Life, liberty, and the pursuit of celestial bodies. “America’s done expanding” is the implicit rule. Our nation’s finished cooking, and the future looks like this forever (or maybe just a little smaller). It’s impossible for us to grow, and if it’s not impossible it’s bad. While we almost never discuss it in this way, everyone knows our country is as big as it will ever be. But when did I pick up the idea? Who taught me this, and why? More importantly, is it true? Why can’t, or shouldn’t, America grow?

I started listening to Trump when he tried to buy Greenland.

It was August 16, 2019, and I’d never seen the journos cry so hard. But I felt something new that day. At first, I didn’t understand it, or why — that mix of earnest excitement and dread, that desire to discuss the proposal with enthusiasm, and that sense that it was not allowed. An America that grows? It was, and to a large extent remains, a shocking suggestion. A dangerous idea. Forbidden. But for the first time in decades I was intrigued by something happening in Washington. I was excited. Damn it, I thought. I was inspired. I was also confused.

The strangeness of Trump — all of the erratic, clownish behaviors and turns of phrase, the casual departure from longstanding trade and foreign policy tradition, that total, narcissistic break from “reality” that enabled the TV star to run for President in the first place — indicates a core quality of his, which is either an inability to perceive the implicit rules of American aristocracy, or a joy in breaking them. In either case, his apparent immunity to the largely invisible laws of elite society, more than any other quality, is how Trump often arrives at obvious conclusions (trade deals should benefit America, manufacturing should come home, we should have a border) that attract the average voter and repulse the average elitist.

Is Greenland for sale? Because if Greenland is for sale we should obviously buy it. Hello, Greenland? How much???

Hawaii became the 50th state on August 21st, 1959, following Alaska’s entrance to the union earlier that year. Both states had been territories since the 19th century, the last half of which concluded most of our nation’s centuries-long territorial acquisition — Puerto Rico, Guam, American Samoa, and a long list of islands and atolls are still American today — with a couple final purchases during or after the World Wars, including the U.S. Virgin Islands (1917), and the Northern Mariana Islands (1947). Notably, we purchased the former tropical paradise from Denmark, which currently owns Greenland. It was a great deal, we all now agree.

But even by the late 1950s, the notion of an expanding America was controversial. Both Hawaiian and Alaskan statehood faced considerable domestic opposition, not only politically but culturally, a sentiment ultimately formalized over the next decade in a pair of Cold War-era treaties that effectively ended the concept of expansion for great powers. In 1961, the Antarctic Treaty formally ended all territorial claims on Antarctica, establishing the continent as a “peaceful reserve.” And in 1967, the Outer Space Treaty ended all territorial claims throughout the rest of the universe (yes, really). This is how, in 1969, Americans pulled off the greatest feat of adventure, exploration, and technological achievement in human history, landed on Moon, planted a flag, and went home with some rocks. Since then, many years have gone by, but our country has not grown, in either a literal or spiritual sense.

The Outer Space Treaty contains four principles: no sovereignty on Moon or anywhere beyond, “universal ownership” (space communism, in other words (which is maybe why there’s still nothing up there)), all known and unknown space reserved for “peaceful purposes,” and a prohibition on military activity. In other words, every practical reason for the colonization of Moon, Mars, or any other celestial body is technically presently banned. Obviously, at the time we signed, that final principle on military activity was the real juice.

Nobody wanted nukes in space in 1967, and in the shadow of Sputnik Americans didn’t think at all that we could quickly, painlessly win another war — even if, we would later learn, the Soviet Union was a starving house of cards. In Hollywood and academia, there was a lot of cheery, utopian talk about colonizing space together, beyond notions of nation and capital (again: literally communism). In this stew of hippie feels-based thinking, “Star Trek” was born, and “Star Trek” was how Americans conceived of space colonization for the rest of the century. Ironically, the philosophy underpinning this story of peaceful space exploration, contra basic human realities like “property” and national security, is ultimately what shackled us on earth.

Had America claimed Moon, or at least some giant chunk of it, the Space Race would have continued, as the Soviets would have felt compelled to follow. Downside? None that I can see. Even had both nations done the unthinkable and armed Moon with nukes, the concept of mutually assured destruction would likely have prevented war from space just as it prevented war between continents. But it also would have accelerated space colonization. That mid-century rush for lunar territory would have provided incentive not only to build, but to occupy.

Had we just a slightly different perspective on our role in the world in 1969, as well as our potential, there would be bases on Moon today. Moon would be populated. Moon would possibly have two new idiot senators for me to bash in the Pirate Wires Daily. “Don’t tell me I have to wear a mask,” I would say, “you live on Moon. Go buy some more oxygen, idiot.” Our discourse would be fun. We would also enjoy an untold number of technological wonders born from human pressure on that wild, difficult, alien terrain. What else would we know about gravity, at this point? Or human biology? Would we be traveling from Los Angeles to New York City in thirty-minute trips on repurposed reusable rockets? Instead, “the moon” belongs to “everyone,” and nobody’s up there. Ridiculous. Bad. A path in need of change. The correct course is obvious:

Moon should be a state.

As you’ve been raised in a culture that teaches you to hate yourself, your potential, and your country, I’ll assume you’re not yet sold on the concept of Moon statehood — the Moon Thesis, we call it. But there are a handful of good reasons for Moon. First, national security. Ask yourself, and try to be honest: when you look up at the night sky, do you really want to see China?

Lately, there’s been a great wave of short-sighted enthusiasm among the “yay space” people surrounding recent Chinese and Indian lunar probes. But what is really here to celebrate? Moon was already probed. We, along with the Soviets, did it six decades ago, which means there’s not even a scientific achievement worth celebrating in foreign lunar probing. The only thing we can possibly celebrate here is nationalism, and not for us, but for two giant, increasingly competitive countries run by governments that actually want what’s best for their people (must be nice). It doesn’t make sense. If a neighbor probed your backyard with the intention of mining it for resources, would you celebrate? Or would you politely ask him what he’s doing in your yard? Did the Indian government request permission to visit Moon? No? Then the correct response is not “congratulations,” but “what are you doing on our moon?”

Now, in the quest for resources, and through competition for resources, we arrive at probably our most practical reason for Moon. Even given just the bit we know for sure about the territory, it’s relatively resource rich. From Helium-3, a rare isotope of helium theoretically key to nuclear fusion, to water ice, silicon, and most core metals for building, Moon has everything we need to assemble and run a colony, which will separately make for cheaper launch pads on our way to Mars. But there are probably also untold wonders beneath the lunar surface, tucked away within the ancient lava tubes, and across a barren world we’ve still just barely explored. That’s a good enough reason to go. Still, it’s not my reason.

More important than lunar gold, outposts for research, satellite repair, or future launch pads, and even more important than beating back the Chinese, there is both a moral and a spiritual case for Moon.

In terms of Moon morality, I like to keep it simple: finders keepers. This is fairly basic stuff that, if permitted, any Kindergartner could grasp. We did the work, and secured a celestial body. Now, it belongs to us. When we formalized the communist fantasy that all lands and things belong to all people regardless of the creativity, money, and work it takes to secure such lands and things, we forked civilization onto a dark path contra all natural human impulses. Which brings us to the spiritual component.

Proponents of the Moon Thesis — good people, strong people, just people — tend to invoke the frontier, the existence of which forces talented, creative men to innovate, and spin civilization out of lifeless rocks. A technological frontier generally follows a physical frontier because a physical frontier is dangerous, and survival demands ingenuity. Is it really a coincidence that every great empire, at least since Rome, opened and thrived along some untouched barbaric land? I don’t think so. The frontier is a compelling, valid case for Moon. But I think the spiritual importance exists in something even simpler.

America’s acquisition of any new territory proves, beyond all reasoned arguments to the contrary, that we are growing, and with this evidence comes new hope for the future. That hope exists above us, literally, instantiated in an actual body in space — a constant, nightly reminder of our potential, as America moves the tides. The story of greatness tells itself, and self-perpetuates. The motivating fruits of Moon will be unlike anything we’ve ever seen, incalculable. And today we need that motivation more than ever.

This week, in a piece framed as a kind of field guide for dealing with “porch pirates” (jail would deal with this just fine, by the way), the New York Times casually described the concept of “delivered packages” — of mail — as “luxurious,” and the expectation your packages not be stolen the height of luxury. What is even left to say? A nation that doesn’t grow is a nation that decays. Your choices are Moon, or cease to exist. I choose Moon.

Let every young American look up, actually see their boundless potential in the sky, and remember the bounty before them in this life. And let a teacher ever try to tell her students America sucks again. While she’s standing underneath our second world.

Moon should be a state.

—SOLANA