france & america’s relationship was strained a couple of times in the late 18th/19th century, so i have a lot of Feelings about the gifting of the statue of liberty being the point where they agreed to put all of that behind them & started to become closer than they had ever been before. the statue was given to commemorate america’s centennial, and it also came right after france had become a republic again, and i generally imagine that if france hadn’t gotten in america’s pants prior to this point in history then this definitely would have done the trick.