CITIZENSHIP AND AMERICAN IDENTITY:what is america

          We are all foreign-born or the descendants of foreign-born, and if distinctions are to be made between us, they should rightly be on some other ground than ingenuousness. The early colonists came over with motives no less colonial than the later. They did not come to be assimilated in an American melting pot. They did not come to adopt the culture of the American Indian. They had not the smallest intention of ‘giving themselves without reservation’ to the new country. They came to get freedom to live as they wanted to. They came to escape from the stifling air and chaos of the old world; they came to make their fortune in a new land. They invented no new social framework. Rather they brought over bodily the old ways to which they had been accustomed. Tightly concentrated on a hostile frontier, they were conservative beyond belief. Their pioneer daring was reserved for the objective conquest of material resources. In their folkways, in their social and political institutions, they were, like every colonial people, slavishly imitative of the mother country. So that, in spite of the ‘Revolution,’ our whole legal and political system remained more English than the English, petrified and unchanging, while in England law developed to meet the needs of the changing times.
        This quote by Randolph Bourne summaries the concept of immigration.Immigrants from European countries who settled here either through exploration,wars or persecution did not discard their cultures or norms.they rather integrated it with the already existing society.the american culture basically was assimilated by these foreigners from Europe.It can be read that while European culture changed,american society was resistant to changes that was brought forth by immigrants from other continents other than European. american culture was basically an European culture.the american identity must therefore be fluid and adaptive to changing times.immigrants must not be coerced to assimilate the borrowed norms of the colonials but rather embraced.
      I chose this quote because it speaks on the recent immigrant-phobia of america.it must be known that European settlers were not required to speak native language nor adhere to traditions and culture.however, they allowed the freedom as immigrant to express their foreign norms without any threat or fear from natives.however recent immigrants are seen as threat to american identity which was the identity of old Anglo-Saxon .the requirement to speak English only enhances communication but forcibly asking immigrants to discard culture and take up the norms of the new world is rather un- american. one american identity is freedom and it implies that one can do anything as far as it doesn't interfere with others.identity in current american is color,race,income and many superficial indices.we have lost the appreciation of  a deeper identity that manifests itself through a person's character.