What is an American?

It has become trendy to say that an American is anyone who believes in American ideals. But nobody really believes that, as most immigrants don't really believe in American ideals, and a lot of citizens don't either.

From a NY Times op-ed:

Senator Elizabeth Warren, a Democrat, has repeatedly cited Roosevelt as her favorite president and her “dream” running mate ...

At the National Conservatism Conference, Rich Lowry, the editor of National Review, picked up on one of Roosevelt’s core themes in his speech, “Why America Isn’t an Idea.” Like Mr. Lowry, Roosevelt believed that America’s political culture was rooted not in universal principles about things like liberty and individual rights, but in the specifics of its history, its landscape and the experience of its people — which to Roosevelt meant predominantly Northern Europeans.

That’s one reason Roosevelt, like many of today’s conservative nationalists, endorsed restrictions on immigration. In his 1905 message to Congress, he said: “It will be a great deal better to have fewer immigrants, but all of the right kind, than a great number of immigrants, many of whom are necessarily of the wrong kind.”

... He proposed subsidies for white Americans to have more children and endorsed sterilizing the poor and mentally handicapped ...

Vox Day writes:

Remember, US citizen != American citizen of the USA. The latter is a subset of the former. There are many US citizens who are not Americans and there are also more than a few Americans who are not US citizens. Americans are the genetic descendants of the original People of the United States, for whom the Tranquility, the general Welfare and the Blessings of Liberty are to be secured by the US Constitution.

There is an American ethnic identity, just as this for French, Russian, or Japanese. A white person living in Japan would never describe himself as Japanese. I occasionally hear people describe themselves as ABC = American Born Chinese.

If someone asks for my ethnicity and I say "American", no one seems puzzled at the answer.

Also, people from other parts of North and South America do not call themselves "American". There is no Brazilian states of America, or any other country with America in the name. America means the American nation, governed by the US Constitution.

America was settled by somewhat different ethnic groups from Northwest Europe. But they blended together to form a new American identity. Indians and Africans were separate.

The term "native American" makes the most sense for White Americans born in America to American parents. Indians are not really Americans if they belong to some tribe claiming to be sovreign.