Thanks for posting this. I didn't even think about it, but if you combined the African-American and "American" ancestry regions into one, it would overlap almost exactly with the low-development region in the Southeast, much more than even the borders of the Confederacy.

Those folks identifying only as "Americans" are in fact Scots-Irish, the so-called "invisible ethnicity." Part of their identity actually involves not identifying as anything other than simply "American," but they have a rich history all their own. If anyone enjoys whiskey and bluegrass, they should read up on the Scots-Irish. They are the "white trash," "rednecks" and "crackers" who were too poor to own slaves, but who served as cannon fodder for the wealthy plantation aristocracy.

The theory goes that the powers that be in the South actively encourage racism because if those two groups, the African-Americans and the rednecks, ever got together, they'd overthrow their masters.