Daniels Chapt 5, Ethnicity and Race in America

The big question asked back in colonial times and still brought up today, "What is an American?", echoes the United States' struggle of finding its true identity which historically has been given many definitions. What is an American all about, regardless if his or her ancestors's culture originated in North America or not? French author, Michael Guillaume-Jean de Crevecoeur, had an interesting take when he defined an American as "either an European or the descendant of an European, hence that strange mixture of blood, which you will find in no other country." He classified America as one the place where "individuals of all races are melted into a new race of men , whose labours and posterity will one day cause great changes in the world." One can presume Crevecoeur meant Americans of European descent and that his perception of American life is more romanticized than what really made the United States of today. This nation has had a long history of racial prejudice and segregation, in fact, more than most would think during its colonial era. During that time, great conflict occured between the English settlers and their European counterparts.

As such, we know of the destructive conflicts that arose between white settlers and Native Americans that soon changed the face of America forever. What was interesting to me was the amount of cultural hatred the English had towards their European neighbors. At one point, settlers from England were the majority until Africans were brought over for slavery and numerous non-English immigrants arrived. While many English felt the need to establish organizations to help their shrinking community, their culture, law, language and other customs greatly dominated the colonial way of life in America. Many aspects of this system have had a profound effect on how the legal, political, and economic systems work in this country today. Yet, tensions were still high between English Americans and other ethnic groups such as the Germans and the Irish for a number of reasons.

In the case of the Irish, I always knew it was due to the different interpretations of God between Catholics and Christians that spurred the hatred between the two cultures. The American colonies did pass some non-Catholic legislation out of fear of the Irish community growing, even though Catholics were a minority at the time. The mere sight of a Catholic and his ways was enough to frighten colonial Americans into thinking their way of life might be threatened. In time, the religious tensions between Catholics and Christians in the United States soon came to pass.

The majority of German immigrants settled in Pennsylvania, but they made up a third of the population. They were looked down for being the one group that didn't seem fully assimilated into colonial society. Ben Franklin himself didn't think too well about Germans, especially since they mistakenly voted for his opponents in a number of elections. Despite the prejudices, the new German Americans thrived as agricultural workers and continued to have great future impacts on this country's prosperity; one of them involving their work in the automobile industry.