Split infinitives

Ever since I learned about split infinitives, I have been paying increasing attention to them both in reading and in writing. The traditional rule against split infinitives apparently finds its root in classical languages such as Latin and Greek, in which infinitives are not formed with a particle like to in English, but with verb endings. For these languages, the infinitive appears as one word, not two, and the problem of split infinitives is nonexistent. The infinitive in German is closest to English, formed with the particle zu. However, as I understand it, the zu is so close to the verb that it would be impossible to put another word between them. In fact, for verbs with separable prefixes, the zu goes between the prefix and the root verb, forming a single word, e.g., ausgehen, auszugehen. Hence, I believe the split infinitive is nonexistent in German as well.

The problem with English is that it is a very malleable and expressive language. Whatever sounds all right to a native speaker would gradually make its way to becoming standard. In many cases, the split infinitive may have somewhat different connotations than its non-split form. In other cases, the placing of the adverb or adverbial phrase before the particle to may result in ambiguity as to which verb—the leading verb or the infinitive?—is being modified. I am mostly comfortable with split infinitives in such cases. Nevertheless, I believe it is still considered nonstandard to split an infinitive with certain adverbs, such as not and never. Thus, this sentence in an article coming from no less than a publication known as Editor & Publisher, caused me to cringe (emphasis mine):

The board of The American Society of Journalists and Authors (ASJA) has voted unanimously to not endorse an earlier decision to give a Conscience in Media award to jailed New York Times reporter Judith Miller, E&P has learned.

(UPDATE 2005-08-04 22:24): According to The Merriam-Webster Dictionary of English Usage (1989),

In some sentences—particularly ones where the infinitive comes after a copula and particularly ones with a negative like never or not—the infinitive is customarily not split. Here are two examples:

Molee’s quest for a perfect replacement for English seems never to have ended —Baron 1982

... human qualities that even the most zealous military officer must possess if he is effectively to command men —William Styron, This Quiet Dust and Other Writings, 1982

I would add that the infinitive ought not to be split for constructs such as in order to and ought to.