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The issue of second language acquisition by immigrants was a major political issue in Quebec in the second half of the twentieth century. In Montreal in particular, where a French-speaking majority coexisted with an English-speaking minority, recent comers had historically tended to assimilate with the numerically smaller group. After the Quiet Revolution, a movement emerged among nationalist Francophones to alter this trend and to convince allophones to join forces with the demographic majority. Recent data from the 2001 Canadian census shows that the effects of Quebec's linguistic laws are beginning to be felt more and more in Montreal, and that in this context knowledge of the French language has progressed constantly among recently arrived immigrant groups. With the steady rise in official language bilingualism and the relative maintenance of heritage languages, a new equilibrium is emerging which points to a renewed social peace and a more intense participation of immigrants in mainstream French-speaking society. La question de l'apprentissage d'une langue seconde par les immigrants a ete un enjeu politique de premiere importance au Quebec au cours de la deuxieme moitie du XXe siecle. A Montreal en particulier, ou une majorite francophone cohabitait avec une minorite anglophone, les nouveaux citoyens ont eu tendance historiquement a s'assimiler plutot du cote des locuteurs de l'anglais. Apres la Revolution tranquille, un mouvement a emerge parmi les nationalistes francophones pour modifier cette tendance et convaincre les allophones de se joindre a la majorite demographique. Des donnees recentes extraites du recensement canadien de 2001 montrent que les effets des lois linguistiques quebecoises commencent a se faire sentir de plus en plus a Montreal et que, dans ce contexte, la connaissance du francais a progresse au sein des communautes immigrantes recemment arrivees. Accompagnee d'une hausse du bilinguisme et d'une relative stabilite des langues patrimoniales non officielles, cette tendance semble augurer d'un nouvel equilibre linguistique dans la ville.