Defining American Culture: The Six Historical Groups of Americans
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Defining American Culture: Part 1 – The Six Historical Groups of Americans
In the US, there are no less than six distinct groups that form our melting pot of cultural values. When we analyze each of these groups, we come to a realization that American history has many interpretations. We shall look closely to see why Americans seem to have such deep political and ideological divisions. Problems such as racism, elitism, and greed stem from a failure to understand the fundamental differences in others. At their heart, these differences are not based on race or culture, but on the basic relationship we all have to the formation of the modern United States of America. Here, I will examine the differences between the people descended from those who gained independence from Britain versus those who became citizens through conquest, immigration, or emancipation. Each group has a distinct historical perspective on the United States.
1. The Revolutionary Colonials
This greedy lot is made up of the Scottish, English, Welsh, Dutch, and Swedish transplants that colonized the east coast in the 17th Century. These colonists all lived through the American Revolution only to begin seeking opportunities toward financial independence. A few politicians kept the constitutional government focused, but many of these folks cared little for the new republic they had just inherited. For many, their behavior could be likened to children whose parents suddenly disappeared, leaving the brats to fight for possession and control of the household. This group forms the core of American culture that all future American groups are expected to view as their model for assimilation.
2. The Annexed Colonials
These people are the descendents of the Spanish and French colonials of the Mississippi Valley, the gulf coast, and the American southwest. Their lands were eventually conquered (either diplomatically or militarily) by the United States. Now American citizens, they are somewhat culturally distinct in their towns and cities from the Anglo-Dutch Americans. This is made clear by the obvious cynicism they display toward the founding fathers, the constitution, and the incorporation that was forced upon them. (Think New Mexico, New Orleans, and Puerto Rico)
3. The Old World Immigrants
Any European or Chinese immigrant who came to America between the 1783 Treaty of Paris and today should be included in this group. For these immigrants, America was an opportunity. Some wanted freedom while others escaped debt, famine, or war; or simply wanted to become rich. Instead, most found their way into near-forced labor, constant warfare, and economic depression. They built America’s canals and railroads. They worked the manufactories and coal mines. They fought America’s wars. Their grandfathers had nothing to do with the revolution or the constitution--something many of the newcomers did not care for either way. Those Protestants who could pass for Anglo-Americans assimilated more easily, while the others tended to congregate into homogenous cultural centers for protection. This is the most represented group living in the US today with a makeup of no less than 37% of the US population.
4. The New Immigrants
Middle-easterners, Indochinese, Indians, and Latin Americans make up this group. What they all have in common is that, while their countries were once considered colonies of the European powers, they all followed the US example. They had their own revolutions and started their own republics. Since that time, political turmoil (related to US intervention) or economic opportunity had caused them to leave their republics and move to the US. The Americans of the old world should have seen kindred spirits in these immigrants. Instead, they saw them as threats. Hard working and intelligent, many of these immigrants had been forced into homogenous cultural districts due to language and religious differences.
5. The Freedmen
Obviously, these are the descendents of those Africans forcibly brought into the US as slaves and made to work the fields. These Afro Americans gained their nominal freedom in the 1860s and gained their civil rights in the 1960s. Today, they seek the same acceptance, dignity, and self-actualization afforded to all other groups of American citizens. They feel no inclusion in either the 1776 revolution or in the 1787 framing of the constitution. 13% of the Union Army in the Civil War was made up of freedmen. The freedmen’s “Revolutionary War” was fought from 1861 to 1865. For most of them, their American history really began at that time.
6. The Native Tribes
Stripped of their ways of life, these tribes of varying lifestyles faced relocation, forced assimilation, and total annihilation at the hands of the Anglo-Dutch Americans. Extra-tribal division and constant US pressure kept the tribes from effectively uniting against their common enemy. A Shawnee warrior in 1813 was the last chief to come close to creating an independent nation for them all to share. Today their communities thrive on tracts of sovereign lands known as reservations. Ironically, it is on these reservations that they hire white Americans to run their businesses for them.
The conclusion to which we inevitably come is that the US might need a new constitution for which all Americans can take full ownership. The old Anglo-Dutch Americans had their chance to run things their way. What we got was greed, poverty, and war. Embarrassingly, Washington, Jefferson, and Madison owned slaves and there were no women present at the constitutional convention. How can all Americans feel included in our nation’s history when so few were included at the outset? How can everyone feel that our history is worth preserving when so few had a role in it? There are no less than six American histories to be written. Why not have new revolutions with full inclusion of all Americans? Perhaps such an event will create the sort of patriotism and leadership we need in order to survive the coming decades.
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Thanks for the great insights. I think the founding fathers were the celebrities of their day, though they were often hypocrits. It just goes to show that no one is perfect. Washington and Jefferson lived in Virginia and owned slaves. But the tobacco industry was in decline and cotton was not yet a profitable commodity for southerners. As a result, they freed their slaves on their deaths. If cotton were booming in Virginia as much as it was in Alabama in the first half of the 19th Century, I doubt Washington and Jefferson would have ever freed any slaves.
"How can all Americans feel included in our nation’s history when so few were included at its outset?"
Prior to 1964, the American gov't was exceptionally stable and its people economically prosperous. In 1965, the Johnson Reed Immigration law was replaced to create more multiculturalism.
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The Revolutionary Colonials
“This greedy lot is made up of the Scottish, English, Welsh, Dutch, and Swedish transplants that colonized the east coast in the 17th Century.”
Well, I must say, I feel that these people you refer to as a “greedy lot” were the backbone of Colonial and pre and post 19th century America. And those who created the American gov’t structure (al coming from the ethnic stock you mention), they ware widely recognized (worldwide) as “great” men. They were the first to accomplish creating a government structure which was not based on an aristocracy (privilege by birth and a blood lineage to the ancient Romans / Greeks ruling class). For those who fought (it was actually only about 15- 18% of the males in their prime years who fought for Independence), these bold and brave people risked everything, including their lives to attempt to create a new type of societal structure. At least that’s the way I read American History (and I’ve read it quite thoroughly).
Surely you can say SOMETHING good about them?
As for your “opinion” describing “Annexed Colonials” and “Old World Immigrants”, I can only say it is way too broad a brush you’re using in your description of these people and what they represented to the American experience.
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Afro American
Those of African descent were a free people in America after 1865. They were free to colonize a place in America’s VAST amount of unsettled land. Free to build their own cities, their own towns, their own industries and their own urban housing; and there OWN political environments. The same educational knowledge that was available to the White man was available to the Black man. The Black race was expected to be free, separate and self-reliant. Never in human history had two or more different races of males been involved in the SAME political arena. So it should not be surprising to see the white man resist being forced into a societal anomaly (1964 Civil Rights Act, which created forced integration). Finally, there was no Constitutional right for racial integration. Those White people prior to 1964 who desired to keep racial separation, they were NOT violating any American laws.
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The American Indian
That “white people stole the way of life of the Indian”, or committed “cultural genocide” against them by forcing them to give up their way of life, is an oversimplification to say the least. The reality was (and still is) that the American could no more allow the Indian to live his primitive and nomadic way of life in THEIR presence then the Spaniards could allow the Central American Indians to continue to commit ritual cannibalism in THEIR presence. The right thing to do was to try to teach the Indian a better way of life. The Americans were not trying to amalgamate the American Indian into his society. The desire, again, was to teach the Indian to be settled and self-reliant. I wrote a Hub on this experience…
S.L.,
I have been hoping to generate some healthy discourse on this hub some day.
Indians: Come on; I got that same boilerplate story of history in high school too. Here's the truth: The railroad industry dominated politics during the Gilded Age. There are plenty of reasons why Americans moved west, but none had anything to do with some abstract sense of freedom or destiny. Some mined or drilled resources of oil, gold, coal, iron, etc for the industrialists. Others built rail lines to facilitate supply chains for the industrialists. Before income tax, the federal government earned revenue by selling public land to homesteaders. Land Speculators dominated the western scene. Other industries existed, of course--herding cattle for example. The Indian tribes were right smack in the way of all of this. The Indian wars were just that--warfare. The wars began permanently in the 1830s and ended in the 1890s. This was not genocide. Who said it was? It was war of conquest. We wanted land, we moved in, and we took it. Then our millionaires became billionaires. You name any Indian war and I will name the company or tycoon behind it. Northwest Indian War of the 1780s and 1790s--started by a land-speculation syndicate called the "Miami Company". Trail of Tears--various cotton investors. Second Seminole War--various sugar refining companies and several cotton planters. History is full of war and conquest and all nations do it. (Including those sweet, innocent Spaniards in Central America) I'm not judging it. I'm just stating the facts.
Revolutionary Colonials: 25% of my ethnic composition comes from this group. First of all, I didn't realise I had said anything bad about them. I'm certainly not going to sugercoat anything with the typical hagiographical accounts that are taught in elementary school. Right or wrong, the founding fathers loathed democracy. I have never found any of Saint Jefferson's writings ever suggesting handing the country over to the fickle whims of the people. The earliest Americans cared about two things--money and personal freedom (to make money). It was the lawyers, landowners, and merchants that wanted their own country. The commoners did not care. They simply didn't like being taxed. The three occupations mentioned above set the framework for a new aristocracy of learned individuals. Three Republics came before ours: Rome (based on a land-owning aristocracy), Venice and the Netherlands (Based on a commercial aristocracy). We were a mercantile republic that grew a few different commodities and sold them to Europe. The greed (not meant in a derogatory way) of men like John Symmes, John Astor, and Cornelius Vanderbilt, fueled the ambition to expand and to either find new commodities or to start our own industrial enterprises. Along the way, they ripped off poor settlers and Indians. But we are a nation founded on greed. As you said, the majority of colonial people did not want an independent nation. Most of those who did want it served in the militia before giving up. Most of the lower rank and file of the professional Continental Army was made up of newly-arrived immigrants. During WWII, we deviated from our core principles of money and business and became a militaristic state--something the Revolutionary Colonials were never about. Oh, and did I mention that half of these great sainted men of the colonies owned slaves? That was about money too.
Annexed Colonials - "Too broad a brush" perhaps to talk about what they all ate for dinner. But they all became Americans the exact same way (Louisiana Purchase, the Guadeloupe Hidalgo Treaty, the Adams-Onis Treaty, etc). These were Spanish and French citizens who became Americans after the US acquired their land. It's not a bad thing, but that's what happened.
Old Immigrants - They all came here from sovereign nations. Most of them served in the army or worked as low-paid laborers. Today they are the majority of Americans. 75% of my ethnic composition comes from this group. My ancestors moved around a lot before settling on their own small farm out west.
Afro Americans/Freedmen - I am pretty sure the southern whites were violating laws by lynching and terrorizing blacks over the next hundred years. I'm pretty sure they violated Amendments 14 and 15 of the Constitution. How could the blacks be independent and self-reliant when they couldn't vote or get a loan to buy land? I'm not here to judge or moralize anything. I'm merely stating facts. Lincoln himself said that the post-Civil War plan for integration would never work. Go back and read the part about freedmen in America. Did I say anything untrue? Should I double the length of my hub by playing the role of apologist and make excuses for why things happened the way they did? Who said I was such a great guy?
I’m not going to address post 1964. There is no precedent in human history to what the American gov’t created in this year.
As for pre 1964...
Revolutionary Colonials: They were of North European origin. They created a political system unlike any other in human history. What a bold and brave move THAT was. Their economic system tho was still entirely similar to their European cousins: laissez-faire capitalism. Each man (irrespective of those in the Euro aristocracy) was required to provide for himself and generate his own wealth. This economic system lasted in america until the 1930s. I don’t see the need to breakdown the white population into all their respective ethnic groups pre or post American revolution - as you do. Suffice it to say, they all assimilated under the banner of the American culture, which was, other than language differences (which kept them out of the political system), entirely similar to the system they emigrated from. Again, each man had to provide for himself. There was corruption, greed, hoarding and all sorts of vices associated with human societies. Big deal. The system your Founding Fathers created past the test of time! It was incredible stable! It was a system in which all members could achieve wealth and participate in voting for their political representatives (some exceptions).
The Annexed Colonials: Your description isn’t in-correct. However, it should suffice to say that the Europeans did assimilate and cooperate with the political and economic system which they had become - unwittingly - part of. Again, this demonstrates to me the GREAT Organizing Document (Constitution) of your Founding Fathers.
Also, Puerto Rico is a commonwealth. By their own volition they remain attached to the American system.
A peoples’ “culture” historically has meant this: the peoples’ folklore, common religion, manner of dress, diet, male and female’s respective roles & all those other things that would make a people distinct from another (except race, which pre 1964 was thought to be an insurmountable barrier). And most of all, culture involves the manner to which the people choose to provide for their daily sustenance, which has been, historically, directly related to their male group power structure. In fact, the entire culture seems to spring from, and is designed to reinforce, the continued preservation of this structure. I see no dveiation from this pattern in human history.
--The American Indians were not part of American culture (any more than the American was part of their respective cultures).
--The non-European racial groups that emigrated to the US were not part of American culture. Each respective non-euro male group lived separately - they did not, and they would no, assimilate.
-- African-Americans also lived separately and were clearly not part of the American culture - however, they did from time to time try to assimilate, tho on their own terms. Yes, slavery was wrong. White people ended it (thousands of blacks owned saves too). As for voting rights, blacks always had the right to create their own political environments i.e. collonize a place in America,build their own towns and/or their own cities. As for loans, they were ALWAYS difficult to get, white or black. They all required collateral. Blacks have ALWAYS had a problem as group , and individually , in generating wealth. This isn't white people's fault.
Old E, I’ll wrap it up here with this. Overall , I found your inimitable ideology on “American culture ” interesting but also desultory. Many anachronisms. I just don’t think - so far anyways - it flows with a logical chronology. Just my humble opinion. I’ll read your part II…
Thanks for the feedback. I'll just say a few things and you can have the last word if you want it.
Rev Colonials: "Big deal" is right. I would disagree that the government created by the founding fathers (Jefferson was in France when the Constitution was written and ratified in Philadelphia) has withstood the test of time. That is unfortunate. But the fact that the Constitution would be eventually circumvented by corruption was predicted by Ben Franklin. Jefferson simply postulated we would need to write a new one every now and then. Our current federal establishment is on the brink of insolvency. Didn’t Alexis de Tocqueville state that Democracy existed in the American colonies long before Independence and the founding of the republic? Laissez Faire economics worked great before America was an industrialized society. We sold raw commodities to Europe and we bought manufactured goods from the Europeans. Americans were either farmers that generated these commodities or they were merchants who sold them. Banking and land dealing all supported this simple economic model. Skilled craftsmen like Paul Revere started to go extinct in the 1790s as Hamilton's plans for industrialization and mass-production began to take shape.
Overall, the purpose of this Hub has been to define American culture. Currently, there are significantly-sized subcultures within the core "American culture". Many of these subcultures are growing and their values are shaping the future of what America is. Can we ignore it or should we define it in some way? I can split this up many different ways: race, religion, ethnicity, etc. I prefer to split them up according to how people became Americans. There are four basic means: 1) Those that fought and participated in the founding of the nation, 2) Those that assimilated through land acquisition, 3) Those who immigrated after the Revolution, and 4) Those who became Americans through emancipation. I believe these groups all love democracy, but had different values for which they voted: role of Government, for example. Intermarriage and the rapid sharing of ideas and information in the 20th Century have certainly impacted these core values to create a more collective set of values and patriotism.
You may not think this is the best way to dissect and categorize American culture. I appreciate your feedback. I welcome any additional comments you have and will let you have the last word.
"Revolutionary Colonials: They were of North European origin. They created a political system unlike any other in human history. What a bold and brave move THAT was. Their economic system tho was still entirely similar to their European cousins: laissez-faire capitalism. Each man (irrespective of those in the Euro aristocracy) was required to provide for himself and generate his own wealth. This economic system lasted in america until the 1930s. I don’t see the need to breakdown the white population into all their respective ethnic groups pre or post American revolution - as you do. Suffice it to say, they all assimilated under the banner of the American culture, which was, other than language differences (which kept them out of the political system), entirely similar to the system they emigrated from. Again, each man had to provide for himself. There was corruption, greed, hoarding and all sorts of vices associated with human societies. Big deal. The system your Founding Fathers created past the test of time! It was incredible stable! It was a system in which all members could achieve wealth and participate in voting for their political representatives (some exceptions)."
I'd take issue with this whole paragraph. The first 3 sentences because a democratic republic was already established by the Greeks, and our founders made mention of it on a regular basis in their personal letters.
"I don’t see the need to breakdown the white population into all their respective ethnic groups pre or post American revolution - as you do."
I find his hubs engaging and thought provoking. The point of this series is to break them down and examine them.
"The system your Founding Fathers created past the test of time! It was incredible stable!"
I call shenanigans on this one. Compared to other forms of government, a democratic republic is still a huge question mark. It didn't end up working for the Greeks, and it looks like it's started collapsing again in modern times.
"The American Indians were not part of American culture (any more than the American was part of their respective cultures)."
The American Indians have influenced American culture more than just about any other cultural influence. They might only make up a tiny fraction of the population, but the influence is all over. They don't build colonials in Arizona. They build adobe. The biggest cash crop in America comes from Native Americans. Dances with Wolves, man. Dances with Wolves!
"The non-European racial groups that emigrated to the US were not part of American culture. Each respective non-euro male group lived separately - they did not, and they would no, assimilate."
Acknowledge it or not, the non-European racial groups have made their mark on American culture. I like me some chicken fried rice, hip hop beats, tacos, and cigarettes.
The summation of your comments points to a narrow view of American culture. It's larger than you make it, and Old Empressario is expounding on it. Quite well I might add.
Andy,
Thanks for the comments. I'm glad you get what I'm saying here. Now here's the key question: Are we still going to keep considering the European descendents living in the US the only true representatives of American culture after they are the minority? I look up and down at my own extended family. 2/3 of my kids are half Hispanic. Most of rest of my cousins and my step siblings are producing Asian, Hispanic, or black mixed-ethnicity children. They are the future; maybe not now, but 30 years from now they will be the American culture. I personally know five people who got married or engaged in the past 12 months. All five are marrying into either Hispanic or Asian families. Most of the Anglo-American couplings today are not producing any children before divorce. Many more of the whites are abstaining from marriage completely. The majority of Americans by 2050 will be brown, not white. I consider Euro culture to be merely a large sub group of American culture. American culture can be compared to a confederate form of government. It is comprised of only a handful of states (in the form of sub cultures) that basically are all defined completely differently. Together, they do have a loose, mutually-acceptable social understanding of democracy and freedom. But essentially, there are fundamental differences in how idealistic one may be toward the nation's history and its government. Take me for example; my dad never ceased to be a subject of Queen Elizabeth II and never became a US citizen, despite living here for years.
And there in lies the conflict we're staring at today. There was a movie within the last 10 years that was a remake of The Time Machine. The movie sucked in general, but when the protaganist went forward in time tens of thousands of years, he ended up in a world with 2 distinct species of human. There were the browns that lived on the sides of cliffs, and the pasty white cave dwellers that pillaged them on a regular basis. It was a pretty good allegory for the culture wars we're experiencing now, and the worldview of S Leretseh. We can only hope that the new majorities of "minorities" wont be as cruel to their old oppressors as the oppressors were to them.
“There were the browns that lived on the sides of cliffs, and the pasty white cave dwellers that pillaged them on a regular basis”
Whenever I see a statement like that I know I’m dealing with someone either with a hate-filled agenda toward the white Christians (a very popular thing I’ve discovered) or someone who actually believes the myth that white people are the source of all evil and wickedness.
It is the non-whites who are coming in HUMAN WAVES to white Christian political and economic systems. No other racial or ethnic group in human history ever allowed this type of calculated migration. And not only have white Christians allowed these people to come, but they have also allowed for their political empowerment. INCREDIBLE
As for those manufactured - ridiculous - images showing white violence against the “brown” colored people in the movie example, well, typical Hollywood guilt trip.
White Christian people have NOTHING to feel guilty about, past or present. They are the most charitable & most generous people on the planet - and in human history. I wrote a Hub about the extraordinary level or charity and generosity of whites toward blacks after the Civil War, trying to make these people self-reliant. After the 1960s, white Christians extended their charity all over the world. Non-whites, that I could find, have, generally speaking, extended NO CHARITY OR GENEROSITY toward white Christians, past or present
Now let's address violence. The racial group doing the most violence in America today against other races is the black race; and their victims are almost all white. White racism appears to be nothing but manufactured MSM propaganda.
I found this site when I googled white on black racism, and the author could find only 42 incidences (!) of violence over 30 or more years:
http://theinjusticefile.blogspot.com/2010/09/white
You can also compare black violence against white people on this site. I found the results STAGGARING TO THE IMAGINATION
Wow thats all are very amazing information .
Thanks...
The point, S Leretseh, is that we're all one race. The human race. I'm a white male in his mid-20s with a Christian cultural background. I don't hate myself. In fact if anything, I'm a bit of a narcissist. Non-whites and whites can all share in the American culture equally, each contributing their traditions into the melting pot of America. Instead you have the mentality that it's "us" and "them". "Those people" are one way, and "we're" this way. I look at it as we're all humans, and we all have our own problems. Sometimes it makes sense to study different backgrounds in a historical or medical context, and some stereotypes are at least worth knowing about, but the large number of exceptions to stereotypes makes them unreliable to control our behavior.
I didn't point out that movie as an example of anything to live your life by or feel guilty about. I pointed it out as a metaphor for things I see happening. Bad things happened even when "the most charitable & most generous people on the planet" were in charge. Why? Can it be avoided in the future?
This argument is so old that Shakespeare wrote a play about it. In Coriolanus, the argument is one of selfish democracy versus nationalism and civic virtue. On one side were the patricians; men who founded Rome, served in its armies, and preserved its traditions. On the other side were the plebeian citizens of Rome: immigrants, freedmen, and men of conquered cities. With democracy increasing in Rome, the plebes gained power to the chagrin of the patricians. Coriolanus was a patrician general who, despite being a national hero, could not gain political office due to his contempt for the plebes. He saw the plebes as self-serving while the patricians contributed blood and treasure toward the continued success of the state. The plebes wanted equality and enfranchisement. Unwilling to compromise his principles, Coriolanus eventually leaves Rome and leads an army of Volscians against the city. I believe we are seeing similar events unfold in the US. Rather than see the blacks or Mexicans win, many whites would rather tear down the whole constitutional model.
“On one side were the patricians; men who founded Rome, served in its armies, and preserved its traditions.”
Most would have said it was the Etruscans who founded Rome. However, I think this is a misnomer. The Etruscans and the Patricians were, I believe, one and the same. Of course, the only source here is historian Livy. One of my hobbies is the search for the origins of what is referred to as ‘Western Culture‘. All “peoples” across the globe today have been introduced to each other (for better or worse) because of this culture. I have always been interested in where / or how it developed.
Of course I have my theory. However, I’d like to know your opinion.
Oh, and I understand and agree with your point (in your post) about history repeating itself. Though isn't it possible that the similarities your alluding to are mainly the result of two political systems being dominated by an identical by culture?
That's fine, but Coriolanus lived within the generation of the founding of the Republic. The Patricians claimed to be descended from Romulus and his band of followers. Therefore, they laid claim to the founding of Rome. The Plebes were the descendents of freedmen, immigrants, and the conquered. Patricians wanted preservation, while the Plebes wanted equality.
The Romans certainly took much of their culture from the Etruscans. But they spoke a different language. Prior to the Republic, the culturally-superior Etruscans absorbed the rustic Latin town of Rome and governed it as a colony for years until the Romans expelled them (depending on which version of history you prefer). The traditionaL founding of the Republic and the framework of the Republican system was almost certainly influenced by the Greek-like Etruscans. I find it curious that Athens became a democracy and Rome is said to become a republic in almost exactly the same year.
The code of the success of Western Civilization has been cracked by Dr. Jared Diamond in his book called Guns, Germs, and Steel.
And to your last point, yes, the cultures in the US are different while those of the early Roman Republic were homogenous.
The United States has always been a bit of a hodgepodge, even in colonial times. With the exception of slaves, these were mostly people of Northwest European descent, but in the thinking of people at the time, this was an extremely diverse environment.
The jury may still be out on whether or not such an odd mixture of people can share a huge nation of 300 million people. If anything, it is remarkable how well most Americans manage to get along. I don't know if there is any such thing as American culture, but there seem to be some abstract principles and economic/political institutions that hold things together (more or less.) And as messed up as our nation still may be, it's better than it was at its founding. Maybe that simple fact is cause for at least a little bit of optimism.
I agree that my last paragraph comes across as ominous or misleading. It's a little fluffy. I like to forget it. The body of this hub is the meat of it all. How did people become "American"? Were they conquered, emancipated; did they immigrate, or were they are part of American society during the revolution? By now most Americans are a mixture of all of these groups--even many black people have some European ancestry. During the Revolution, our culture was all about money--a beautiful thing that made sense. Now we are still about money...but also about abstract principles like national security, religion, nationalism/patriotism, progressivism, hard work, personal freedom, et cetera. Most of these things contradict one another, yet so many people want all of them. It's madness. I live in Texas where the ethnic groups do not particularly get along. Mexican immigrants are a source of cheap labor, so the business class enjoys their illegal immigrations. Yet the tough nationalists want to stop Mexican immigration. All of this would be fine except for the fact that both of these contradictory principles are represented by the same political party. Blacks and whites in Texas are distrustful of one another. In Texas, people of mostly European descent dominate the business class and they control education. Black people are leading the only progressive movement. Aside from immigration, I cannot see that the Mexican Americans have any interest in progressive reforms. But since the whites are not reproducing at a significant rate, the Mexican Americans are sure to overtake their numbers by mid century. If the Mexican Americans were to remain homogenous, I would find it hard to believe that they would see the US republic of 1787 as anything worth preserving. Most follow a cultural identity, not a national one. With no cultural link to the founding of the US, they would care nothing for it. But to show that I can be optimistic, I see lots of evidence that the Anglos and Mexicans are intermarrying at very high rate. The more of that, the better. Intermarriage could save us and finally create a unique American culture. And I agree that the US never did form a culture of its own. We are a collection of states after all!
I'm a greedy Welsh/English person, with a fascination for US history, and found this Hub really interesting. I look forward to reading more of your Hubs.
Good for you! A little cultural self-loathing, if not criticism, lends a healthy perspective from which I begin to approach history.
Andy 21 months ago
I'd recommend reading Howard Fineman's book The Thirteen American Arguments if you haven't already. It's a good read and speaks to the interactions of various political interests at work today (and since the founding of the country). Even just skimming the chapter titles can get you thinking about some interesting tangents that would go nicely with this part 1.
I vote against writing a new constitution in the current polarized climate. That's not to say I see it getting less polarized in the near future. We might go revoking rights of certain individuals or transitioning to a flat tax system. Glenn Beck's giving a big speech soon (I think it was today?) and it's bound to rile up some folks for a year or two. I'm quite thankful that the founders had the forethought to write some things into stone that they themselves weren't practicing at the time. They got most of them worded quite nicely to remain mostly applicable today. Pretty amazing if you ask me. There are stages that most intelligent people go through when thinking about the writers of the constitution and the revolutionaries that allowed it to happen. You start with a major boner for them because you learned about them in school. Then you start reading some of the history surrounding them and realize that they were totally hypocritical a-holes. Then you start to figure out that they might have been hypocrits, but they did put a lot of good stuff in that work of prose poetry. Then you come right back around to the hero-worship bonerness you started with. We don't always follow their rules, but they were some darned good rules.