MODERN AMERICA: CH 22SEIZING AN AMERICAN EMPIRE

QUESTIONS???

• What motivated American’s “new imperialism”

• What was the role of religion as a motive for American territorial expansion?

• What were the causes of the war of 1898?

• What did America gain from the War of 1898?

• What were the main achievements of President Teddy Roosevelt’s foreign policy, “Speak softly and carry a big stick”?

AMERICAN IMPERIALISM IN A GLOBAL CONTEXT• 2nd Industrial Revolution

• New markets

• Raw materials

• European Imperialism in Great Britain, Germany, France, Belgium, Spain• Africa

• Asia

• Missionaries• Bring Christianity and Civilization to inferior races around the world

• Our Country: Its Possible Future and Its Present Crisis by Josiah Strong (1885)• The Anglo-Saxon race embodied 2 great ideas

• Civil Liberty

• “a pure, Spiritual Christianity”

• Anglo Saxons ; “divinely commissioned to be, in a peculiar sense, “his brother’s keeper”

NAVAL PRESENCE PARAMOUNT

• Capt. Alfred Thayer Mahan, The Influence of Sea Power upon History, 1660-1783 (1890)

• Modern Economic Development required:• Powerful navy

• Strong merchant marine

• Foreign commerce, colonies, naval bases

• American Destiny• Control the Caribbean

• Connect the Caribbean & Pacific Oceans with an isthmus canal

• Spread Western Civilization in the Pacific

RACIAL SUPERIORITY AND IMPERIALISM

• Western Industrial nations including the U.S. used Social Darwinist arguments to justify economic exploitation and territorial conquest

• Among nations just as among individuals, only the fittest, survive

• Superior character of Anglo-Saxon peoples and institutions

• Protestant work ethic: reform the less civilized races through hard work and Christianity

SECRETARY OF STATE WILLIAM SEWARD

• Believed that the U.S. had to remove all foreign interests from the northern Pacific Coast to gain access to valuable ports

• Sought to annex British Columbia

• Learned that Russia desired to sell Alaska in 1866

• Purchased Alaska for 7.2 million “Seward’s folly”

SEWARD’S FOLLY

HAWAII

CHEAP LABOR IN HAWAII

• Sugar and Missionaries

• 1875: Reciprocal Agreement

• Hawaiian sugar was duty free

• Hawaii guaranteed that no other power would have access to its territory

• Hawaiian Minority by 1890

• McKinley Tariff of 1890 reimposed tariff on Hawaiian sugar and granted subsidy to sugar producers in the U.S.

QUEEN LILIUOKALANI• 1891 attempted to overturn the existing Hawaiian Constitution and give

veto rights to the monarchy and voting rights to native Hawaiians

• 1893 American planters revolted and seized power

• U.S. Ambassador called in the marines to support the coup

• Planter’s committee called for annexation of Hawaii to the United States

• Blount Report commissioned by President Grover Cleveland found the coup was engineered illegally by American planters with help of the U.S. Ambassador

• December 18,1893 demanded the reinstatement of the Queen

• Provisional Government refused and Cleveland sent the issue to Congress

• Morgan Report of 1894 commissioned by the U.S. Senate found American planters innocent

• July 4, 1894 Republic of Hawaii: Sanford B. Dole inaugurated as President

QUEEN LILUUOKALANI & SANFORD B. DOLE

THE WAR OF 1898

• “Cuba Libre”• Cuban drive for independence from Spain

• 1895 Spanish governor placed all members of Cuban opposition in jail

• U.S. sugar and mining interests traded more with Cuba than did Spain

• February 24, 1895: popular uprising

• Pressure for War• Joseph Pulitzer New York World

• William Randolph Hearst, New York Journal• Yellow Journalism

Frederic Remington, 1896 (PD)

REMEMBER THE MAINE!

• U.S.S. Maine docked in Havana Harbor on January 25, 1898

• February 15, 1898 the Maine exploded

• 260 sailors died

• Rush to Judgment

• Claims of sabotage supported by the media

• True cause: accidental

BREAKING NEWS

THE “SPLENDID LITTLE WAR”

• 114 Days

• The Finale of Spain’s overseas empire

• Philippine Theatre - April 30: Commodore George Dewey destroyed Spanish flotilla in Manila Bay

• Relied on Filipino guerillas to hold the islands against Spanish troops

THE “SPLENDID LITTLE WAR”

• Cuban Theatre

• Spanish Navy stationed at Havana

• American Navy blockaded Spanish Navy while American troops transported to Cuba

• Teddy Roosevelt & The Rough Riders

“PEACE”

• August 12, 1898

• Spain must relinquish Cuba

• Puerto Rico

• Manila

THE WAR OF 1898

• The Debate over Annexation• Location: next to Asia

• Natural resources

• Opportunity to Christianize

• The Philippine-American War• 1899 American soldier fired on a group of Filipino nationalists

• Guerilla war lasted 3 years

• Insurgents turned against Americans

Filipino Insurgents

THE WAR OF 1898

• Religion and Empire

• Protestant ministers supported war as opening up opportunities for evangelism

• Protestants favored annexation of Philippines

• Roman Catholics opposed

• Could Filipinos be converted or did evangelization make matters worse?

THE WATER CURE

THE WAR OF 1898

• Organizing the Acquisitions• Philippines added as Territory of U.S.

• William Howard Taft: 1st Governor

• Puerto Rico• Organized to provide a buffer against European aggression

• Guard post for future Isthmus Canal linking Atlantic and Pacific Oceans

• Cuba• Constitution

• Platt Amendment

IMPERIAL RIVALRIES IN EAST ASIA

• The “Open Door”• 1853 Commodore Perry forced Japan to open markets to U.S. goods

• 1895 Japanese expansion

• 1st Sino-Japanese War

• Islands

• Revealed Chinese weakness against foreign aggression

• The Boxer Rebellion• Chinese nationalists opposed to foreign encroachments

• Germany, France, Great Britain divide China into markets for Western goods

• Boxer Rebellion defeated by British, German, Russian, Japanese and U.S. forces

THE OPEN DOOR

U.S. TROOPS IN CHINA

EIGHT NATION ALLIANCE

Britain, Unite States, Australia, British India, Germany, France, Austria-Hungary, Russia, Italy, Japan, 1908 Historica Yamagawa Shuppan

BIG-STICK DIPLOMACY

• Roosevelt’s Rise

• Governor of New York

• Vice President (1900)

• President (1901)

• The Panama Canal

• Opened in 1914

“President Teddy Roosevelt on a SteamShovel,” New York Times, 15 November 1906

BIG-STICK DIPLOMACY

• The Roosevelt Corollary• If a foreign nation had an issue with a Western Nation, it should deal with the

U.S. first and the U.S. would handle it

• The Russo-Japanese War• Japan attacked Russia in 1904

• Japan destroyed Russian fleet

• Roosevelt sponsored meeting between Russia and Japan

• Treaty of Portsmouth: status quo ante

BIG-STICK DIPLOMACY

• Relations with Japan• Japan disavowed claims to the Philippines in return for U.S. recognition of

Japanese control of Korean Peninsula

• San Francisco ordered Japanese students to attend separate but equal schools

• In response to Japanese government protest, Roosevelt forced city to change policy and Japan agreed not to issue any visas for citizens to visit U.S.

• The United States and Europe• 1907 Roosevelt and the Great White Fleet

Waterman, C.E. “Ships Steaming in Column from Hampton Roads, VA December 1907 (Public Domain)

Wainwright, Richard “Teddy Roosevelt on USS Connecticut” 22 February 1909 (Public Domain)

1908 Australian Postcard Welcoming the Great White Fleet

Rogers, W.A. “Welcome Home,” New York Herald, February 22, 1909 (Library of Congress).

BIBLIOGRAPHY NOTE

• All images are in the Public Domain or Licensed under a Creative Commons License.

• Attribution has been given where known.