Eleven States Ready To Adopt Arizona Immigration Laws

[rs232c]

While America is a nation of immigrants,

This phrase has confused me for years. I had always believed that we were a nation of citizens not of immigrants.

As for myself I am a sixth generation American and my siblings children the seventh. At what point do we become citizens and no longer immigrants?

I can't see it to mean 'America is a nation built by immigrants' because I recall the study that said 83% of our country was built by citizens and 14% non-citizens.

I have a problem understanding that 'America is a nation that was born of immigrants, therefore we have always come from immigrants, and will always be of immigrants', because the same would be true for the Indian population, which I understand still have soverign nations and are all citizens at birth now anyway.

And last it certainly doesn't make any sense to me to be a citizen in a nation of immigrants, that just doesn't seem to mean anything at all. In my understanding it is valid to be a citizen and 'used to be an immigrant' in a nation of citizens, but not both concurrently.

In my pea-sized brain the only thing that does make sense to me is that it is a policitally correct phrase that defines the status of immigrant and the status of citizenship to be one in the same and indistingusihable.

Are they?