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Scotland - US Relations

Some 30 million Americans today trace their lineage to the Scots, a bloodline marked stained by centuries of continuous warfare along the border between England and Scotland, and later bitter settlements of England’s Ulster Plantation in Northern Ireland. Between 250,000 and 400,000 Scots-Irish migrated to America in four waves during the 18th century, traveling in groups of families and bringing with them not only long experience as rebels and outcasts but also unparalleled skills as frontiersmen and guerrilla fighters.

The Scottish Affairs Office in Washington DC exists to help promote Scotland's interests in the United States and Canada. The USA is Scotland's biggest overseas trading partner; the largest inward investor and a hugely valuable tourism market. US students account for the second largest overseas group in Scotland and links between Scottish schools, colleges and universities and their counterparts in the USA are developing all the time. The Scottish Government's key objectives in the USA were set out in The Scottish Government's Plan for Engagement with the USA, published in July 2010. Annual reports, which have been compiled on the basis of extensive contributions from all public sector partners are available for 2011, 2013 and 2013. The 3 key strategic objectives of the Plan are to: bring a sharper economic growth focus to the promotion of Scotland; to create the conditions for people to live, learn, visit, work and invest in Scotland; and to manage Scotland's reputation as a distinctive global identity.

Scots-Irishman James Webb, Vietnam combat veteran, former Naval Secretary, and former US Senator Jim Webb argues that their cultural identity reflected acute individualism, dislike of aristocracy and a military tradition, and, over time, the Scots-Irish defined the attitudes and values of the military, of working class America, and even of the peculiarly populist form of American democracy itself.

Scottish emigration to North America was fueled by both political and economic discontent. Scotland had been joined to England by the Act of Union in 1708 after centuries of strife. The act was widely resented in Scotland, and Scottish separatism was manifested in rebellions in 1715 and 1745 against the English Hanoverian monarchy. In addition, agricultural reforms displaced farmer workers. Altogether some twenty-five thousand Scots emigrated to America between 1763 and 1775.

The Ulster Scots also came in significant numbers. The Ulster Scots were Scots who had been encouraged by the English government to settle in the Ulster region of northern Ireland in the early seventeenth century. They have been traditionally known as Scots-Irish. The term, however, is misleading because they were actually Scots living in northern Ireland. some two hundred thousand of the six hundred thousand people living in Ulster were Ulster Scots. Between fifty and seventy thousand came to America before 1770. Economic problems in the 1760s and 1770s led to an even greater surge of emigration. In the five-year span from 1770 to 1775, as many as forty thousand more Ulster Scots came to America.

Scots-Irish were 40 percent of the Revolutionary War army; they included the pioneers Daniel Boone, Lewis and Clark, Davy Crockett, and Sam Houston; they were the writers Edgar Allan Poe and Mark Twain; and they have given America numerous great military leaders, including Stonewall Jackson, Ulysses S. Grant, Audie Murphy, and George S. Patton, as well as most of the soldiers of the Confederacy (only 5 percent of whom owned slaves, and who fought against what they saw as an invading army).

Scots-Irish redefined American politics, creating the populist movement and giving the country a dozen presidents, including Andrew Jackson, Teddy Roosevelt, Woodrow Wilson, Ronald Reagan, and Bill Clinton. And it explores how the Scots-Irish culture of isolation, hard luck, stubbornness, and mistrust of the nation’s elite formed and still dominates blue-collar America, the military services, the Bible Belt, and country music. [possibly Webb is a bit too fixated on what he sees, in Manichaean terms, as a class conflict between the Scots-Irish and America's "paternalistic Ivy League-centered, media-connected, politically correct power centers."]

Carl Mays, in his PEOPLE OF PASSION book, writes about the early Scots-Irish of the Southern Highlands as "...good-hearted people with faith in God, nature, themselves, and their neighbors." Unlike Webb's book, PEOPLE OF PASSION gives more credit to the Scots-Irish for working together and with others to help establish a backbone in the Southern Highlands.

On 24 February 2009 thirty Senators tonight joined together to form a caucus that aimed to strengthen the links between the US and Scotland. First Minister Alex Salmond was in Washington DC to help launch Senate the caucus which had been established largely due to the work of Senator Jim Webb (Democrat - Virginia), a long time supporter of Scotland. It was co-chaired by Senator Lamar Alexander (Republican - Tennessee).

The formation of the new Caucus built on the establishment, in 2006, of a Friends of Scotland Caucus in the House of Representatives, co-chaired by Congressman Mike McIntyre (Democrat - North Carolina) and Congressman John Duncan (Republican - Tennessee). Senate and House members of both Caucuses were attending a special 'Year of Homecoming' reception tonight at the Library of Congress in Washington DC, co-hosted by the First Minister, Senators Webb and Alexander and Congressmen McIntyre and Duncan.

Speaking from the American capital the FM said: "Every Senator who has joined the new Caucus shares an affinity with our great nation and I welcome them as Friends of Scotland.... Members of the 'Friends of Scotland' Caucus in the House of Representative have been active supporters of Scotland and we greatly value their continued commitment. Scotland now has two powerful voices on Capitol Hill, with nearly 80 ambassadors in the world's most powerful legislature which is a fantastic tribute to our nation."

Senator Jim Webb, author of the American best-seller Born Fighting: How the Scots-Irish Shaped America, said: "I am obviously proud to be among the more than 30 million Americans who share a Scottish or Scots-Irish ancestry. I am even more proud of the impact that this heritage has made on the evolution of American-style populist democracy, and in the shaping of our military and musical traditions. I believe that the Friends of Scotland caucus in the Senate, now 30 members strong, will inspire a deeper understanding of this heritage and of those contributions to America."

The US Consulate General Edinburgh, provides all non-emergency passport, citizenship and other consular services for U.S. citizens in Scotland by appointment only. Appointments are scheduled on Tuesdays and Wednesdays.