap choice. To wage a full-blown campaign with TV ads and rallies, etc., would have cost much more than anyone wanted to try to raise.

Grizzled veterans of Nashville's political wars are scratching their heads over whether it'll work. Here's the question: Can a gang of lefties and hippies actually manage to pull their heads out of the clouds long enough to find enough votes to beat a referendum?

The English Only opponents originally envisioned some kind of grand public education campaign involving love and hope and harmony.

But at one early organizing meeting, an insider recalls, "A few of us old campaign farts started wandering into the room and the first thing we said was, 'Look that's all great, but most people don't like immigrants. Most people think every immigrant they see is here illegally taking their jobs and raping their kids.'

"So we said, 'Unless you've got millions of dollars for a major public education campaign, you're going to lose. Instead of trying to change the world, why don't you just get out there and find enough votes to win?' "

At this point, some twentysomething do-gooder raised his hand and offered this bright idea: "What we should do is make Crafton think we're disorganized."

"That won't be hard to do," one old fart thought.

Since then, instead of making speeches about the evils of intolerance, hippies at Nashville's Peace and Justice Center have been staffing phone banks in search of supporters. They hope to raise around $200,000 to send some mail. They've mounted a surprisingly successful effort to round up help from Nashville's churches. More than 100 ministers have signed a petition against English Only.

"We come from a variety of religious traditions," the petition says, "but we are united in our opposition to the English First amendment. We consider it to be unjust, inhospitable and detrimental to the well-being of our community. We urge our fellow Nashvillians to defeat this measure once and for all."

Even some evangelicals, not typically touchy-feely on immigration, have joined the cause. Fiscal conservatives have good reason to oppose English Only because the special election is costing Metro at least $350,000.

"People are coming out of the woodwork to fight this thing and show that Nashville is better than this," says one organizer, attorney Gregg Ramos. "Eric Crafton is trying to drive a wedge into the city. But in a perverse way, he's bringing good groups together. Churches, unions, big business, the Chamber of Commerce—we're all pulling together."

Ramos is probably overstating his support. But turnout is certain to be low, so it won't take many votes to win. If opponents are better organized, they have a realistic chance of pulling this off.

The city's leaders are predicting all sorts of dire consequences if the measure passes. In a speech to the council, Mayor Karl Dean warned it would hurt the economy.

"Under the charter amendment," he said, "if Nashville wanted to communicate with a foreign-based company to encourage them to come to Nashville—and the recent announcement of Volkswagen in Chattanooga is a good example of the significance that could have—if we wanted to do that communication, whether it's a letter or conversation in person in the company's native language, we wouldn't be able to."

Luckily, English Only is clearly unconstitutional because it discriminates against people based on national origin, as the Metro law department has opined. It wouldn't take a judge too long to toss it out.