Muhlenberg legend

According to the legend, the single vote of Frederick Muhlenberg, the first-ever Speaker of the US House of Representatives, prevented German from becoming an official language of the United States.

Ripley's version credits the story to an alleged letter by Heinrich Melchior Muhlenberg published in Halle in 1887.

[8] The legend has a long history and led to a number of analyses and articles published from the late 1920s to the early 1950s explaining that the story was false.

[14][15][16] For example, in 1987, a letter from a former Missouri election official emphasized the importance of voting in an Ann Landers column.

He included a list of events allegedly decided by one vote from his local election manual, one of which was a claim that "in 1776, one vote gave America the English language instead of German" (in fact, versions of the error-filled list long had predated the 1987 Ann Landers mention).

Frederick Muhlenberg , first Speaker of the US House of Representatives, who did not cast a deciding vote in 1794, 1776, or any other year, to prevent German from becoming the official language of the United States
Franz Löher , whose 1847 German book included an early version of the story