E.U. President Von der Leyen Survives A No-Confidence Vote

Falling short of the two-thirds majority needed to pass on July 10, 2025, the no-confidence vote on President Von der Leyen of the Commission in the E.U.’s parliament mustered only 175 representatives in favor while 360 voted against the motion and 18 abstained. Although commentators discussed whether the president was weakened anyway, a more important matter relates to the politics of the vote as distinct from the Parliament’s institutional interests as they relate to the Commission and the European Council. I contend that the Parliament, which represents E.U. citizens, has a vital interest that is vital to the E.U. itself in maintaining a balance between the collective power of the representatives of the citizenry and the power the state governments at the federal level. Parties making deals with Von der Leyen on policy positions undercut the vote as a means of holding the Commission to maintaining that balance.

For example, the Socialists and Democrats Party “extracted a pledge on the next long term budget in exchange for their support.”[1] The right-wing Patriots for Europe Party and Europe of Sovereign Nations Party both voted in favor of removing Von der Leyen, but certainly not because she left made a deal with the states to sidestep the Parliament on certain matters of policy, for those parties favor more power for the state governments at the federal level. In fact, those parties even deny that there is a federal level! Therefore, we cannot assume that the vote of no-confidence was on the matter of the Commission siding with the state governments to marginalize the Parliament.

The Commission under Von der Leyen had “invoked Article 122 of the Treaty of the Functioning of the European Union (TFEU) to set up SAFE which allows member states to directly approve a Commission proposal ‘if severe difficulties arise in the supply of certain products’ or if a member state is ‘seriously threatened with severe difficulties caused by natural disasters or exceptional occurrences beyond its control.’”[2] Because the Commission and the state governments were able to set up a federal defense-loan program without the approval of the European Parliament, and thus the citizens of the E.U., Roberta Metsola, the head of the Parliament, wrote to Von der Leyen of the “deep concern” in among the representatives that excluding the Parliament meant “putting at risk democratic legitimacy by undermining Parliament’s legislative and scrutiny functions.”[3] The democratic legitimacy of the federal level depends on the involvement of the Parliament, as it is the only institution representing E.U. citizens directly, rather than state governments, which have their own institutional interests even apart from state residents.

It is highly significant that Metsola “stressed that ‘the European Parliament is not questioning the merits of this proposal for a regulation’.”[4] The objection was not one of policy; rather, the concern was based on the democratic viability and overall balance of the E.U. itself as a federal system. By involving policy in the deal-making leading up to the censure vote, certain political parties in the Parliament undercut that institution’s interest in protecting itself against the Commission giving too much power to the state governments at the federal level. The Socialists should not have extracted a political gain from Von der Leyen, and the Green Party members should not have voted on the basis of how much Von der Leyen had prioritized environmental policy. Instead, the parties apprehensive about the Parliament having been circumvented by the state governments and the Commission should have voted to offset the state-rights ideology of the far-right parties in the Parliament. Had this been done, the next Commission would have been very cautious about circumventing the voice of the people by making deals with the governors of the several states. 

Generally speaking, protecting the viability of the federal system itself, including the checks and balances at the federal level, does not get done by prioritizing political deals and even particular policies, as if the pushing for certain policies in the aggregate were tantamount to protecting the system of governance itself.

1. Jeremy Fleming-Jones, et al, “Von der Leyen’s EU Commission Survives Parliament Confidence Vote,” Euronews.com, July 10, 2025.
2. Alice Tidey, “MEPs Vote for Parliament to Sue Commission over €150 bn Defense Loan Programme,” Euronews.com, June 25, 2025.

3. Ibid.
4. Ibid.

Putting a State in Charge of the E.U.

If only Ukraine could become the 51^st member-state of the U.S., rather than the 28^th state of the E.U., given the veto of Viktor Orban of the E.U. state of Hungary on the E.U. annexing Ukraine. Besides the inherent problems that come with relying so much on the principle of unanimity in the European Council and the Council of the E.U., mislabeling the prime minister of the state that chairs the legislative committees known collectively as the Council of the E.U. as the E.U. president not only marginalizes the federal officials, including President Von der Leyen, who, as the head of the E.U.’s executive branch, can rightfully be considered as the president of the European Union. In contrast, government officials of a state chairing legislative committees can hardly be said to collectively be the “presidency” of the European Union. Behind the promotion of this fallacy is the anti-federalist, or Euroskeptic, political ideology that misconstrues the E.U. as merely a network of intergovernmental relations between the states.

Although the E.U., like the U.S., splits governmental sovereignty between two systems—that of the union and that of the states, the two unions have different ways in which state officials participate at the federal level. The official participation roles are greater in E.U. institutions than in U.S. institutions at the union level. In his book, Federal Government, Kenneth Wheare makes the point that federalism has two systems of government, neither of which is a “level” above the other. He is correct because the sovereignty remaining with state governments, which in both unions includes all residual sovereignty, is not “lower” than the exclusive or shared competencies, or enumerated domains of power, delegated to the federal governmental institutions. The fallacy of “levels” is much easier to grasp by looking that the European Union than the United States because of the extent of official roles in certain E.U. governmental institutions for state officials, whereas in the U.S., state officials lost their direct participation when U.S. senators became elected offices rather than by appointment by the respective state chief executives/heads of state/commanders in chief (i.e., “governors” being those who govern) or legislatures. This difference may be why so much governmental sovereignty will not be transferred from the system of state governments to the union’s governmental institutions in the E.U. by 100 or 200 years in the E.U. as in the U.S. as of the 249^th anniversary of the thirteen colonies boldly (as there was considerable risk) declaring themselves to be free and independent countries, then already in a military alliance (i.e., the Continental Congress).

On the day before the 249^th anniversary of 13 British colonies in North America declaring themselves to be sovereign countries, Ukrainian President Zelensky attended “the opening ceremony of the Danish EU Presidency in Aarhus.”[1] Depicting or characterizing Denmark as the “EU Presidency” is misleading, for the reference is to officials of that state chairing policy-domain specific committees rather than standing for the E.U. itself. The exaggeration is at the expense of recognition that the Commission’s head, Von der Leyen, a federal rather than a state official, has a greater claim to speak for the European Union. As president of the E.U.'s executive branch, Von der Leyen delivers the annual State of the Union address at the Parliament chamber, just as the president of the U.S. delivers the State of the Union in the U.S. House of Representatives' chamber. It is revealing that just before the Parliament's vote of confidence in Von der Leyen on July 10, 2025, a lawyer specialized in E.U. law predicted that even if the vote is favorable to Von der Leyen, more "and more [E.U.] citizens will ask themselves, is she really the right person to lead the E.U. in such turbulent times."[2] It is not as though the rotating 6-month "presidency" of whatever state government is chairing the committees known collectively as the Council of the E.U. could claim to be at the helm, and thus step in for a weakened Von der Leyen. 

Generally speaking, putting a state in charge of the E.U. would be loaded with intractable problems. In June of the same year, the governor of the E.U. state of France presumed to speak for the European Union rather than just for his state on foreign policy, effectively (and I suspect intentionally) sidelining the E.U.’s president and its foreign minister, an office that is deliberately mislabeled as the “High Representative” to appease Euroskeptics. 

Regarding the involvement of the state governments at the federal level, the President of the European Council, António Costa, had a greater claim than the chair of legislative committees to be referred to as a president, and Macron of France was not the federal official standing for the European Council. That the governor of the E.U. state of Denmark “vowed to support Ukraine’s accession process” to be annexed by the E.U. and to use the “presidency of the E.U. Council to put ‘maximum pressure’ on Hungary to lift its veto on Ukraine” being annexed by the E.U. is less significant than the pressure than the federal officials António Costa and Ursula von der Leyen could apply on Hungary’s governor.[3] In response the emphasis, for example, of the Danish foreign minister chairing the other state foreign ministers in one of the committees in the Council of the E.U., Viktor Orban could more easily relegate Von der Leyen, Kaja Kallas and António Costa and thus deflate pressure from the E.U. itself, which is greater than a committee of state officials chaired by a Danish state official.

In other words, the paralyzing impact of retaining vetoes in the European Council and the Council of the E.U. is exacerbated by falsely portraying a state government as the “Presidency of the E.U.” The Parliament and the Commission even together may be too weak to counter the power of the states in the E.U. governmental system within the federal system; mislabeling a state as the E.U. Presidency only exacerbates the imbalance, even if it is a policy of officials of that state to resist the veto of another state. The E.U. is more than being the simple aggregate of the states, and the European Court of Justice, the European Commission, and the European Parliament are all institutions of the E.U. that manifest the E.U. being more than the sum of its states. Just as balance is important between the system of state governments and the system of the federal government in a federal system, so too balance of power is important between the branches of government, and in this respect the federal government should be distinguished from state government within a federal system because only in the former are some institutions representing states and others represent federal citizens. It is important that the power of the state officials in union institutions not overwhelm the power of federal officials in other union-institutions, lest particular state interests dominate those of the whole. Denmark may have its own economic and political interests with respect to Ukraine, whereas Von der Leyen and Kallas represent the E.U.’s interests rather than those of any state. Overstating the salience of the state governments in E.U. governance at the expense of federal officials.

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1. Evelyn Ann-Marie Dom and Jorge Liboreiro, “Ukraine Will Do ‘Anything’ to Advance EU Accession Talks Despite Hungary Veto, Zelenskyy Says,” Euronews.com, July 3, 2025.
2. Sandor Zsiros, "EU Parliament Censure Vote Leaves von der Leyen Weakened, even in Victory," Euronews.com, July 10, 2025, italics added.

3.  Evelyn Ann-Marie Dom and Jorge Liboreiro, “Ukraine Will Do ‘Anything’ to Advance EU Accession Talks Despite Hungary Veto, Zelenskyy Says,” Euronews.com, July 3, 2025.

E.U. Political Parties

Following the E.U. 2024 election, political parties jostled for members in the Parliament. Whereas the political duopoly of parties in the U.S. House of Representatives severely limits such skipping around, the European analogue puts more of an emphasis on party management in terms of weighing ideological or policy “purity” against the power that comes from size. In contrast, the two major parties in the U.S. must be content to be “big tents,” each of which contains groups. From the standpoint of the parties in the E.U. Parliament, the groups are at the state level. The defection of Andrej Babis and the rest of his group from the Renew Europe party just weeks after the E.U. election in June, 2024 demonstrates the distinct balancing task of the E.U. parties. Such balancing is not something that the American political duopoly of parties need do. I contend that the Americans could benefit by looking at the European case in this regard.

On the one hand, the departure of Babis’s group caused Renew Europe to go from 81 representatives to 74, further weakening its power in the federal legislative body. On the plus side, however, Valérie Hayer, Renew Europe’s head, observed of the departed representatives that “their divergence from our values” had “increased exponentially and we witnessed this with great concern.”[1] For his part, Babis pointed out, “We went to the European elections saying that we would fight against illegal migration, that we wanted to repeal the ban on internal combustion engines and fundamentally change the Green Deal. . . . Above all, we want the Czech Republic to remain a sovereign country.”[2] Although Babis’ claim that the Renew Europe party would not change its party platform on immigration and the Green Deal is correct, he could not very credibly blame the party because the Czech Republic had given up some of its sovereignty in becoming a state in the Union; qualified majority voting alone is part of that transfer, since Babis’ state could be on the losing side of a QMV in the European Council. Nevertheless, the ideological difference between Bibis’s group and the party on immigration and the Green Deal meant that the Renew Europe party would be more ideologically “tight” and thus powerful in that sense with the departure of Babis and his fellow MEPs, and they in turn could find another party closer to their views precisely because the Parliament contained several parties rather than just two. Hayer pointed to the impact on the party’s ideological position in saying that the departed MEPs’ “unwillingness to continue their commitment to liberal values has led to today’s outcome. They have turned their back to our firm pro-European convictions and values.”[3] More to the point, Hayer predicted that the party would be “more united.”[4]  Fewer members in the legislative body but more united: this is the trade-off that any party leadership in the E.U. Parliament had to balance in the post-election phrase of politics. I submit that this is a good thing.

A major benefit of the balancing act is that E.U. citizens going to the polls could more closely tailor their respective votes to their political positions or ideology than can U.S. citizens voting for members of the U.S. House. An American voter angry at the Israeli government, for example, did not have a choice of party opposing the military incursion into Gaza; both the Democratic and Republican parties supported Israel in 2024. In contrast, a European could vote for a party with a plank opposing military support for Israel. The drawback in the European case is in terms of political stability in the Parliament, but as even an increase in representatives in the parties on the right did not fundamentally alter the majority coalition of parties, the inertia of the status quo has considerable weight in maintaining stability even as multiple parties jostle for members while trying to stay true to specific values on the political spectrum. In other words, the fear of political instability from there being many parties in the Parliament is overstated.

Therefore, Americans could be less scared of deviating from the American duopoly of major parties, as if the credible advent of other parties being truly competitive would trigger seismic political instability. A recalibrated “cost-benefit” analysis of having a duopoly of just two major “big tents” could result in reforms in which voters would be better able to tailor their votes to their values and political positions without having to vote for whichever party is closer even if it isn’t really very close and may even have antipodal positions. The political-legal electoral architecture, or basic framework, that favors the duopoly would have to be fundamentally changed, and in a political culture of incrementalism, such a change is only possible but not probable. Even so, it doesn’t hurt to look to the E.U. for ideas. That is to say, the U.S. could learn a thing or two from the E.U.

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1. Jorge Liboreiro, “E.U. Liberals Dealt a New Blow after Czechia’s Andrej Babis Pulls Out His Seven MEPs,” Euronews, June 21, 2024.
2. Ibid.
3. Ibid.
4. Ibid.

An E.U. Political Party Mischaracterizes the Union as an Alliance: Suicide by Mis-Identity

Two weeks before the E.U. election in 2024, far-right parties were projected to do well and thus have more seats in the E.U.’s lower legislative chamber, the European Parliament. Immigration was a key issue in the rising popularity of those parties. Although immigration in both the E.U. and U.S. was in dire need of governmental fixes, the rise of the right in the E.U. came at the expense of the union itself due to an underlying category mistake evinced at least in the European Conservatives and Reformists party. 

Even though it was at the time a political party in the Parliament, the European Conservatives and Reformists party denied its obvious identity as a political party in referring to itself vaguely as a group instead. No doubt according to that party, and other Euroskeptic parties on the right, a mere alliance of countries cannot have political parties, so linguistic gymnastics were resorted to, such that the parties in the European Parliament would be known as “groups,” any of which could be composed of member parties. 

A legislative body, including the E.U.'s parliament,  has political parties even if some call themselves or are called groups whose members are state-level parties. Such "members" are not recognized as such in the Parliament because it does not represent the states; the European Council does that. Even if a party is only in one state, it is a federal party if it exists in and is recognized by the European Parliament because one or more representatives, or Members of Parliament, claim to be of such a party, which in turn is thereby federalized. 

All of such mental twisting was being done of course for ideological purposes so the nobody would dare liken the E.U. to the U.S., or any other empire-scale federal union, such as the former U.S.S.R. Such equivalencies of reason pale next to puffed up egocentricity that wants to claim that a state in one such union is equivalent to an entire union elsewhere in the world. 

Both in terms of scale and the type of federalism, category mistakes have been conveniently promoted by politicians and a willing media in the E.U. and unknowingly parrotted by purblind journalists in the U.S. Because the U.S. began as a military alliance of sovereign counties under the Articles of Confederation and then invented and adopted modern federalism in 1789. those automated journalists should have known at the very least that the E.U. fits modern rather than confederal federalism.

That a union with dual-sovereignty is distinct from a mere alliance is supposedly “unthinkable,” at least it was to Nicola Procaccini, a co-president of the European Conservatives and Reformists party. “It is unthinkable that anyone would argue that the European Union was born as the ECSC and as the European Community, as a federalist state, as a United States of Europe,” he said.[1] However, the E.U. is distinct from the previous European Coal and Steel Cooperative (ECSC) and the European Community. The E.U. began after those two single-issue groups, neither of which included a government—complete with executive, legislative, and judicial governmental bodies, or “arms”/branches. In contrast, the E.U. has not only the European Council, which represents the state governments, but also a parliament, which represents E.U. citizens, the European Court of Justice, and the Commission. Furthermore, governmental sovereignty is divided in the E.U. between the federal and state governments; qualified-majority voting alone involves some sovereignty being at the federal level. So as it turns out, it is not unthinkable, undenkbar, to think of the E.U. as a federal system because it is precisely that—unlike what the ECSC and the EC were.

Procaccini’s nationalist ideology blocked his mind from grasping the fundamental difference that renders the E.U. as a federal system rather than as a mere alliance wherein sovereignty resides with the states. “We want to go back to the original idea of the European Union,” he said, “which is an alliance of nations doing a few things together, doing those things that nation-states alone wouldn’t be able to do in the best way.”[2] Although the latter refers to the principle of subsidiarity, which, like its counterpart in the basic law of the U.S., is valid, it is incorrect that the E.U. was founded in 1993 as an alliance of still-sovereign countries. Instead, the governmental atom of sovereignty was split, just as I was in 1789 in the United States. In other words, Procaccini was conflating the original idea of the ECSC and the EC with that of the European Union. Going back to Althusius’ Politica (1603), the politician was confusing plena (full) with nonplena (not full) federalism.

The distortive cognitive effect of a fervently held ideology had just a week earlier been referred to by Pope Francis in an interview with the American television show, 60 Minutes. Referring to the socially ideological Roman Catholic bishops, the pope said, “conservative is one who clings to something and does not want to see beyond that. It is a suicidal attitude. Because one thing is to take tradition into account, to consider situations from the past, but quite another is to be closed up inside a dogmatic box.”[3] In fact, the pope said that ideology itself is bad. In falsely claiming that the E.U. was an alliance of sovereign nation-states, Procaccini was trapped in an antiquated dogmatic box at odds with the social reality of the E.U.; his view was thus inherently suicidal to that federal system in denying its very existence.

To be clear, sole E.U. competencies, or enumerated domains of political authority, or law, and the union’s voting mechanism of qualified (by E.U. population and by numbers of states) majority instantiate governmental sovereignty that no longer resides with the state governments. The E.U. is thus not an alliance because in an alliance, all governmental sovereignty is retained by the countries. The splitting up of governmental sovereignty between a federal government and state governments is also not confederal; instead, it evinces what scholars of federalism call modern federalism. Both the U.S. and E.U. are cases of that kind of federalism.

Therefore, just as characterizing the U.S. as an alliance is unthinkable, so too should such a characterization of the E.U., so it is ironic that Procaccini’s dogmatic box contains the unthinkable. If allowed to be imposed on the E.U., Genovese’s distorted ideology would place that union in an impossible position—namely, of being contrary to what it is. Hence that ideology can indeed be characterized as suicidal. Now that truly makes the sordid ideology unthinkable, or at least it should be so.

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1. Vincenzo Genovese, “Nicola Procaccini: Reformist Group Seeking Balance of Power Shift in E.U. Parliament,” Euronews, May 24, 2024.
2. Ibid.
3. Norah O’Donnell, “Pope Francis Tells 60 Minutes in Rare Interview: ‘The Globalization of Indifference Is a Very Ugly Disease,” CBSNews.com, May 19, 2024 (accessed May 25, 2024).

Congress: Hitched to the Status Quo

To lead is to be out in front, pointing the jet’s nose one way rather than another. Leadership is not that which causes drag at the back of the plane. Leadership is not that which holds a society in place or protects the vested interests. Whether envisioning something new or a return to a better time, a leader is not oriented to the status quo. It is significant, therefore, that the Minority Leader of the U.S. House of Representatives, one of the two chambers in the American Congress, has stated publicly that the Congress is rigged to advantage the status quo. The stunning implication is that members of Congress are actually anti-leaders.

In an interview in 2013, Nancy Pelosi admitted, “This is an environment that is almost rigged, intentionally or not, wittingly or not, rigged so that the status quo just goes on.”[1] This amazing line can be read as confirmation that the fears of some of the American Founders has come true—namely, that the U.S. House would itself become an aristocratic body rivaling the U.S. Senate. With just 435 representatives for over 310 million people, George Washington’s plea on the last day of the Constitutional Convention that a minimum of 30,000 rather than 20,000 in a district would not be sufficiently democratic sounds trite, even antiquarian. With so few representatives relative to the total population, the U.S. House could not help but be aristocratic, each member being like a magnet to huge “gifts” from vested interests. “We have to kick open the door and make our own environment” in the Congress, Pelosi urged, “reduce the role of money [in campaigns], insist on the civility of debates, and bring more women here, and that’s a better reflection of our country.” In painting this picture for us, the Minority Leader was indeed leading, for she was intrepidly venturing out beyond the status quo. Nevertheless, the thrust of leadership is not always enough to counter the gravity of the vested interests grounded in the status quo.

For example, as long as so few representatives hold such power, the money of the vested interests will inevitably find its way to the campaigns and the Congressional bills will continue to be written by the vested interests themselves. In approaching this problem systemically, more is needed. One possibility is to sift the E.U.’s lower legislative chamber for possible solutions. 

The U.S. House of Representatives (top) and the European Parliament (bottom). 

At the beginning of 2012, European Parliament had a maximum of 751 representatives to cover a population of about 504 million, which works out to an average of 671,105 people in a district. Meanwhile, the U.S. House had 435 representatives to cover a population of about 313 million, which corresponds to an average of 719,540 people in a district. The difference is 48,435 people per district. To get down to 671,105 people per district, the U.S. House would need to add 31 seats. Were the House to have 751 representatives, the average number of people in a district would be 416,777. While more democratic than districts with an average population of 719,540, neither figure comes close to satisfying George Washington’s objection that 30,000 people in a given district is not sufficiently democratic (i.e., too many constituents for a given representative).

Therefore, in addition to increasing the number of seats—with the knowledge that 751 in a chamber can work—further reduction in the centralized power would be needed to reduce the money magnet’s power. One option would be returning more domestic policy areas to the state legislatures. At the time of Pelosi’s statement, the U.S. states had 7,382 state legislators altogether. [2] Spreading around additional powers, taken from the Congress, to so many more representatives would not only make American federalism more democratic, but also open up possibilities for real change beyond the grasp of the status quo. As a few examples even without the additional power, some states had legalized gay marriage, two had legalized pot, and one had achieved universal health-insurance. Admittedly, the status quo has a greater grip in some states (e.g., Kansas) than others (e.g., California). However, spreading out governmental power could perhaps be sufficient to give leadership a chance to outpace the moneyed interests in the status quo.     

1. Laura Bassett, “Nancy Pelosi: Congress Is ‘Rigged’ to Maintain the Status Quo,” The Huffington Post, June 5, 2013.

2. National Conference of State Legislatures, “Sizes of Legislatures,” 2013.

The U.S. House of Representatives: An Aristocratic Democracy-Deficit?

The abrupt resignation of Jesse Jackson, Jr., from the U.S. House of Representatives in 2012 only weeks after being re-elected gave Democratic politicians in Chicago a rare opportunity to get their hands on a Congressional seat. The New York Times observed at the time that such seats “in Democratic strongholds” of Chicago “do not come open very often, and when they do, a line forms fast.” According to Debbie Halvorson, who ran against Jackson, “If someone is thinking of becoming a congresswoman or congressman, this might be their only chance. Whoever gets this will have it forever, they say. That’s why everyone wants to take a chance.” In other words, the office is a sort of personal entitlement. From a democratic standpoint, this represents “slippage.”

The reason for the two-year term in the U.S. House is to render the representatives responsive to their respective electorates or constituents. The six-year term in the U.S. Senate was chosen for precisely the opposite reason—that such a term would give the senators some breathing room from the “real-time” demands of their respective states. The bicameral result would ideally be a check and balance of the people’s momentary passions and deliberation on the country’s best interests beyond today. Having a House seat “forever” renders its occupant immune, at least potentially, from having to respond legislatively to contemporary demands “back home.” Indeed, having the job for life, an incumbent might even move to Washington, D.C., with only occasional visits “back home.” With only 435 members representing a combined population of about 310 million (as of 2012), the U.S. House is already aristocratic in nature; a re-election rate for incumbents up for re-election of over 90% and certain seats being virtually life-time appointments render the “people’s House” akin to a House of Lords.

Because the U.S. Senate was intended to represent the propertied interest as well as the states, an aristocratic House gives the elite too much institutional power in the U.S. Government. Other things equal, the democratic element—that of the people—will in theory eventually revolt. Were the imbalance in favor of the masses, the propertied would soon “opt out” too. Hence, the delegates at the U.S. constitutional convention in 1787 intentionally fashioned a federal government reflecting “the one, the few, and the many” in a sort of balance.

The U.S. President is “the one”—the antecedent being the imperial monarch. The U.S. Senate and the U.S. Supreme Court both refer to “the few.” The U.S. House, being at first the sole repository of democracy in the U.S. Government, was to represent “the many.” As in juggling, if one ball joins one of the others rather than there being three separated equidistantly, the balance is off and all of the balls are likely to be dropped. At the very least, the pernicious impact of the imbalance can be lessened by shifting domains of authority back to the governments of the member-states.

                                    Even though the U.S. House Chamber looks large, it represents 310 million people.   Source: Britannica

Additionally, the U.S. House could be enlarged to the size of the European Parliament—both containing representatives of a people spanning an empire in scope. Lest it be concluded that such a size is nonetheless unwieldy for a legislative body, it could be argued that the “extended republic” has become too big for even a “repository of democracy,” in which case we are back to the notion that power could be transferred back to the states—many of which have populations equal to or exceeding that of the United States when the U.S. Constitution was formulated and ratified.

Accordingly, several of the states might consider adopting federalism—the states’ “states” (i.e., provinces, “countries” (in UK), cantons, or lander in European terms) might be as the early state legislatures were in the early United States (i.e.., citizen representatives serving for a time). Put another way, the large and medium republics in the U.S. as of the end of the twentieth century at least may themselves be commensurate with the early U.S. as a whole from the standpoint of population and representative democracy. Even so, the diversity within a given state is not as great as that which exists even in 2012 from state to state. Europeans who travel from New York to Miami and on to San Francisco and maybe Utah discover that the United States do indeed differ cultural, albeit in different ways perhaps than the member-states do at home in the European Union. Even though less diverse internally than interstate, some of the United States are internally diverse enough—and populous enough—to warrant the application of federalism to those republics such that legislatures covering a number of counties could be formed and given a portion of the state’s remaining sovereignty. Just as the E.U. deals directly with regions of states, the U.S. could as well.

In short, the U.S. House of Representatives, being in many respects an aristocratic body—the advent of which some of the founders, particularly the anti-federalists, anticipated back in 1787—enlarging that chamber democratically AND extending federalism down into the states could lessen the democratic deficit in the system overall.  

Source:

Steven Yaccino and Monica Davey, “Illinois Sets Election Dates to Replace Jackson in House,” The New York Times, November 27, 2012.

Ethnic Groupings in the European Parliament: A Function of Rhetoric

L’extreme droit a formé un autre parti fédéral. The anti-E.U. party officially announced on June 16, 2015, is named “Europe of Nations and Freedoms.” A label can say a lot about a party’s principles. In this case, the overriding point is that the E.U. is supranational. That is to say, the Union is an international organization. Closely behind is the secondary point that freedom resides at the national level, otherwise known as the level of the states. Even though the supporting state parties were at the time typically labeled as extreme—the extreme right—the main-stream media in the E.U. reporting on the new party used rhetoric subtly undergirding the principles.

Le Pen and Wilders toasting their new ethnic group in the European Parliament.  
(Source: Geert Wilders)

Deutsche Welle, for example, repeatedly refers to the new party as a “group in the European Parliament.”[1] Governments, after all, have parties, and the E.U.’s “assembly” can hardly be considered a legislature—so goes the party-line. Accordingly, the PVV’s Geert Wilders tweeted, “The formation of a group in the European Parliament has succeeded!”[2] Le Pen’s FN put out a statement referring to “a political grouping . . . within the EU assembly.”[3] Both “grouping” and “assembly” intimate an international forum rather than a legislative body whose representatives are elected by citizens directly rather than appointed by states and representing them.

That “Euroskeptic and right-wing parties came out top in the European Parliament elections in May 2014” is to say that the national parties did well. The reference is not to the parties in the Parliament. “In France,” for example, Deutsche Welle reports that “FN garnered more votes than any other party.”[4] The night before the announcement of the new “grouping” in the Parliament, Florian Philippot, vice president of the FN, told Reuters, “We were five and it’s been possible to add two other nationalities to form a group.”[5] Clearly, he was not referring to an ethnically-diverse group of people. The linguistic stretch alone belies the veracity of the rhetoric and its underlying principles.

Imagine the confusion were a new party formed in the U.S. House of Representatives with members from seven states and the rhetoric were similar to that being applied to the chamber’s counterpart in the E.U. A headline such as, “Seven ethnicities have formed a group in the House of Representatives,” would naturally be taken as referring to the Congressional Black Caucus joining forces with other such groups in the House. Of course, race is distinct from ethnicity, but distortive rhetoric in American politics is not the point of this essay. Rather, my point is that a new party in the European Parliament is not somehow akin to the Congressional Black Caucus.

Moreover, a recognized party in a legislative body is not “a grouping.” Nor is the European Parliament an international assembly, for states (a.k.a. nations in the European context) are not represented. Ironically, the word “Congress” comes from the French, le congrès, which can mean “conference”—as in an international conference. The Continental Congress, which was the federal institution from 1776-1781 in the U.S., was indeed a conference, as the thirteen sovereign nations sent delegates to represent those states at a level viewed at the time as international rather than national. It would be une erreur formidable to imply that the E.U. states were still sovereign states at the time of the new party’s announcement, and thus that the E.U. was somehow an international organization with legislative groupings rather than parties.  

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1. “Le Pen’s FN to Form Far-right Group in EU Parliament,” Deutsche Welle, 16 June 2015.

2. Ibid.

3. Ibid.

4. Ibid.

5. Ibid.

Federalism and the Democratic Deficit: The E.U. as Suboptimal?

One major criticism of the E.U. has concerned its “democratic deficit.” The European Commission, the E.U.’s executive branch, has taken most of the criticism because the bureaucrats are not elected. Even though the European Council consists of elected state executives, the state legislatures are viewed as “closer to the people” and therefore more democratic. At the E.U. level, the European Parliament is the most directly democratic, as the EP’s representatives are directly elected by E.U. citizens. Therefore, one means of reducing the “democratic deficit” has been to increase the Parliament’s authority relative to those of the Commission and the Council. Lest it be thought that this solution has no drawbacks, the case of whether E.U. ships should be permitted to be beached for recycling in South Asia illustrates a problem.

Beaching old ships for recycling in South Asia is cheaper but can result in leaks of toxic chemicals. Image Source: Agence France-Presse/Getty Images

Facing pressure from South Asian governments, the E.U. state leaders on the European Council opposed a ban on beaching over the objections of environmental groups. Facing a different political dynamic, the European Parliament favored the ban. After weeks of negotiations, the parliament and council agreed to a compromise. Beaching a ship would be allowed as long as “fixed structures” are involved. As this wording is notoriously open to interpretation, clarity was sacrificed for the sake of a compromise.[1]

Interpretation may not even be necessary, as the E.U. has no language in the compromise to prevent ships from changing their flags, Patrizia Heidegger of the NGO Shipbreaking Platform observed. “So the stronger language won’t mean much,” she added.[2] The compromise looks a bit like Swiss cheese. Lest this flaw be attributed solely to politics, that the Council had to negotiate with the Parliament on the matter means that the solution to the “democratic deficit” is at least partly to blame. That is to say, public policy can suffer from efforts to reduce the deficit.

Of course, that the E.U. consists both of states and citizens means that the Council and Parliament both have vital roles in the E.U.’s government aside from the issue of democracy in a federal system. So public policy being diluted in the negotiation process is also a necessary part of having a federal union of states with direct effect. Even if no “democratic deficit” existed, in other words, the involvement of both the Council and the Parliament, and thus the negotiation, would be on firm ground. Even so, this “cost” of having a federal union can be minimized by the principle of subsidiarity, wherein legislation is to be accomplished at the lowest governmental level possible. In the case of the U.S., the problem of “lowest common denominator” federal legislation can in principle be mitigated by the fact that Congress’s powers are enumerated, and thus limited, with the residual sovereignty residing with the state governments. The problem is thus when too much legislation occurs at the federal level, whether in the E.U. or U.S.

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1. Costas Paris, “EU Won’t Ban Ship Recycling on Asian Beaches,” The Wall Street Journal, June 26, 2013.

2. Ibid.

The 2014 E.U. Parliament Election: A Gray Cloud with a Silver Lining

Whereas the European Parliament election in 2009 suffered from state-level issues and low voter-turnout, the legislative election in 2014 promises to be a super-charged one in the “super-nation.”[1] Most notably, the electoral contests are “shaping up as no less than a referendum on the merits of continuing on with the European Union itself.”[2] With popular distrust of the E.U. at an all-time high, this bit of news seems rather bad for pro-E.U. Europeans. Any pessimism in anticipation of the election that exists is mitigated by “the bigger picture.”

The European Parliament. (comagra.eu)

Specifically, I want to point to the shift from the European electorate essentially using the federal legislative elections as a means of contesting on state-level issues or otherwise simply abstaining from voting at all, whether out of protest or sheer indifference. Debating the E.U. itself implies a shift to the federal level, which is proper for a federal election. 

Lest it be feared that the anti-federalists, or euro-skeptics, win big, the practical impact would likely be less than that which federalists fear, for the Parliament’s powers are dwarfed by those of the European Council and the Council of Ministers. It is the anti-federalist sentiment in those bodies that can inflict serious damage, or at least hamper, the E.U. as a viable federal union. The shift to using the Parliament election to debate the E.U. itself may be an early sign not of dissolution, but, rather, of tacit acceptence of there being a federal level.

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[1] Peter Goodman, “Skepticism and Contempt Color Upcoming European Parliament Elections,” The Huffington Post, January 21, 2014.

[2] Ibid.

Pressuring E.U. States: The Debt Crisis as Leverage

By mid 2012, the verdict was in on the German-led recipe for restoring states overwhelmed by public- or private-sector debt: Austerity is counter-productive in reducing government deficits. On June 6, 2012, the media reported: “Prolonged austerity is making it harder, not easier, for governments like Greece to become self-reliant again.”[1] Salaries and pensions in the private and the public sectors in the state had been cut by up to 50 percent, leaving Greece 495 million euros short of its revenue targets in the four months ending the previous April, according to the Greek Finance Ministry.[2] With less cash, consumers had to reduce spending, leading thousands of taxpaying businesses to fail. Income expected from a higher, 23 percent value-added tax required by the bailout agreement fell short by around 800 million euros in the first four months of 2012. That is partly because cash-short businesses that were once law-abiding started hiding money to stay afloat, tax officials said.

The complete essay is at Essays on Two Federal Empires.

1. Liz Alderman, “Greece Warns of Going Broke as Tax Proceeds Dry Up,” The New York Times, June 6, 2012.

2. Ibid.

European Central Bank to E.U. Leaders: Vision Is Needed

Mario Draghi, president of the European Central Bank, warned a committee of the E.U.'s parliament at the end of May 2012 that the structure undergirding the euro in the E.U. had become "unsustainable." He criticized political officials for having kicked the can down the road by enacting half-measures or else delaying decisions, thus making the debt crisis even worse than it otherwise would have been. "The next step is for our leaders to clarify what is the vision for a certain number of years from now."[1] Similarly, Olli Rehm, vice president of the E.U. Commission (the E.U.'s executive branch), said that ways must be found to avoid a disintegration of the common currency.

The full essay is in Essays on the E.U. Political Economy, available in print and as an ebook at Amazon.

1. Jack Ewing, "A Terse Warming for Euro States: Do Something New," The New York Times, May 31, 2012.

Democracy and State Governments at the E.U. Level

In mid-February 2012, Mario Monti of the E.U. state of Italy addressed the European Parliament. In his speech, he advocated increasing the legislative body's power. The Parliament's 754 representatives represent E.U. citizens just as the members of House of Representatives represent U.S. citizens. The representatives in both of the legislative chambers are democratically elected to represent the people in local or regional districts rather than states more generally. The chambers are “national” in that they bypass the state governments. The latter are represented in the European Council of Ministers and in the U.S. Senate, both of which are legislative in nature and thus can be stylized as the “upper chamber” in federal lawmaking.

The complete essay is at Essays on Two Federal Empires.

A Dilemma for the E.U.: A Convention or an Amendment?

In November 2011, European leaders began to talk about amendments to the E.U. that would “change the fundamental structure of the union.”[1] Complicating the talks was ambiguity concerning the nature of the E.U. itself at the time. Foremost among the changes being discussed was the idea of a form of centralized oversight of the budgets of the state governments, with “sanctions for the profligate.”[2] The existing E.U., while more than the American Articles of Confederation, was at the time found to be insufficient in keeping the debt crisis from spreading from state to state and engulfing the union itself and its currency. “The survival of the euro zone is in play,” one senior European official said, “So far it’s been too little, too late.”[3] In this respect, the pressure for “ever closer union” was like that facing the Americans in the mid-1780s. Because the nature of the union was itself an issue, a convention composed of delegates—not state officials—directly elected by the people for the purpose might seem best suited. However, I contend that while rethinking the E.U. was not without merit at the time, the specificity of the planned amendment argues against the idea.

1. Steven Erlanger, "Leaders Struggle for a Deal to Keep Euro Intact," The New York Times, December 4, 2011.

2. Ibid.

3. Ibid.

On the Role of the European Central Bank in Ending the Debt Contagion

“That the [ECB was being] forced [in 2011] to step into the power vacuum left by a fractious political class underscores the increasing centrifugal forces unleashed by the debt crisis.”[1] Yet that pressure was being applied to the central bank to issue Eurobonds and buy more state government bonds in spite of the objections of German officials suggests that there were also centripetal forces acting on the center at the expense of the state capitals, even Berlin. It is important to view the E.U.’s “management” of its debt crisis through the prism of the history of European integration since the Shuman Plan in 1951, which called for ever closer union so as to obviate war and give Europe a stronger economic and diplomatic power in the world. The history of the European project can be characterized as a series of fits and starts, punctuated by momentary crises—each proffering potential ruin to the union itself. For example, France’s veto of Britain’s accession as a state must surely have struck some people as portending the end of the EC—the forerunner to the E.U. Yet from the vantage point of 2011, the conduct of the accession seems a mere hiccup on a much longer road of hills and valleys. Regarding the extent of integration by 2011 (e.g., monetary union), the question is whether European efforts to come to grips with the contagion of over-burdened state debt signify merely another valley, or an inherent contradiction or fault-line in the E.U. itself. Whatever the answer, the outcome will no doubt come about incrementally, as one might expect from E.U. history.

The full essay is at "Essays on the E.U. Political Economy," available at Amazon.

1, Brian Blackstone and Matthew Karnitschnig, “Crisis Ensnares Central Bank in Desperate Bid to Save Euro,” The Wall Street Journal, November 18, 2011.

E.U.: Ever Closer Energy

Günther Oettinger, the energy commissioner at the E.U. Commission (the E.U.’s executive branch), said at a news conference on September 7, 2011 that the E.U. needs to look “beyond its borders to ensure the security of energy supplies.”[1] Having the states “act together and speak with one voice” through their federal government is the rationale for ever closer union.[2] To be sure, ever closer union has its limits; the hominization of Europe via political consolidation would ignore the innate diversity that exists within any empire-level union of states, whether the E.U., A.U. or U.S. Even so, fear of consolidation need not hamper Europe from being able to benefit from united action.

The full essay is at "Essays on the E.U. Political Economy," available at Amazon. 

1. James Kanter, “Brussels Seeks More Control Over Energy Deals,” The New York Times, September 8, 2011.
2. Ibid.

Eurobonds: The Solution to the E.U.’s Debt Crisis?

One possible solution to the E.U.’s debt crisis may be debt issued by an E.U. government agency and vouched for by all 17 state governments that use the euro currency. According to The Wall Street Journal, “Such euro bonds would dispel concerns Italy or Spain might not be able to get the financing they need, as it would be provided centrally.”[1] Of course there is the downside of moral hazard: states facing crushing debt-loads could rely on the wealthier states to guarantee additional debt. Because the “fiscally imprudent” state governments “could borrow freely at low cost, there would be little incentive to stop.”[2] The wealthier states in turn would be in the position of guaranteeing debt that they do not control.

The full essay is at "Essays on the E.U. Political Economy," available at Amazon.

1. Charles Forelle, “A Shaken Europe Looks for Bolder Fixes,” The Wall Street Journal, August 19, 2011. 

2. Ibid.

What Is a Member-State?

It is easy to get locked into a certain way of viewing something, even if the perspective, it turns out, has more to do with one’s epoch than the thing itself, including how it came about and was designed. I contend that one of the main category mistakes is that wherein one Union is treated as equivalent to a state in another Union. It is astounding when citizens of the former acquiesce in the likening of “apples and oranges” at their own expense—in this case, citizens of the United States unwittingly treating their Union as though it were simply France with a very big backyard rather than a Union commensurate with the European Union (in which France is a state). The affable “going along” is caused in part by a willful indifference that relegates any study of the origins and history of the United States. I submit that a proper comparison between the U.S. and E.U. takes both after their respective first fifty years—hence most Americans are ill-equipped to refute the asseverations of European friends that the U.S. itself is somehow equivalent to a state in their own Union.

The complete essay is at Essays on Two Federal Empires.

The European Union: Dissolution or Consolidation?

In its 1993 Maastricht decision, the German Constitutional Court ruled that national authorities are not bound to respect and apply Community law to the extent that it exceeds the outer boundaries of Germany’s transfer of sovereignty to the E.U.  The Court also ruled that no transfer of sovereignty is valid to the extent that it results in a violation of the fundamental individual rights guaranteed in the German Constitution.  Nevertheless, a subsequent ruling on this subject indicated a willingness to rely on the European Court of Justice (ECJ) for the vindication of those fundamental rights.

The complete essay is at Essays on Two Federal Empires.