Agenda for 2/1

Key Concept 7.3:

Participation in a series of global conflicts propelled the United States into a position of international power while renewing domestic debates over the nation’s proper role in the world.

I.               In the late 19th century and early 20th century, new U.S. territorial ambitions and acquisitions in the Western Hemisphere and the Pacific accompanied heightened public debates over America’s role in the world. 

A.              Imperialists cited economic opportunities, racial theories, competition with European empires, and the perception in the 1890s that the Western frontier was “closed” to argue that Americans were destined to expand their culture and institutions to peoples around the globe.

Examples:  Alfred Thayer Mahan’s Influence of Sea Power Upon History (1890), census of 1890 and the “closure of the frontier”, Frederick Jackson Turner’s Significance of the Frontier in American History (1894), Rudyard Kipling’s White Man’s Burden (1895), Venezuelan boundary dispute (1895), overthrow of Hawaiian government (1893), annexation of Hawaii (1898), yellow journalists such as William Randolph Hearst and Joseph Pulitzer

B.         Anti-imperialists cited principles of self- determination and invoked both racial theories and the U.S. foreign policy tradition of isolationism to argue that the U.S. should not extend its territory overseas.

Examples:  Anti-Imperialist League (1898), issue of imperialism in the Election of 1900

C.             The American victory in the Spanish–American War led to the U.S. acquisition of island territories in the Caribbean and the Pacific, an increase in involvement in Asia, and the suppression of a nationalist movement in the Philippines.

Examples:  Treaty of Paris (1898); acquisition of Puerto Rico, Guam, and Philippines, Emilio Aguidaldo and the US-Philippine War (1899-1902), Open Door Policy (1899), Theodore Roosevelt’s “big stick” policy, Roosevelt Corollary (1904), Taft’s dollar diplomacy (1911), US intervention in Mexican civil wars of 1910s, Pancho Villa, Wilson’s “moral diplomacy”, US military intervention in Nicaragua (1912-1933)

1. American Imperialism - APUSH Explained Slide Show

2. American Imperialism - Quote Analysis

3. American Imperialism - Political Cartoon Analysis

4. American Imperialism DBQ

HW - American Imperialism DBQ

• Analyze Docs (CAPP)
• Write Thesis