## Facts

- Arizona voters adopted Article XXVIII of the Arizona Constitution through an initiative that designated English as the official language and required state and local governments to “act in English and in no other language,” subject to limited exceptions (e.g., federal-law compliance, foreign-language instruction, public health and safety).
- The amendment applied broadly to “official acts” of all state and local officers and employees and authorized enforcement suits by any Arizona resident or business.
- Ten bilingual elected officials and public employees alleged the amendment barred them, during official duties, from communicating in Spanish with constituents, clients, parents, and patients, creating a risk of private litigation for routine communications.
- The superior court upheld the amendment, treating it as a content-neutral rule and finding insufficient proof of discriminatory intent for equal protection.
- The court of appeals reversed in part. The Arizona Supreme Court granted review and addressed the amendment’s facial validity.

## Issues

1. Whether Article XXVIII’s requirement that government officials and employees “act in English and in no other language” is an unconstitutional restriction on protected expression under the First Amendment, including under overbreadth principles.
2. Whether Article XXVIII violates the Equal Protection Clause by unlawfully burdening non-English speakers’ access to government information and services and bilingual officials’ ability to communicate with them.
3. Whether a court may adopt a narrowing construction to avoid constitutional defects and, if not, whether any portion of Article XXVIII is severable.

## Decision

- The Arizona Supreme Court held Article XXVIII unconstitutional on its face and directed that it not be enforced.
- The court reversed the superior court’s judgment and vacated the court of appeals’ opinion.
- The court rejected the Attorney General’s proposed narrowing construction as inconsistent with the amendment’s text and apparent purpose.
- The court concluded severability could not save the measure because the constitutional defects were tied to the amendment’s central operative command.

## Legal Principles

- A governmental mandate restricting the language used in official communications can burden protected expression because language is integral to conveying ideas and information.
- A law is facially invalid under the First Amendment overbreadth doctrine when it sweeps substantially beyond any legitimate applications and predictably deters protected speech, including through credible enforcement threats such as broad private-right-of-action provisions.
- Even where asserted state interests (e.g., promoting English, civic unity, or cost reduction) may be legitimate, a broad prohibition on non-English official speech is unconstitutional if it is not sufficiently tailored and does not materially advance those interests in a way that justifies the burden on communication.
- Equal protection is violated when state action substantially burdens a group’s ability to obtain government information and participate in civic and political life without an adequate justification.
- Courts may not “save” an unconstitutional enactment by adopting an interpretation that rewrites clear operative language; severance is inappropriate when invalid provisions reflect the measure’s core scheme and removing them would change what voters adopted.

## Conclusion

Article XXVIII’s English-only command was held facially unconstitutional because it broadly barred government officials from communicating with the public in languages other than English, substantially chilling protected speech and impairing meaningful access to government for non-English speakers, and it could not be cured by judicial re-interpretation or severance.


Ruiz v. Hull, 191 Ariz. 441, 957 P.2d 984 (Ariz. 1998)