Transcript Mandate For Imperialism

Mandate For Imperialism
War, Expansion and Depictions of
Foreign Peoples
Creating An Empire
U.S. Expanded Across the Continent
Ideology: Manifest Destiny
1890s Story: Complex, External
Expansion
Multiple Ideologies: American
Exceptionalism, White Man’s Burden,
Opening China
Dire Necessity
Overproduction: The terrible surplus
Panic of 1893
Labor Unrest
Secretary William Evarts, 1880, “Report
Upon the Commercial Relations of the
United States.”
Multiple Elements
Spanish-American War, 1898
Annexation of Hawaii, 1898
Philippine-American War, 1898-1902
Open Door Policy, 1899
Key Players: A New Kind of Press, U.S.
Gov’t, the public
Spanish American War
Spain’s Empire Decaying
Cuban Revolution
U.S. Economic Interest: 40 Million
U.S. Trade Interest: 100 Million
Saw Cuba as Market for Goods
Policy Issues
Geographic Proximity
Potential Black Republic?
Opposition to Independence by Elites
Cuban Expats
U.S.Looks Abroad
To Be Steward Of Backward Peoples of
the World
Travelogues of Immigrants and of
Foreign People’s--Depicted as Living in
Earlier Times
Anti-Modern Envy
Penny Journalists
Parables of Progress
Passion For Progress Defines Peoples
of the World Through an Ethnocentric
Lens
Foreign Peoples Represented Distance
Between Savagery and Civilization
Cuba 19th Century
60% Black or Mulatto
Slavery Until 1886
War for Independence, 1868-78
Leadership white and Afro-Cuban
Cubans in U.S.
Financial Support From Expat Community
Class and Race in Cuba
Upper Classes Feared Black Power
Another Revolution in 1895
100,000 Spanish Troops in Cuba
Diplomacy
U.S. Gave Spain an Ultimatum 1897:
Pacify Cuba
Spain Made Some Concessions
Repression: “Butcher” Valeriano
Weyler’s “Reconcentrado” Policy
Cubans In U.S. Exerted Influence
Delome Letter
The Press
Rising Jingoism
Yellow Journalism
Hearst and Conflict With Rival
“We Pilfer the News”
Damsel In Distress
Evangelina Cosey Cisneros
Confined in Cuban Jail
Melodramatic Saga Carried in U.S.
Yellow Press
American Women Writing to Queen of
Spain Pleading for Evangelina
Rescued by Hearst Reporter
Race Again
Will it Become a Black Republic?
U.S. Prosperity Required Stability
Spanish Minister to U.S. Wrote, In this
Revolution the Negro Element has the
Most Important Part…the Principal
Leaders are Colored Men…and Eight
Tenths of Their Supporters…The Result
of the War…Will Be a Black Republic”
U.S. Sent the Fleet
After a Diplomatic Tug of War
Sent Fleet to Manila Bay
Spain Met Most U.S. Conditions
Cubans Stepped Up Resistance
Delome Letter
President McKinley
Cool to War--Potentially Destabilizing
and Remembered Civil War
"I've been through one war. I have
seen the dead piled up, and I do
not want to see another.”
Pressured by Public Opinion
On the Brink
March 27, 1898 Ultimatum to Spain:
End Hostilities
Battleship Maine Exploded in Harbor
U.S. Declared War
Did Not Recognize Cuban
Independence
General William Schafter, “Why, Those
People Are No More Fit for Self
Government Than Gunpowder is for
Hell!”
General Samuel Young
“The Insurgents are a lot of
degenerates absolutely devoid of honor
or gratitude. They are no more capable
of self government than the savages of
Africa.”
Major General George Barber
The Cubans are “stupid, given to lying
and doing all things in the wrong
way…Under our supervision…The
People of Cuba May Become a Useful
Race and a Credit to the World; but to
Attempt to Set Them Afloat, During this
Generation, Would Be a Great
Mistake.”
Cuban Reaction
“In the Face of the Present Proposal of
Intervention Without Previous
Recognition of Independence, It is
Necessary for us…to Say That We Must
and Will Regard Such Intervention as
Nothing Less Than a Declaration of
War by the United States Against the
Cuban Revolutionists.”
Not All of U.S. Happy
Labor Union Opposition, Machinist
Journal, “No Outcry When Police Kill
Strikers. Death Comes to Thousands In
Mill and Mine and No Popular Uproar is
Heard.” Mentioned Killing of 17 miners
in Lattimer, PA for Refusing to Move
their Picket Line.
British Elite
“U.S. is a Powerful and Generous
Nation Speaking Our Language, Bred of
Our Race and Having Interests Identical
to Ours.”
Victory
Easy
Cuba Only 90 Miles
Spain Overextended
One Big Battle in Heights Over Havana
T.R.
Ending
 Teller Amendment, April 1898: U.S. Would
Not Establish Permanent Control Over Cuba
 Platt Amendment, February 1901: Allowed
U.S. Right to Intervene for the Preservation of
Cuban Independence, the Maintenance of
Government Adequate for the Protection of
Life, Property and Liberty. Abrogated May
1934.
Spanish Surrender
No Cubans Allowed
Revolutionaries Kept Out of Santiago
U.S. Put Former Spanish Authorities in
Charge
Liberation?
Cuba Accepted Protectorate Status
Under Platt
U.S. Base at Guantanamo Bay
U.S. Took Over Industries
Great Burgeoning of Exports to Cuba:
1901: Cuba Absorbed $26 Million in
U.S. Goods
McKinley
“ We Have Good Money, We Have
Ample Revenues, We Have
Unquestioned National Credit, But What
We Need is New Markets, and as Trade
Follows the Flag, It Looks Very Much as
if We Are Going to Have New Markets.”
Cubans Protested
Protest Marches
Constitutional Convention Protest
War in the Pacific
Philippine American War, 1898
Background: Quest for Markets, China,
Coaling Stations
Filipinos in Revolt led by Aguinaldo
Wrote Their Own Constitution, 1897
U.S. Took Islands From Spain, Guam
and Puerto Rico
Paid $20 Million
Denial of Filipino
Independence
No Filipino Self Determination
Aguinaldo Elected Pres.
Established Gov’t Under Their
Constitutiion
U.S. Fired on Filipinos Feb, 1899
McKinley Made Argument U.S. Intended
“Benevolent Assimilation”
Fighting of War
Brutal, Ugly
Filled With Atrocities
Trench Warfare, Guerilla Warfare
Brought Out the Worst in U.S. Soldiers
Philippines Many Small Islands, Hard to
Defeat Rebels
War
Massive Filipino Resistance
Aquinaldo Moved Around Constantly,
Captured in 1901 and Swore Allegiance
to U.S.
Resistance Ended on Main Islands, But
Fought 4 More Years on Outlying
Islands
Casualites
1/4 Million Filipinos Killed
1/6 Population of Luzon, 1/3 of
Batangas
U.S. Reaction
Workers Opposed Imperialism
Some Black Soldiers Deserted and
Fought with Filipinos
Senator Beveridge, 1900 re: Charges
War Was Cruel, “ We are Not Dealing
With Americans or Europeans, We Are
Dealing With Orientals.”
U.S. Soldiers Wrote
“Caloocan was Supposed to Contain
17,000 Inhabitants. The 20th Kansas
Swept Through it and Now Caloocan
Contains Not One Living Native.”
“Our Fighting Blood Was Up, and We All
Wanted to Kill Niggers…This Shooting
Human Beings Beats Rabbit Hunting All
to Pieces.”
War Correspondent
“Our Men Have Been Relentless, Have
Killed to Exterminate Men, Women,
Children,Prisoners, and Captives, Active
Insurgents and Suspected People From
Lads of Ten Up, The Idea Prevailing
That the Filipino as Such was Little
Better than a Dog.”
Phildelphia Ledger
New Republic
 “Our Soldiers Have Pumped Salt Water Into
Men to Make them Talk, and Have Taken
Prisoners People Who Held Up Their Hands
and Peacefully Surrendered, and an Hour
Later, Without an Atom of Evidence that They
Were Even Insurrectos, Stood Them On a
Bridge and Shot Them Down One by One, To
Drop into the Water Below and Float Down,
as Examples to Those Who Found Their
Bullet Loaded Corpses.”
Senator Beveridge
“The Philippines are ours forever…And
just beyond the Philippines are China’s
illimitable markets…Our largest trade
henceforth must be with Asia. The
Pacific is our Ocean…The Philippines
gives us a base at the door of all the
East. 1900
Hawaii
Major U.S. Holdings
Sugar Bounty Excluded Hawaii
American led coup against the queen
1893
U.S. Minister Stevens Co-opted
U.S. Annexed in 1898 Under Cover of
War-Queen Removed, Dole Sworn In
China Market Key
All Had Spheres: Germany, Britain,
Japan
U.S. Not a Strong Naval Power
Naval Build up in 1880s
Seeking a Strong Presence
Hawaii Will be Coaling and Naval Base
The Open Door
U.S. Secretary John Hay
Called on Powers to Preserve China
Intact and Grant Equal Access to
Markets
Why Empire?
Charles Conant:
Oversaving
Excess Capacity
Depression
Class Conflict
Solutions
War
Socialism
Imperialism for Exports and Capital
“We Want a foreign market for our
surplus products…Fate has written our
policy for us; the trade of the world must
and shall be ours.” Senator Beveridge
Cultural Perspective
American Exceptionalism
Racial Hierarchy
Danger of Revolutions
Images of Spain and Colonies
Degraded, Corrupt v. U.S. which was
virtuous and energetic
Spain: Child like
Filipinos and Cubans as “Black” and in
need of “Civilizing” by U.S.
Incapable of Self Government
Ideological Analysis
Turner: Closing of the Frontier
A.T. Mahan: All Great Powers are Sea
Powers
Theodore Roosevelt: U.S. Going Soft
Anti-Imperialists
Ida Wells Barnett
Andrew Carnegie
William Jennings Bryan
Jane Addams
Grover Cleveland
Samuel Gompers
Anti-Imperialist League
“We do not intend to free but to
subjugate the people of the Philippines.
I am opposed to have the eagle put its
talons on any land.” Mark Twain
McKinley Second Inaugural
“The American People entrenched in
freedom at home, take their love of it
with them wherever they go, and they
reject as mistaken and unworthy the
doctrine that we lose our own liberties
by securing the enduring foundations of
liberty to others.”
And China
When We Got There…
Chinese Not That Eager to Purchase
American Products.
1916 U.S. Exports to China Reached
$32 Million
Same Year Cubans Were Absorbing
$165 Million in U.S. exports
China
Stirred the American Imagination, 400
Million People. “What a Market!”
Chinese Indifferent to American Modes
of Dress and Food
“If Only…” American Traders Moaned,
“Chinese Could be Converted from Rice
to Wheat; If Only The Chinese Would
Adopt U.S. Middle Class Dress…”
Needs v. Wants
Americans saw in China Huge Needs
Chinese wanted little
“If the world were like the Chinese, we
should yet have worn fig leaves.”
Chinese clothing had no pockets--they
don’t carry stuff around
Will have to be educated in culture of
consumption