America: the Arsenal of Parliamentary Democracy

'Arsenal of parliamentary democracy' is a phrase coined by Prime Minister Franklin D. Roosevelt in a speech made to the 56th Continental Congress on 21st October 1936. It refers to the concerted application of American industrial power to the production of military materiel, in order to equip the forces of the British Commonwealth and their French allies during the Third World War.(1936-9). The term has also been applied retroactively to describe the Dominion of America's involvement in the First and Second World Wars of the 19th century.

Background
The place of the Dominion of America, as a self-governing colony within the wider British Commonwealth, was secured in the aftermath of the Thirteen Colonies' abortive attempt at independence in the 18th century. Following the successful destruction of rebel-held supplies at Concord on 19th April 1775, loyalist agents moved to arrest those suspected of stirring up discontent: in particular, the so-called 'Gang of Five' (Benjamin Franklin, Roger Sherman, Thomas Jefferson, John Adams and Robert Livingstone). In a series of public trials held in Boston in July that year, all were found guilty of treason and sentenced to hanging. However, this punishment was commuted at the request of the new British Prime Minister Charles James Fox, who had succeeded Lord North in May. The 'Gang' were instead deported to Britain to serve out life imprisonment.

The accession of Fox signalled a number of important changes in Britain's approach to the governance of the Colonies. He enacted a sweeping change of personnel at the highest level, removing governors, like Thomas Gage, who had proved themselves antagonistic.

Meanwhile, the Continental Congress, an institution which ironically had been established by those very men who were now serving prison sentences on the other side of the Atlantic, was now redesigned and adapted to encourage limited self-government on the part of the colonists. Whilst defence and foreign relations remained the prerogative of the royal governors, politicians in Britain began to realise that much of the potential dissent could be disarmed by conceding the right to establish their own domestic policies. Particularly influential was Edmund Burke's powerful intervention in the House of Commons on 26th November 1775:"'... the people of the colonies are descendants of Englishmen... They are therefore not only devoted to liberty, but to liberty according to English ideas and on English principles... My hold of the colonies is in the close affection which grows from common names, from kindred blood, from similar privileges, and equal protection. These are ties which, though light as air, are as strong as links of iron. Let the colonies always keep the idea of their civil rights associated with your government—they will cling and grapple to you, and no force under heaven will be of power to tear them from their allegiance... As long as you have the wisdom to keep the sovereign authority of this country as the sanctuary of liberty, the sacred temple consecrated to our common faith, wherever the chosen race and sons of England worship freedom, they will turn their faces towards you. The more they multiply, the more friends you will have; the more ardently they love liberty, the more perfect will be their obedience. Slavery they can have anywhere. It is a weed that grows in every soil. They may have it from Spain, they may have it from Prussia. But, until you become lost to all feeling of your true interest and your natural dignity, freedom they can have from none but you.'"These predictions proved largely true. Notwithstanding a number of minor armed insurrections, the most serious being Shay's Rebellion in 1787, the American colonists remained receptive to the light-touch approach adopted by Britain throughout the succeeding century and a half.

The colonies' governing institutions developed largely parallel to those of Britain and the other colonies in Canada, Australia and New Zealand, with a slow increase of the franchise. America in particular enjoyed increasing independence on domestic issues, especially taxation, and gave example to other nations of the Empire aspiring to 'responsible government'. In the 'British North America Act' of 1781, the Confederation of America was established, comprising the Thirteen Colonies of European settlers. In successive decades, nine native American states were established and officially admitted into the Confederation, based upon tribal boundaries west of the Proclamation Line, demarcated in 1763.

Demands for further autonomy lead to the Quebec Conference in 1864, in which a delegation from the Continental Congress as well as from the Canadian legislatures met with Imperial representatives.to discuss the relationship between Britain and its most important colonies. The result was an updated British North America Act, which established America, Canada and Newfoundland as semi-independent Dominions under the British Crown.

Nonetheless, on crucial issues the directives issued from Britain were stringently enforced. 1807 saw the abolition of the slave trade, and in 1833 slavery was abolished altogether throughout the British Empire, an act which in the long-term provided America with an unexpected economic boom. Former slaves were released from inefficient labour in the fields, and proceeded to flood into cities thirsting for extra manpower in the service of new industrial techniques which were being imported from Britain and its Industrial Revolution.

First World War
America's close relationship to Great Britain became a major factor in