ethnic regimes hae existed in tlic pnstrnbnt have usually begun as, or turned into,rnempires. Republics, b contrast, have requiredrna higher degree of cohesion to allowrnfor effcchve self-rule, hi such politics,rnpeople must command themseKcsrnas an extended commnnitv rather thanrntake orders from an emperor or from publicrnadministrators. While a sophisticatedrnawareness of the distinction may haverneluded WASP elites, they did considerrnthe newcomers as cidturallv and evenrnmoralK’ alien to the American people.rnOnly when the WASP establishment becamernthoroughly decrepit did it movernon, with the help of immigrant populations,rnto espouse present-day “multieulturalism.”rnAn ideolog} described bv Baronernhimself as a prescription for Western suicide,rnit is clearly not the multicidturalismrnhe identifies w ith. But what Barone looksrnback to is more of an ideal than a realitv.rnT hat world is no longer realizable:rnAccelerating multiethnicih, guiltriddenrnor opportimistic politicians, andrndemographic trends ha’C moved us politicallyrnand socially beyond the situationrnthat Barone would like to see prevail.rnContrar- to his stated hope, tiicre is nornevidence that present American elites arernchanging their views about “the basicrngoodness and deccncx of American institutions,”rnif that means traditional attitudesrnregarding lintited gocrnment. It isrnone thing to alue institutions, as blirierrndid the Weimar constitution, as w indowdressingrnfor a sociopolitical revolution. Itrnis another thing entircK’ to appreciaterntiiem as checks upon human appetitesrnand an overreaching central state. Wdi},rnin an case, shordd Central Americanrnimmigrants arriving here legallv or illegalKrn(legal status being presently a distinctionrnwithout a difference) ree|nest, orrnecn accept, an Americanizing education?rnTheir perception of who developedrnthat education is exactiy Barone’s: It wasrnthe work of a prejudiced elite that wernhae (fortunateb ) jettisoned. Besides,rnthe “new Americans” are entering a trid’rnmulticultural socieh- in whieli even Republicanrnpresidents liasten to showerrnquotas and set-asides on “Ilispanics.”rnWh should these beneficiaries of etiiniernfaxors surrender their privileged position,rnparticularlv when the’ hold the electoralrnbalance in major states?rnOther questions arise from readingrnBarone’s brief on behalf of the “newrnAmericans.” (Presenting blacks underrnthis rubric is so ludicrous that it is best tornignore the semantic issue.) Was the prejudicernbesetting American societx’ beforernthe Great Enlightenment in the 6()’srnmosth’ or cntirelv the Eiidt of Anglo-SaxonrnProtestants? Having (like Barone)rngrown up in a Northern industrial cih’ inrnthe 195()”s, I do not recall a single ethnicrnclash or incident of etiinic name-callingrnthat involved a WASP. The first time thatrnI encountered large numbers of Protestantsrnof Northern European extractionrnwas as a student at Yale. Although thesernclassmates had white-bread personalitiesrnand were far less animated than thosernwho attended Bridgeport high schools,rnthe’ were also more ci’il. The same isrntrue of all the WASP populations I havernsojourned among since then.rnBarone has foolfsh things to sa’ in tr-rning to make the “new^ Americans” lookrnlike the older ones. Plis comparison ofrnLatinos and Italian-Americans understatesrndie behavioral differences betweenrnthem. Wliile Italian immigrants and theirrnprogenv did not have children out ofrnwedlock, aoided welfiire like the plague,rnand never treated the United States asrnpart of Italia irredenta, Latinos offer arnvastly different group profile. Baronernwould do well to read the articles of StevernSailer on the prettifieation of Latino immigrantsrnundertaken by pro-immigrationrnadvocates. While he may choose to placernsome of the blame for both tire seamvrnside of Latino barrio life and die currentrnantiwhite Latino nationalism on Americanrnpolitical enablers, that does notrnchange the objective situation: Latinosrnare behaviorallv different from the SontiiernrnItalians who settled in Americanrncities in tiic cadv part of the last century.rnPerhaps diese earlier immigrants wouldrnhave behaved more like present-da Latinosrnhad political elites and WASP presidentsrnslobbered over them a eenturv^ ago.rnBut diat is not the wav’ it happened, andrnthe difference in political climate mustrnbe taken into account in consideringrnAmerica’s abilih’ to absorb Third Woddrnimmigrants.rnBv the end of his text, Barone is fallingrno er himself to prove that “we’ve beenrnhere before.” Indeed, “dicre is no greaterrnbiological difference between the minorihrngroups and odier Americans of todayrnthan there was between the immigrantrngroups and other Americans of a hundredrnyears ago.” The real difference betweenrnthe two eras comes down to this:rn”‘I’liere is far less overt bigotrv and discriminationrnin the early hvenh-first centurvrnthan in the earlv twentieth.” ObvionsK,rnthe noisy, incessant outbursts directedrnby minority spokespeople againstrndie rest of us do not constitute “overt bigotry.”rnFurthermore, it is absurd to declarernthat a socieh’ in which whites arcrnbecoming a minorih’ is racially the samernas it was a hundred vears ago. For all ofrnBarone’s talk about WASPs carrving non-rnCaucasoid blood, tiiere is a telling differencernbetween being an Oklahoman withrna Cherokee grandmother and being arnMexican of iztee descent in California.rnBarone’s empty assertions remind mernof a book, published in 1998 hvLe Monde.rnwhich claimed to contextualize the cataclysmicrnimmigration of North AfricanrnAluslims into France. Although the foreign-rnborn in France, predominantlv non-rnEuropeans, amomited in that year tornabout eight percent of the total population,rnthe author, Philippe Bernard, warnedrnagainst excessive concern. A similar figurerncan be found for the I930’s, whenrnEastern and Central Europeans werernfleeing from the Nazi and Soviet empiresrnand from the lands in between. WhatrnBernard and Le Monde do not remark isrneven more pertinent. The emigres of thern30’s were European and mostly Christian.rnBut Eastern European Jews who fledrnto France and who were mostly on thernpolitical left did suffer from antisemiticrnattitudes. Alore importandy, however,rnnone of these emigres demanded thatrnFrance transform itself into a midtieulturalrnsocietv and discipline fliose Frenchmenrnwho did not show sufficient reverencernfor non-Western minorities. In thern30’s, die French government did not jailrnFrenchmen for publishing imfriendlvrnarticles about immigration or about Muslimrnattitudes toward constitutional government.rnMoreover, violent crime, exceptrnfor die riots unleashed by politicalrnextremists, was not a social problem inrnPrance. By now, flic hanlieues of largernFreneli cities have become grim replicasrnof Bedford-Stv. An insufferably smaniivrnpiece in the New York Post (August 22)rnannounced diat French crime, which isrnup almost ten percent this vear, hasrnsurpassed die American rate. The Po.sfrnblames this fact on French inattentivenessrnto the American way of fightingrncrime: “a combination of betterrnand smarter policing, incarceration, decreasedrnpublic and ofiieial tolerancernof ninsanee crimes and more efficientrncourts.” Would anyone care to suggest inrndiis instance the “somediing that is missing”?rn26/CHRONICLESrnrnrn