Imperialism in the Late 1800's and Early 1900's
Imperialism Unit Essay
Imperialism is the policy of extending the role of authority of a nation over a foreign country, usually in material gain. In the late 1800’s and early 1900’s, the United States went through an era of imperialism. At the time, the US was quite powerful, but was looking to continue to spread their territory, make themselves even stronger, and have multiple trade routes to have all the resources they needed and wanted. There were three major policies that the US used during this era. One policy is the Big Stick Diplomacy. The president at the time was Roosevelt and was striving to take control over other territories. His famous quote related to this policy is “Speak softly and carry the big stick”. What he’s saying is that the US will play nice to others if they let us go along with our control. If they resist, we take a stick and beat them. The next policy is Social Darwinism. This policy is referred to the theory of evolution by Charles Darwin. The policy says the strongest people will survive. The US felt that we were the strongest already so we decided to go to weaker countries around the world, take control of them, and spread our culture. The last major policy is the “White Man’s Burden”. This policy stated that we, meaning the US, must help the backwards people of the world, like modern day third world countries. We decided to go to these countries and make them become more “white”, meaning more American by teaching them our culture, or way of living. In this time period, the US took over the territories of Hawaii, the Philippines, Cuba, Panama, and the Panama Canal. The reasons for the US taking over Hawaii was for their resource of sugar and also to locate a naval base there to make us stronger in trade and war. It would become a rest stop for us for the military. Pearl Harbor is located here so that would be our port for trade. The reason why we, the US, took over the Philippines is since we wanted to trade with
Imperialism is the policy of extending the role of authority of a nation over a foreign country, usually in material gain. In the late 1800’s and early 1900’s, the United States went through an era of imperialism. At the time, the US was quite powerful, but was looking to continue to spread their territory, make themselves even stronger, and have multiple trade routes to have all the resources they needed and wanted. There were three major policies that the US used during this era. One policy is the Big Stick Diplomacy. The president at the time was Roosevelt and was striving to take control over other territories. His famous quote related to this policy is “Speak softly and carry the big stick”. What he’s saying is that the US will play nice to others if they let us go along with our control. If they resist, we take a stick and beat them. The next policy is Social Darwinism. This policy is referred to the theory of evolution by Charles Darwin. The policy says the strongest people will survive. The US felt that we were the strongest already so we decided to go to weaker countries around the world, take control of them, and spread our culture. The last major policy is the “White Man’s Burden”. This policy stated that we, meaning the US, must help the backwards people of the world, like modern day third world countries. We decided to go to these countries and make them become more “white”, meaning more American by teaching them our culture, or way of living. In this time period, the US took over the territories of Hawaii, the Philippines, Cuba, Panama, and the Panama Canal. The reasons for the US taking over Hawaii was for their resource of sugar and also to locate a naval base there to make us stronger in trade and war. It would become a rest stop for us for the military. Pearl Harbor is located here so that would be our port for trade. The reason why we, the US, took over the Philippines is since we wanted to trade with