Senators: Sing national anthem in English

The Associated Press

WASHINGTON - In a warm-up for next week's immigration debate, impatient senators flirted with the fringes of the issue with separate bills to crack down on border tunnel builders and insist that the national anthem be sung in English.

A compromise that would protect most of the estimated 12 million illegal immigrants from being deported faltered in the Senate in April.

Senators, however, were unwilling to wait to express their disdain for a recently released version of the national anthem in Spanish or to delay legislation for imprisoning smugglers convicted of digging tunnels under the U.S.-Mexican border.

The Senate approved a resolution late Monday evening stating that the national anthem, the Pledge of Allegiance, the oath recited by immigrants when they are sworn in as citizens and other songs or statements symbolizing national unity should be spoken or sung in English.