The funniest story on this comes from the end of the Civil War, when a leftist 48er officer from Germany started haranguing a Confederate officer descended from Founding stock and son of President Zachary Taylor, about "American values". Here's how Gen. Taylor described it:
"There was, as ever, a skeleton at the feast, in the person of a general officer who had recently left Germany to become a citizen and soldier of the United States. This person, with the strong accent and idioms of the Fatherland, comforted me by assurances that we of the South would speedily recognize our ignorance and errors [โฆ] and rejoice in the results of the war. [โฆ] I apologized meekly for my ignorance, on the ground that my ancestors had come from England to Virginia in 1608, and, in the short intervening period of two hundred and fifty-odd years, had found no time to transmit to me correct ideas of the duties of American citizenship. Moreover, my grandfather, commanding the 9th Virginia regiment in our Revolutionary army, had assisted in the defeat and capture of the Hessian mercenaries at Trenton, and I lamented that he had not, by association with these worthies, enlightened his understanding. My friend smiled blandly, and assured me of his willingness to instruct me."
>When a foreigner starts talking about โOur Constitutionโ and what โWeโ believe