Status Updates From Rich Relations: The America...

"Historically, service in war had been an automatic avenue to US citizenship for the foreign born. Those ready to die for their country were deemed worthy to vote in it." Well, yes. In that case, we simply make sure the law recognizes the reality.

"Thus, the United States was a democracy that became a state; Britain was a state that was slowly democratized."

If you count land that was not yet part of the US but would become so later on, Alta California, New Mexico, and Florida were all settled by the Spanish by 1776. The oldest city in the US, St. Augustine, was founded by the Spanish. Santa Fe, also founded by the Spanish, is as old as Jamestown in Virginia.