This paper examines the political meanings of language in the USA, from the perspectives of both majority- and minority-language groups, and focuses especially on Mainstream US English, African-American Vernacular English, and Spanish. It briefly traces the history of language policy in US education and argues that because language serves as a proxy for race, power and identity, language policy alone is not sufficient to address exclusionary practices. As long as the issues underlying language are not addressed, the rhetoric of equal treatment and language policies based on such rhetoric will continue to be manipulated to serve an exclusionary agenda that reinforces traditional social hierarchies. (Contains 2 notes and 2 footnotes.)