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Where Are the English-Americans?
...They are the glue that still holds the country together.
There are Irish-Americans, Scots-Americans, and Scotch-Irish-Americans. There are Polish-Americans, German-Americans, Mexican-Americans, Chinese-Americans, and a host of other hyphenated citizens. Why are there no English-Americans?
England was the cultural mother of the United States, and Englishness is its default culture. Colonists do not come to assimilate into an existing culture but to transplant their own. The English who came to America in the 17th century were intent on creating a world in their own cultural image, though with certain variations, such as different religious regimens.
The English were also the numerically dominant pioneers from the Jamestown settlement of 1607 until the Revolution. At the time of the first US census in 1790, English-descended settlers accounted for 60 per cent of the white population, and the majority of the other whites were from Scotland, Ireland, and Wales. The total population was 3,929,214, of which 3,172,006 were white and 757,208, or 19 percent, were black.
It is possible that English ancestry was downplayed in the 1790 census and for much of the 19th century because of the anti-British feeling caused by the American Revolution and various disputes afterwards such as the War of 1812. If so, the under-recording of English ancestry would have continued though succeeding generations. Whatever figures are correct, it is certain that by 1790 English was the dominant language and the template for American society had been cut.
Most of the colonists considered themselves English. Even the rebels justified rebellion on the ground that they were defending true English liberty that had been usurped by the king. The Declaration of Independence is a catalogue of breaches of what the colonials considered to be their rights as Englishmen.
Edmund Burke recognized the colonists’ demands as English demands.
Those in Britain who were sympathetic to the Americans’ cause had no doubt that the 13 colonies were English creations in spirit as well as blood. In 1775 in the House of Commons, Edmund Burke urged the British government to accept the colonists’ demands because they were based on Englishness:
. . . the people of the colonies are descendants of Englishmen . . . . They are therefore not only devoted to liberty, but to liberty according to English ideas and on English principles. The people are Protestants . . . a persuasion not only favourable to liberty, but built upon it . . . . My hold of the colonies is in the close affection which grows from common names, from kindred blood, from similar privileges, and equal protection. These are ties which, though light as air, are as strong as links of iron. . . . As long as you have the wisdom to keep the sovereign authority of this country as the sanctuary of liberty, the sacred temple consecrated to our common faith, wherever the chosen race and sons of England worship freedom, they will turn their faces towards you.
It is worth noting that the English are not the only missing hyphenated Americans. There are no Canadian-, Australian-, or New Zealand-Americans. This is probably because they are from societies that derive from England, too; there is very little besides accent to distinguish them from the mainstream, and even that is gone in a generation. (In Maine, there are French Canadians with a distinct identity that has been held together by language.)
This raises the question of why the non-English Britons—most notably the Scots and the Irish—have self-consciously maintained their hyphenated status. It is probably because they felt themselves to be peoples who were subject to England and who bore a grudge against England. It is worth adding that Americans who call themselves Scots-American or Irish-American today are indistinguishable from American-Americans in everything except for a sentimental attachment to their Celtic ancestry and a residual polishing of an historical victimhood.
The English are a significant demographic group to this day. The 1980 census showed that 26.34 percent of the white American population reported English ancestry (49,598,035). German heritage was just behind at 26.14 percent, followed by Irish (21.33 percent), French (6.85 percent), Italian (6.47 percent), and Scottish (4.34 percent). How many readers would have known that French heritage was more common than Italian or Scottish?
The census no longer collects official information on the European ancestry of whites. It is too busy classifying Hispanics as Nicaraguans, Dominicans, Colombians, etc. However, the Census Bureau does conduct something called a Community Survey, that is supposed to gather this information, and for 2008 we find something very surprising: The number of Americans claiming English heritage (9.0 percent of the total population) has fallen well behind those claiming to be German (16.5 percent) and Irish (11.9 percent).
What is going on? Millions of English-descended people cannot have suddenly vanished. Nor have there been millions of German and Irish immigrants in the last 30 years. There are several possible explanations. First, because they are of the founding culture, those with English ancestry simply think of themselves as Americans. And, indeed, according to the 2008 Community Survey, we find that 5.9 percent of the population simply considered itself “American,” a category that was not tabulated in the 1980 census. Many of those “Americans” are probably of English heritage.
Full article here for all those interested: http://amren.com/features/2012/01/wh...ish-americans/
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Originally Posted by Aces High
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