Americans: Difference between revisions

'''Americans''' are the [[Citizenship of the United States|citizens]] and [[United States nationality law|nationals]] of the [[United States|United States of America]].The United States is home to [[Race and ethnicity in the United States|people of many racial and ethnic origins]]; consequently, [[Law of the United States|American law]] does not equate [[nationality]] with [[Race (human categorization)|race]] or [[ethnicity]] but with citizenship.<ref>{{cite web |url=https://cite.case.law/f3d/502/337/#p341 |title=Fernandez v. Keisler, 502 F.3d 337}}</ref><ref>{{cite web |url=https://cite.case.law/f-supp-2d/599/772/#footnote_1_3 |title=Robertson-Dewar v. Mukasey, 599 F. Supp. 2d 772}}</ref><ref>{{cite web |title=Permanent Allegiance Law and Legal Definition |url=https://definitions.uslegal.com/p/permanent-allegiance/}}</ref><ref name="Citizen">{{cite book |author1=Christine Barbour |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=40dPkS2aRZEC&pg=PA31 |title=Keeping the Republic: Power and Citizenship in American Politics, 6th Edition The Essentials |author2=Gerald C Wright |date=January 15, 2013 |publisher=CQ Press |isbn=978-1-4522-4003-9 |pages=31–33 |quote=Who Is An American? Native-born and naturalized citizens |access-date=January 6, 2015 |archive-date=February 5, 2023 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230205053711/https://books.google.com/books?id=40dPkS2aRZEC&pg=PA31 |url-status=live }}

* {{cite book |author=David Halle |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=1KCdTkq56zoC&pg=PA233 |title=America's Working Man: Work, Home, and Politics Among Blue Collar Property Owners |date=July 15, 1987 |publisher=University of Chicago Press |isbn=978-0-226-31366-5 |page=233 |quote=The first, and central, way involves the view that Americans are all those persons born within the boundaries of the United States or admitted to citizenship by the government. |access-date=October 16, 2015 |archive-date=February 5, 2023 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230205053712/https://books.google.com/books?id=1KCdTkq56zoC&pg=PA233 |url-status=live }}</ref><ref>{{cite book |last1=Petersen |first1=William |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=7Mkxdz_3d-oC&pg=PA62 |title=Concepts of Ethnicity |last2=Novak |first2=Michael |last3=Gleason |first3=Philip |publisher=Harvard University Press |year=1982 |isbn=9780674157262 |page=62 |quote=...from Thomas Paine's plea in 1783...to Henry Clay's remark in 1815... "It is hard for us to believe ... how conscious these early Americans were of the job of developing American character out of the regional and generational polaritities and contradictions of a nation of immigrants and migrants." ... To be or to become an American, a person did not have to be of any particular national, linguistic, religious, or ethnic background. All he had to do was to commit himself to the political ideology centered on the abstract ideals of liberty, equality, and republicanism. Thus the universalist ideological character of American nationality meant that it was open to anyone who willed to become an American. |access-date=February 1, 2013 |archive-date=April 4, 2023 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230404205901/https://books.google.com/books?id=7Mkxdz_3d-oC&pg=PA62 |url-status=live }}</ref> The U.S. has 37 [[American ancestries|ancestry groups]] with more than one million individuals.<ref name="An2000">{{cite web|title=Ancestry 2000|url=https://www.census.gov/prod/2004pubs/c2kbr-35.pdf|date=June 2004|publisher=U.S. Census Bureau|url-status=live|archive-url=http://webarchive.loc.gov/all/20041204015245/https://www.census.gov/prod/2004pubs/c2kbr-35.pdf|archive-date=December 4, 2004|access-date=December 2, 2016}}</ref> [[White Americans]] with ancestry from Europe, the Middle East, or North Africa form the largest [[race (human classification)|racial]] and [[ethnic group]] at 61.6% of the U.S. population.<ref>{{cite web | url=https://www.census.gov/library/stories/2021/08/2020-united-states-population-more-racially-ethnically-diverse-than-2010.html | title=The Chance That Two People Chosen at Random Are of Different Race or Ethnicity Groups Has Increased Since 2010 }}</ref><ref>{{cite web|title=Table 52. Population by Selected Ancestry Group and Region: 2009|url=https://www.census.gov/compendia/statab/2012/tables/12s0052.pdf|year=2009|publisher=U.S. Census Bureau|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20121225031832/https://www.census.gov/compendia/statab/2012/tables/12s0052.pdf|archive-date=December 25, 2012|access-date=February 11, 2017}}</ref> [[Hispanic and Latino Americans]] form the second-largest group and are 18.7% of the American population. [[African Americans|Black Americans]] constitute the country's third-largest ancestry group and are 12.4% of the total U.S. population.<ref name="An2000" /> [[Asian Americans]] are the country's fourth-largest group, composing 6% of the American population. The country's 3.7 million [[Native Americans in the United States|Native Americans]] account for about 1.1%,<ref name="An2000" /> and some 574 native tribes are recognized by the federal government.<ref>{{cite web |title=Federally recognized American Indian tribes and Alaska Native entities {{!}} USAGov |url=https://www.usa.gov/indian-tribes-alaska-native |access-date=April 5, 2024 |website=www.usa.gov |language=en}}</ref> In addition to the U.S., people of American descent can be found internationally. As many as seven million Americans are estimated to be living abroad, and make up the [[American diaspora]].<ref>{{cite news |title=A Growing Trend of Leaving America |author=Jay Tolson |url=https://www.usnews.com/news/articles/2008/07/28/a-growing-trend-of-leaving-america |newspaper=[[U.S. News & World Report]] |date=July 28, 2008 |access-date=December 17, 2012 |quote=Estimates made by organizations such as the Association of Americans Resident Overseas put the number of nongovernment-employed Americans living abroad anywhere between 4 million and 7 million, a range whose low end is based loosely on the government's trial count in 1999. |archive-date=October 23, 2012 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20121023170519/http://www.usnews.com/news/articles/2008/07/28/a-growing-trend-of-leaving-america |url-status=live }}</ref><ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.aaro.org/about-aaro/6m-americans-abroad |title=6.32 million Americans (excluding military) live in 160-plus countries. |author=<!--Staff writer(s); no by-line.--> |publisher=Association of Americans Resident Overseas |access-date=December 17, 2012 |quote=The total is the highest released to date: close to 6.32 million. |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20121119013957/http://www.aaro.org/about-aaro/6m-americans-abroad |archive-date=November 19, 2012 |url-status=dead |df=mdy-all }}</ref><ref>{{cite journal |title=The American Diaspora |journal=[[Esquire (magazine)|Esquire]] |date=September 26, 2008 |publisher=Hurst Communications, Inc. |url=http://www.esquire.com/features/american-diaspora-1008 |access-date=December 17, 2012 |quote=he most frequently cited estimate of nonmilitary U. S. citizens living overseas is between three and six million, based on a very rough State Department calculation in 1999—and never updated. |archive-date=November 3, 2012 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20121103233148/http://www.esquire.com/features/american-diaspora-1008 |url-status=live }}</ref>

The majority of Americans or their ancestors [[Immigration to the United States|immigrated]] to the United States or are descended from people who were [[Atlantic slave trade|brought]] as [[Slavery in the United States|slaves]] within the past five centuries, with the exception of the [[Native Americans in the United States|Native American]] population and people from [[Alaska]], [[Hawaii]], [[Puerto Rico]], [[Guam]], [[Texas]], and formerly the [[Philippines]],<ref>{{cite book|last=Lifshey|first=Adam|title=Subversions of the American Century: Filipino Literature in Spanish and the Transpacific Transformation of the United States|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=Z17rCgAAQBAJ|year=2015|publisher=University of Michigan Press|isbn=978-0-472-05293-6|page=[https://books.google.com/books?id=Z17rCgAAQBAJ&dq=%22the+status+of+filipinos+in+the+philippines+as+american+nationals%22&pg=PA119 119]|quote=the status of Filipinos in the Philippines as American nationals existed from 1900 to 1946|access-date=May 26, 2018|archive-date=September 28, 2023|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230928160538/https://books.google.com/books?id=Z17rCgAAQBAJ|url-status=live}}<br />{{cite book|author=Rick Baldoz|title=The Third Asiatic Invasion: Empire and Migration in Filipino America, 1898–1946|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=J7QUCgAAQBAJ&pg=PA174|date=28 February 2011|publisher=NYU Press|isbn=978-0-8147-9109-7|page=174|quote=Recalling earlier debates surrounding Filipinos' naturalization status in the United States, he pointed out that U.S. courts had definitively recognized that Filipinos were American "nationals" and not "aliens".|access-date=May 28, 2018|archive-date=September 23, 2023|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230923060630/https://books.google.com/books?id=J7QUCgAAQBAJ&pg=PA174|url-status=live}}<br />{{cite web |url=https://fam.state.gov/FAM/08FAM/08FAM030205.html |title=8 FAM 302.5 Special Citizenship Provisions Regarding the Philippines |author=<!--Not stated--> |date=15 May 2020 |website=Foreign Affairs Manual |publisher=United States Department of State |access-date=9 Jun 2020 |archive-date=July 19, 2018 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180719010406/https://fam.state.gov/FAM/08FAM/08FAM030205.html |url-status=live }}</ref> who became American through expansion of the country in the 19th century;<ref>Fiorina, Morris P., and Paul E. Peterson (2000). ''The New American Democracy''. London: Longman, p. 97. {{ISBN|0-321-07058-5}};</ref> additionally, [[American Samoa]], the [[United States Virgin Islands]], and [[Northern Mariana Islands]] came under American sovereignty in the 20th century, although American Samoans are only nationals and not citizens of the United States.<ref>U.S. Census Bureau. [https://www.census.gov/population/foreign/about/faq.html Foreign-Born Population Frequently asked Questions] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20151117174325/https://www.census.gov/population/foreign/about/faq.html |date=November 17, 2015 }} viewed January 19, 2015. The U.S. Census Bureau uses the terms native and native born to refer to anyone born in Puerto Rico, American Samoa, Guam, the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands, or the U.S. Virgin Islands.</ref><ref name="American Somoans">* {{cite news |date=March 28, 2018 |title=U.S. nationals born in American Samoa sue for citizenship |work=NBC News |agency=Associated Press |url=https://www.nbcnews.com/news/asian-america/u-s-nationals-born-american-samoa-sue-citizenship-n860721 |access-date=2018-10-01 |archive-date=September 28, 2018 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180928134312/https://www.nbcnews.com/news/asian-america/u-s-nationals-born-american-samoa-sue-citizenship-n860721 |url-status=live }}