Abstract: Its foreign language (FL) education policy is an important component of American language policies. It could be seen that changes, adjustments and transformations featured American FL policies in its 300-year long history, from practice priority to national interests centered, from politically oriented to economically oriented, and from national security strategy to participation of international competition. Its experiences and lessons learned could provide pratical guidelines for other developing countries. With such a concern, the present study attempts to analyze American contemporary foreign language policies and their effects on its foreign language education in order to offer helpful perspectives for China's FL education.