The U.S. as a new Venice?

When I first saw the link for this book review, subtitled "George Washington once dreamed of turning America into a new Venice," I immediately thought of how many of the founders saw the Venetian government as the archetype of the ideal republic.*

But it turns out, according to Joel Achenbach's new book, The Grand Idea, that Washington actually envisioned an intricate system of canals "connecting navigable rivers, linking every state, city and village."

It's unclear from the review whether the Venice analogy is Achenbach's or the reviewer's (or even Washington's?). In any case, it's not very apt. Venice is famous for its canals because there's no other way to get around Venice. The city, quite literally, was built on the water. When you build haphazardly on a lagoon, waterways are going to remain. And they're not going to make sense, as anyone who's ever tried to walk around Venice knows. Just look at this map. Chaos.

Then there's the question of scale. The United States, even in the early years of the republic, was significantly larger than any European state (with the exception of Russia, of course). Venice, as the scale on the map linked above, is tiny. If you could magically walk on water (as Venetian fishermen are allegedly able to...), you could walk across the entire city in half an hour.

It's barely necessary to touch on the navigability issue. Gondolas look the way they do for a reason. You're not going to be able to ship much on one of them.** I can't imagine that's what Washington had in mind.

My suspicion is that the reviewer came up with the Venetian analogy. It doesn't fit. But it caught my eye and got me to read the review, so it did something right.

Ah, Venice.

*For my take on Venice's republicanism, see this paper.

**Besides tourists, of course.