The united states Absolutely is Not a Nation of Immigrants

[NOTES: The text and image below is a post from my Facebook archive, posted seven years ago today, July 24, 2019. For a longer piece with my research and musings on this matter, read, listen to, or watch this piece, originally peer-reviewed, edited, and published in truthout.org on August 27, 2019.]

The US absolutely is NOT a nation of immigrants. This is a terrible colonial take (pun intended) that must be laid to rest.
​
The Naturalization Act of 1790 was the first federal law dealing with national citizenship. The law states that the only “alien” who could apply for naturalization is a “free white person” who has been on this stolen land for at least two years. These were settler-colonialists, not “immigrants.” This law intentionally excluded Black/Indigenous peoples, enslaved peoples, women, indentured folks and others who those in positions of power deemed unfit. This and other laws helped to normalize, formalize and legalize the violent settler-colonial project that is the “United States.”

The erasure of this and other truths are, in large part, why the US continues to enact violence against indigenous/displaced Black & Brown peoples from around the globe. The “innocent explorer-discoverer, manifest destiny” narrative is incompatible with what actually transpired. Complete with “patriotic” songs (e.g. “this land is your land, this land is my land”), pledges, and poems, Americans have done their damndest to avoid confronting these truths. When we conceal genocides & colonialism, and refuse to reckon with our past, that past continues to form and inform our present and future. This is at least in part how we end up with “good citizens” co-signing and participating in continued, unjustified violence in 2019 in the name of a hollow and f[l]ailing nationalism that we’d all do better to release.

In any case, this blood soaked land has never belonged to those who claim legal title to it.*

And that, friends, is the story of this nation’s capture. I suppose with such a faulty foundation, continued crumbling should be expected.

All said, please just remember: Folks indigenous to the “Americas” and enslaved folks indigenous to the African continent did not immigrate here, and settlers are not [im]migrants.

Also remember: before colonization, borders as we know them did not exist and the land/environment was cared for collectively and the land/environment took care of its stewards in return.

People moved.
People lived.
People loved.
Freely.

Image Description: Image of a page from the 1790 US Code book that reads as follows: Acts of the first Congress of the United States, passed at the second session, which was begun and held at the city of New York on Monday, the fourth day of January, 1790, and ended on the 12th day of August, 1790. George Washington, Pres., John Adams, vice president of the United States, and president of the Senate, Fredericke Augustus Muhlenberg, Speaker of the House of Representatives. Section 1. Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States of America in Congress assembled, That any alien, being a free white person, who shall have resided within the limits and under the jurisdiction of the United States for the term of two years, may be admitted to become a citizen thereof, on application to any comm… ​ [image stops here but the text from the full section continues below] Image Description: United States Congress, “An act to establish an uniform Rule of Naturalization” (March 26, 1790). any common law Court of record in any one of the States wherein he shall have resided for the term of one year at least, and making proof to the satisfaction of such Court that he is a person of good character, and taking the oath or affirmation prescribed by law to support the Constitution of the United States, which Oath or Affirmation such Court shall administer, and the Clerk of such Court shall record such Application, and the proceedings thereon; and thereupon such person shall be considered as a Citizen of the United States. And the children of such person so naturalized, dwelling within the United States, being under the age of twenty one years at the time of such naturalization, shall also be considered as citizens of the United States. And the children of citizens of the United States that may be born beyond Sea, or out of the limits of the United States, shall be considered as natural born Citizens: Provided, that the right of citizenship shall not descend to persons whose fathers have never been resident in the United States: Provided also, that no person heretofore proscribed by any States, shall be admitted a citizen as aforesaid, except by an Act of the Legislature of the State in which such person was proscribed.