Mixed Feelings

My sense every July 4 is that I could get more jazzed up about independence if it were more plausible for Americans to work ourselves up into a fury of anti-British sentiment. In the real world, however, America's two closest allies are the former colonial power and the segments of British North America that didn't join in our rebellion. Ultimately, I think the United States is a pretty awesome country but it very plausibly would have been even awesomer had English and American political leaders in the late 18th century been farsighted enough to find compromises that would have held the empire together.

Nevertheless, we live in the world that is. Happy birthday, America! These lines from the Declaration of Independence still ring out as incredible wisdom hundreds of years later:

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. — That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, — That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness. Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shewn that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security.

Fireworks!

Comments

Ultimately, I think the United States is a pretty awesome country but it very plausibly would have been even awesomer had English and American political leaders in the late 18th century been farsighted enough to find compromises that would have held the empire together.

And just where do you think that the thinkers of the Enlightenment would get their "experiment in democracy" if this happened? France? Do you actually believe that the modern version of parlaimentary democracies in the UK and the commonwealth countries would exist without what happened in the US?

Posted by Walker | July 4, 2008 11:28 AM

We are way awesomer because we kicked their ass!

Have you listened to the Canadian national anthem? It's wussy! Why? Because they signed a treaty! We had a war! And they still aren't free - the Queen's on their money!

{ / jingoistic Fourth of July Fervor... }

Posted by Mark Haverty | July 4, 2008 11:38 AM

While I'm sure that overcooked beef and soggy cabbage have their merits the food alone is reason enough not to have inbred English elites running things over here.

There's no certainty Britain would have even become a parliamentary democracy without the American example.

There's significantly more certainty that there is no more welcoming place of refuge for the oppressed than America regardless of their race, ethnicity, creed, or religion. Britain - with its old class prejudices, and quasi-continental ethnocentricity - has little on us in this regard.

America is a deeply flawed place. It's original sin - slavery - has lingering effects that no black president will be able to undo. It's treatment of native peoples, the poor, criminals has been appalling.

But I still believe - as the cliche goes - it is the last best hope on earth.

Several dozen of my ancestors fought on behalf of independence and at least one of them died. I think it was worth their sacrifices.

Posted by Linus | July 4, 2008 11:43 AM

You must have had a subscription to What if...? comics when you were a kid. You sure do love counterfactuals. Maybe British colonialism would have done for North America what it did for Africa? Maybe the United States in the latter part of the 20th century more like South Africa than Canada. Maybe if the American revolution happens in 1915 instead of 1775 we find ourselves allied with German nationalists in the late 1930s. Maybe in the 25th century Isiah Thomas will be viewed as the best Knicks GM in history.

Assignment desk: Explain the value of counterfactuals and your affection for them.

Posted by joejoejoe | July 4, 2008 11:48 AM

"Ultimately, I think the United States is a pretty awesome country but it very plausibly would have been even awesomer had English and American political leaders in the late 18th century been farsighted enough to find compromises that would have held the empire together."

Um, no, not plausible at all. We'd still be a fucking colony, like DC.

If the colonies and Britain had remained one, the colonies would have become the crazy, infantile Id and Britain would have remained the legalistic, monarchical Ego that it was in the eighteenth century.

By separating, both societies became more balanced: the US was forced to grow up and in process created those most beautiful of documents, the Declaration and the Constitution.

Conversely, Britain was forced to loosen up, and the result was the Romantic movement: Wordsworth, Blake, Shelley, and the rest.

Would you trade those creations for a boring and eternal transatlantic Canadaism? I wouldn't.

Posted by lampwick | July 4, 2008 11:51 AM

Matt, this post reeks of APPEASEMENT.

Posted by Jake | July 4, 2008 11:52 AM

In one post, you've explained why you continue to think your patriotism is questioned. Perhaps because you have a serious deficit in that department...

Posted by James Robertson | July 4, 2008 12:12 PM

No, the US Constitution was definitely several steps forward in the right direction. And the American Revolution was the model for my country (and all of South America) to follow in the subsequent decades. A much better way to make the world "more awesome" would be for the US to return to the ideals of its Founding Fathers.

Happy July 4th!

Posted by Alejandro | July 4, 2008 12:13 PM

I have to agree with Mark. If we had not left the British Empire, we would have the Queen on our money. (Although in profile, she looks not a little like George Washington...)

Posted by Evan | July 4, 2008 12:23 PM

"Ultimately, I think the United States is a pretty awesome country but it very plausibly would have been even awesomer had English and American political leaders in the late 18th century been farsighted enough to find compromises that would have held the empire together."

Um, no, not plausible at all. We'd still be a fucking colony, like DC.

Er no. It would be more like Australia, or New Zealand, or, for that matter, Canada.

Remember that Britain has had a parliament for a lot longer than America has even existed. It wasn't very democratic back in the day (though neither was the US before 1920). But it was getting steadily more democratic, and it's hard to see any radical move to more democracy being caused by the American Revolution.

Moreover, the colonies they did form immediately after 1776 (notably Australia and New Zealand) became independent through natural processes anyway. Again, it's hard to see the American Revolution being causal. (And this is why we care about the counterfactuals; it's really interesting to think about the causal role in world history of things like the American Revolution, and really hard to do so without some counterfactuals.)

All that said, the social setup in the (non-slaveholding) parts of the US post-independence seem freer and fairer (especially for white males) than in the UK at the time, so it was a move for the good. It's had some long-run downside - the trend in Britain was away from having lots of power embodied in one person, and the Americans reversed that - but it made many people freer than they would have been. So hooray for the patriots/traitors (choose one depending on perspective!). But making it central to the history of democracy in the last 250 years is a little much.

Posted by Brian Weatherson | July 4, 2008 12:30 PM

Someone, somewhere, had to set a precedent for kicking the pricks out. Might as well have been us. The real shame is that the rest of British North America didn't join in, thus paving the way for a quicker eradication of slavery and the glories of socialized health insurance.

Anyway, the end result is that while we do live in a country where Dick Cheney has his grubby paws on the levers of power, we also live in a country where you can shove a roman candle up the ass of a Dick Cheney effigy to entertain small children at a barbecue. And this makes me feel very patriotic indeed. Sic semper tyrannis!

Posted by LaFollette Progressive | July 4, 2008 12:39 PM

If the revolution didn't happen when it did, might it have occurred a generation or two later, when Britain began outlawing slavery? I could see that happening, with the south winning and forming its own country on the basis of slavery. Things could have been much worse.

Posted by the grass is always greener | July 4, 2008 12:52 PM

Without the enormous debt caused by paying for your revolution, I'd still have a head and Mlle Coppola wouldn't be making preposterous movies about my wife. Sacredieu, vive la Brittania!

@ LaFollette Progressive: where might one obtain such effigies?

Posted by Louis XVI | July 4, 2008 1:03 PM

. Again, it's hard to see the American Revolution being causal.

ol' wikipedia says the Australian colony was founded because Britain couldn't dump it's convicts in North America anymore. Or did you mean casual to their eventual independence? That I agree, the events of 1776 had little (but some) bearing on the eventual path to 'independence' of aus, can, etc.

Posted by Kolohe | July 4, 2008 1:26 PM

Anglophile.

Fuck those pricks. The butchers bill is long and bloody. Ireland, Scotland, India, South Africa, Kenya and pretty much everywhere else on the planet. Read John Dolan's review of Imperial Reckoning.

Posted by Hustler | July 4, 2008 2:11 PM

Matt Yglesias really is dirt-stupid when it comes to the Revolution, which would be OK if he didn't insist on talking about it. You know what? The Queen IS on Canadian money. The Queen. A hereditary monarch. Canada didn't become fully independent until 1982, by the way. Nineteen fucking eighty two, or, if you prefer, two hundred and six years after we did.

I hope the face of liberalism in 2008 isn't one that speaks for colonialism and monarchy, as Matt Yglesias likes to. Thomas Paine would kick his ass.

Posted by Vidor | July 4, 2008 2:24 PM

it very plausibly would have been even awesomer had English and American political leaders in the late 18th century been farsighted enough to find compromises that would have held the empire together.

No, it would have been even awesomer, as you allude to above, if Britain was still a rival/enemy/threat, and July 4th could be about waving our flags and screaming, "I your FACE, England! You want a piece of me?"

Posted by Tyro | July 4, 2008 2:36 PM

There are two sets of remarkable triplets in our core documents:

"life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness"

"government of the people, by the people and for the people"

Do they remain our guiding principles?

Posted by cube | July 4, 2008 2:38 PM

It would be nice to have some of the features of the English/British constitution. I think it would be fabulous if a President could be brought down with a vote of no confidence. Totally great to see a President have to go back to his home district and get reelected in his congressional district before he could represent his party in a national election. The Presidency has a major flaw in that one man is both head of state and chief executive. The founders thought they had created such a weak, ineffectual presidency that his principle duties would be digging cornerstones, cutting ribbons and hosting T-Ball tournaments. They never dreamed of maniacs like Nixon or GWBush.

Still, it was because we fought together for our liberty that we became one nation. Remember that to the Crown we were not Americans--we were colonists of 13 separate colonies. They would have had an interest in keeping us isolated, small, dependent.

Mr Alejandro, thank you for the kind words. There are many of us share your desire that we would begin restoring our nation to the original values.

Posted by JohnMcC | July 4, 2008 4:16 PM

Yeah, the differences leading up to American independence do seem like differences that cooler heads might have been able to resolve. Of course we don't know if the world would have been better places if that happened. Too many butterflies.

All things being equal (which they never are) I think that for America would have been better off without the South. Without all that baggage, the US could have been bigger, warmer, and more important version of Canada.

Posted by Danny | July 4, 2008 4:55 PM

Re: There's no certainty Britain would have even become a parliamentary democracy without the American example.

Britain was already well on the way to becoming a parliamentary democracy by 1776. See: English Civil War and Glorious Revolution of 1688. And history would have played out pretty much the same in Britain: George III would still have gone bonkers, his sons George IV and William IV would have been just as stupid and decadent, nor would Victoria, competent, intelligent, but absorbed mostly in her family life, have been any different as a monarch.

Re: Conversely, Britain was forced to loosen up, and the result was the Romantic movement: Wordsworth, Blake, Shelley, and the rest.

Um, the Romantic Movement was born in late 18th Germany, and transmitted to the rest of Europe by the writings of Napoleon's domestic arch-nemesis, Mme de Stael.

Posted by JonF | July 4, 2008 4:58 PM

Follette,

Someone, somewhere, had to set a precedent for kicking the pricks out. Might as well have been us. The real shame is that the rest of British North America didn't join in, thus paving the way for a quicker eradication of slavery and the glories of socialized health insurance.

Er, "the pricks" abolished slavery thirty years before the United States did. And they didn't have to fight a bloody civil war to make that happen. And they've had "socialized health insurance" for over fifty years. You seem to be arguing that "the pricks" should have remained in power, not that they should have been kicked out.

Posted by Mixner | July 4, 2008 5:08 PM

I seem to remember Matt getting really defensive when Jonah Goldberg used a similar moronic post on the same topic against him. Matt retorted that it was "tongue in cheek". Well titling your post about July 4th "Mixed Feelings" doesn't seem very tongue in cheek to me. Only a liberal would come up with elaborate theories about how it would be so much better if we were ruled by another country from thousands of miles away.

Posted by Brad | July 4, 2008 5:18 PM

Ya know, Vidor, the Canadians may have not become _officially_ indpendent till the 1980's, but they were so by all intents and purposes by WWI. If the UK said frog, the Canadians were pretty free to jump or not jump as they saw fit, and after the sacrifices of WWI, they were increasingly unwilling to do so.

Given simple demographics, the American colonies becoming essentially independent from the UK was pretty inevitable, short of the imperial capital being moved to Knoxville, Tennessee. (I wonder if anyone has ever written a story where the UK revolts against the oppressive political dominance of the Americans?)

And Matt, a United Anglosphere probably would not have been so awsome to the Indians, Africans, etc. upon whose necks our boots would most likely still be firmly planted if the resources of a United North America had been available to prop up the Imperial project.

Posted by Bruce | July 4, 2008 5:40 PM

Ya know, Vidor, the Canadians may have not become _officially_ indpendent till the 1980's, but they were so by all intents and purposes by WWI. If the UK said frog, the Canadians were pretty free to jump or not jump as they saw fit, and after the sacrifices of WWI, they were increasingly unwilling to do so.

Given simple demographics, the American colonies becoming essentially independent from the UK was pretty inevitable, short of the imperial capital being moved to Knoxville, Tennessee. (I wonder if anyone has ever written a story where the UK revolts against the oppressive political dominance of the Americans?)

And Matt, a United Anglosphere probably would not have been so awsome to the Indians, Africans, etc. upon whose necks our boots would most likely still be firmly planted if the resources of a United North America had been available to prop up the Imperial project.

Posted by Bruce | July 4, 2008 5:42 PM

It is a myth -- propagated by the Liberal Party of Canada -- that we were not independent until 1982. Our Supreme Court has noted that the exact moment of independence is difficult to locate, but ocurred sometime between Canada's independent signature to the Treaty of Versailles (1919) and the Statute of Westminster (1931). Of coruse, long before 1919, British North Americans controlled their own domestic affairs, and being "subject" to the Empire's foreign policy came with the great advantage of the promise of defence against Yankee expansionism.

Posted by Pithlord | July 4, 2008 6:02 PM

It is not a "myth" at all. Canada did not become fully independent from England until 1982.

Interesting that the poster above mentioned WW1. Because historians might wonder if it was worth it for the English to go to war over Belgium, but we do know that Canada had precisely fuck-all at stake.

And surely it doesn't need to be said that a person who can't tell when a country became independent (1919? 1931? Dunno) is on pretty shaky ground.

As for Yglesias, he should say whether he's a monarchist and imperialist.

Posted by Vidor | July 4, 2008 6:43 PM

It is not a "myth" at all. Canada did not become fully independent from England until 1982.

Interesting that the poster above mentioned WW1. Because historians might wonder if it was worth it for the English to go to war over Belgium, but we do know that Canada had precisely fuck-all at stake.

And surely it doesn't need to be said that a person who can't tell when a country became independent (1919? 1931? Dunno) is on pretty shaky ground.

As for Yglesias, he should say whether he's a monarchist and imperialist.

Posted by Vidor | July 4, 2008 6:44 PM

It is not a "myth" at all. Canada did not become fully independent from England until 1982.

Interesting that the poster above mentioned WW1. Because historians might wonder if it was worth it for the English to go to war over Belgium, but we do know that Canada had precisely fuck-all at stake.

And surely it doesn't need to be said that a person who can't tell when a country became independent (1919? 1931? Dunno) is on pretty shaky ground.

As for Yglesias, he should say whether he's a monarchist and imperialist.

Posted by Vidor | July 4, 2008 6:45 PM

It is not a "myth" at all. Canada did not become fully independent from England until 1982.

Interesting that the poster above mentioned WW1. Because historians might wonder if it was worth it for the English to go to war over Belgium, but we do know that Canada had precisely fuck-all at stake.

And surely it doesn't need to be said that a person who can't tell when a country became independent (1919? 1931? Dunno) is on pretty shaky ground.

As for Yglesias, he should say whether he's a monarchist and imperialist.

Posted by Vidor | July 4, 2008 6:46 PM

Simon Schama talks about Britain's choice of the 'wrong empire', since there was obviously a constituency in London supportive of some kind of American self-rule. (Niall Ferguson's collection Virtual History also talks about it as a counterfactual, though Ferguson has a very different attitude towards imperialism.)

I had a nice discussion with a NPS ranger at the Liberty Bell a few years ago about this, while waiting to visit Independence Hall. Ultimately, I think any compromise would have been unsustainable, for a huge variety of political and economic reasons, not least that a fully-colonial North America would have remained up for grabs as far as the European great powers were concerned. Independence reconfigured

Our Supreme Court has noted that the exact moment of independence is difficult to locate, but ocurred sometime between Canada's independent signature to the Treaty of Versailles (1919) and the Statute of Westminster (1931).

And the Australian High Court ruled in similar terms when determining that Australians who retain British citizenship are ineligible to stand for parliament.

Posted by pseudonymous in nc | July 4, 2008 8:40 PM

Finishing my thought: Independence reconfigured power relations on the continent by adding a new player and forcing the existing colonial powers to work with, against or around it. Whatever happens to France between 1774 and 1800 absent American independence, it's hard to imagine the Louisiana Purchase.

Posted by pseudonymous in nc | July 4, 2008 8:46 PM

It would have been totally awesome had the US and Britain still been bound together. Especially where the two big beneficiaries of slavery, the slave owners and the English textile industry, would have been able to join forces in parliament and preserve slavery for longer. We could also have enjoyed being drawn into more, perhaps innumerable, stupid wars over who got to rule Silesia.

Posted by Fin Fang Foom | July 4, 2008 8:53 PM

Sure, Matt would rather skip over our founding documents, piss all over The Rights of Man, betray our early revolutionaries like Ben Franklin and John Hancock, and never bother with the Bill of Rights. Sure, he'd rather our people were ruled by a hereditary monarch in London, thousands of miles away, than by our own elected representatives. And sure, he'd rather skip over this whole pesky notion of natural rights granted by God to individuals, independently of Government's recognition of these natural rights. And sure, he's on record hoping that an Obama administration will promply abuse these rights.

But don't you dare question his patriotism!

Posted by Jason Van Steenwyk | July 4, 2008 9:31 PM

Alas, we've always had such people with us:

If you love wealth more than liberty, the tranquility of servitude better than the animating contest of freedom, depart from us in peace. We ask not your counsel nor your arms. Crouch down and lick the hand that feeds you. May your chains rest lightly upon you and may posterity forget that you were our countrymen.

--Samuel Adams

Geez, Matt. Have you NEVER read The Rights of Man or the Declaration?

Posted by Jason Van Steenwyk | July 4, 2008 9:41 PM

Brian Weatherson at 12:30 made all my points, except for one. His central point, that American and British democracy developed contemporaneously, is true and important. We abolished property qualifications for voting in the 1830s and '40s, the British had their first reform law around then. We extended the vote to women in 1920, they did in 1919.

The one big difference that would not have happened without the American Revolution is the First Amendment's guarantee of freedom of speech and of separation of church and state. England still has an established religion, even if it's atrophied.

Oh, and would the French Revolution have happened without the American one? And was that a good or a bad thing?

Posted by Hal | July 4, 2008 11:08 PM

Just because you say something four times, Vidor, does not make it true.

Canada signed the Versailles Treaty independently. It and the other dominions were given full sovereignty in the 1931 Statute of Westminster. Canada did not enter into war with Germany in 1939 until one week after Britain, and it certainly declared war for its own internal political reasons. Ireland, which at the time had the same dominion status as Canada under the British Crown, remained neutral throughout the war.

In 1931, Canada chose for its own reasons to leave amendment of the constitution with the British Parliament. That's just because the provinces and the federal government could not agree on an amending formula.

The case where the Supreme Court says we were in a state of quantum sovereign indeterminacy between 1919 and 1931 is the1967 Offshore Mineral Rights case.

Americans are hardly well placed to make fun of hereditary monarchy after 8 years of Bush the lesser. In fact, a constitutional monarchy is a great institution, and George III was a fine exemplar of it. Your Revolution turned out much better than most because Washington and Hamilton were sensible fellows, but it was a bit of a close run thing with Jacobins like Paine and Jefferson running around.

Posted by Pithlord | July 5, 2008 1:02 AM

I'm fairly good at working myself up into an anti-British lather. They screwed up the Middle East. The can't cook. They still have leaders whom they bow to. The British press thought the Gettysburg Address was so stupid that they suggested Lincoln was an idiot or he deliberately phoned it in. Tony Blair is proud of the British empire. Some guy in the Guardian, rightly praising Dreams of my Father, recently said Obama would be the best writer ever to be president (as if Lincoln and Jefferson were quasi-literate beaver trappers). Oh, and the Lexington column in the Economist is tripe.

"Your Revolution turned out much better than most because Washington and Hamilton were sensible fellows, but it was a bit of a close run thing with Jacobins like Paine and Jefferson running around."

The reasons it was better are actually that our Robespierre wasn't actually a Robespierre but became a decent two-term president, and that our Napoleon was killed in a duel.

Posted by Colatina | July 5, 2008 2:45 AM

I would be prouder of my country while watching fireworks if my country hadn't been part of the last 600 years of annihilation of indigenous north and south american peoples.

Posted by brenna | July 5, 2008 12:39 PM

Colatina works him/herself into a lather against the British by focusing on the trivial or by faulting Anglos for doing what everyone else has also done.

Is cooking more important than representative institutions, free speech, the market economy, the discoveries of Newton and Darwin, the common law, organized sport and English literature? To say so is to privilege the stomach over everything else.

The Middle East was already screwed up. People are entitled to varying opinions of the Gettysburg Address. Some guy in the Guardian saying something foolish is small beer, indeed. I have to agree with you about "Lexington", though.

But what you really miss is the significance of a deferential system of status separated (at least in principle) from power and wealth.

I also agree that Jefferson-as-President wasn't as bad as one would have expected from his writings. The Good Lord looks after drunks, children and the United States of America.

Posted by Pithlord | July 5, 2008 1:12 PM

Re: Canada did not become fully independent from England until 1982.

The US was not legally independent of Britain until the treaty of Paris in 1783 -- and British troops still garrisoned some places, like Detroit, until well into the 1790s. Yet we still celebrate 1776 as the year of our country's birth as a sovereign nation.

Re: Whatever happens to France between 1774 and 1800 absent American independence, it's hard to imagine the Louisiana Purchase.

But easy to imagine Britain itself taking over New Orleans and thereby all of Louisiana territory during the Napoleonic wars. France in fact had been stripped of these territories back in 1763, and they had been awarded to Spain-- but Napoleon compelled the Spanish to return them in 1802 when he was planning to launch a renewed French imperial project in North America. Britain would not have permitted that project to stand. Louisiana (along with Florida, which Britain had owned since 1763) would have eventually been part of whatever nation emerged from British North America.

Re: We could also have enjoyed being drawn into more, perhaps innumerable, stupid wars over who got to rule Silesia.

We were drawn into the Napoleonic Wars-- that's what the War of 1812 resulted from. But after 1815 a general peace reigned in Europe for almost a century.

Re: Oh, and would the French Revolution have happened without the American one?

In some form, yes. Louis XVI would have been no more competent, and France's finances no more sound. The day of reckoning may have been put off a couple of years without the draining of the French treasury that the American Revolution produced, but sooner or later the French government was going to implode.

Posted by JonF | July 5, 2008 3:30 PM

Nevertheless, we live in the world that is. Happy birthday, America!

You are truly disgusting.

Posted by RJ | July 5, 2008 6:29 PM

"Matt Yglesias really is dirt-stupid"

You had me at that.

Posted by Mister Snitch! | July 5, 2008 7:03 PM

No United States?

Hmmmmm......that means:

No Hostess Twinkies.

No NASCAR.

No Budweiser.

No jazz.

No gay marriage.

No pizza.

No Coca-Cola.

No illegal immigrants.

No reality TV (hell, probably no TV either)

Few blacks in North America...because most have already been voluntarily or forcibly repatriated back to Africa.

Lots of imported Indian labor.

John Lennon = merchant seaman

George Harrison = Liverpool bus driver

Richard Starkey = ladies hairdresser

James "Paul" McCartney = music-hall entertainer

And Sir Michael "Mick" Jagger (K.B.E.) works in the City of London as an internationally respected accountant and prominent figure in Whig Party circles. Sir Michael will retire to the country, with his beloved and only wife of 40 years, upon his 65th birthday at the end of this month.

**************

God, I'm REALLY glad we fought, and won, the Revolutionary War, aren't you?

Posted by MarkJ | July 5, 2008 7:21 PM

Jeez, Matt, did you get infected with some kind of July 4th dumbassness?

Posted by Brian | July 5, 2008 7:30 PM

Franklin, in the early 1770's actually did envision what we might now call the Commonwealth. However, such a solution was opposed both in the UK and by the colonies. In truth, the Revolution was necessary for the US, something Franklin recognized as well. He had been an ardent anglophile, but turned his back on the old country (and his son, who sided with the crown).

Posted by Pierre de Fermat | July 5, 2008 8:48 PM

Re: Development of parliamentary democracy in Britain:

What Hal and Brian Weatherson neglect is the extent to which the American experiment was used in the arguments over expanding suffrage in Britain. Many American states, particularly in the North, had substantial suffrage (a large majority of adult males) well before Britain did. Those favoring broader suffrage in Britain constantly pointed to the American system, and the fact that it was already working in America was a key to their success in expanding suffrage.

The broader point is that it was almost universally believed in Europe before the American Revolution that a republican form of government was not feasible for any sizable nation. It took the success of the American example to convince people otherwise.

Posted by Curt | July 5, 2008 9:15 PM

I'm sorry, but "We could have been like Canada" is supposed to be an argument AGAINST the revolution? Hmmm, repeat after me -- "Massachusetts Civil Rights Commission."

I'll keep the First Amendment, thank you very much.

Posted by GMS | July 5, 2008 9:27 PM

Yglesias, what the hell is wrong with you?

Posted by Mitchell | July 5, 2008 10:21 PM

Re: Few blacks in North America...because most have already been voluntarily or forcibly repatriated back to Africa.

Huh? Where did that happen in the British Empire?
I advise a visit to Jamaica or Guyana to behold contrary evidence.

Re: The broader point is that it was almost universally believed in Europe before the American Revolution that a republican form of government was not feasible for any sizable nation.

The Netherlands was a republic up until the Congress of Vienna turned it into a monarchy. And while the country may seem small today, it was one of Europe's principle commercial and imperial powers in the 1700s.

Posted by JonF | July 5, 2008 11:07 PM

This is one of the dumbest things I have read in some time. Do liberals just keep getting stupider?

Posted by JB | July 6, 2008 12:13 AM

Yes indeedy. If only we'd learned how to suck English cock. Then we could have a disarmed populace, CCTVs at every corner, a constabulary more interested in harassing the public than in solving crime, "Allah uh Akbar!!!!!" on every corner, and Pakistanis from Yorkshire detonating themselves in the New York subway.

Oh, and I doubt there's be a Jew alive anywhere in the world today.

You are waaaaaay too stupid by half.

Well, there you go. Intellectuals. Thank God they get the short shrift they deserve, here in America, rather than going on to execute tens of millions, like they do in Europe.

Posted by Malaclypse the Unfortunate | July 6, 2008 12:14 AM

JohnMcC:

"It would be nice to have some of the features of the English/British constitution."

LOL! What constitution?

Anyone who would like July 4th a lot better if we could still hate the Brits, and thinks the U.S. would have been better off sans divorce, is suffering from a terminal case of illogical superficiality. I can't comment on what Yglesias might be smoking, but his posts are certainly substance free.

Posted by JM Hanes | July 6, 2008 12:31 AM

WHo the hell can say how it would have turned out? Far too many things would have happened differently, with cascading effects. It would be a way too different univserse. No French revolution, at last not at that point in history. No Napoleon as Emperor; he might have been a minor artillery general in the French royal army.

After the cotton gin was invented, rich Southern slaveowners would have been able to buy titles and seats in the House of Lords, and abolition of the slave trade would have been substantially delayed. West Indian slaveowners would have been able to sell their slaves on the mainland after the sugar market collapsed following the invention of beet sugar -- they would have had less motivation to go along with the bail-out that emancipated compensation really was. Perhaps there would have been an Empire-wide Civil War, with Lancashire textile workers volunteering for anti-slavery regiments.

The best part would have been that a united Anglo-America would have been way too strong to permit the First World War or its equivalent from breaking out, or going on too long if it did. Avoiding WWI, the Soviet coup, the rise of fascism, WWII, the Holocaust, and the Cold War might have been worth whatever downsides there were. We could always have out fieworks on November 5th.

Posted by Jim Bennett | July 6, 2008 12:55 AM

Who the hell can say how it would have turned out? Far too many things would have happened differently, with cascading effects. It would be a way too different univserse. No French revolution, at last not at that point in history. No Napoleon as Emperor; he might have been a minor artillery general in the French royal army.

After the cotton gin was invented, rich Southern slaveowners would have been able to buy titles and seats in the House of Lords, and abolition of the slave trade would have been substantially delayed. West Indian slaveowners would have been able to sell their slaves on the mainland after the sugar market collapsed following the invention of beet sugar -- they would have had less motivation to go along with the bail-out that emancipated compensation really was. Perhaps there would have been an Empire-wide Civil War, with Lancashire textile workers volunteering for anti-slavery regiments.

The best part would have been that a united Anglo-America would have been way too strong to permit the First World War or its equivalent from breaking out, or going on too long if it did. Avoiding WWI, the Soviet coup, the rise of fascism, WWII, the Holocaust, and the Cold War might have been worth whatever downsides there were. We could always have out fireworks on November 5th.

Posted by Jim Bennett | July 6, 2008 12:56 AM

"It's SHITE being Scottish! We're the lowest of the low. The scum of the fucking Earth! The most wretched, miserable, servile, pathetic trash that was ever shat into civilization. Some hate the English. I don't. They're just wankers. We, on the other hand, are COLONIZED by wankers. Can't even find a decent culture to be colonized BY. We're ruled by effete assholes. It's a SHITE state of affairs to be in, Tommy, and ALL the fresh air in the world won't make any fucking difference! "

Posted by Ian McGregor | July 6, 2008 3:00 AM

I think it would be even awesomer if the phrase "even awesomer" had never appeared in the pages, actual or digital, of The Atlantic Monthly.

Posted by Mike G | July 6, 2008 10:30 AM

Curt at 9:15 pm, July 5: You make a strong point. That the American example of a working, stable democracy made it easier to argue for democracy in Britain had not occurred to me. I am still not entirely convinced that Britain wouldn't have achieved universal suffrage without an American example, or that there would have been no American example in an English-speaking commonwealth where the American states/colonies/provinces had a large degree of local home rule. I would need to be more steeped in British 19th century history to know.

Posted by Hal | July 6, 2008 9:53 PM

"compromises that held the empire together" is a line which makes me laugh.

What was the result of the second war of independence if it wasn't a three-way compromise to screw the French?

Isn't screwing the French by evolving the 'empire' into an open alliance against tyrrany more important that holding to the imperial doctrine of caring who has the biggest schlong?

At least this way we can bicker with each other without having to pretend to understand what those nancy frogs are saying!

Posted by thomas | July 12, 2008 1:31 PM

Speaking as an Englishman... when are you Americans gonna wake up? Your government's wiping its arse on the Constitution and crossing off the Amendments one by one. I take no pleasure in saying this, but THE BRITISH EMPIRE TOOK YOU BACK IN 1913!

All the founding fathers are spinning in their graves. You gotta do what Andrew Jackson did - KILL THE BANK. The 'special relationship' is a myth. The British establishment used it to get you to fight their wars.

Posted by Trooper Thompson | July 12, 2008 11:15 PM

Speaking as an Englishman... when are you Americans gonna wake up? Your government's wiping its arse on the Constitution and crossing off the Amendments one by one. I take no pleasure in saying this, but THE BRITISH EMPIRE TOOK YOU BACK IN 1913!

All the founding fathers are spinning in their graves. You gotta do what Andrew Jackson did - KILL THE BANK. The 'special relationship' is a myth. The British establishment used it to get you to fight their wars.

Posted by Trooper Thompson | July 12, 2008 11:17 PM