America’s Rise and Fall among Nations: Lessons in Statecraft from John Quincy Adams by Angelo Codevilla

New York: Encounter Books, 2022
288 pp. $30.99 (hardcover)

Plainly spoken truth characterized American foreign policy until the early 20th century. John Quincy Adams—James Monroe’s secretary of state, later president of the United States from 1825 to 1829—exemplified diplomacy rooted in truth, and his principles guided American diplomats until “Progressive” fantasies tempted them away. This is the crux of the late Angelo Codevilla’s final book, America’s Rise and Fall among Nations: Lessons in Statecraft from John Quincy Adams, lessons from which today’s politicians—and tomorrow’s statesmen—could learn much about proper foreign policy.¹ It describes the foundations of Adams’s approach, recounts his era and legacy, explains the gradual degradation of America’s foreign relations, and offers much sound advice for restoring the nation’s stature and influence.

Codevilla points to founding documents such as The Federalist Papers, showing that minding one’s own business was a guiding principle behind America’s relations with foreign powers. The young country’s statesmen, steeped in an ethos of mutual noninterference and an international system of separate-but-equal sovereignties, sought to refrain from interfering in foreign conflicts but also were prepared to punish foreign interference in America’s interests. This idea reflected the character of America’s people, mostly immigrants who came to escape the ancient quarrels of the old world and pursue their happiness in the new world. They wanted peace, yet they had no illusions about the force required to preserve it.

These ideas are illustrated, for instance, in Adams’s correspondence with Russia’s envoy Baron de Tuyll, who conveyed messages from the tsar. The tsar sought America’s continued neutrality in Spain’s war with its South American colonies, and he gratuitously proclaimed the superiority of monarchy over other forms of government. Adams was silent on the remark about the supposed superiority of monarchy, but he made clear that although America wanted peace with Russia, it would not submit to a possible Russian occupation of the recently emancipated South American colonies. To Adams, America’s greatness and safety depended on preserving the “political character” of the hemisphere, so he warned the tsar against intrusion. However, he refrained from any mention of Russia’s considerations of acquiring land on America’s northwest coast, a matter that was of interest to America. Why stay silent on the latter? Because, Codevilla observes, Adams saw that recent Russian disarmaments, such as the sale of its battleships to Holland, indicated that it was unlikely that Russia could execute such plans. Note the contrast between the tsar’s needling and Adams’s combination of assertiveness and restraint.

Adams thought that taking sides in foreign conflicts with no bearing on American interests could needlessly justify strife against and among Americans. So, when Henry Clay and John C. Calhoun proposed issuing statements regarding the independence of Greece, Adams rebuked them for attempting to burden America with a stance on a matter in which it had no interest. Similarly, when President Monroe wanted to commit to defending recently freed Latin American colonies against an alliance of Russia, Prussia, Austria, and France, Adams urged against it. Why? He determined that the weakness of the alliance made invasion unrealistic, and even if it did invade, the conflicting interests of its members would doom the endeavor. America’s Rise provides a more contemporary example as well—a 20th-century transgression of this principle: Codevilla argues that American interference in the Middle East inflamed Islamic terrorism, which prompted the U.S. government to impose stringent security measures, which ultimately targeted average Americans more than terrorists.

Codevilla also shows that although the famous doctrine opposing European colonialism in the Western hemisphere bears Monroe’s name, it exhibits Adams’s principles. Monroe’s initial draft condemned European policies related to Greece and Spain, but Adams urged him to remove these criticisms. Adams’s guidance confined the Monroe Doctrine to positions actually supportive of America’s interests. For instance, it opposed foreign intervention in the political affairs of Latin America because of its proximity. The crux of the doctrine involved maintaining separate spheres of influence between the old world and the new.

“Sacrificing virtue to the prospect for greatness was an ever-present temptation,” Codevilla writes. By “greatness,” he presumably meant American hegemony abroad. He showed how the Wilson administration indulged this urge. Wilson wanted to “improve” not only America but the world. He brought America into WWI to establish a “permanent peace” and to spread democracy. Codevilla argues that a practitioner of the old diplomacy, such as Theodore Roosevelt, would not have entered the war for such vague reasons with no bearing on the country’s interests. Here, Codevilla omits important facts, seemingly to suit his theory. He forgets to mention that Roosevelt was himself a “Progressive,” and that he criticized Wilson for not entering the war sooner, after Germany sank the RMS Lusitania. He called Wilson the “lily-livered skunk in the White House”; and when America did enter the war, he campaigned vigorously, but unsuccessfully, for permission to assemble and lead a volunteer force to go and fight.²

Codevilla is certainly right, though, that “Progressive” ideology took hold of American elites in the early 20th century. They considered the League of Nations, rather than military might, to be the source of peace. But America’s Rise illustrates how, in fact, decision makers used the League to distract from humiliation resulting from their “Progressive” policies and decisions. When Japan invaded China, violating a 1921 treaty to which America was a party, President Hoover announced that Japan’s primary violation was its commitment to the League, thereby diverting attention away from America’s inaction regarding the breach.

“Progressivism’s” fundamental alignment with communism—its core view that individuals are subordinate to the “common good”—incentivized American leaders to disregard the tyranny of the latter. Many in Franklin Delano Roosevelt’s leftist base supported Hitler because of his pact with Stalin, the leader of the strongest political manifestation of “Progressive” ideology. Consequently, Roosevelt was reluctant to treat Hitler as anything less than a fellow statesman. Further, “Progressive” opposition to Italy’s invasion of Ethiopia amounted to mere “virtue signaling,” according to Codevilla, based as it was on popular anticolonialist notions that put its adherents reflexively on the side of the weaker state. Though Italy had been allied with Austria and stationed troops at its border to deter the Germans, this animosity from the United States and the United Kingdom—precisely the sort of meddling that Adams had warned against—pushed Italy toward Hitler, enabling Germany’s invasion of Austria and beginning the war. These are among the book’s many examples demonstrating the diversion of U.S. diplomacy away from America’s interests in service of calamitous ideology untethered from reality.

Along with the leftward drift of American foreign policy came the country’s retreat into a bulwark of bureaucracy, shielding its heads of state from accountability. Adams was the chief architect of his foreign policy, making clear who was responsible for its consequences. In contrast, after WWII, America’s foreign policy decisions emanated from the depths of the government’s “fourth branch,” mainly from the State Department and military leaders. This faceless system has often been leveraged by those with agendas counter to American interests. And as with the League of Nations, presidents have hidden behind it when criticized, such as when Obama blamed recommendations of policy experts for his decision to send extra troops to Afghanistan—and Biden’s faulting American intelligence and military personnel for America’s disastrous withdrawal from Afghanistan.

Codevilla goes on at length about what actions Adams would take if he were in power today. Instead of presuming what Adams would think or do, perhaps it would have been better merely to examine how his principles apply to current circumstances, thus clarifying the distinction between the author’s opinions and Adams’s. Nonetheless, this flaw doesn’t detract from the points made. For example, it’s probably safe to assume, as Codevilla does, that Adams would counsel against America’s close involvement with European politics while recognizing China’s expansion into the Pacific as antithetical to America’s trade and security interests.

However, some of Codevilla’s later recommendations arguably are at odds with earlier principles he extols. He describes the Kurds as the only group in the Middle East not having shot at an American despite having twice suffered American betrayal: In 1975 and 2014, America armed them against Iraq and ISIS respectively, only to abandon them later. Codevilla argues that to restore honor and inhibit the evil designs of America’s Middle Eastern enemies as it withdraws from the region, the United States should help the Kurds establish their own state. However, such a move seems at least as likely to further entangle America in the region as to facilitate its exit.

Such minor downsides do not undermine the foundation on which Codevilla’s thesis lies, reaching down as it does into the bedrock moral framework of America, founded on mutual noninterference and self-governance. The book provides a broad perspective of the course of American statecraft over the centuries, showing its arc from humble, inward-looking beginnings to grandiose ambitions after the 19th century. It’s useful reading for anyone interested in the reasons for America’s current posture vis-à-vis the rest of the world. And it may inform future statesmen of the grim consequences of holding fantasy above reality.

About Bill Sanders

Bill Sanders is a software engineer and former lawyer. He's an avid reader with a special appreciation for writing concerning individual liberty and human flourishing.

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