King Charles II was in debt. Admiral Penn, a staunch royalist in the Civil War, had used

his personal wealth to rebuild the navy after the restoration, and the King owed him £16,000

about £3 million in today's money. Fate intervened before Charles could repay the admiral

died, but there was a son, William, a troublemaker who'd been in and out of prison for the

sin of being a Quaker, a legal, in 17th century England. William saw an opportunity. He went

to the King and asked him to honour the debt to his father, not with money, but with the

gift of a tranche of land across the Atlantic, in America. In 1681, Charles gave him 45,000

square miles of real estate west of the Delaware River, and William set sail to build what he

called a holy experiment, where Quaker ideals could be put into practice without the threat

of persecution. He wanted to name the colony Sylvania, Latin for Woodland, after the vast

forests that covered his new home. But the King insisted on a prefix to pay tribute to the

late admiral, his surname, and so Penn, Sylvania, was born. 340 years later, William Penn's

old home is the site of one of the tightest senate races of the 2022 midterm elections.

With 193 days to go, I'm John Prado, and this is Checks and Balance from the Economist.

Each week we take one big theme, shaping American politics, and explore it in depth.

Today, why is the Pennsylvania Senate race so fascinating?

A celebrity doctor and a hedge fund manager, a neck and neck. On the other side, an oddball

giant, with man of the people appeal, is pulling ahead of a candidate who seems like he was

made in a factory by establishment Democrats. The race for Pennsylvania's open-senacy

is wild, and between now and November, we'll be regularly checking in. The first major

milestone, the primaries, is a few weeks away. What can the Pennsylvania Senate race tell

us about the future direction of American politics?

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