This essay argues that the international arms trade bound the revolutions in British North America, Saint-Domingue, and Spanish America in dependent relationships. Throughout the colonial era, an informal arms control regime made it impossible for Europe’s American subjects to mass-produce war material or buy enough on the open market to equip independence through war. As became clear by late 1776, even the hemisphere’s best-connected colonists could not overcome this obstacle. Only the decisions of France and Spain to secretly arm and then openly support the British North Americans made their revolution a success. But as France and Spain would soon come to realize, US independence fatally undermined the early modern arms control regime that had kept independence a practical impossibility in their own colonies. North American merchants became the indispensable arms dealers to the hemisphere’s later revolutionaries, first in Saint-Domingue and then across mainland Spanish America. Crucially, though, the United States never offered terms remotely as generous as those it had enjoyed during its own independence struggle. Rather than rely on imperial patronage or republican solidarity, Haitians and Spanish Americans had to navigate a cutthroat market to obtain the tools of independence. That comparative disadvantage would haunt their postcolonial histories.

The mental health experiences of Black Americans remain understudied in existing COVID-19 research. While several vital reports highlight disparate physical health outcomes—and even higher mortality rates among Black Americans—few queries have considered the current mental health concerns for this particular group. This investigation therefore examines correlates associated with experiencing suicidal ideation at the beginning (e.g., 2020) and in a later phase (e.g., 2022) of the COVID-19 pandemic. Study 1 includes responses from (n = 489) Black young adults ages 18–30 who completed online surveys from May 27 to June 24, 2020. Study 2 includes response from a separate, nationally representative probability-based sample of (n = 794) Black adults ages 18–88 who completed online surveys between April 21 and June 1, 2022. Participants’ fear of COVID-19, feelings of hopelessness, and perceptions regarding meaning in life were considered. Study findings indicate that hopelessness, but not fear of COVID-19, was positively associated with suicidal ideation in both studies. Further, presence of meaning in life was negatively associated with suicidal ideation during the past 2 weeks in Study 1 and was also associated with significantly lower odds of suicidal ideation during the past year in Study 2. Presence of meaning in life moderated the relation between hopelessness and suicidal ideation among participants in Study 1 only. Thus, having a sense of life purpose appears to be an important construct to consider when working to prevent suicide among Black Americans during the current global COVID-19 pandemic.