Empire and U.S.

Relations 02/08/2007 07:30:00

Guantanamo Bay
• We get it from the Spanish American War
• The Platt Amendment. 99 year lease in 2001 was up.
• After WWII we get to keep the base in perpetuity
Embedded Histories – America in a World of Empires
• US is born out of Empire
• The Founding Fathers thought of the US as existing within a world of
Empires
o They want to be one of those empires
o They speak about becoming an empire
o Not the same sense of empire, however.
 Continental expansion
o In the late 19th century is becomes an issue about land across
the oceans, before then it’s just land through the continent
• Ideology
o Foreign policy in which empire is present
o National greatness
o The desire to being a great power
o Racialized view of the world
 It isn’t until the 1960s that racism is being challenged
o Gendered view of the world
o Christian Civilizing mission
  Founding fathers not so much
 By 1920-30, it becomes a powerful force
 Missionaries go from America to the middle east
o Economic and Political development model
 they are free land holders and they should have political
rights under British rule
 by the early 19th century land holders are surpassing
land holders in Britain
o Ambivalence toward Revolutions
 they don’t really like the French revolution
 they don’t like the radicalization of the French revolution
in the 1790s
 they start to be scared about the racial system, and the
revolution of Haiti, and that it could happen in the
southern states
• Contact
o The US is unique
o pre-independence the US is a settler colony from many
different European nations
o the settlers outnumber the indigenous people very quickly
o by 1820 80% of the population of all the continental US is
European descent
• Power
o Economic and Military power
 Growth rates compared to the other parts of the world
 <2% for other European nations
 >4% for the US
o empire of liberty or for liberty
  be free, or push liberty around the world
 do you want a highly centralized power that can create
armies and navy
Early American Tensions
• The American Multiplication Table and the Wicked Factions
o Every generation the population is doubling
o you need more land in order to sustain this many people
o Madison comes up with the idea of the Wicked Factions
 the biggest threat are the wicked factions
 more and bigger factions fighting for limited resources
 in order to deal with it is by having more land
 land will separate the factions and to do that you need a
strong federal gov’t
o Madison and Hamilton
 They talk about empires in official documents and how
to protect American democracy
 this fundamental idea leads to the continental
expansion
o 1803 Louisiana Purchase
 doubles the size of the United States in one shot
• Continental Expansion
o Two ways to get resources out and in
o the Mississippi river and the great Lawrence river
o Andrew Jackson is concerned with native removal policies
• Washington Farewell Address
 o You need to avoid entanglement alliances
 Avoiding formal alliances with European powers
 they want to be pushed by treaties to do things with
them or for them
o is not about isolationism is about being a different kind of
power
• The Monroe Doctrine (1823)
o Europeans stay there and US stays here
o they had no way to challenge that
o primarily directed toward the British
 British power is going into the pacific
 the Americans are concerned with the British having an
empire in the Atlantic and the pacific ocean
o it is also directed toward Russia
o against formal colonialism in the Caribbean
Transition: From the Old Foreign Policy to the New (1840s to 1870s)
• The Meaning of Land
o when industrialization kicks in, land is less important
o now economic growth is not by what you grow, but by what
you manufacture
• The Meaning of a Great Power
o they believe they will be an empire, but by the mid 19th
century having an Empire is a defining characteristic of a
being a Great Power
• The Searches for Markets
o on the positive side
 the domestic market is huge
  its ability to consume its own good
o on the negative side
 how to get goods from New York to Kansas
 ships to other countries help out
• The Civilizing Mission
o by the 1860s Americans are founding schools all over the
middle east
o Syria, Iran, Turkey had over 40,000 students in American
schools
o William Henry Seward
 bought Alaska
 Sec. of State for Lincoln
 Production and Westward Moving Empire
 we need to find a way to move the products
 how to maximize their time as a global power
o The Pacific Rim
 Alaska, Hawaii
o Railroads and a Central American Canal
 How to get a canal that will make shipping easier
 he starts to look into the Panama Canal
 45 years later, after he dies the Panama Canal is
created
o Frederick Jackson Turner and the American Frontier
 Historian that gave an address about the frontier
  what happens when we run out of land in the
continental US
 he begins to think if its possible to have a new frontier
beyond the US
o Alfred Thayer Mahan – “The Influence of Sea Power Upon
History”
 Naval strategist
 argues against the notion that oceans are barriers
 Oceans has Highways of Commerce and the Two-Ocean
Navy
 allow for goods to be moved back and forth
 shipping routes become crucial
 we only had a small Atlantic navy
 he makes the push for a Two-Ocean navy
 The Significance of Industry
 The need for the navy is because of the industrial
need for shipping goods and protect those goods
 without the industry there is no need for the navy
o Josiah Strong and the Civilizing Mission
 Sold over 175,000 books in the first year in 1890. “Our
Country”
 In 1909 “Our World”
 he's reaching a massive audience when it was not easy
to do so
o The situation by the 1890s
 Economics
 The US is the biggest economy in the world since
the 1870s
 one of the most volatile in the world
 • massive ups and downs
• growth and depressions over and over again
 Demographics
 until about 1910 population keeps accelerating
 from 1890 to 1910, 20 million people migrate to
the US
• plus natural growth
The Spanish/American/Cuban/Philippine War and American Imperialism
• we acquire Guam, Puerto Rico, Philippines and Cuba
• the ideology
o business interests
 sugar production in Cuba
 Philippines and Guam could be a great place to protect
the seas for American enterprises
o Race, Gender, and the Civilizing Mission
o Platt Amendment (1902)
o The Roosevelt Corollary to the Monroe Doctrine
 it will now be US policy to intervene in Latin America to
protect US business interests
o Teddy Roosevelt as Personification of the Ideology
 Speak softly and carry a big stick
 rough and tumble intellectual
What happens when the US pulls back from the formal control
• Cuba and others gain control
• US and economic power is taking off
• today the US has about 23% of world total output
• Pact-o-mania
o NATO and others
• open door principle of economics is crucial in the US
• If the US has a fair opportunity it can beat any other economic
power in the world
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02/08/2007 07:30:00