July 4, AD2025, 249 Years and We Are Not Done; But Global Trade Networks Will Not Wait Forever
Dear Reader,
Happy Independence Day!
I spent last week in Normandy and Paris, mostly Normandy. Having returned home to Virginia (where America began), I am appreciative of the diversity of our country. I mean real diversity: America is continent-wide and contains everything from the deserts of New Mexico and Arizona to the tropics of Hawaii and the arctic zone of Alaska, with the other 46 states and commonwealths doing their part. Happy Birthday, America. We have so much here at home.
But I also think of Canada Day, July 1, and of our brethren to the north. I think of how, before the British Parliament made its mad grab for power, the term “American” included the Anglo-Canadians from Nova Scotia to Ontario. Nova Scotia especially had significant immigration from the New England colonies between 1763 and 1776.
Most Americans have never heard of the Refugee Tract of land granted to Anglo-Canadians—many from Nova Scotia—who sided with the 13 Colonies in their constitutional dispute with Parliament. The Refugee Tract was a 103,000-acre strip of land in central Ohio granted by the United States government to Canadian refugees who had supported the American Revolution. These individuals, unable to return home due to British persecution, were rewarded with land for their support and sacrifices, sacrifices for America. Established by Congress, the tract stretched across parts of present-day Franklin, Licking, Fairfield, and Perry counties, serving as compensation and boosting the development of Ohio. Before the Revolution, Anglo-Canadians were not foreigners; they were the most northern members of British America. Some considered Nova Scotia the 14th colony. I look forward to better days of brotherhood with the Canadians. These temporary difficulties will pass, and our common North American future will resume. We cannot remove ourselves from the Canadians, nor they from us, we are bound together on the continent and we will prosper together, or not.
As an undergraduate, I minored in modern Hebrew, and as a doctoral student, I took Goethe-Institut classes in modern German. But after going to Normandy and seeing the bust of Gilbert du Motier, Marquis de Lafayette, in the French Museum of the Army, I am going to start learning French. I might as well embrace my renewed love of our cousins in Quebec and our first allies in the Fifth Republic of France.
But back to the news regarding Independence Day. Note: I never say “Happy Fourth!” just like I never say “Happy Presidents Day.” There is George Washington’s Birthday and Independence Day. These distinctions are important. I will write about the Supreme Court’s corrections and missteps in their most recent decisions later, and I will respond to the so-called Big Beautiful Bill next week as well.
This week I want to remind my countrymen and our neighbors to the north that we are not so new anymore; we are not a young country. Virginia has a continuous governmental history of over 400 years, the oldest form of European style representative government in the Western Hemisphere. You’re welcome.
The United States hits 250 next year. The reality is as such: we are now an older country among the nations of the earth. After the Vatican, Britain, Denmark, and Sweden, the United States is the fifth-oldest major country in the world in terms of government continuity. All the others suffered revolutions or colonization of one form or another after 1776. Eastern Europe was remade completely after 1939 and the German invasion of Poland that started World War II in Europe. The rest of the world was colonized and gained independence after the USA. Western Europe was revolutionized by the French after 1789.
While the USA has had one republic, with modifications since 1788, our friends the French have had five republics, two royal monarchies, and two empires—and that is if you count the period from 1792 to 1804 as one republic, which is a stretch the French embrace. What that means is that more maturity is called for in America. More appreciation for continuity and less immature seeking after novelty. American was made great and strong by consistency, not by puffery and bombast.
Less wishcasting, more doing. Democracy requires maturity about our status and the nature of power. Happy Independence Day America, we have another 250 years to look forward to, but that will require seriousness and hearts of steel.
American leadership of the world was always based on the consent of the led. The Europeans consented to being led by the victor of the two world wars because of our magnanimity. Without it they will withdraw and assert themselves. This is already happening with the German led effort to replace the World Trade Organization. The World Trade Organization (WTO) is an international body established in 1995 to promote and regulate global trade through a system of rules agreed upon by its member countries. The United States is a founding member and has played a central role in shaping the WTO’s framework. While the U.S. has benefited from the WTO’s rules-based system, it has also expressed significant criticisms, particularly regarding the organization’s handling of trade disputes, its inability to effectively address unfair trade practices by countries like China, and its slow pace. In recent years, the U.S. has blocked appointments to the WTO’s Appellate Body, effectively paralyzing its ability to resolve appeals in trade disputes. This petulance has consequences.
Well, the anti-realists running the United States have now provoked a European military buildup, which will inevitably give the Europeans strategic independence from America; and the Germans, the wealthiest Europeans, are now pushing for a WTO alternative without the United States. European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen and German Chancellor Friedrich Merz have proposed creating an alternative to the WTO, citing the WTO’s dysfunction, particularly its stalled dispute resolution system due to U.S. obstruction. The proposal includes forming a new trade alliance with like-minded countries, potentially through deeper cooperation with members of the Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership (CPTPP). The goal is to promote fair, rules-based trade while excluding protectionist or non-transparent actors like the U.S. and China unless they adopt reforms. While the EU insists this initiative is meant to complement and reform the WTO, critics warn against creating fragmented global trade blocs. The US invented the rules-based order, got the world used to it, and then decided to call it quits under the mistaken impression that the world could not continue without US. Not good.
But the US provoked this during the first Trump Administration by blocking WTO appointments. You see, the Multi-Party Interim Appeal Arbitration Arrangement (MPIA) is a temporary system created by a group of World Trade Organization (WTO) members to keep trade dispute appeals functioning after the WTO’s Appellate Body became paralyzed in 2019 due to the U.S. blocking new appointments. Launched in 2020, the MPIA allows participating countries to resolve trade disputes through an arbitration process that mirrors the WTO’s formal appeal mechanism. It is voluntary and only applies to disputes between the 57 countries that have joined, including the European Union, the UK, and Canada. While not a permanent solution, the MPIA helps maintain a rules-based dispute system among like-minded nations until broader WTO reforms can be achieved. Here’s the thing that the media will not tell you, these countries represent 57% of global trade, and the Germans are basically saying “what if we exclude the USA and China and have a coalition of the medium countries?” The world is not waiting for us to get a clue and start acting responsibly, they also have agency and will act to maintain stability for themselves, even it that means cutting the US out.
So as we celebrate Independence Day, remember that America was not built in a day, and rebuilding will not be a simple overnight affair. Enjoy fireworks, BBQ, and plan for the work ahead.
Bonne fête de l'Indépendance!
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