Lecture 3 The Monroe Doctrine revisited, race, and Western civilization

Question 1

The Russo-Japanese war

Answer 1

1905

Question 2

The transatlantic science of race

Answer 2

1. Arthur de Gobineau
2. Herbert Spencer
3. Cesare Lombroso

Question 3

Plessy v. Ferguson

Answer 3

Plessy v. Ferguson(1896), Supreme Court decision upholding the constitutionality of state laws requiring racial segregation in public facilities under the doctrine of “separate but equal”.

Question 4

Mass migration and empire, 1870-1920

Answer 4

1. Cheap labor: second industrial revolution, new markets
2. US imperial expansion as domestic moral regeneration (Theodore Roosevelt )
3. Controversies over non- Anglo Saxons and self government, at home and abroad.

Question 5

The assimilationist view

Answer 5

Emma Lazarus, The New Colossus (1883) - “Give me your tired, your poor, Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free”

Question 6

The nativist view

Answer 6

Thomas Aldrich, The Unguarded Gates (1895) - “These bringing with them unknown gods and rites Those, tiger passions, here to stretch their claws.”

Question 7

The anglosaxonist consensus:

Answer 7

Josiah Strong, Our Country (1885) - “…all men may be lifted up into the light of the highest Christian civilization, are, first, a pure, spiritual Christianity, and, second, civil liberty.” - the Anglo-Saxon, as the great representative of these two ideas.

Question 8

US views on Latin America

Answer 8

• Black Legend
• Catholicism as threat
• Miscegenation as threat

Question 9

Theodore Roosevelt and the progressive “The Monroe Doctrine”, 1899

Answer 9

“…not to be justified by precedent merely, but by the needs of the nation and the true interests of Western civilization” - Expansionism.

Question 10

Civilizational imperialism: liberation and uplift

Answer 10

“Many of the Philippines peoples are utterly unfit for self-government, and show no sign of becoming fit.” - Theodore Roosevelt, The Strenuous Life, 1899

Question 11

Panama Canal

Answer 11

“Highway of civilization” (1904-1914)

Question 12

Roosevelt Corollary

Answer 12

1904 cf. German Weltpolitik
• Dichotomic view of the world: civilization v. barbarism
• Latitudinal axis (North/South) replaces Longitudinal axis (West v.East)
• US hemispheric policeman and global actor
• Compromise at home: benefits expansionism v. costs military occupation
• The Roosevelt Corollary broadly announced the United States intention to exercise an interventionist “police power” in the Caribbean.

Question 13

The challenges to the Monroe Doctrine when entering the “American Century”

Answer 13

• From republicanism to empire: war and military occupation
• From hemispherism to globalism: US power beyond the Americas
• From opposition to cooperation: ‘rapprochement’ with British empire.

Question 14

Insular Cases

Answer 14

A series of opinions by the U.S. Supreme Court in 1901, about the status of U.S. territories acquired in the Spanish–American War. The Supreme Court held that full constitutional rights do not automatically (or ex proprio vigore—i.e., of its own force) extend to all places under American control. This meant that inhabitants of unincorporated territories such as Puerto Rico—”even if they are U.S. citizens”—may lack some constitutional rights (e.g., the right to remain part of the United States in case of de-annexation). - the constitution does not follow the flag.

Question 15

Diaz Doctrine

Answer 15

Called for the states of the Americas to collectively enforce the Monroe Doctrine. Roosevelt rejects this because he wants to keep the option of unilateral intervention.