This is Europe’s independence moment, writes Vincent Stuer—Join or die.
Dear Americans friends,
may we borrow your constitution for a while? Europe badly needs a new one, and yours is just what we need.
You know how it is, when 'in the course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands with another'—you need to think on your feet. If the republican experience at your end is over, for now, the federalist experiment over here is just starting.
We have Trump to thank for that.
He has stirred domestic insurrections amongst us, from Hungary to France. He has obstructed the administration of justice, from Gaza to Ukraine. He has abdicated the transatlantic alliance by declaring us out of his protection, and seems ready to wage war against us over Greenland.
The list goes on and on. The story of your present President is a history of repeated injuries and usurpations to Europe, all having in direct object the establishment of an absolute tyranny over our states. For refusing his assent to digital laws, the most wholesome and necessary for the European public good. For cutting off our trade with all parts of the world. For imposing tariffs on us without our consent—or yours, for that matter. For all those reasons and more, we need to step away from this guy.
Of course we don’t take this decision lightly, and indeed many of our politicians are still hesitating. Europeans are always more disposed to suffer, as long as possible, rather than to right themselves by abolishing the national politics to which they are accustomed. But we no longer have a choice. This is Europe’s independence moment, whether we like it or not. We need to band together as a European Union to survive—Join or die. And your constitution is the way to do it.
In any case, it seems you’re not using it for yourself at the moment, so I figured it’s worth asking.
Draghi—a European musical
True, you don’t make a federation on paper only. Shared threats and shared debts are what breathes life into it, and a healthy sense of mutual distrust is what keeps it alive.
You know that as well as anyone.
When your republic was in its infancy, the turning point was the threat from Barbary pirates targeting US ships, sailors and security. It was Thomas Jefferson, reluctant though he always had been towards central government, who built up the country’s defences to 'effect a peace through the medium of war'.
Now it’s our turn to shape up. As American colonies, we used to be properly protected from barbarians all around us, indisposed and even incapacitated to start wars amongst ourselves by American-inspired and -financed integration. But Putin’s threat and Trump’s submission to it mark a turning point for us too. With Jefferson, we now ask ourselves 'how to prevent the wars produced by the wrongs of other nations?', and answer: 'By putting ourselves in a condition to punish them. Weakness provokes insult and injury, while a condition to punish it often prevents it.'
So the peace project —Nobel-Prize certified!— is arming up. Then there’s the money issue.
Like all states, we jealously guarded our independence by keeping the central government lean and mean. In normal times, the EU’s budget was 1% of European GDP—mind you, in a political culture where government usually accounts for almost half of GDP. To compare: Washington spends 23% of your GDP.
Now, former central banker Mario Draghi has argued we need ro raise investments by €800 billion per year to deal with pressures on our economy and security. That means we have to spend — ballpark, as you say— five times as much on collective projects as we do now. And we can only do it if we tax, borrow and spend it together, as a European Union. Not for nothing, it has been called 'Europe’s Hamiltonian moment'. (Please let there never be a Mario Draghi musical. We’ll vote an amendment to that effect.)
But ultimately it’s about the politics.
Contrary to perception, a federation is not a superstate. Written into your constitution is the exact opposite: not only a division of powers between the three branches of government, but a division of labour between the levels of government as well. Layers of government living apart together, each with their own roles, views and interests. With states’ rights trumping federal powers, and a Bill of Rights to protect citizens from all of them.
Europe is too diverse to capture in one centralised state, but a federation of forces like that seems just what we need. Common sense really, a constitution like yours.
So would you consider it? Your mad king may have lost our continent for the moment, but surely we can still be friends, and you would really do us a favour by lending us your founding document for a while. Just to help us on the way in this crazy, lonely new world.
Thanks so much.
Oh and by the way, were you still needing that Statue of Liberty we sent you? Cos I was thinking...
