Expansionism And Imperialism

Ben Kavalec February 27, 2008 APUSH Essay

To what extent was late nineteenth-century and early twentieth-century United States expansionism a continuation of past United States expansionism and to what extent was it a departure?

Throughout the history of the United States, America had a burning desire to expand its boundaries. The United States acquired most its land during the nineteenth and early twentieth century with a brief hiatus during the Civil War and Reconstruction. However, the means by which America grained new lands drastically changed from a non-aggressive fashion in the beginning to an extremely aggressive one towards the end. The two main ways of land gain for the United States was through expansionism and imperialism. These two means have several striking similarities between them. For instance, both of these policies led to conflicts. During expansionism, the main logic behind new statehood was to have the upper edge for free or slave states. Of course, this desire to gain as many free or slave states as possible led to such conflicts as Bleeding Kansas, where free and slave advocates flocked to Kansas in order to decide whether Kansas would allow or ban slavery. While the U.S. was imperializing, conflicts also took place rather frequently. In the Philippines, Emilio Aguinaldo led a two-year revolt against American forces in order to become free from American reign. Racism was also a key similarity between expansionism and imperialism. When Americans began to establish

states as they moved westward, they had no consideration for Native Americans and considered them to be extremely invaluable. The exact same thing occurred about one hundred years later, with the “criminal aggression” that took place in the Philippines. The American Anti-Imperialist League argued that the blood of the Filipinos was on American hands, and we more deeply resented this betrayal. Just about everybody who was not a white, Anglo-Saxon protestant was discriminated against. The foreign policies that President Roosevelt employed were ultra aggressive, using his newly built naval force, the arm of offensive power, as a way to conquer. This idea of using naval power as a way to conquer the world was brought to Roosevelt’s attention because of Alfred T. Mahan’s The Interest of America in Sea Power. Aside from these, the economy was the factor running most constantly through expansionism and imperialism. During expansionism, Americans were looking to spread out, enjoy their own property, farm their land, and make their lives better. Imperialists’ desire was also to fuel the economy. People saw other lands as a way to get the “needed” materials they couldn’t get elsewhere. Theodore Roosevelt and all Americans saw the land as a place where they could exploit trade to the natives. Finally, the church drove both of the policies of expansionism and imperialism. Americans saw their newly formed country as one that needed to expand from sea to shining sea. It was basically their God given right to pursue their dream. Imperialism began when missionaries traveled to foreign lands in order to Christianize its people. They wanted to spread Christianity throughout the world before any other religion could beat them there first. Josiah Strong viewed imperialism as the ruling of the highest civilization, and that it will spread itself over the entire earth.

Although imperialism was in many ways a continuation of the expansionism years before, it was more of a departure than it was a continuation. The departure from expansionist views during imperialism is fairly more apparent then the continuation. For instance, when America was expanding, it had no problems with admitting the new territories as states because the inhabitants were already Americans wandering westward. However, during imperialism, Americans were hesitant to allow the territories statehood because of the fact that the people were foreigners; so, they basically didn’t deserve to be Americans. After Downes v. Bidwell, Congress decided that the United States prescribed upon which terms it received inhabitants of territories taken during imperialism. The United States saw other lands in the world free to conquer. Americans figured that other world powers did, so why shouldn’t we? Countries like Germany, Britain, and Russia had already carved up most of the world, and America should join in while they could. Besides this, the way in which America gained new lands was fair different during imperialism than it was during expansionism. When America was expanding, it simply made a treaty, purchased an area of land, or annexed an established territory. Contrary to this, while imperializing, America found itself conquering and forcing new lands to become property of the United States. This is most evident in the annexation of Hawaii, during which white American planters staged a revolt in order to obtain statehood for Hawaii. However, mostly all of the Hawaiians had no desire to become U.S. citizens. The location of new lands acquired between expansion and imperialism is also quite differing. In expansion, the United States was only concerned with the lands in North America. During imperialism, however, the United States turned to the rest of the world in search of new lands. Aside from these points, the

opposition received during both policies is also quite different. While America was growing on its native continent, people did not care whether or not it grew. Except for the Native Americans, nobody was in opposition to the expansion. But, one hundred years later, imperialism was opposed by many in the United States. The Anti-Imperialist League, which included high-figured people such as Mark Twain and Andrew Carnegie, promoted the abolishing of imperialism. They believed that the U.S. had a vast expanse of untouched territory at home and that it was too expansive to operate outside our continental boundaries. Finally, the competition experienced between expansionism and imperialism was an extreme departure. Nobody was in the west to stop the United States from expanding all the way to the Pacific Ocean. However, throughout imperialism, countries such as Russia, Britain, and France attempted whatever they could in order to get their hands on a piece of the strategic locations the United States hoped to control. In summary, the departure from expansionism during imperialism is quite evident; however, both policies share interesting similarities between them.