Richard A. Silocka
By 1898 the United States, like the nations of Europe, was caught up in a wave of imperialism. During the nineteenth century, the United States had filled out her continental domain and reached tentatively into Latin America, Alaska, and the Pacific. The new American imperialism of the twentieth century was a different matter, involving the annexation of far-flung islands in the Caribbean and the Pacific and the use of financial influence and naval power to secure control over the policies of other states.
Imperialism in the United States had roots similar to European imperialism. American capitalists sought new areas in which to invest their surplus money, new sources of raw materials to feed American industry, and new markets for industrial products. Since the achievement of these goals was felt to require the cooperation of government through appropriate foreign diplomatic policies and the use of armed forces, there developed an intimate relationship between business policy and American foreign policy. At the same time, as the economic depression lifted after 1896, a more confident national spirit began to assert itself in the United States. Americans wished to turn away from the painful years of civil war, industrial strife, and political bitterness, and to immerse themselves in some kind of unifying national achievement. Given these strong motives, other arguments for entry into the world of imperial competition fell quickly into place. The application of Social Darwinism to international relations led easily to the conclusion that the United States should use its new economic and military power to protect what the British poet Rudyard Kipling called “the lesser breeds without the law” and show them the road to republican democracy. Finally, it was confidently asserted that the United States must seize and safeguard the approaches to the New World or else its national security would be precarious in a world of grasping imperial powers and military alliances.
In the 1880’s and 1890’s many powerful advocates of imperialism appeared. The most literate imperialist was Captain A. T. Mahan of the United States Navy. In his book
The Influence of Sea Power Upon History
and in many other articles and books, Mahan argued that British power had always depended upon the naval superiority which enabled her not only to act decisively in war, but to build the sinews of economic and military strength by controlling colonies, naval stations, and even world commerce. As the proper inheritor of this British power, Mahan continued, the United States must act quickly to build a large navy and emulate earlier British imperial policies. It was therefore imperative that the United States control the Caribbean and construct a canal through the Central American isthmus. Mahan also expanded the current doctrine of Social Darwinism. The white Anglo-Saxons, he declared, had proved their exceptional power to survive in the evolutionary race and should face up to the challenge of the future, the principal feature of which would be an epic struggle between Eastern and Western civilizations.
A powerful group of young Republicans supported Mahan’s arguments for a great navy and an imperialist foreign policy. Among the most prominent of these were Senators Henry Cabot Lodge of Massachusetts, Albert Beveridge of Indiana, and William McKinley of Ohio. Theodore Roosevelt, who became Assistant Secretary of the Navy in 1897, and John Hay, who became Ambassador to London in 1897 and Secretary of State in 1898, were other prominent Republican imperialists. Their ranks were strengthened by the support of a number of Democrats outside Congress and several influential editors, clergymen, and businessmen. One of the most voluble spokesmen of American imperialism was Josiah Strong, a minister who crusaded for reform in the cities but who also believed firmly in the superiority and “Manifest Destiny” of the American branch of the Anglo-Saxon people. In a widely read book,
Our Country,
he proclaimed that the “peculiarly aggressive traits” developed by Americans were calculated to spread reform, social justice, and “spiritual Christianity” across the face of the earth.
Bowing to this imperialist persuasion, Congress passed a Naval Act in 1890, which appropriated money to construct ships of every class. By 1900 the United States Navy, with an official policy of being “second to none,” had become the world’s third-largest sea force. The Navy was more than ready for the crisis that developed in 1898 in the affairs of Spanish Cuba.