Democracy DemotionJuly/August 2019 25eorts to suppress the vote o racial and
ethnic minorities.THE AMERICAN EXAMPLE
This is not the Ãrst time that global
freedom has been under threat. Back in
1946, as the Cold War was coming into
view, the diplomat George Kennan sent
his famous “Long Telegram” from the U.S.
embassy in Moscow. Kennan urged the
United States to grasp with clarity the
diuse nature o the authoritarian threat,
strengthen the collective military resolve
and capacity o democracies to confront
and deter authoritarian ambition, and do
whatever it could to separate the corrupt
authoritarian rulers from their people.
But Kennan also understood some-
thing else: that the greatest asset o the
United States was its democracy and
that it must Ãnd the “courage and self-
conÃdence” to adhere to its convictions
and avoid becoming “like those with
whom [it is] coping.” Kennan advised:
“Every courageous and incisive measure
to solve internal problems o our own
society... is a diplomatic victory over
Moscow worth a thousand diplomatic
notes and joint communiqués.”
Today, as the United States confronts
not a single determined authoritarian
rival but two, Kennan’s counsel deserves
remembering. The United States stands
at a precipice, facing a time when
freedom and democracy will be tested.
It remains, within the world’s vast web
o alliances and organizations, the
indispensable democracy. Now, as much
as ever, the fate o American democracy
is bound up with the global struggle for
freedom. And the outcome o that strug-
gle depends on Americans renewing the
quality o their own democracy and their
faith in its worth and promise.∂unthinkable for both countries—because
in China, it would mean subordinating
the party to an independent judiciary,
and because in Russia, the regime is
an organized crime ring masquerading
as a state. Yet leading democracies have
some leverage, because much o the
staggering personal wealth generated by
corruption pours into the banks, corpo-
rate structures, and real estate markets o
the United States and Europe through
legal loopholes that beneÃt only a privi-
leged few. These loopholes allow
dictators and their cronies to stash and
launder dirty money in and through
anonymous shell companies and anony-
mous real estate purchases. The United
States, for its part, can legislate an end to
these practices by simply requiring that
all company and trust registrations and all
real estate purchases in the United
States report the true beneÃcial owners
involved. It can also ban former U.S.
ocials and members o Congress from
lobbying for foreign governments and
enhance the legal authority and resources
o agencies such as the Treasury Depart-
ment’s Financial Crimes Enforcement
Network to detect and prosecute money
laundering.
Finally, i the United States is going
to win the global battle for democracy, it
has to start at home. People around the
world must once again come to see the
United States as a democracy worthy o
emulation. That will not happen i
Congress remains gridlocked, i Ameri-
can society is divided into warring
political camps, i election campaigns
continue to drown in “dark money,” i the
two parties brazenly gerrymander
electoral districts to maximum partisan
advantage, and i one political party
comes to be associated with unrelenting