Washington Post Claims America Post-1776 Remains Part Of An Extended Global System Of White Supremacy

A Washington Post opinion piece published July 3 argues that American independence helped further colonialism and white supremacy. The op-ed contends, “As the country prepares to celebrate the anniversary of its formal declaration of independence from Britain on July 4, 1776, we must, once again, reckon with two dark historical truths.”

Perspective: It is time to reconsider the global legacy of July 4, 1776https://t.co/wJG1cmK6N6

— The Washington Post (@washingtonpost) July 4, 2020

The first is the central paradox in U.S. history: The nation’s democracy was founded as a slave society. The second is that after cutting political ties with Great Britain, Americans doubled down on the British Empire’s project of colonial domination. The American Revolution inspired freedom movements in other parts the world (sic). But it also contributed to the worldwide spread of white supremacy.

The article analyzes US expansion, concluding that since 1776, the US did not spread liberty, but oppression. “When President Thomas Jefferson set the country on a path of westward expansion, he imagined an “empire of liberty” that would spread freedom across the continent and protect the nation from the “dangerous extension” of British power. But the growth of slavery and the “removal” of native peoples on the mainland were achieved by force, not consent.

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