In 1968, Domengeaux accepted an appointment from Louisiana Governor
John McKeithen, his fellow Democrat, to preside over a new state-charted organization called the
Council for the Development of French in Louisiana, commonly known by the acronym CODOFIL. As president of CODOFIL, Domengeaux spearheaded a statewide effort to introduce French education in public classrooms from elementary through high school levels. He did so largely by recruiting teachers from
France,
Belgium,
Quebec, and other
French-speaking regions and nations around the world. Such recruitment placed Domengeaux at odds with the educational establishment, which preferred the hiring of local teachers. This effort represented a major shift for Louisiana's educational system, which for decades had punished
Cajun children for speaking
French in school — a practice that more than any other factor had dramatically reduced the number of native French speakers in the state. In 1976, Domengeaux arranged for the then French President
Valéry Giscard d'Estaing to visit Lafayette. In the 1980s, Domengeaux embraced a new teaching method: French
immersion, in which children were to be taught a variety of subjects in French for 60 percent of the school day. This method replaced the previous, less successful method of teaching French in only thirty-minute daily increments. In addition to advancing French education, Domengeaux used CODOFIL as a watchdog organization that defended Cajuns from perceived affronts. For example, Domengeaux crusaded against use of the word "
coonass," which he considered an ethnic slur against the Cajun people; and he condemned such Cajun humorists as the popular
Justin Wilson, who was born not in
Acadiana, but in
Tangipahoa Parish, one of the "
Florida Parishes" east of
Baton Rouge, and who disagreed with Domengeaux politically. A charismatic public figure, Domengeaux was often at odds with detractors, who criticized his reliance on international teachers as well as his emphasis on continental French to the exclusion of
Cajun French. For his efforts to save the French language in Louisiana, Domengeaux received an honorary doctorate from
Louisiana State University in
Baton Rouge, the Order of the
Legion of Honor from the French government, and the
Order of the Crown from Belgium, among numerous other citations. On November 11, 1986, coinciding with
Veterans Day, Lafayette Mayor
William Dudley Lastrapes and Governor
Edwin Washington Edwards proclaimed "Jimmy Domengeaux Day". The University of Louisiana at Lafayette created an "Eminent Scholar Chair in Foreign Languages" in Domengeaux's honor. The organization over which Domengeaux presided for the last two decades of his life, CODOFIL, continues to coordinate French education in Louisiana; and in his honor CODOFIL's supporting foundation offers a scholarship known as the
Bourse James Domengeaux (James Domengeaux Scholarship). ==References==