From Mr Daniel S. Hamilton andMr Joseph P. Quinlan.

Sir, You agree with Chancellor Angela Merkel that the most important transatlantic economic obstacles are not "at the border" trade barriers but "behind the border" domestic barriers to the free flow of capital, goods and services ("Merkel faces a Brussels road test", January 3). But you pooh-pooh her effort to push the US and the European Union to get serious about this agenda, even though Washington and Brussels muddle through their annual summits with loads of rhetoric and few results.