Donald Trump has repeatedly raised the specter of annexing Canada since his inauguration to a second time period as president.
The president’s rhetoric about making Canada “the 51st state” could appear to mission confidence, a Twenty first-century imaginative and prescient of manifest future, a perception in the US’ proper and obligation to develop.
Trump will not be the primary American chief to dream of northern enlargement. To me, a historian of early U.S.-Canadian relations, these designs counsel not energy, however weak spot and simmering divisions inside the US.
Early People’ lust for Canada
Even earlier than independence, social battle helped flip American eyes northward. All through the 18th century, England’s Colonial inhabitants in North America doubled each 25 years. Successive generations of Colonists alongside the Japanese Seaboard needed to compete with one another, and with Indigenous folks, for assets, arable land and commerce.
These sad, land-hungry Colonists clamored for enlargement, instigating a collection of wars towards each the French and Spanish empires for management of the northeastern half of the continent, culminating within the French and Indian Battle, from 1754 to 1763.
Whereas these Colonists had been animated by their thirst for enlargement, they’d little else unifying them. Many People at present are aware of the “Join, or Die” cartoon Ben Franklin printed, that includes a segmented snake with every part representing one of many Colonies. Nonetheless, few notice that it was not crafted through the Revolution to unite Colonists towards Britain, however in 1754, to rally divided British Colonists of their warfare towards France.
This well-known picture urging the American Colonies to unite was in assist of a warfare towards France, not Britain.
Benjamin Franklin through Wikimedia Commons
Britain completed conquering Canada in 1763, however the empire by no means totally supported Colonial enlargement northward. Within the 1750s and 1760s, British troops forcibly eliminated French colonists from Acadia in Nova Scotia and recruited hundreds of Colonists from neighboring New England to maneuver north. These settlers had lengthy imagined the area wealthy in fishing and timber to be a land of alternative. However disillusioned by the monetary value of sustaining their settlements, many of those Colonists returned to New England by the early 1770s.
Makes an attempt to settle different lands ceded by France had been no extra profitable. Fearful that Colonists would possibly provoke a expensive warfare with Indigenous folks, Parliament issued the Proclamation of 1763, which tried to guard homeland by discouraging Colonial enlargement westward. Many Colonists turned towards Britain in response, particularly these like George Washington, who had speculated within the land west of the Appalachian Mountains.
The failed invasion of Canada
Within the earliest months of the Revolution, the Continental Congress approved an American invasion of British-occupied Quebec. In a letter addressed to “Friends and Brethren” of Canada, Washington himself implored Canadians to hitch invading troops. “The Cause of America, and of Liberty, is the Cause of every virtuous American Citizen,” he wrote. “Come then, ye generous Citizens, range yourselves under the Standard of general Liberty.”
However at house, Colonists had been removed from united of their rise up. Historians estimate that round 20% of the white Colonial inhabitants, greater than 500,000 folks, remained loyal to Britain, and a good bigger quantity hoped to stay impartial.
The tough realities of conquest additionally turned many troopers towards the invasion of Canada. In late October 1775, practically 1 / 4 of the underfed and overworked troops beneath the command of soon-to-be turncoat Benedict Arnold deserted their arduous journey via inside Maine towards Canada. The troopers who carried on prayed these deserters “might die by the way, or meet with some disaster, Equal to the Cowardly dastardly and unfriendly Spirit they discover’d in returning Back without orders.”
The extra resilient troops who reached Quebec had been emphatically defeated by British forces in December, making Washington skeptical of any future efforts to assault Canada.
American troops conflict with British troopers and the French defenders of Quebec in December 1775.
Charles William Jefferys, cowl artwork for ‘The Father of British Canada: A Chronicle of Carleton,’ Quantity 12 by William Wooden, 1916
Nineteenth-century divisions
Battle with Britain over land and commerce within the early 1800s reopened outdated divisions amongst People. Virginia Congressman John Randolph expressed his frustrations with renewed requires a northern invasion. “We have but one word, like the whip-poor-will, but one eternal monstrous tone,” an exasperated Randolph famous, “Canada! Canada! Canada!”
The talk over Canada was one among many points dividing the nation, and as President James Madison would later clarify, he hoped that warfare would assist unify a polarized nation. His gamble paid off, however solely after opponents from New England flirted with the concept of secession to barter their very own finish to battle.
When the favored editor and columnist John O’Sullivan known as for the annexation of Texas and warfare with Mexico in 1845, he additionally advised the annexation of Canada would naturally comply with. The anti-expansionist response united pacifists, abolitionists and a wide range of non secular and literary figures, serving to deepen the divides that will result in the Civil Battle.
Annexation speak within the twentieth century
Trump’s posturing has served to unite Canadians and revive Canadian nationalism. Within the U.S., most individuals appear to know the sensible hurdles of including a brand new state or dismiss the concept altogether.
A Canadian demonstrates in Washington, D.C., towards President Donald Trump’s insurance policies on Feb. 17, 2025.
Dominic Gwinn/Center East Photos/AFP through Getty Photos
One instance of annexation speak from the twentieth century, nonetheless, would possibly function a warning to Trump, displaying how aggressive rhetoric towards Canada has led to political defeat. In 1911, a invoice creating free commerce with Canada handed Congress with the assist of President William Taft, regardless of objections from protectionists in each events.
In an try and have the settlement defeated within the Canadian Parliament, U.S. opponents from each side of the aisle tried to stir in style sentiment towards the U.S. in Canada. Champ Clark, the Democratic speaker of the Home and a front-runner for the presidential nomination in 1912, seized on the second.
“I hope to see the day when the American flag will float over every square foot of the British North American possessions, clear to the North Pole,” Champ proclaimed on the Home flooring. William Stiles Bennet, a Republican, proposed a decision that will authorize the president to start negotiations for annexation.
Their method to defeating the commerce settlement labored, not less than in Canada. Within the basic election of September 1911, anxious Canadian voters ousted the Liberal Celebration, which had supported free commerce, and the brand new Conservative majority rejected the settlement.
Again house, nonetheless, the plan backfired. Woodrow Wilson, not Clark, secured the Democratic nomination in 1912 and would go on to defeat each the incumbent Taft and former President Theodore Roosevelt. The bluster led to not success and victory, however loss and defeat.