The USA may have been on the leading edge of headlight technology when sealed beam headlights were invented. We have been behind the world for more than 50 years.
I suspect that a lot of that back then was lobbying by the Big 3 since they more than likely owned the companies that made the headlights, to keep European manufactures like Hella and Cibie out of the US market even though they made headlights that the lenses were specific to right hand drive and left hand drive cars. Cars that were left hand drive had different aim fluting cut into the lenses so that they aimed the light towards the right, and right hand drive lenses had the flutes cut to aim the light to the left, this was so that the headlights aimed the light more to the shoulder instead of oncoming traffic.
I bought my first pair of Halogen headlights, 7" round ones, in 1980 and used them on my cars that had that style of headlight. The ones I got were like these Hella's with H4 bulbs like this
For a few years I always got hassled from time to time when I would go for my annual safety inspection because someone would claim they were illegal in Oklahoma.
Adaptive headlight were available in the US back in the 30's on Duesenberg, Cord, Auburn and Cadillac I think. They had headlights on the fenders and then they had a set in front of the grille that was attached to the steering linkage so they would aim the direction the steering was pointed. Post war the Tucker had the center headlight that worked the same way. Citroen has had steerable headlights as well.
From what I have read, the newer adaptive headlights not only have the steering capability, but they also are self leveling, but they're not cheap. Even non adaptive ones can run well over $1000.00 per side, and the aftermarket ones are just crap. People buy them because they're cool, but they aren't aimed properly and built so poorly they just shine light everywhere.