Months after Britain seceded from the E.U., the government of the former state went rogue in intending to pass a law that would unilaterally change, and thus violate, the terms of the post-secession trading agreement between the UK and its former union. The bill proposed no new checks on goods going from the Northern Ireland region to the other regions of the UK. Whereas the British prime minister was claiming that the full sovereignty of the former state meant that Parliament could unilaterally change the terms of a treaty, the European Commission was saying, in effect, that an agreement is an agreement. I contend that the Commission was correct. Moreover, even before the UK seceded from the European Union, an obsession on sovereignty (then, states' rights) rendered Britain vulnerable to failing to grasp the costs.
The full essay is at "Trade Treaties and Governmental Sovereignty."
