The "special relationship" between the United States and the United Kingdom has always rested on more than shared military alliances or financial markets. The two countries have been bound together by a common heritage of freedom—the conviction that government exists to protect liberty, not police it. But in today's Britain, that heritage is under strain.

In the U.K., peaceful citizens have been arrested simply for praying silently in their heads near an abortion facility. Not for shouting, not for intimidating, not for obstructing access—but for thinking thoughts of prayer.

The United States government has taken notice. This week, Washington issued its strongest rebuke yet, condemning Britain's "buffer zones" around abortion clinics as "an egregious violation" of free speech, echoing remarks made by Vice President JD Vance in his Munich Security Conference speech in February. When the U.S. State Department declares that Britain's censorship "represents a concerning departure from the shared values that........

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