Well, yes. We are a union and a functioning democracy, thanks to the British. But it wasn't entirely due to them that we are a free country. For example, Pakistan was created the same time out of the erstwhile British-Indian empire, but fumbled from being a democracy pretty early on, in spite of being of the same ethnicity as the rest of the Indians. And on the English language, I find that American English is a lot more practical than the other forms of it, but, as you would be aware, old habits die hard, and hence my preference for spelling words with 'our' instead of 'or'.
Being an engineering student, I often have to go through American and British books for many of my study subjects, and I've always found American books far more straightforward and easy to understand, than British ones. You may have noticed that too, especially when it comes to reading the occasional instruction manuals!
My ex-wife is British.She used to tell me that they spoke English and we speak American.
The old expression that the problem between Americans and the English is that they speak two different languages is true in a lot of ways.
When I married her, she had three kids. Two sons, 12 and 14, and a daughter, 17. They were raised in the U.S. from babies. The daughter remembered a little bit about England before they moved here. So, for the most part, they were raised here.
I still laugh when I think about what the two boys would do when they heard their Mom use the word "fag" when talking about cigarettes. They found that most hilarious, and would roll with laughter when she'd say "fag".