America thinks of itself as a diverse society -- a "gorgeous mosaic," in the words of New York City Mayor David Dinkins; a quilt of many ethnic and racial patches, in a favorite metaphor of the Rev. Jesse Jackson's. But the figures of the 1990 census, only now crunched, suggest that the demographic surface of life in the U.S. is a lot smoother than one thinks. So is the cultural surface, unless the politicians ruffle it.
Fifty-eight million Americans, out of a total population of 248 million, claim German ancestry. In second place are 38 million who say they are wholly...
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