Walter F. LaFeber - The New Empire - An Interpretation of American Expansion 1860-1898-Cornell University Press (1967)
Walter F. LaFeber - The New Empire - An Interpretation of American Expansion 1860-1898-Cornell University Press (1967)
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By WALTER LAFEBER
Cornell University
C o rn ell P a p erb a ck s
C O R N E L L U N IV E R S IT Y PR ESS
ITH A C A AND LONDON
© 1963 by the American Historical Association
All rights reserved. Except for brief quotations in a review, this
book, or parts thereof, must not be reproduced in any form without
permission in writing from the publisher. For information address
Cornell University Press, 124 Roberts Place, Ithaca, New York 14850.
First published 1963 by Cornell University Press
Published in the United Kingdom by Cornell University Press Ltd.,
2-4 Brook Street, London W1Y 1AA
Second printing 1965
First printing, Cornell Paperbacks, 1967
Second printing 1968
Third printing 1969
Fourth printing 1971
Fifth printing 1975
W alter L aF e b e r
Cornell University
May 196$
Contents
II T he Intellectual Formulation . . . . 62
Frederick Jackson Turner and the American Frontier 63
Josiah Strong and the Missionary Frontier . . . . 72
Brooks Adams, Alfred Thayer Mahan, and the Far
Western F r o n tie r .........................................................80
The Ideological C onsensus............................................. 95
Acknowledgments . . . 427
Index • . 429
THE NEW EMPIRE
An Interpretation of American Expansion
1860-1898
Years o f Preparation, 1860-1889
with the history of the South, this demarcation has certain values.
But for historians of American diplomacy this emphasis on the
South can entice them to take their eyes off events during these
years which had more importance in the making of foreign pol
icy. Certainly the energy and time devoted to waving the bloody
shirt in the 1870’s did divert some attention from external affairs;
and no doubt the beginnings of industrialism in the South deserve
attention since many southern industrialists soon joined their
compatriots in the N orth in the search for foreign markets. A ll
this can be granted and the point can still be emphasized that, as
far as the internal dynamics of American foreign policy are con
cerned, the most important events occurred outside the South.10
W hen coupled with the maturing of the economy, especially
in the industrial segment, America’s western history provides
valuable insights into the formulation of foreign policy after
Seward. This is so for several reasons. First, the American W est
supposedly held the great open frontier of opportunities for both
individual farmers seeking land and for eastern and midwestern
industrialists searching for markets and raw materials. W hen in
the 1880’s many Americans feared that this frontier was closing,
they reacted in the classic manner of searching farther west for
new frontiers, though primarily of a commercial, not landed,
nature. This swept them into the Pacific and Asiatic area and
hence into one of the maelstroms of world power politics. Sec
ond, when the belief spread that the internal frontier had quit
expanding and had begun to stagnate, the new ly restored Union
faced an intensified internal threat. This came from bankrupt
farmers, unemployed laborers and miners, and bitter social critics
including some of the foremost novelists of the day. Foreign
policy formulators and many businessmen viewed expanding
Seward
In the unfolding drama of the new empire W illiam H enry
Seward appears as the prince of players. Grant, Hamilton Fish,
W illiam M. Evarts, James G . Blaine, Frederick T . Frelinghuysen,
and Thomas F. Bayard assume secondary roles. Although Seward
left the stage in the first act of the drama, only a few of the other
players could improve on his techniques, and none could ap
proach his vision of American empire.
Henry Adams described Seward near the end of his career as
“a slouching, slender figure; a head like a wise macaw; a beaked
nose; shaggy eyebrows; unorderly hair and clothes; hoarse voice;
offhand manner; free talk, and perpetual cigar.” Seward never
theless attracted an urbane, educated person like young Adams,
for the Secretary of State, like Adams, was an intellectual in 786
46 Seward, W orks , III, 618; V , 246; Stutz, “Seward,” 26; Charles Vevier,
“T he Collins Overland Line and American Continentalism,” Pacific H is
torical Review, XXVIII (August, 1959), 237-252.
Years of Preparation 31
nephew, George F. Seward, to sign a trade treaty with Korea,
but this attempt also failed.47 Fifteen years later, however, Korea
grudgingly opened its doors to American traders and mission
aries.
H enry Adams summed it up: “The policy of Mr. Seward was
based upon this fixed idea [of expansion], which, under his active
direction, assumed a development that even went somewhat too
far and too fast for the public.” Seward’s Caribbean plans, espe
cially the purchase of the Danish W est Indies and Santo Domingo,
came to nothing. N or did he bring Hawaii into the American
orbit when he wanted. But he did outline in some detail his ideas
of an integrated empire w ith a great continental base which
would produce vast quantities of goods for hundreds of millions
of consumers in Asia. H e did see the completion of the trans
continental railroad, industries supported by tariffs and internal
improvements, and the acquisition of Alaska and M idway as w ay
stations to the Asian market. H e accomplished much of his
work, moreover, despite the G vil W ar and a strong antiexpan
sionist feeling in the late 1860’s.48
T he antiexpansionists effectively used several arguments to
thwart Seward’s ambitions. As noted earlier, they claimed that
the United States suffered from a land glut already; no more
land could properly be developed. If the Union acquired more
territory, it might be Latin-American, and this would aggravate
the race problem. Others argued that the United States should
avoid a colonial policy, especially at a time when England was
trying to dispose of her own unprofitable outlying areas. Finally,
47 T yler Dennett, “Seward’s Far Eastern Policy,” American Historical
Review , XXVIII (O ctober, 1922), 45-62; Knight Biggerstaff, “T he Offi
cial Chinese Attitude toward the Burlingame Mission,” American His
torical R eview , XLI (July, 1936), 682-702; Stutz, “Seward,” 31-35.
48 Adams, “T he Session,” 54; Bancroft, Seward , II, 479-491. Also Dozer,
“Anti-Expansionism during the Johnson Administration,” 253-275. For
mention o f Seward as the “chief link” between expansion before and
after the Civil W ar, see Julius Pratt, “T he Ideology o f American Ex
pansion,” in Essays in H onor of William E . D odd . . . » edited by A very
Craven (Chicago, 1935), 346.
$2 The N e w Empire
some antiexpansionists urged financial retrenchment in order to
start American industries and farms booming again rather than
paying fancy price tags for noncontiguous territory.4® T he
most notable characteristic of these arguments is not that they
were effective in the late 1860’s, but that they melted away in
large measure after the 1870’s, as the frontier closed, an open-
door commercial policy eliminated colonial problems, and Amer
ican factories and farms boomed so successfully that the result
ing glut of goods threatened to inundate the econom y. W ith
these changes, Seward’s successors were able to complete much
of what he had been unable to finish.
Evarts
From 1877 to 1881 one of the more underrated Secretaries of
State hastened the progress of this empire. Born in 1818 of a
distinguished family, W illiam M. Evarts had graduated with
17 Josiah Strong, Our Country: Its Possible Future and Its Present Crisis
(N e w York, 1885), 29.
18 Ibid., 153-158.
The Intellectual formulation 15
into urban, industrialized areas. But the W est developed with
the railroad, which immediately spawned industry. The farms,
for the most part, follow ed or arrived concurrently with this
industrialization. H e concluded that the innumerable, complex
problems inherent in an urban-industrialized society would strike
the W est much earlier in the process of its settlement and with
a greater impact than when they had struck the East. The W est
had to be prepared or a social breakdown might result.19
This sense of urgency throbbed throughout Strong’s writing,
and it was intensified by the observation that modern history
moved many times faster than ancient, “for the pulse and the
pace of the world have been marvelously quickened during the
nineteenth century.” H e outlined the communication and trans
portation revolutions, the astonishing changes in modern science,
and the rapidity with which “great ideas” sprouted. The “western
world in its progress is gathering momentum like a falling body.”
H is view of history, like that of H enry Adams’ “law,” saw events
moving ever faster. Out of this insight he evolved his own law:
tw o “great principles” were at work in history—the develop
ment of the individual and the organization of society. The ac
celerated pace of history, caused by the discovery and uses of
the steam engine and electricity, was creating a centripetal force
that ever more rapidly transformed diversity into unity. This
tendency toward centralization appeared not only in industry,
but in politics and society as w ell. The effects of such a basic
change in Man’s history could be perilous since it was occurring
so rapidly that Man could not adequately adjust to it. “Thought
ful men everywhere have become expectant of great social
changes,” Strong warned. “Many expect revolution,” and “prob
ably” the Christian church was all that stood^in the path of such
a revolution.20
38 See Mahan to Gen. Francis V . Greene, Sept. 17, 1900, Alfred Thayer
Mahan Papers, Library of Congress, Washington, D.C. James C. Malin
has caught the importance of Mahan’s writings for the technology of
the late nineteenth century in The Contriving Brain and the Skillful
Hand in the United States, 344.
39 A. T . Mahan, The Influence of Sea Power upon History, 1660-1783
(Boston, 1890), 53, 28. This postulate is mentioned two more times in
the famous first chapter, pages 70 and 83-84.
The Intellectual Formulation St
what has been called the first link in the chain which makes sea
power.” But “the increase of home consumption . . . did not
keep up with the increase of forth-putting and facility of distri
bution offered by steam.” The United States would thus have to
embark upon a new frontier, for “whether they w ill or no, Amer
icans must now begin to look outward. The growing production
of the country demands it. An increasing volume of public senti
ment demands it.” The theoretical and actual had met; the pro
ductive capacity of the United States, having finally grown too
great for its continental container and having lost its landed
frontier, had to turn to the sea, its omnipresent frontier. The
mercantilists had viewed production as a faculty to be stimulated
and consolidated in order to develop its full capabilities of pulling
wealth into the country. But Mahan dealt with a productive com
plex which had been stimulated by the government for years and
had been centralized and coordinated by corporate managers.
H e was now concerned with the problem of keeping this society
ongoing without the problems of underemployment and result
ing social upheavals.40
Reversing the traditional American idea of the oceans as a
barrier against European intrigue, Mahan compared the sea to
“a great highway; or better, perhaps . . . a wide common, over
which men pass in all directions.” T o traverse this “highway”
a nation needed a merchant marine; Mahan made this the second
part of his postulate. In his 1890 volume he expressed doubts
whether a navy could be erected without the solid foundation of
a carrying fleet.41 This, however, was one of the few times in the
decade that Mahan emphasized the necessity of a merchant
marine. As the 1890’s progressed, he could look about him and
T he Ideological Consensus
These four men typified and/or stimulated the thought of
American expansionists in the 1890’s. Their views provide a
start (and this chapter pretends to be no more than that) in
understanding the avowed reasons for accelerating the develop
ment of the new empire at the end of the century. In some re
spects these men disagreed with each other. But on some of the
most vital issues they reached a substantial consensus.
A ll agreed with Turner that the 1890’s marked the closing of
“the first period of American history” and the beginning of a
new epoch. T hey defined this as a crucial period partly because
they discerned the disappearance of the landed frontier. Turner,
o f course, made this central to his thesis, but the other three men
also recognized to a lesser degree the importance of the frontier
in their writings. This frontier, as Turner declared, provided
the econom ic support for political and social democracy. The
others, using as evidence either the economic importance of the
frontier and/or the glut of material wealth produced by Amer
ican factories and farms, also interpreted the cause of the crisis in
econom ic terms. This was the age o f Econom ic Man, and these
49 Beringause, Brooks Adams, 376; Ford, “Memoir,” 355-356.
pS The New Empire
writers, as they traced the crisis to economic causes, reflected the
emphasis of their time.50
Many Americans displayed their anxiety in one particularly
fascinating way; they constantly compared their era w ith the
late stages of the Roman Empire. Turner’s most influential
teacher at W isconsin, W illiam F. Allen, published in 1890 a
seminal book on the Roman Empire, which opened to Turner
new insights into American history. Brooks Adams made an
extensive study of Rome in order to trace the working o f the
“law,” and both he and Henry, although they preferred medi
eval history, were not above buttressing their pessimism w ith
references from the three centuries after Augustus. Mahan’s
study of the Punic W ars had amazingly transformed him from
an anti-imperialist in the early 1880’s to the foremost exponent
o f an offensive policy in the follow ing decade. H e compared
the “barbarians” of Asia in his own time w ith the barbarians on
the Roman frontiers who remained peaceful while Caesar held
a strong hand over them, but who overran Rome once the
Empire’s desire for peace made it soft. Cecil Spring-Rice, Sec
retary o f the British Embassy in W ashington and a close friend
of Roosevelt and both Adamses, justifiably complained to a
close friend after reading Law of Civilization and Decay:
“Everyone has a new prescription for humanity and a new
diagnosis. T hey all begin with the Roman Empire and point out
resemblances.” 51
Americans balanced the pessimism and fear implicit in this
13 Blaine to Morgan, June 21, 1881, Foreign Relations, 1881, 768; Blaine
to Harrison, Sept. 23, 1891, and Harrison to Blaine, Oct. 1, 1891, Corre
spondence of Harrison and Blaine.
14 Messages and Papers of the Presidents, IX, 10; A. T . Volw iler, “Harri
son, Blaine, and American Foreign Policy, 1889-1893,” Proceedings of
the American Philosophical Society, LXXIX (N ovem ber, 1938), 637-
639; Blaine to Harrison, Aug. 10, 1891, Correspondence of Harrison and
Blaine; Reid to Harrison, Oct. 9, 1891, Harrison to Reid, July 12, 1891,
Harrison to Reid, Oct. 21, 1891, all in Harrison MSS. For Harrison’s
The Strategic Formulation Ill
27 Harrison, Speeches, 287, 325, 388, 409, 415, 467-468, 499-500, 522,
540-541; also see the President’s commendation o f reciprocity in Messages
and Papers of the Presidents, IX, 313.
122 T he N e w Empire
armored battleships which could enjoy a wide cruising range
and hold their ow n in pitched major naval battles on the high
seas found inadequate support.
A congressional consensus on the battleship theory occurred
after the arrival of Benjamin F. Tracy as Harrison’s Secretary
o f the N avy. The tw o events were directly related. T he
President-elect had named Tracy in an effort to m ollify com
peting Republican factions in N ew York, but Harrison had done
so only after receiving assurance from several close advisers that
Tracy could handle a post which the Chief Executive regarded
“as one of the most important in my Cabinet.” As the Boston
Journal reported, Congress was in a big-navy mood, and no
cabinet post promised “more to statesmen w ho are ambitious to
increase their reputations.” A leading lawyer and judge in N ew
York during the 1870’s and 1880’s, Tracy fully lived up to
expectations. Besides initiating the battleship fleet, he organized
the Bureau of Construction and Repair to eliminate much of
the red tape which had restricted the designing and building of
new ships. H e also established the Naval Reserve in 1891, issued
a contract for the first American submarine in 1893, presided
over the production of the first heavy rapid-fire guns, smokeless
powder, torpedoes, and heavy armor, and reversed a former
N avy Department decision in order to save the Naval W ar Col
lege, where Mahan’s The Influence of Sea Power upon H istory
was gestating.28
T racy’s first annual report in December, 1889, set the new
battleship navy on its course, but the Secretary received much
help in properly arranging the stage for rapid congressional
action. W hile writing the report, he worked closely w ith Sena
tor Eugene Hale, a powerful big-navy advocate from Maine.
T he confrontation o f American and German naval units at
67 Public Opinion , Feb. 4,1893,415-417; Feb. 11, 1893, 439-441; Feb. 18,
1893, 466-467; Feb. 25, 1893, 489; March 11, 1893, 540.
68 Spreckels is quoted in Dozer, “Anti-Imperialism,” 220.
The Strategic Formulation 149
not simply a half-century-old antique. The Harrison adminis
tration’s Hawaiian policy is atypical when placed in the whole
of its foreign policy. Before early 1893, it had emphasized com
mercial expansion and had focused on Latin America. The Inter-
American Conference, Blaine’s reciprocity, the attempt to ob
tain strategic bases in Haiti and Santo Domingo, and the striking
at European interests in the Chilean revolution point up the prin
cipal features of the administration’s policy in foreign affairs.
Under the impetus of the depression, to which w e shall now
turn, the Cleveland administration would vigorously reassert
the tenets of the new empire in Latin America.
Hawaii would have to wait until the Venezuelan episode and
the war with Spain established American supremacy in the
W estern Hemisphere. O nly then would the State Department be
able to give the attention that area deserved. But as Frederick
Jackson Turner observed, “it is one of the profoundest lessons
that history has to teach, that political relations, in a highly de
veloped civilization, are inextricably connected with economic
relations.” 69 The Hawaiian policies of the United States could
not escape the logic of this dictum. W ithin six years after they
left office, the United States achieved many of the strategic goals
outlined by Harrison and Blaine in both Latin America and the
Pacific.
Moore Teller: Defender of the West (Caldwell, Idaho, 1941), 228; Mes
sages and Papers of the Presidents, IX, 444-445.
12 Mark D. Hirsch, William C. Whitney: Modem Warwick (N e w
York, 1948), 475-481; W . C. W hitney to Cleveland, Oct. 31 and N ov. 22,
1894, Cleveland MSS; W hitney to O lney, Sept. 28, 1895, Richard Olney
papers, Library o f Congress, W ashington, D.C.
13 “W ill There Be a Union of Protectionist and Free-Silver Forces?”
Literary Digest, June 16, 1894, 181; Reed’s interview is in Fortnightly
Review (L ondon), LXI (June, 1894), 837-838; Nevins, Grover Cleveland,
608-609; W illiam A. Robinson, Thomas B. Reed, Parliamentarian (N ew
York, 1930), 315-316; Brooks Adams to Lodge, May 6, April 11, 1894,
i¡¡8 The N e w Empire
Several aspects of the bimetallist scheme were of particular
significance. First, it appealed to Republican protectionists as a
means of selling surplus goods abroad without a modification of
high tariff principles; second, since this selling could most easily
be done in the silver standard nations in Latin America and Asia,
commercial attention focused on these areas; third, the proposal
singled out Great Britain as the obstacle to an international
bimetallist agreement. Believing foreign markets to be a tonic
for the nation’s economic illness, the bimetallists blamed England
for the inability o f the United States to reach these markets
through a bimetallist standard. This conclusion carried sharp
connotations for the bimetallists’ foreign policy.1451
The Cleveland administration answered such arguments by
also relating the monetary standard to international trade. In a
letter to the Chicago Business Men’s meeting in April, 1895,
the President emphasized that debased m oney would work only
if the United States was “isolated from all others.” But if it be
came commercially isolated, “American civilization . . . would
abjectly fail in its high and noble mission.” H e wrote a southern
governor, “I have never ceased to wonder w hy the people of
the South, furnishing so largely as they do products which are
exported for gold, should be willing to submit to the disadvan
tages and loss of silver monometallism.” 16
Secretary Carlisle rephrased Cleveland’s arguments when he
gave the Secretary of the Interior, H oke Smith, a lesson in inter
national finance in August, 1894. Smith, a Georgian who would
leave the Cleveland cabinet over the silver issue in 1896, asked
Carlisle w hy the government could not adopt free coinage of
silver. Carlisle wrote a long reply, of which more than half ex-
N ov. 24, 1893, Jan. 13, April 23, 1894, Lodge MSS. See also E. Benjamin
Andrews, “The Bimetallist Committee of Boston and N e w England,”
Quarterly Journal of Economics, VUI (April, 1894), 319-327.
14 See, for example, Textile Record, April, 1894, quoted in Nation,
April 26, 1894, 3°3*
15 Commercial and Financial Chronicle, April 20, 1895, 690; Cleveland
to H on. J. M. Stone, April 26, 1895, Cleveland MSS.
The Economic Formulation ijp
plained the international trading aspects of the silver-gold con
troversy. If America w ent on a silver basis, Carlisle insisted, the
nation would receive payment for its goods in silver, but would
have to pay for purchases w ith gold. Carlisle repeated this same
argument in his annual report of 1894.16
16 Carlisle to Smith, Aug. 11, 1894, Cleveland MSS; see also Carlisle’s
views in his Annual Report , 1894, lxxiii.
17 Prof. Frank W . Taussig has observed that most tariff controversies
in American history have been “concerned with the production o f wealth
rather than its distribution” ( “Rabbeno’s American Commercial Policy,”
Quarterly Journal of Economics , X [October, 1895], 109). For an ex
cellent summary o f this type o f tariff argument, see article by David
Ames W ells in the N e w York W orld , Aug. 8, 1893, in Bayard MSS.
iS o The N e w Empire
reciprocity. T hey simply criticized the Republicans for not tak
ing the idea to its logical conclusions. The Cleveland forces at
tacked “sham reciprocity” w ith the tw o telling points that, first,
the United States as an agricultural nation was, under Republican
reciprocity, encouraging trade relations with other agricultural
nations, and little could be gained from this; second, that the
retaliatory provision of the 1890 tariff had created ill w ill for
the United States in Latin America. But the Democratic tariff
plank was most emphatic in proclaiming that the Republican
tariff had been “a fraud” in that it enriched the very few . The
Democrats espoused a revenue-only tariff.18
Cleveland’s letter of acceptance dealt largely with the tariff
issue, but the statement displayed little concern with foreign
markets. Other Democratic spokesmen, including W illiam L.
W ilson of W est Virginia, who would lead the Cleveland forces
in the House should the Democrats win the election, also slighted
the foreign trade aspects of the tariff.19
The onslaught of the depression, however, drastically changed
these viewpoints. The three men most responsible for the success
of the administration’s tariff plan, Cleveland, W ilson, and Senator
Roger Q. Mills of Texas, began to emphasize in late 1893 that
the tariff’s main objective would be to help American manu
facturers compete in foreign markets. The President stressed
this aspect of the tariff measure in his annual message of 1893.
23 House Miscellaneous Document No. 443, 53rd Cong., ist Sess. (serial
3156), 257-260, 324, 327, 329, 326; Andrew Carnegie, The Miscellaneous
Writings of Andrew Carnegie, ed. Burton J. Hendrick (Garden City,
N .Y ., 1933), II, 31-32.
/t>4 T he N e w Empire
that he had fallen into the trap by agreeing, “It is satisfactory.” 24
In spite of W ilson’s arguments, the majority of those appear-*
ing before the committee wanted to retain the 1890 measure.
H igh tariff arguments so loaded down the testimony, in fact,
that W ilson insisted that only a small portion of the hearings be
published.25 But the hearings had little bearing on the bill as it
was introduced into the House. W ilson and Cleveland had care
fully decided what would cure the illness of the American econ
omy. T he medicine was going to be given whether the patient
liked it or not.
The pall of economic stagnation overhung all the tariff de
bates. In presenting the measure on the House floor, W ilson ad
mitted that it had been devised “in the shadow and depression of
a great commercial crisis.” H e did not wish to discuss the causes
of the trouble, though “there seems to be some recurring cycle,”
but he asserted without a hint of doubt that the stagnation could
be lifted by lightening taxation and loosening “the fetters of
trade.” 26 The bill he presented promised to do just that.
The proposed tariff helped the sugar trust by reimposing a
duty of one-fourth cent per pound on refined sugar, and the bill
protected American petroleum with the only reciprocity clause
embodied in the bill. One distinct change appeared in the re
placement of specific rates w ith ad valorem tariffs. But most im
portant, the measure levied no duty on many raw materials
needed for manufacturing. This free list contained more than
340 subdivisions, including coal, lumber, iron ore, hides, raw
sugar, cotton, w ool, raw silk, and salt. W ilson indicated the
extent of reform when he noted that the average rate on imports
would drop about 18 per cent under these new provisions.27
24 House Miscellaneous Document No. 443, 53rd Cong., ist Sess. (serial
3156), 268-273.
25Festus P. Summers, William L. Wilson and Tariff Reform (N e w
Brunswick, N .J., 1953), 167-170; House Report No. 234, 53rd Cong., 2nd
Sess. (serial 3269), 1.
26 Congressional Record , Appendix, 53rd Cong., 2nd Sess., 193.
27 In introducing the bill, W ilson said that his committee was not
The Economic Formulation IS }
T o regain this lost revenue, and as a sop to the Populists, an in
come tax was imposed on earnings above $4,000 annually. This
clause was the main target when the Senate later mutilated the
bill.
As explained by W ilson, the measure was based on tw o as
sumptions: that the United States now enjoyed a mature farm
and industrial economy, and that trade expansion would solve
the three major problems of the current stagnation—labor un
rest, farm surpluses, and inadequate revenue. Free raw materials
provided the key, since they would enable this mature industrial
system to acquire the necessary markets. W ilson summarized
the argument when he stated that free raw materials would result
in “the enlargement of markets for our products in other coun
tries, the increase in the internal commerce and in the carrying
trade of our own country.” A ll these factors would “insure a
growing home market.” In effect, W ilson was forecasting that
the United States would build its home market by enlarging its
foreign market. H e used iron and steel as an example. As far
as this industry was concerned, “W e could throw down to-day
our tariff walls and defy the world’s competition.” W ith better
tariff provisions “w e w ill not only supply our own country, but
w e w ill go out and build up other great countries with our
products.” This campaign need not be limited to iron and steel,
however, as the United States possesses “in many lines of pro
duction, the manufacturing supremacy of the world.” 28
Focusing upon this free raw materials clause, the minority
on the W ays and Means Committee launched a strong attack
against W ilson. These dissenters alleged that the provision would
injure laborers. N ot only would workers in industries which
W hat hope is there, Mr. Chairman, for a labor strike when produc
tion has outrun the demands o f the home market . . . ? D o w e
not know when supply has outrun remunerative demand, the em
ployer welcomes a strike . . . ? But with the world for a market,
with hundreds o f millions o f consumers for our iron and steel and
other products, with all our mills running and orders ahead, labor
can achieve its own emancipation and treat on equal terms for its
own wages.29
29 House Report N o. 234, 53rd Cong., 2nd Sess. (serial 3269), 5, 16,
20; Congressional Record , Appendix, 53rd Cong., 2nd Sess., 196-197.
80 House Report N o. 234, 53rd Cong., 2nd Sess. (serial 3269), 8, 10.
T he Economic Formulation 167
explained that freer trade would raise laborers’ wages. Cockran
declared: “W e want to raise the value o f labor in this country
by increasing its production. W e want to stimulate production
so that w e can get into the markets of the world and command
tribute from the people of every nation that finds a dwelling
place upon this globe.” But it was the Populist, Simpson, who
gave the most sophisticated argument for the reformers. H e
based his case on the fact that there had once been a “great and
boundless W est” where “surplus labor . . . could find an out
let.” N ow , however, since the frontier had closed, “there is no
more new country to be thus opened, and the great tide of popu
lation is turned back again upon the East.” Fortunately this oc
curred at a time when no other world power could match
American economic might. N o w “w e can safely tear down the
custom-houses and challenge the world for competition in its
markets.” Democrats Josiah Patterson and James C. McDearmon,
both from Tennessee, follow ed w ith passages even more purple.
Patterson concluded his speech by exclaiming, “Sir, restriction is
not progress; liberty is progress, and free trade points the w ay to
achieve the manifest destiny of the American people.” 81
Protectionist representatives declared that if W ilson really
wanted to help the farmers he should strengthen, not abolish,
reciprocity. T hey believed that “the achievements of reciprocity
mark the triumph o f American trade in the markets of the
w orld.” W ilson and his backers disagreed. T hey dissented, not
because they liked Republican reciprocity less, but because they
loved unlimited reciprocity more. Democrats attacked this
“sham” on three counts. T hey charged that it helped manu
facturers, but not farmers, since it was aimed at Latin-American
nations whose products were largely agrarian. Second, its re
taliatory measures had provoked ill w ill from several nations,
notably Colombia. Third, the President had been given this
81 Congressional Record , 53rd Cong., 2nd Sess., 945, 776, Appendix, 79.
168 The N e w Empire
power of retaliation to use at his discretion. The Democrats
claimed this gave him “the power to establish the commercial
policy of the first Napoleon.” 32
The bill passed 204-140 on February 1, 1894. As it left the
House, the measure specifically exempted all previous reciproc
ity treaties from abrogation. Moreover, it kept and strengthened
the reciprocity principle; raw sugar remained on the free list,
and this item had been the basis of most of America’s reciprocity
treaties. In effect, the Democrats tried to extract the trade bene
fits from reciprocity without straining diplomatic relations and
enlarging executive power. It was not a radical tariff. Senator
Mills called it “only a Sabbath D ay’s journey on the w ay to
reform.” Perhaps the best description was the nickname attached
when W ilson first introduced it: “The N ew England Manufac
turing Bill.” 33
During the next five months the Senate mangled the W ilson
measure beyond recognition. W hen it emerged from the upper
house, the over-all protection rates had risen only slightly, but
the free raw materials list contained only three items: w ool,
lumber, and copper. Most of the reasons for this result were
political. Five can be singled out. First, leadership in the Senate
passed out of the hands of Cleveland’s followers. Roger Q . Mills
and Daniel W . Voorhees agreed with the President and W ilson
as to the role free raw materials were to play in American foreign
trade. But due to Mills’ ineffectiveness and Voorhees’ age and
illness, other men, many of whom were enemies o f Cleveland,
assumed the leadership.34 Second, Cleveland made crucial polit
ical mistakes. His refusal to compromise on the silver repeal and
his determination to use all the patronage at his disposal to pass
the repeal, sadly depleted his power. H e alienated the tw o sena-
82 Congressional Record , 53rd Cong., 2nd Sess., 1417-1418, Appendix,
826; Congressional Record , 53rd Cong., 2nd Sess., 681, 1422.
83 Ibid., 659; Laughlin and W illis, Reciprocity , 242; Barnes, Carlisle,
323; Nevins, Grover Cleveland, 564, Summers, Wilson , 174-175.
84 John R. Lambert, Arthur Pue Gorman (Baton Rouge, La., 1953),
201-203.
The Economic Formulation 169
tors from N ew York because of personal incidents. An attempt
to ram a Supreme Court nomination down Senate throats led
to a rebellion and to Cleveland’s ultimate defeat on the nomina
tion. After rejecting conciliation late in the fight, the President
wrote a bitter letter, which was made public and consequently
stiffened the back of the Senate. After this W ilson found it im
possible to obtain compromises in the Senate-House confer
ences.3563
Third, representatives of the Sugar Trust, the National Lead
Trust, coal interests, Standard Oil, and other opponents of the
bill exerted their considerable influence on key senators. W ilson
had ignored these interests when writing the House measure, but
senators were more susceptible.38 The result was a hodgepodge
o f amendments protecting varied private interests, which the
depleted Cleveland forces were unable to override. Fourth, the
income tax provision alienated many influential businessmen who
could have exerted considerable pressure. Powerful Senator
David B. H ill of N ew York intensely disliked this part of the
tariff bill. Fifth, Arthur Pue Gorman of Maryland opposed
Cleveland more bitterly as the fight progressed. Gorman did
not rewrite the bill’s provisions in the Senate (James K. Jones
of Arkansas handled this), but he did control the votes, and so
was the man to win if Cleveland hoped to have his way. Gor
man’s golden rule was to keep the Democratic party united what
ever the cost. Believing that compromises on the measure were
permissible if in the end it could be passed by a majority of Demo
crats, Gorman climaxed the struggle when he castigated the
President on the Senate floor because Cleveland would not mod
erate his adamant stand for free raw materials.37
“Symptoms of Revolution”
On the first day of November, 1894, Cleveland’s good friend,
N ew York banker James Stillman, told the President that “con
trary to general expectation,” the tariff bill had “not produced
any great revival in business.” The depression was entering into
its deepest trough. Looking back a decade later, Cleveland com
mented that after December 1, 1894, there “followed a time of
bitter disappointment and miserable depression, greater than any
that had before darkened the struggles of the Executive branch
of the Government to save our nation’s financial integrity.” Con
ditions improved in February, 1895, when the Morgan-Belmont
syndicate stepped in to save the Treasury’s gold reserve. This
move ushered in several months of business improvement includ
ing a boom in iron and steel. But as the N ew York correspondent
of the London Economist warned in early fall, “business condi
tions in the United States have not even approximately returned
to their normal level.” Overproduction in iron and steel triggered
51 Bradstreet’s, Jan. 19, 1895, 36; May 26, 1894, 322-323; Aug. 31, 1895,
546; Commercial and Financial Chronicle, Jan. 19, 1895, 107-109; Econ
omist, Aug. 3, 1895, 1022; Public Opinion, Sept. 26, 1895, 397.
The Economic Formulation 179
But when these exports could not match the import of foreign
goods and American securities returned by European investors,
“it is inevitable that gold w ill leave this country.” 52
As gold continued to flow outward, business circles cried that
they would have “to continue to suffer this sort of financial night
mare every time our international trade statistics indicate an
unfavourable trade balance.” One authority publicly prescribed
the cure which many businessmen were considering. A. S. Heidel
bach, the senior member of a large international banking firm in
N ew York, declared that in order to end the gold out-flow, the
balance of trade in merchandise would have to reach “at least”
$350,000,000 a year. Some disputed his figures, but few disputed
his solution.53
The selling of American securities not only endangered the
gold reserve but also threatened to stunt the growth of the in
dustrial econom y through financial starvation. Reports issued
by Bankers* Magazine and W orthington C. Ford, Chief of the
Bureau of Statistics, clearly explained the relationship between
foreign funds and American economic strength. The irony of
this situation lay in thç fact that surplus money glutted Amer
ican banks. Secretary Carlisle noted in his 1895 report that
money had been hoarded “until it nearly reached the proportions
o f a panic.” Business magazines concurred with this view. Much
o f this m oney abjured depression-ridden domestic securities and
moved into foreign markets. Americans actually increased their
investments abroad by almost $250,000,000 during the depres
sion. Most of this m oney w ent to Canada and Latin America.
N ot only did this movement o f capital leave American indus
tries in their stagnant condition, but it greatly aggravated the362
62 Bradstreet's, June 29, 1895, 403; Economist, Oct. 12, 1895, 1339-
1340; D ec. 7, 1895, 1592.
63 Economist, N ov. 2, 1895, 1435; Alfred S. Heidelbach, “W h y G old
Is Exported,” Forum , XVIII (February, 1895), 647-051; W orthington C.
Ford, “Foreign Exchanges and the M ovement of Gold, 1894-1895,” Yale
Review , IV (August, 1895), 137-138; Commercial and Financial Chron
iclet March 30, 1895, 542-543.
i So The N e w Empire
balance of payments by enlarging the American demand for
foreign exchange.64
Industrialists began to realize a harsh fact. As Bradstreet's
commented, money would flow into American factories only
when there would be “developments of commercial activity and
legitimate business in lines which, up to the moment, cannot be
clearly foreseen.” This journal added that “if business becomes
active,” European investors would also “at once come back to the
market.” Bankers’ Magazine agreed with this analysis. T o restore
this commercial activity, however, demand had to be found.55
By late 1895 the business community and the Cleveland ad
ministration agreed that exports provided one solution for the
economic problems. In the business community no one sum
marized this agreement better than H enry W . Cannon, President
o f the Chase National Bank. W riting in February, 1895, Cannon
stated that in order to prove to European investors that the
United States could maintain gold payments, “it is necessary
. . . that w e should compete in the markets of the world with
our goods and commodities, and also reconstruct our currency
54 Bankers' Magazine, XLIX (August, 1894), 97-98; XLIX (January,
1895), 156; Hoffmann, “Depression of the Nineties,” 156-157; James A.
Stillman to W illiam E. Curtis of the Treasury Department, July 31, 1894,
Cleveland MSS; N oyes, Thirty Years of American Finance, 217-218;
Bradstreet's, June 22, 1895, 388; W orthington C. Ford, “The Turning
o f the T ide,” N orth American R eview, CLXI (August, 1895), 188; Annual
Report of the Secretary of the Treasury, ¡895, lxix; Messages and Papers
of the Presidents, IX, 650; Commercial and Financial Chronicle, Jan. 5,
1895, 10; Robert W . Dunn, American Foreign Investments (N e w York,
1926), 2.
65 Bradstreet's, Sept. 29, 1894, 609; May 26, 1894, 323; Aug. 11, 1894,
499; Bankers' Magazine, XLIX (October, 1894), 245. For evidence o f
the recognition in 1894-1895 that the glut o f both goods and m oney
was deepening the depression, see W . P. Clough to Cleveland, March
23, 1894, Cleveland MSS; Charles Stewart Smith et al., “H om e Industries
and the W ilson Bill,” N orth American Review, CLVIII (March, 1894),
312-324; N e w York Journal of Commerce quoted in Public Opinion, Sept.
27, 1894, 623-624; Bankers' Magazine, XLIX (January, 1894), 489; Brad-
street's, Oct. 19, 1895, 659; the first three condensed articles in Literary
Digest, Jan. 6, 1894, 189-191.
The Economic Formulation 181
system.” The N ew York reporter for the Economist stated the
proposition tersely in September, 1895: “Either goods or gold
must go abroad to pay for our purchases there, and thus far this
autumn our shipments . . . have not equalled expectations.” 50
The most significant and influential statement of this sort,
however, came from Secretary Carlisle in his annual report of
1894. H e noted at the outset that the United States had been
kept “almost constantly in the position of debtors.” Then in a
striking analysis of what he considered to be the American sys
tem’s dynamic, Carlisle observed that the nation’s “prosperity
. . . depends largely upon [its] ability to sell [its] surplus
products in foreign markets at remunerative prices” in order to
pay off loans and interest and to secure credit abroad. The Amer
ican economy, Carlisle warned, could survive the selling of se
curities by foreign investors in only tw o ways: “One is for our
people to export and sell their commodities in foreign markets
to a sufficient amount to create a balance of credit in their favor
equal to the amount to be withdrawn, and the other is to ship
gold, that being the only money recognized in the settlement of
international balances.” The latter course had been resorted to
since 1893, and the results had been disastrous. The Secretary’s
either/or alternative appeared to be the only escape out of the
depression.5 57
6
W ith recovery defined in such terms, the responsibility upon
American exporters was great. Unfortunately, this responsibility
came at a time when they could ill bear the burden. Exports for
the 1894 fiscal year had been surpassed only twice before in
American history, but ominously, the four leading staples—
breadstuffs, provisions, cotton, and petroleum—had fallen off
60 Bradstreefs, O ct. 26, 1895, 674; April 27, 1895, 259; D ec. 22, 1894,
802; D ec. i, 1894, 754; N ov. 2, 1894, 693; Commercial and Financial
Chronicle, July 21,1894,95; Jan. 5,1895,10; July 29, 1895, 90-91; Bankers’
Magazine, XLVIII (March, 1894), 649-650, and XLIX (December, 1894),
31-32; Economist, March 3, 1894, 273; Sept. 22, 1894, 1169; Dec. 1, 1894,
1473; Supplement, Oct. 13, 1894, 8.
61 Bankers* Magazine, XLIX (Novem ber, 1894), 326-328; XLIX (O cto
ber, 1894), 249; W orthington C. Ford, “Commerce and Industry under
¡s4 The N e w Empire
Corroborating this reasoning, industrial goods slow ly edged
upward on the export charts, accounting for 15.61 per cent of
the total exports in the fiscal year 1892, 19.02 per cent in 1893,
21.14 per cent in 1894, and jumping to 23.14 per cent in 1895.
This, plus the announcement in m id-1895 that a large shipment
of United States steel was to go abroad to compete in the highly
competitive European market, “attracted considerable atten
tion,” in the words of Literary Digest. Examining these events,
the N ew York Journal of Commerce, the N ew York Herald,
and the antijingoist Louisville Courier-Journal had their views
w ell summed up by the London iron and Coal Trades Review:
“The Americans themselves argue . . . that they must continue
to increase the export of their manufactured goods, since their
exports of food and other raw products must inevitably de
cline.” 62
*
Businessmen saw foreign markets as vitally important for their
economic welfare, but they also clearly saw and feared the social
consequences which would follow should their programs of com
mercial expansion fail to restore prosperity. Nowhere was this
stated better than in Bankers’ Magazine of February, 1894. This
article is certainly one of the most interesting printed during the
1890’s in business or popular journals. W ritten during the time
when Populism was reaching its peak and labor uprisings threat
ened, the article re-evaluated American society along the classic
lines of James Madison’s The Federalist, N o. 10.
The article opened by noting that business was severely de
pressed, and that destitute tramps symbolized the United States
of 1894. h then asked bluntly whether the American political
system had reached the end of its usefulness. The United States
1893-1895
Gresham wrote Schurz, “It is the best article of the kind that I
have seen.” 11
Hawaii
Cleveland’s and Gresham’s attitude toward Hawaii w ell il
lustrated the tenets of the new empire. B y discounting Har
rison’s fears o f British encroachment or a successful native
uprising against the provisional government, the President and
his Secretary of State could enjoy the luxury of preserving and
even tightening the American hold on the islands while at the
same time righteously rejecting the burdens of governing a poly
glot population located tw o thousand miles from the mainland.
Moreover, when the United States would annex Hawaii in 1898,
it would occur within the pattern of expanding American inter
ests in Asia. In 1893 these interests were still nascent. During the
Cleveland administration attention focused southward, not west
ward.
Shortly after entering office in March, 1893, Cleveland with
drew Harrison’s annexation treaty from the Senate. The Presi-
14 Bureau o f American Republics, Special [M onthly] Bulletin (Jan
uary, 1894), 30.
204 The N e w Empire
dent told close friends that he had not decided for or against
annexation, but that “we ought to stop, look and think.”
Gresham, however, was already averse to annexation, partly be
cause of his intense personal dislike of Benjamin Harrison.
Gresham expressed a second and stronger reason for his opinion
in a personal conversation with the Russian Minister to W ash
ington on March 16, 1893. The administration, the Secretary of
State said, “would not favor principles and policy looking to
the acquisition of foreign territory.” 15 That Gresham made such
an unequivocal statement at this early date is particularly inter
esting in view of Cleveland’s indecisiveness.
Five days before, the President had named James H . Blount of
Georgia, former congressman and chairman of the Foreign A f
fairs Committee, to investigate the situation on the islands. In
early August, Blount informed Cleveland and Gresham that the
Harrison administration and the American naval units had acted
unjustly during the January revolution, and that without this
help the Queen would not have been overthrown. This informa
tion settled the annexation matter in Cleveland’s mind. A fter tw o
more months of Gresham’s prodding, the President decided to
help the Queen regain her throne if this could be accomplished
without bloodshed and if the Queen would promise to abide by
“all obligations created by the Provisional Government.”
W hen the American Minister informed the former ruler of
this offer, she astounded the diplomat with the reply that she
would settle for nothing less than the heads of the provisional
government’s leaders. After several more sessions, however, she
agreed to Cleveland’s offer. But when the American Minister
then approached the Dole government, that regime, assured by
its representative in W ashington that the Cleveland administra
tion would not resort to force, flatly refused to discuss the propo
sition. Faced with this impasse, Cleveland dumped the matter
18 A fter losing their sugar bounty in the 1894 tariff bill, domestic sugar
growers attempted to abrogate the Hawaiian treaties of 1875 and 1887.
Senators Morgan, Chandler, and Perkins led a fight to retain the trea
ties. T h ey effectively argued that Bayard had remarked in 1887 that if
the treaty o f reciprocity was repudiated, the U nited States w ould lose
its rights to Pearl Harbor. T he Morgan forces maintained the reci
procity treaty with a crushing 57-11 vote of confidence (D ozer, “A nti-
Imperialism,” 234-236).
19 Gresham did not hesitate to interfere and threaten die use o f force
to protect American citizens implicated in revolutionary activities against
the Hawaiian government during an 1895 uprising; see Gresham to
W illis, Feb. 26, 1895, Hawaii, Instructions, N A , R G 59; Stevens, Am er
ican Expansion in Hawaii, 276-277; W illis to Gresham, D ec. 9, 1893,
Cleveland MSS.
Reaction: Depression Diplomacy 207
The 1894 tariff considerably simplified Gresham’s task. By
abolishing the sugar bounty and restoring the Hawaiian plant
ers’ favored position in the American market, the W ilson-
Gorman bill alleviated the islands’ economic problems. The meas
ure had also tightened the economic interdependence of the tw o
nations. Realizing the importance of these developments, many
planters w ho had warmly endorsed or equivocated on the
question of annexation, now strongly opposed the union. Bene
fiting from both the American market and the immigration of
coolie labor (w hich annexation would terminate), the influ
ential planters had the best o f both worlds. The American
Minister informed Gresham of these developments in 1894.20
Gresham and the planters enjoyed such latitude in their ac
tions only because outside powers did not pose a threat to the
de jacto American protectorate. Jingoist congressmen, expan
sionist-minded naval officers, and militant-minded newspaper
editors frequently attempted to conjure up the specter of British,
Japanese, or even Russian control of the islands. The State D e
partment was not alarmed. In a series o f private conversations
conducted shortly after he entered office, Gresham told the
British Ambassador and the Japanese and Russian Ministers that
the United States would tolerate no outside interference in the
islands. T hey, in turn, remarked that they had been directed by
their foreign offices to assure the Secretary that their respective
governments had no aspirations regarding Hawaii.21
W hen the British Minister to Hawaii became too ambitious
in advancing English and Canadian interests, Gresham promptly
asked Great Britain to replace its representative with someone
“who had no entangling relations with the natives or with aliens,
^ W illis to Gresham, May 24, 1894, July 21, 1894, Sept. 20, 1894, all
in Gresham MSS; Scrapbook, Box 240, M oore MSS; Stevens, American
Expansion in Hawaii, 281.
21 Pauncefote to Rosebery, May 6,1893, Archives o f the Foreign Office,
Public Record Office, London—cited hereafter as F.O. follow ed by
record and message number—5/2189; Memoranda o f Conversations,
March 16, 1893, N A , R G 59; Pratt, Expansionists of 1898, 125-127.
2 o8 The N e w Empire
prosecuting business at Honolulu” (italics added). Gresham and
the Secretary of the N avy, Hilary Herbert, also shrewdly kept
British warships away from Hawaii by assuring London that the
United States would protect British lives and properties on the
islands. W hen one American naval officer misunderstood his
instructions, refused to guarantee British property, and then re
ported a British warship steaming back into the Hawaiian area,
Herbert gave the officer a severe reprimand.22 The United
States wanted a monopoly in those waters.
Richard Olney took much the same approach when he became
Secretary of State after Gresham’s death in May, 1895. W hen
the Japanese began exerting pressure on Hawaii because of im
migration problems in 1896, the Hawaiian Minister to the United
States asked Olney for help. The Secretary of State replied that
he doubted whether Japan would push too far in the face of
strong American claims to priority on the islands, but if the Japa
nese did do so, the United States would, Olney intimated, become
directly involved. The Hawaiian Minister reported to Honolulu
that the Secretary had, in effect, stretched the Monroe Doctrine
to touch Hawaii.23
The N ew York Evening Tost had given a good summary of
the administration’s policies in 1893 when the journal advised
Hawaiians, “Go on, therefore, sending us your sugar and other
tropical products, and sitting under your own fig-trees, in the full
assurance that none w ill dare make you afraid.” The rationale
for this policy was outlined tw o years later, in 1895, by a State
Department official. W riting a series of anonymous articles on
Cleveland’s foreign policy, Frederic Emory devoted special at
tention to Hawaii. H e recalled that during the President’s first
term, Bayard and Cleveland had persevered to advance “Amer
ican influence” there. “The obvious course was to wait quietly
26 This section o f the present study was first published in more de
tailed form as “United States Depression Diplom acy and the Brazilian
Revolution, 1893-1894,” in the Hispanic American Historical Review,
X L (February, i960), 107-118.
27 Gresham, Lije of Gresham, II, 777; Laughlin and W illis, Reciprocity,
208, Joâo Pandiá Calógeras, A History of Brazil, translated and edited
b y Percy Alvin Martin (Chapel H ill, 1939), 290-291; Lawrence F. H ill,
Diplomatic Relations between the United States and Brazil (Durham,
N.C ., 1932), 265-272. T he best account o f the revolution and American
participation in it is in H ill, United States and Brazil, 265-281. John
Bassett Moore, A Digest of International Law . . . (W ashington, D.C.,
Reaction: Depression Diplomacy 211
Elements of the Brazilian navy formed the core o f the in
surgents. Led by Admiral Custodio de M ello, the rebels boarded
three warships and a number o f merchant vessels and set siege to
the harbor of Rio de Janeiro. Land forces fought pitched battles
in southern Brazil, but the rebellion was to be decided in this har
bor. Admiral de M ello’s strategy was simple: keep as many for
eign ships as possible away from the harbor so that the customs
houses, upon which the government largely depended for reve
nue, would soon become bankrupt. Gresham thus had to do tw o
things. H e had to get American ships into the harbor for the
double purpose of keeping American trade flowing and strength
ening the pro-United States elements in Brazil. Further, he had
to withhold belligerent status from de Mello or else the United
States would be forced, by declaring a position of legal neu
trality, to allow de M ello to blockade the harbor, stop trade, and
probably overthrow the Peixoto government. Gresham’s trou
ble was compounded when it appeared that several European
nations, especially Great Britain, were clandestinely helping the
insurgents.
T he American Minister to Brazil, Thomas S. Thompson, ob
served strict neutrality at the outset. H e refused to confer with
1906), II, 1113-1120, covers the period from Jan. 11 through Feb. 1,
1894, in detail. Adequate accounts are Charles A. Tim m , “T he Diplo
matic Relations between the United States and Brazil During the Naval
R evolt o f 1893,” Southwestern Political and Social Science Quarterly, V
(September, 1924), 119-138; also Charles E. Martin, The Policy of the
United States as Regards Intervention (N e w York, 1921), 118-123. Tim m
relies on the printed volumes o f United States Foreign Relations, while
Martin uses M oore’s Digest as his principal reference. A good Brazilian
account is Calógeras, History of Brazil, 290-294. Also see Pedro Calmon,
Historia de la civilización brasileña, traducción del original de Julio E.
Payró (Buenos Aires, 1937), 390-392, which considers mostly the fighting
on the mainland and neglects foreign participation. Pedro Calmon,
Brasil e America: Historia de urna política (R io de Janeiro, 1944), 79,
mentions and passes judgment on American actions during the revolt.
See also citations in H ill, United States and Brazil, 280, 208-313. N on e
o f these accounts, American or Brazilian, attempts to explain the reason
for the American policy adopted after Jan. 6, 1894.
212 The N e w Empire
Peixoto, but did call for American ships to protect United States
commerce and citizens. This was the only time Thompson was
neutral throughout the revolution, however, for, influenced by
the American business interests in Rio, he soon took a strong
pro-Peixoto position. H e asked United States naval commanders
to bring American goods to shore even if force had to be em
ployed in accomplishing the task.
His requests were based upon instructions from Gresham
which arrived on October n , though the Secretary of State
had carefully refrained from mentioning the use of any force.
As a result of Thompson’s requests, a split ensued between him
and the American commander, Rear Admiral Oscar F. Stanton,
who disagreed on the use of force to protect American goods.
Stanton then overstepped his bounds when he visited de Mello
on board an insurgent ship. He was promptly recalled.28
His replacement, Commander Henry Picking, followed Stan
ton’s policy, splitting with Thompson and with the American
Consul General in Rio, W illiam T . Townes, over the attitude
to be taken toward the insurgents. Gresham stepped into the
breach. On October 25 he refused an insurgent request for bel
ligerent status. This was follow ed by a statement of policy on
November 1. Since there had been no belligerent status ac
corded, and since there was “no pretense” that Rio was block
aded, Gresham declared that American ships could land their
cargo on lighters which could go on into shore provided that
the lighter “in doing so does not cross or otherwise interfere
with Mello’s line of fire.” In this note, Gresham developed the
policy which could achieve both his objectives: he provided for
the landing of American goods, but he also maintained at least
a semblance of neutrality by saying that the goods should not
28 Gresham to Minister Thomas S. Thompson, Oct. 11, 1893, Brazil,
Instructions, N A , R G 59; Thompson to Gresham, N ov. 10, 1893, Brazil,
Despatches, N A , R G 59; Secretary of N avy Hilary Herbert to Rear
Admiral Oscar F. Stanton, Oct. 23, 1893, Cipher Messages Sent (1888-
1895), N A , R G 45.
Reaction: Depression Diplomacy 213
land if in landing they interfered with the course of the revolt.
This loophole was to cause Gresham much trouble. For longer
than a month, this policy worked satisfactorily. American ves
sels had little trouble landing their cargo, though other nations
met some difficulty. As the goods rolled through the customs
houses, de Mello’s chances grew dim. By late November he had
suffered losses in land skirmishes and had lost prestige.29
In general the American press backed up Gresham’s attitude,
though it put his policy in more active terms than he had him
self. The Springfield Republican, the Boston Daily Advertiser
and the Philadelphia Recorder agreed with the N ew York Trib-
une, which stated that the “plain duty of the Cleveland Adminis
tration” was to support the existing government and so discour
age such “revolutionary outbreaks and political anarchy.” But at
least one newspaper, the Detroit N ew s, believed that Washing
ton was “not so neutral” as “it wanted the public to believe it
was”; not only was the administration helping Peixoto through
trade, but N ew York shipyards were busy building a “formida
ble” navy for him. This, the N ew s feared, was “more suggestive
of the w ay the Confederate N avy recruited its navy-yards dur
ing our war.” 30
In early December the rebel cause was suddenly strengthened
by the defection of Admiral Saldanha da Gama. H e previously
had been a neutral, and, since he had strong monarchical tend
encies, he brought with him many who wanted to restore the
pre-1889 rule. Although the State Department knew about the
strengthening of the insurgents through the defection of da
29 United States Consul General W illiam T . Tow nes to Commander
H enry Picking, N ov. 6, 1893, Area 4 file, N A , R G 45; Gresham to
Thompson, Oct. 25, N ov. 1, 1893, Brazil, Instructions, and Thompson
to Gresham, N ov. 23, 1893, Brazil, Despatches, N A , R G 59.
30 Literary Digest, N ov. 25, 1893, 277; Public Opinion, N ov. 2, 1893,
117; Jan. i i , 1894, 352. See also H ill’s citations of newspaper opinion.
United States and Brazil, 280; Public Opinion, Jan. 4, 1894, 329; Feb. 22,
1894, 495; Literary Digest, N ov. 25, 1893, 277; and the Nation's strong
denunciation of any possible American intervention, Jan. 4, 1894, 3.
2ij. The N e w Empire
Gama, Gresham did little until January 6, 1894. The Secretary
o f State evidently feared that the insurgents were gaining in
power, and he wanted to be on the right side when the battle
ended.31
But Gresham was soon shaken from this wait-and-see attitude.
H e received word from Thompson that the Brazilian govern
ment had tw o affidavits showing that Great Britain was helping
the rebels, and that this pro-da Gama policy was being follow ed
in the hope that the insurgent leader would reinstall the mon
archy once he overthrew the Peixoto regime. The Brazilian
Minister in W ashington confirmed this information. Gresham
especially feared the withdrawal of the British fleet protection,
for he believed it would be a prelude to recognizing da Gama’s
belligerency.32
This rumored British action only pointed up a more important
threat to American interests, however. If the insurgents, en
couraged directly and indirectly by British elements, eventually
overthrew the Peixoto government, American trading interests
would be in serious danger. Many of the insurgent leaders could
not see advantages for Brazil in the 1891 reciprocity agreement.
If helped to power by European interests, these leaders would
certainly discriminate against American products. A t this same
time, December, 1893, this agreement was being abrogated in
the United States Congress. The proposed substitute, however,
the so-called W ilson tariff, was being framed with the express
intention of obtaining even more South American markets.
Gresham’s beliefs coincided with the philosophy of the W ilson
65 Ibid., 41.
66Messages and Papers of the Presidents, IX, 451; Congressional
Record, 53rd Cong., 2nd Sess., 4636-4637, 7210.
67 Messages and Papers of the Presidents, IX, 540-541.
2^2 The New Empire
of interest in the navy. First, the American fleet in the South
Atlantic and the Pacific had been remarkably busy during the
previous tw o years. Cleveland noted in his 1893 message that
ships had even been taken from the Fish Commission and the
Revenue Marine to supply the demand “in Nicaragua, Guate
mala, Costa Rica, Honduras, Argentina, Brazil” and Hawaii.
Affairs in Brazil and Nicaragua could have alone fully occupied
the navy. Mahan complained to a British friend that the Amer
ican fleet could never get together for maneuvers, for “just as
w e expect them to begin, a bobbery starts up in Central or South
America, or H ayti, or elsewhere, and away go one or tw o
ships.” 68
A second general cause for the renewed interest centered
around Mahan’s growing influence and the increasing prestige
of other naval officers. Mahan had followed his historic book of
1890 with a series of articles which applied the lessons of history
to America of the 1890’s. In 1893 he emphasized the need for
control of the canal route. In 1895 Mahan analyzed the rising in
terest in the Monroe Doctrine. H e emphasized that “reduced to
its barest statement . . . the Monroe Doctrine . . . formulated
an idea to which in the last resort effect could be given only
through the instrumentality of a navy.” Mahan believed that this
laid bare the weakness of the frequently advanced argument that
America needed a navy only “for the defence of our own
coasts.” 69
In the m id-1890’s naval officers enjoyed their most popular
days since the Civil W ar. The navy exhibition at the W orld’s
Fair in Chicago in 1893 proved to be a tremendous attraction to
visitors. W hen a navy review was held in N ew York in August,
1893, the N ew York Herald reported that “it was a sight to stir
68 Ibid., 450-451; Mahan to J. R. Thursfield, N ov. 21, 1895, Mahan
MSS.
69 Mahan, “T he Isthmus and Sea Power,” 102-105; Mahan, “T he
Future in Relation to American Naval Power,” 152, 156, 158-159. Both
articles are reprinted in The Interest of America in Sea Power . This
work is discussed in Chapter II, above.
Reaction: Depression Diplomacy 233
men’s souls, to send the blood tingling through their veins.” 70
Naval officers used this new ly found popularity to advance their
views on naval expansion.
In almost every instance these officers called for a battleship
navy which would be able to protect America’s growing com
mercial interests abroad. In 1896, Lieutenant John M. Ellicott
published an article calling for strict enforcement of the Monroe
Doctrine and a battleship fleet. H e made the cardinal mistake,
however, of declaring that the United States ought to be ready
to fight a defensive war, that the best weapon in such a war was
commerce destroying, and that a navy loaded with monitors
(along with battleships) could best defend American coastlines.
Commander C. F. Goodrich attacked this position vigorously,
arguing Mahan’s thesis that wars were decided only when battle
ships went far out to sea and destroyed entire fleets. Goodrich
received strong support from Rear Admiral Stephen B. Luce,
founder of the W ar College and in 1895 President o f the Naval
Institute at Annapolis. Luce believed that by 1898 the United
States would need eighteen battleships, with “other classes of
ships, in proportion.” H e justified such an estimate by repeating
Mahan’s history of commercial sea lanes.71
The depression provided the reason for the third and fourth
causes of revived interest in the battleship navy—the need to
provide jobs for American laborers, and the impulse to find and
85 Messages and Papers of the Presidents, IX, 733; Report of the Secre
tary of the N avy , 1896, 4-5, 7, 9, 56.
86Boutelle analyzed the reasons w hy Congress did not act in Con
gressional Record , 54th Cong., 2nd Sess., 2115.
Reaction: Depression Diplomacy 241
security and national greatness. The fact seems to be now thor
oughly implanted in the popular mind and is largely responsible for
the birth of our navy. . . . Yet it is not to be forgotten that men-
of-war for a nation that is without the vessels of commerce is al
most an incongruity and that the true basis of a navy is a merchant
marine. The business man of this country, therefore, who longs to
see its foreign trade conducted to a reasonable extent at least under
the stars and stripes, . . . who objects to one great power sequester
ing the highways of the ocean, . . . that man is not to be regarded
as a mere sentimentalist.87
Olney missed the vital point that American bottoms were not
necessary to stimulate American exports. A ll that was needed
was the ability to outproduce other manufacturing or agricul
tural countries, plus a navy to protect both distant markets and
the merchant ships that carried this surplus. This statement never
theless shows that Olney appreciated Mahan. It also demon
strates that he realized the value of “free access to the markets of
the world,” and that he resented “one great power sequestering
the highways” to these markets. That the Cleveland adminis
tration thought about these factors, and that it viewed any busi
nessman who wanted to obtain overseas markets as more than
“a mere sentimentalist,” can be illustrated not only in this speech
of its Secretary of State, but also in the way the administration
countered British encroachments in Venezuela.
Crisis o f 1895-1896
T he Explosion
O lney began the July 20 message by reviewing the respective
claims.2
30
9 H e concluded that neither party stood for a boundary
line “predicated upon strict legal right.” The Secretary of State
then turned his fire directly on Great Britain for its attempt to
move “the frontier of British Guiana farther and farther to the
westward” o f the Schomburgk line. O lney noted the vital point
This phrase provides the key to the remainder of the note, for
O lney then tried to fit the Monroe Doctrine into the meaning
of this sentence. The Secretary of State made a bad fitting, but
this is irrelevant to the understanding of O lney’s intention and
to the aims of the administration’s foreign policy. O lney ad
vanced the argument that American interests as w ell as V ene
zuelan territory were at stake. In essence he was interpreting the
Monroe Doctrine as the catchall slogan which justified protecting
what the United States considered as its own interests. If the
Monroe Doctrine had not existed, O lney’s note would have been
written anyway, only the term American Self-Interest would
have been used instead of the Monroe Doctrine.3 32
1
84 Adee to Olney, Sept. 2, Aug. 30, 1895, Andrade to Olney, D ec. 11,
1893, Bayard to O lney, O ct. 21, 1895, O lney MSS; Cleveland to Olney,
Oct. 16, 1895, Cleveland MSS; Bayard to Olney, Oct. 22, 1895, Great
Britain, Despatches, N A , R G 59. Venezuelan pleas to the State Depart
ment can be found in Foreign Relations, i8ps> II, 1483-1488.
264 The N e w Empire
territory in Venezuela to arbitration, especially that area which
contained British settlements. O lney feared that this interview
was a “foreshadowing” of the British reply from Salisbury on
Venezuela.35
O lney also became concerned over British actions in N ic
aragua. Bayard reported in early November that the British had
“reserved their rights” in the whole Nicaraguan affair. Later in
November, the British-Nicaraguan indemnity treaty was made
public. The pact expressly stipulated that no American could
serve as the third commissioner on the arbitration board. Eng
land wanted to settle directly with Nicaragua. Adee believed
that such an obviously anti-American provision was “an impor
tant indication of the drift of British policy.” 36
Adee’s fear was mirrored in the American press and political
circles throughout the fall and early winter of 1895. During
October and November journals freely expressed the opinion
that Cleveland would present a vigorous interpretation of the
Monroe Doctrine in his December address. Many of these papers
fervently hoped for such a message. Politicians recognized that
many constituents were intensely concerned with Latin-Amer-
ican affairs. Representative Thomas M. Paschal from Texas
wrote Olney, “Turn this Venazuelan [«V] question up or down,
North, South, East or W est, and it is a ‘winner.’ ” “W hy, Mr.
Secretary,” Paschal exclaimed, “just think of how angry the an
archistic, socialistic, and populistic boil appears, on our political
surface. . . . One cannon shot across the bow of a British boat
in defense of this principle w ill knock more pus out o f it than
would suffice to inoculate and corrupt our people for the
next tw o centuries.” Other congressmen, as Representatives Joe
W heeler of Alabama and Charles H . Grosvenor of Ohio and
Senator W illiam E. Chandler of N ew Hampshire, published ar-
35 Olney to Bayard, Oct. 8, 1895, Great Britain, Instructions, N A , R G
59-
36 Bayard to Olney, D ec. 2, 1895, Great Britain, Despatches, and Adee’s
notation on Baker’s despatch to Olney, N ov . 18, 1895, Nicaragua, Des
patches, N A , R G 59.
Reaction: Venezuelan Crisis 26$
tides stressing the importance of the Orinoco River within the
context of the necessity to expand the foreign commerce of the
United States.87
Salisbury’s reply finally arrived at the State Department on
December 7, five days too late for Cleveland’s annual message.
The answer consisted of tw o letters. One message bluntly re
futed the validity of the Monroe Doctrine as international law,
while the other answered O lney’s defense of the Venezuelan
position and the Secretary of State’s request for arbitration.
In his consideration of the Monroe Doctrine, Salisbury simply
disclaimed the relation of the hallowed dogma “to the state of
things in which w e live at the present day.” But he went beyond
this generalization. Olney’s “novel prerogative,” the Prime Min
ister observed, in effect asserted an American protectorate over
Latin America. This was something which Monroe’s “sagacious
foresight would have led him energetically to deprecate.”
Salisbury emphasized this vital point in another way. H e chal
lenged O lney and Cleveland to admit explicitly that the Amer
ican economic and political system could not remain a viable
system if it was forced to remain within the continental bounds
of the United States. Salisbury declared that “the United States
have no apparent practical concern” with the controversy. The
adjectives are important. Olney had mentioned that American
“honor and . . . interests” were involved. Salisbury had demon
strated that historically the Monroe Doctrine had no relevance
to the affair. If the United States then rested its case on some-73
37 Bradstreet’s, Oct. 19, 1895, 657; Economist, N ov. 30, 1895, 1563;
quotations in Perkins, Monroe Doctrine, ¡867-1907, 169-171; H enry M.
Stanley, “Issues between Great Britain and America,” Nineteenth Cen
tury, XXXIX (January, 1896), 1; N ew York Tribune, N ov. 26, 1895, 6:3;
Public Opinion, N ov. 7, 1895, 585-586; Blake, “Background of Cleveland’s
Venezuelan Policy,” 270-271; Thomas M. Paschal to Olney, Oct. 23, 1895,
Olney MSS; Joseph W heeler and Charles H . Grosvenor, “Our D uty
in the Venezuelan Crisis,” North American Review, CLXI (Novem ber,
1895), 628-633; Nevins, Grover Cleveland, 637. See also the stormy
congressional debates in early December in Congressional Record, 54th
Cong., ist Sess., 24-25, 28, 36, 114-126.
266 T he N e w Empire
thing beyond the tradition of the Doctrine, namely the nation’s
honor and interests, Salisbury demanded to know what these in
terests were. The Prime Minister emphasized this point w ith a
touch o f sarcasm. T he United States, he wrote, ‘‘is not entitled
to affirm as a universal proposition, w ith reference to a number
of independent States for whose conduct it assumes no respon
sibility, that its interests are necessarily concerned in whatever
may befall those States simply because they are situated in the
W estern Hemisphere.”
Salisbury capped his argument by making a tactical conces
sion. H e admitted that, if American interests were involved or
threatened, the United States had a right, “like any other nation,
to interpose in any controversy” which endangered these rights.
The Prime Minister granted that the United States was entitled
to “judge whether those interests are touched, and in what meas
ure they should be sustained.” H e merely wanted O lney and
Cleveland to define these interests. Unless his allegations could
be controverted, Salisbury denied that the United States had a
right to demand arbitration in the dispute.38
The second note, dealing w ith the boundary controversy
proper, began by again declaring that the British government
believed the boundary dispute “had no direct bearing on the
material interests of any other country.” Salisbury cited histor
ical facts which ripped apart Olney’s argument for the V ene
zuelan case. A t one point Salisbury sarcastically commented, “It
may reasonably be asked whether Mr. O lney would consent to
refer to the arbitration o f another Power pretensions raised by
the Government of Mexico on such a foundation to large tracts
o f territory which had long been comprised in the Federation
[of the United States].” The Prime Minister steadfastly refused
to submit to arbitration those claims of British subjects “who have
for many years enjoyed the settled rule of a British Colony.” 88
Bayard immediately wrote Cleveland to praise Salisbury’s
88 Salisbury’s first note is printed in Foreign Relations, i8$s, I, 563-567.
89 Salisbury’s second note is in ibid., 567-576.
Reaction: Venezuelan Crisis 267
notes as being “in good temper and moderate in tone.” The
American Ambassador believed that “our difficulty lies in the
w holly unreliable character of the Venezuelan rulers and people.”
Neither Cleveland nor Olney, however, was in a frame of mind
to listen to Bayard’s eulogies of Salisbury’s diplomacy. Cleveland
was “mad clean through.” H e later wrote that it would have been
“depressing” and “unpleasant” for the United States to learn
that the great Monroe Doctrine was really “a mere plaything
w ith which w e might amuse ourselves.” 40
O lney released his anger by drafting the President’s message of
December 17. Cleveland later asserted that O lney’s draft “en
tirely satisfied m y critical requirements”; in fact, “I have never
been able to adequately express m y pleasure and satisfaction over
the assertion of our position.” The draft was never submitted to
the other members of the cabinet. This was unfortunate, for Car
lisle and the Secretary of Agriculture, Sterling Morton, later
expressed disagreement with the bluntness of the message.41
O lney and Cleveland thus unloaded their fury unmolested, and
on December 17 the world heard of the American challenge to
the British Empire.
The President’s message was, in essence, a succinct summary of
O lney’s July 20 note. Cleveland’s declaration is significant, how
ever, because it emphasized and amplified O lney’s crucial point
that the United States was becoming involved in the controversy
not for the sake of Venezuela, but for the welfare of the United
States. It directly replied to Lord Salisbury’s charge that, since
the Monroe Doctrine was inapplicable “to the state of things in
which we live at the present day,” the United States had no right
to become involved in the dispute.
A t the beginning of his message Cleveland quoted and then
40 Bayard to Cleveland, D ec. 4, 1895, Cleveland MSS; Perkins, Monroe
Doctrine y 1867-1907, 183; Grover Cleveland, Presidential Problems (N e w
York, 1904), 268; O lney to Pauncefote, D ec. 10, 1895, O lney MSS.
41 Cleveland to Olney, D ec. 3, 1895, Cleveland MSS; George F. Parker,
Recollections of Cleveland (N e w York, 1909), 197, 199; Nevins, G rover
Clevelandy 641.
268 The N e w Empire
attacked these words of the British Prime Minister. The Monroe
Doctrine was “strong and sound,” the President declared, “be
cause its enforcement is important to our peace and safety as a
nation and is essential to the integrity of our free institutions and
the tranquil maintenance of our distinctive form of govern
ment.” Such a principle could “not become obsolete while our
Republic endures.” This was an emphatic definition of the Mon
roe Doctrine as a doctrine of self-interest. Cleveland so defined
the Doctrine explicitly: “The Monroe doctrine finds its recog
nition in those principles of international law which are based
upon the theory that every nation shall have its rights protected
and its just claims enforced.”
Cleveland and his Secretary of State did believe that American
interests were greatly endangered. N othing better illustrates
their beliefs than Cleveland’s statements in the closing part of
his December 17 message: “The duty of the United States [is]
to resist by every means in its power, as a willful aggression upon
its rights and interests, the appropriation by Great Britain of any
lands or the exercise of governmental jurisdiction over any ter
ritory which after investigation we have determined of right be
longs to Venezuela.” Cleveland emphasized the importance he
placed on this sentence by then declaring, “In making these rec
ommendations I am fully alive to the responsibility incurred and
keenly realize all the consequences that may follow .” 42 H e
italicized the sentence, as it were, by saying that the United
States would risk war in order to preserve the principle contained
in the statement.
In a letter to Ambassador Bayard in late December, Cleveland
again underscored the fact that the United States was entering
into the boundary imbroglio to protect its own interests. The
President also emphasized that the controversy had been ger
minating for some time. The administration had not suddenly
leaped upon the issue in m id-1895 for domestic political gains.
Cleveland wrote:
42 Messages and Papers of the Presidents, IX, 656-658—italics added.
Reaction: Venezuelan Crisis 26p
Aftermath
Expansionist-minded Americans heartily endorsed the Presi
dent’s message, though most of them also fully shared his hopes
that no war would result. In its lead editorial Public Opinion
declared, “It is doubtful if there was ever before witnessed in
the United States so nearly unanimous an expression o f press
approval o f any Administration.” 46 In Senate proceedings, how
ever, H enry Cabot Lodge and other ultraexpansionists toned
down their belligerence. T he House had responded to Cleve
land’s message by quickly whipping through an appropriation
measure for a boundary commission. T he Senate, while standing
firm on the principles o f the Monroe Doctrine, nevertheless asked
that the Committee on Foreign Relations carefully consider the
measure before the entire upper house voted upon it. There was
a minimum o f indulgence in the popular congressional game of
45 See especially the last three paragraphs o f die message; also Young,
“Intervention under the Monroe Doctrine,” 259-260. Both nations alerted
their military planning experts. See Rear Admiral H . C. Taylor, “T h e
Fleet,” Proceedings of the United States Naval Institute, XXIX (D ecem
ber, 1903), 799-808; and J. A . S. Grenville, “Great Britain and the Isthmian
Canal, 1898-1901,” American Historical Review, LX 1 (October, 1955),
51, for relevant comment.
46 Public Opinion, D ec. 26, 1895, 837; N e w York Tribune , D ec. 18,
1895, 6:5; for m idwestem opinion, see Chicago Times Herald , D ec. 18,
1895,6:2; N e w York World , D ec. 18,1895,2:2-8, and D ec. 19,1895,3:3-4.
Reaction: Venezuelan Crisis 27 1
twisting the Lion’s tail. T w o factors probably account for this
attitude. As Senator Roger Q . Mills of Texas declared, “It w ill
be no child’s play, Mr. President, when w e engage in a conflict
w ith Great Britain.” The impending stock market break pro
vided a second moderating influence.47
T he effect on the stock market and the reaction of the Amer
ican business community to Cleveland’s message deserves de
tailed analysis. Historians have pictured this reaction as one o f
panic. From this, it may be inferred that businessmen vigorously
opposed extending American control or responsibility in Latin
America, especially when such action would run the risk of
conflicting with European interests in the area. In reality, busi
ness opinion was more complex.48
Some financial leaders, especially bankers in N ew York, Bos
ton, and Chicago angrily criticized the Chief Executive’s state
ment as ending any hope of immediate business recovery. Peter
B. O lney reported from N ew York to his brother in the State
Department that “there is an undercurrent of sentiment among
bankers and businessmen of considerable strength, that censures”
the message. Critics included Charles Stewart Smith, former
President of the N ew York Chamber o f Commerce, Frederick
D . Tappen, President o f the Gallatin National Bank, and J.
Edward Simmons, President of the Fourth National Bank. In an
informal poll taken at the Union League Club “practically every
body” expressed disgust “over the whole business.” In Boston,
the N ew England Free Trade League and important members of
the Boston Stock Exchange agreed w ith Edward Atkinson’s
views. Atkinson, President of the Boston Manufacturers Mutual
Fire Insurance Company and one o f the popular economists of
the day, shouted to an inquiring reporter, “This is ridiculous,
N ew York W orld, Dec. 20, 1895, 1:8, 2:1, and Dec. 18, 1895, 1:7, 2:3;
Boston Morning Journal, Dec. 18, 1895, 4:6, 5:3, and Dec. 19, 1895, 4:3i
Bradstreet’s, Dec. 21, 1895, 813; Straus to Cleveland, undated, but prob
ably Dec. 18, 1895, Oscar Straus papers, Library of Congress; Carnegie
to the Duke of Devonshire, Dec. 26, 1895, Andrew Carnegie papers,
Library of Congress, W ashington, D.C. Carnegie saw the crisis as an
opportunity to obtain a large order for steel from the United States N avy.
See Carnegie to John G. A. Leishman, President of the Carnegie Steel
Company [no specific date, but after the Cleveland message], Dec., 1895,
Carnegie MSS.
52N ew York W orld, D ec. 18, 1895, 2:2, 13:1, and Dec. 19, 1895, 11:1;
W all Street Journal, Dec. 19, 1895, 2:1.
274 The N e w Empire
not American, touched off the downward surge of stock prices.
But it was American buyers who firmed the prices in the after
noon. The N ew York W orld examined the day’s activities and
bragged that the afternoon events demonstrated the “ability of
American finance to take care o f itself.” The rapidly maturing
N ew York financial community was beginning to demonstrate
that it could play an important independent role in international
finance.63
Second, factors other than the diplomatic crisis undermined
the stock market. In his annual message of December 2, 1895,
Cleveland had warned that the gold reserve in the Treasury had
dwindled to a dangerous point. W hen on December 20 the
President asked Congress for emergency measures to deal w ith
this gold crisis, he thus dealt w ith a long-term problem w hich
had been accelerated by the Venezuelan crisis. Business maga
zines realized this. Financial periodicals agreed w ith R. G . Dun
& Company’s W eekly R eview of Trade, which reported that
the Venezuelan message had little direct effect on the market,
since “business was remarkably dull” anyway.64
Farther removed from the hypnotic influence of the N ew
York exchanges, business groups in Fall River, Massachusetts,
Pittsburgh, Buffalo, Baltimore, and Trenton warmly approved
the President’s stand. Commercial bodies speaking for the mid-
western business communities o f Kansas C ity (M issouri), St.
Paul, Milwaukee, and Indianapolis also expressed wholehearted
support of the message. Most interesting was the Chicago scene,
where the bankers attacked Cleveland, but men in the indus
trial-merchant group, such as Marshall Field and P. D . Armour,
gave equally strong endorsements. Armour even added, “In fact,
63 N e w York W orld, D ec. 21, 1895, 1:7-8; W all Street Journal, D ec.
20, 1895, 2:1; N e w York Journal of Commerce, D ec. 19, 1895, 5:1, and
D ec. 23, 1895, 1:3. B y D ec. 24 the gold exports had dwindled, buying o f
gilt-edged securities had increased, and general optimism prevailed.
64 Messages and Papers of the Presidents, IX, 645; N e w York W orld,
D ec. 17, 1895, 1:1; Chicago Times Herald, D ec. 21, 1895, 14:3; Bankers’
Magazine, LII (January, 1896), 107.
Reaction: Venezuelan Crisis 21$
there are a great many of us republicans [ mV] who like Mr. Cleve
land.” Gncinnati and Cleveland led midwestern support for the
message. The Chambers of Commerce and conservative financial
journals in both cities applauded the President’s position.
Southern and western commercial centers such as Memphis,
Atlanta, San Francisco, and Helena backed the American policy
also.65
Trade journals divided on the issue. Businesses whose stocks
fluctuated w ith every smile and frown of British investors ex
coriated Cleveland’s policy. The Railway G azette. American
W ool and Cotton Reporter, and Engineering and Mining Jour
nal were among the spokesmen for these disenchanted groups..
But many journals, especially those published in industrial and
in iron and steel centers, supported the President. The American
Manufacturer, published in Pittsburgh, was usually not a pro-
Cleveland paper, since it advocated high tariffs. But in discussing
the Venezuelan situation this journal reasoned that England was
in a tight situation because “the markets of the world are being
wrested from her,” and so she “seeks to extend her commercial
influence in South America.” In this light the President’s course
was correct. The Manufacturers' Record, the Farm Implement
N ew s (a bimetallist journal), and the Bulletin of the American
Iron and Steel Association warmly endorsed the President’s mes
sage.66
5 Cleveland to O lney, Sept. 29, 1895, Oct. 6 and 9, 1895, and O lney to
Cleveland, Oct. 8, 1895, Cleveland MSS. A ll the letters cited in notes
4 and 5 may be found in Letters of G rover Cleveland. Also see Messages
and Papers of the Presidents, IX, 636; W isan, The Cuban Crisis, 100.
* Congressional Record, 54th Cong., ist Sess., 1065-1066, 1970-1972,
1317, 2066, 2249-2250; Senate Report N o. 141, 54th Cong., ist Sess. (serial
3362), 1-3. John Bassett M oore publicly charged that the men w ho spon-
Reaction: N e w Problems 2pl
20 See Chadwick, United States and Spain, 465-466, for a similar inter
pretation; also James, Richard Olney , 166; and Pratt, Expansionists of
1898 , 2 1 2 .
21 N o historian has adequately analyzed the links between American
expansion in the Far East from 1895-1898 and the growing United States
involvement in world affairs overall, especially the links between the
Caribbean and Far Eastern policies. This work attempts to remedy this
lack in a minor way. T he definitive work on the topic should be available
when Thomas McCormick of Ohio University publishes his ‘“ Fair
Field and N o Favor’; American China Policy during the M cKinley Ad
ministrations” (unpublished Ph.D. dissertation, University o f W isconsin,
i960).
Reaction: N e w Problems 3oi
N e w Friends
Since the late 1870’s when William Evarts occupied the top
State Department post, the United States had attempted to keep
the open door in Asia ajar through unilateral dealings with China,
Japan, and Korea. Seward’s approach, which posited cooperation
with the European powers, especially England, was replaced by
policies attempting to preserve American freedom of action.
Until 1895 American policy makers operated from a double
assumption: first, that they had or would soon have adequate
economic power to win the battle for Far Eastern markets; sec
ond, that the maintenance of the open door would allow the
strongest economic power to be the first to cross the threshold
into the dreamland of the vast Asian market.
But by late 1895 these assumptions were crumbling. Japan
first attempted to combine military and political force to win
economic and territorial concessions which would cancel out
40 Public Opinion , April 2, 1896, 427-428, and June 11, 1896, 763-764.
41 There is a good sketch o f Kurino in the W ashington Post, Aug. 7,
1894. See also Kurino to Gresham, N ov. 18, 1894, Gresham MSS. Allen’s
reprimand is in O lney to Allen, N ov. 20, 1895, Area 10 file, Box 14, N A ,
R G 45.
374 The N e w Empire
question in American politics had also considerably dwindled.
The British thoroughly disliked the American high tariff policy,
and this dislike tainted their opinion of William McKinley in
1896. But a mounting fear of Bryan and free silver soon over
came their qualms on the tariff, and McKinley entered the W hite
House in 1897 with the best wishes of most of the British people.
The last gasp of the silver advocates in 1896 removed one of the
gravest threats to Anglo-American relations. The silverites had
long railed against Anglo-American cooperation, since, accord
ing to the 1896 Democratic platform, the gold standard had
“brought other nations into financial servitude to London.” Fi
nally, the growth of Canadian-American trade and the settlement
of several outstanding questions had lessened animosities between
the two great nations of North America. This change was a
prerequisite for a meaningful rapprochement between London
and Washington.42
These were important contributions, but the key reasons for
the rapprochement lay in three other areas. First, Americans be
gan to appreciate their historic economic ties with Great Britain.
W hen the Venezuelan crisis flared on December 18, 1895, the
N ew York W orld struck its blow for peace by detailing the
amount of American goods the British consumed and the $3,193,-
500,000 the English had invested in United States corporations.
In numerous popular articles during the mid-1890’s, Edward A t
kinson emphasized the economic links that stretched across the
Atlantic. British and American businessmen kept a wary eye on
each other’s moves in Latin America (the British especially feared
the National Association of Manufacturers), but after the settle
ment of the Venezuelan problem in 1896, this commercial ex
pansion did not threaten to precipitate armed conflict. In March,
42 T he Dilke quote is in the N e w York W orld , D ec. 12, 1897, 35:1; for
Canadian relations see Pauncefote to Salisbury, May 15, 1896, F.O.
5/2290; also Journal of Commerce, N ov. 10, 1897, 4:2, for a good anal
ysis of trade relations with Canada; and also despatches in F.O. 5/2423
in April, 1898; Charles S. Campbell, Jr., Anglo-American Understanding,
1898-1903 (Baltimore, 1957), 3, 4, 7.
Reaction: N e w Problems SIS
1896, one American writer could even advocate an Anglo-
American alliance (with the superior American economic power
serving as senior partner) for the development of the “swiftly
expanding commerce” to the south. A State Department official
could justifiably conclude in mid-1895, “For ‘business reasons’
alone, w e ought to cultivate friendly relations with Great Brit
ain.” 43
British recognition of the State Department’s claims in the
Venezuelan episode decreased American apprehension of Eng
land’s commercial expansion into Latin America; the results of
the Venezuelan crisis provided a second major reason for Anglo-
American friendship. W hen Salisbury informed the United States
on January 9 that he was “prepared to ‘trim’ his views to meet
the requests of the United States Government,” the Cleveland
administration had scored a signal victory in assuring a dominant
American position in hemispheric affairs. Ambassador Bayard,
pro-British as he was, could nevertheless brag that the Venezue
lan crisis had made the “doctrine of European abstention” from
colonialism in Latin America “a fixed fact.” Henry W hite, who
knew British society and politics as well as any American of his
day, concurred with Bayard’s assessment. The prime example of
this change of British attitude toward Latin-American affairs was
Whitehall’s evolving policies toward the Cuban revolution. In
August, 1895, the London Times threatened that Spain should
maintain control over Cuba: “For obvious political reasons, the
annexation of Cuba to the United States would be regarded with
little favour by British statesmen.” W ithin two years her new
43 N e w York W orld , D ec. 21, 1895, 3:3-4; Edward Atkinson to Rev.
Josiah Strong, May 19, 1896, Box 147, J. B. Moore MSS. T he British
analysis of the N .A .M . is proudly printed in an N.A .M . circular of May
12, 1897, “A n English V iew of the National Association of Manufac
turers,” which contains a long editorial from the London Financial N ew s ,
March 23, 1897; the alliance idea is in Sidney Sherwood, “An Alliance
with England the Basis of a Rational Foreign Policy,” Forum , XXI
(March, 1896), 89-99; the same idea is in Emory’s anonymous article
in the Baltimore Sun, May 27, 1895, sent to Bayard, May 28, 1895, Bayard
MSS.
%i6 The N e w Empire
evaluation of American power, her loathing of Spain’s reconcen
trado policies, and her own growing isolation in world affairs
would force Great Britain to assume a position directly contrary
to the tone of this editorial.44
This attitude toward American rights in the Western Hemi
sphere was also influenced by events in a third area, Asia. Here
Great Britain found her strong position undermined by aggres
sive Russian-German policies. England had an immense stake in
maintaining the open door, for she controlled 70 per cent of
China’s trade, and this in turn accounted for one-sixth of total
British commerce. British officials and publicists had often hinted
that they would appreciate open American support in the Far
East. Sometimes the United States responded. In 1894 China at
tempted to restrict imports of foreign machinery. England pro
tested strongly and then asked the State Department to support
the protest. Gresham assured Pauncefote that United States views
“were quite in accord” with those of the Foreign Office. Usually
the United States was reluctant to cooperate, however, since it
believed its traditional policies were working properly. The Sino-
Japanese War and its aftermath destroyed most of this illusion.
Then State Department concern about British incursions in
Hawaii hindered the development of a common policy in the
Pacific. By 1897 British reassurances had removed this obstacle.
Finally, when conditions worsened in Cuba, Americans were
forced to solve this more immediate problem before becoming
deeply involved elsewhere. But they did not exclude all interest
in the Far East. The growing activity of the State Department
N e w Foes
Like the balancing pans of a scale, as the hopes for Anglo-
American relations rose, Russo-American relations began to sink.
It was not coincidental that a century of friendship between the
United States and Russia cooled at the moment the century of
distrust between Americans and British began to disappear. The
cordial relations which Washington enjoyed with St. Petersburg
had depended upon the absence of conflicting interests and a
common anti-British attitude.48
For more than half a century Russia had bowed to the demands
of American expansion. The Czar’s government had placated
John Quincy Adams in 1824 by abandoning its claim to the
Pacific coastline south of 540 40'. Forty-three years later Russia
sold Alaska, her last stronghold on the North American continent,
to the United States. Throughout the last half of the nineteenth
century, Russian foreign ministers gladly recognized American
predominance in Hawaii. Americans misinterpreted the visit of
the Russian navy to N ew York City in 1863 as a demonstration
of the Czar’s support for the North. The fleet was actually search
ing for a suitable refuge in case war broke out between England
and Russia.
During the fur seal dispute in the early 1890’s, the Russians,
who possessed material interests in the matter, had been con-
47 Garvin, Chamberlain, III, 300; Mahan to J. R. Thursfield, D ec. 1,
1897, Mahan MSS. See also Letters of Cecil Spring-Rice, I, 248-249.
48 Pauline Tompkins comments: “Thus the decade of the nineties was
an auspicious one. . . . T he conditions for friendship existing between
1800 and 1870 had vanished, and without them the tradition o f friendship
was meaningless” ( American-Russian Relations in the Far East [N e w
York, 1949], 14-15).
Reaction: N e w P roblem 3*9
spicuously friendly to the American arguments. As the 1890’s
dawned, there were few indications that this would be the tran
sition decade in relations between the two nations. Americans
raised $77,000,000 to help famine victims in Russia in 1891; the
Czar offered a large gold loan (which the United States refused)
to help the stricken American Treasury in 1893; and the Carnegie
steel works and the Cramp Shipbuilding Company were busy
filling large Russian orders.49
But these events were misleading. A growing American ab
horrence of Russian autocratic methods, especially its anti-Jewish
pogroms, had begun to undermine the century-old friendship. A
review in 1889 of W . T . Stead’s Truth about Russia had noted
that “except in time of war, there never was, perhaps, a greater
interest taken in the Russian Empire”; then the reviewer de
scribed Russia as “that distant and darkly mysterious hot-bed at
once of despotic inhumanity, indescribable horrors, Nihilism, and
disturbance to the peace of Europe.” In more moderate terms,
Andrew Dickson W hite, United States Minister to Russia in the
early 1890’s and a respected and widely read author, could agree.
Believing that “Russia’s strong point is not adherence to her treaty
promises,” W hite severely criticized her statesmen and concluded,
“The atmosphere of Russian autocracy is fatal to greatness in any
form.” George Kennan’s Siberia and the Exile System became the
most popular presentation of this viewpoint. W ith strong sup
port from Mark Twain, James Russell Lowell, and Julia Ward
H ow e, Kennan traveled throughout the United States to publi
cize his book and to tell of the horrors of Russian oppression.
The Philadelphia Ledger responded by proclaiming that “civi
lized nations” could have nothing to do with such “cannibals.”
But the anti-Czarist forces in Russia found little American sym
pathy either. This opposition was becoming too radical for
Reaction: Approach to W ar
M cKinley
William McKinley came into the W hite House equipped with
the two qualities all presidents need for political survival: an un
derstanding of the social and economic realities of his time and the
political talents needed to cope with these realities. His political
abilities were particularly noticeable. Always adequate in the
political arena, he could at times be superb. Anyone who could
survive the tough school of Ohio politics in the last quarter of
the nineteenth century was indeed an uncommon political ani
mal. As a congressman in the 1880’s, McKinley worked closely
ß28 The N ev) Empire
with the John Sherman faction, but he shrewdly broke away long
enough in 1884 to back Blaine in the Republican Convention.
By 1889 the Sherman forces had been splintered by Harrison’s
nomination the year before; “Fire Alarm Joe” Foraker, the leader
of the other Republican faction in Ohio, had been well smeared
in the gubernatorial campaign; and McKinley, moving nimbly
from one to the other, walked unscathed out of the wreckage of
both factions. He had also found a new friend, Marcus Hanna,
Cleveland industrialist and political operator extraordinary.
The elections of 1890 appeared to mark the end of the Mc
Kinley luck. W ith his district gerrymandered by a Democratic
legislature for the third time in his career, McKinley suffered
defeat by the thin margin of 300 votes. The Democrats swore
that he should have lost by 3,000 votes. But this told the lesser
part of the story, for Ohio Republicans and independents pro
claimed the defeated congressman as a martyr sacrificed to the
foul gods of the Democracy and promptly elected McKinley as
Governor of Ohio in 1891. Frank Carpenter, the acute observer
of the Washington scene, could conclude a detailed description
of the Ohioan’s nose by remarking, “It is a watchful nose, and
it is a nose that watches out for McKinley.” And Henry Adams,
who said few nice things about anybody who held power after
1828, nevertheless believed McKinley’s “judgment of men was
finer than common in Presidents,” and even described him as a
“marvellous manager of men.” McKinley also, Adams observed,
chose several manipulators to help him (such as John H ay).
McKinley, however, was always equal to manipulating the
manipulators.1
Major McKinley (a rank received for bravery in the Civil
W ar) had early accepted Rutherford B. Hayes’s advice that a
thorough knowledge of the tariff was the key to a successful po
litical career. In the 1880’s he became a leading spokesman on
this issue, showing unshakable devotion to high tariff principles.
1 Morgan, “Congressional Career of M cKinley,” ch. iii, 80-81, 189-
192; A d am s, Education, 373-374.
Reaction: Approach to W ar 32$
The McKinley tariff was the culmination of his work. But he
had just begun to grasp the prodigious meaning of the industrial
revolution.
The post-1893 depression gave him a thorough education on
the nature of the American economy and society. H e had always
been a close friend of the working man. Samuel Gompers fondly
recalled that he and the Major had been friends “for many years”
before 1897. As Governor, McKinley had begun to comprehend
some of the same labor-management problems which troubled
Walter Quintin Gresham. The Ohioan responded by encourag
ing the formation of unions and whipping through the state legis
lature an industrial arbitration bill. This measure proved some
what effective in the strike-ridden years of 1894-1895. But when
the threat of violent strikes began to spread across the state, Mc
Kinley did not hesitate to order out in force the state militia,
believing, as he remarked later, that when a brigade met a division
there would be no battle. His prompt action avoided the blood
shed and the bitter feelings which wracked Illinois and Pennsyl
vania that year. As was usual with most of his policies, his action
did not tarnish his reputation with either labor or management.2
W hen he entered the W hite House in 1897, the depression
surged on “entailing idleness upon willing labor and loss to use
ful enterprises,” as the new President phrased the problem in an
early speech. McKinley had no intention of allowing the business
cycle to take its course. One of the more striking themes which
emerged from his post-1896 speeches was his emphasis on the
necessity for an active national government to cooperate in
friendly fashion with the businessman. McKinley’s first Inaugural
Address outlined this position. If the nation could not promptly
restore “the prosperity of former years,” McKinley declared,
“we can resolutely turn our faces in that direction and aid its
return by friendly legislation. However troublesome the situa
tion may appear, Congress will not, I am sure, be found lacking
2 M argaret L eech, In the Days of McKinley (N ew Y ork, 1959), 53-55;
G om pers, Seventy Years of Life and Labor, I, 522-5*3.
550 The N e w Empire
in disposition or ability to relieve it as far as legislation can do so.”
In fact, the new President proclaimed, “the restoration of con
fidence and the revival of business . . . depend more largely
upon the prompt, energetic, and intelligent action of Congress
than upon any other single agency affecting the situation.” On
several later occasions, McKinley severely deprecated the idea
that Congress could best serve the people by packing as rapidly
as possible and leaving Washington. H e stressed these beliefs in
his several appearances before the National Association of Manu
facturers, especially in his speech to the N .A .M . convention in
January, 1898.a
Perhaps the controlling words of the passage quoted above
from the Inaugural were “friendly legislation.” McKinley con
demned bad corporations, those “organized in trusts or otherwise,
to control arbitrarily the condition of trade among our citizens.”
But very few Republicans— or Democrats—seriously contem
plated a rigid enforcement of the antitrust legislation in the 1890’s.
The President wanted to stimulate, not regulate. Production had
to climb, financial stability had to be ensured, and markets had to
be found. Government could become a partner with business in
achieving these objectives.
Government could help considerably, for example, by settling
the question of the monetary standard. The Republicans had won
on a strong gold platform in 1896, but their presidential nominee
did not belong in the extreme monometallist camp. Throughout
his congressional career McKinley had advocated bimetallism.
Enticed by the vision of an enlarged foreign trade with Latin-
American and Asian nations on the silver standard, he had helped
Blaine secure a silver trade dollar at the 1889 Inter-American
Conference and had promised in 1896 to send a bimetallist dele
gation to Europe if he was elected. True to his word, he sent a
commission, but it promptly ran into a stone wall of British and
French opposition. Fortunately, a rising export trade and dis-
8 W illiam M cK inley, Speeches and Addresses of William McKinley ,
from March t, 1897, to May 30, 1900 (N e w Y ork, 1900), 23, 62. 8.
Reaction: Approach to W ar
coveries of gold in Alaska had eased the monetary situation. Mc
Kinley, however, in the hope of allaying political discontent and
finding foreign markets for American products, had considered
the alternative.4*6
Conditions in the 1890’s changed his mind about the tariff as
well as the monetary standard. “M y fellow-citizens,” McKinley
told a joint meeting of the Philadelphia Museums and the Manu
facturers’ Club in June, 1897, “there is no use in making a product
if you cannot find somebody to take it. The maker must find a
taker. You will not employ labor to make a product unless you
can find a buyer for that product after you have made it.” The
President thought he had found the key to the doors of foreign
markets in the formula of reciprocity. As the handmaiden to pro
tection, reciprocity did not disturb McKinley’s devotion to his
traditional high tariff views. But his stress on the law of supply
and demand in the 1896 campaign, and his belief that the work
ings of reciprocity would ferret out crucial foreign demand
needed to balance the two points of this law, indicated that a
significant change of emphasis had occurred in his thinking dur
ing the 1890’s. McKinley had worked for Blaine’s ideas in 1890,
but the Ohioan became a fervent disciple of reciprocity only
after the economic crisis of 1893.®
A t the first N.A.M . convention in 1895, McKinley outlined
the perfect trade program: “our own markets for our manufac
tures and agricultural products” and “a reciprocity which will
give us foreign markets for our surplus products.” In his Inaugu
ral, the new President boasted of the aid given American foreign
trade by the 1890 provision and declared, “The end in view al
ways [should] be the opening up of new markets for the products
of our country.” After three months in office he could remark
21 Lee to D ay, N ov. 17, D ec. 7,1897, Consular, Havana, and P. F. H yatt
to D ay, Jan. 12, 1898, Consular, Santiago, N A , R G 59.
22 Barclay to Salisbury, Jan. 14, 1898, F.O. 72/2062; Lee to Day, Jan.
12, 13, 14, 15, 1898, Consular, Havana, N A , R G 59; Spanish Diplomatic
Correspondence and Documents, 63-67.
$44 The N e w Empire
that American life and property were not safe. After consulting
M cKinley the day before, Representative Robert H itt of Illinois
rose in the House on January 18 and expressed concern that,
since the reform program had not worked, the United States
would have to intervene to protect American citizens and prop
erty. The same day that H itt spoke with M cKinley, Secretary
Long began reordering the fleet in the South Atlantic, since, as
he wrote in secret orders, “Affairs are very disturbed at Cuba.”
The administration decided on the twenty-fourth to send the
armored cruiser “Maine” to Havana. The Spanish Minister fully
supported the decision to send the vessel. The ostensible purpose
of the sailing of the “Maine” was to resume friendly visits of
American ships to Spanish ports.23 In the context of M cKinley’s
reaction to the Havana riots and Long’s maneuvering of the fleet,
however, the sending of the “Maine” was an attempt to discourage
future outbreaks on the island and to provide notice of the ad
ministration’s concern over the inadequacy of the Spanish re
forms.
The Pittsburgh Press observed that the sailing of the “Maine”
had led to “a strong popular suspicion that the administration is
preparing for intervention,” a rumor which D ay promptly de
nied. But the Journal of Commerce noted “as a matter of interest
that the United States now has assembled near K ey W est the most
formidable fleet of warships that has gotten together in our home
waters for many years.” The most discouraged—and frightened
—reaction occurred in Madrid. There, the British Chargé re
ported, the decision to send the “Maine” was believed to be “in
opportune and dangerous.” The Chargé noted that the decision
was especially inopportune since the Philippine situation had
recently quieted, the new Cuban reforms had just begun, the
United States and Spain had after a long delay initiated friendly
negotiations on a commercial treaty, and, finally, General Juan
23 N ew York Tribune, Jan. 17,1898, 1:4; Long to Chester, Jan. 17, 1898,
Ciphers Sent, 1888-1898, N A , R G 45; Lee to Day, Feb. 12, 1898, Con
sular, Havana, N A , R G 59.
Reaction: Approach to W ar 345
Massó and 110 of his men had voluntarily deserted the revolution
ary cause. Massó had been especially close to Máximo Gómez,
and the desertion buckled rebel spirits. In Spanish minds, the
sailing of the “Maine” threatened to cancel out these vestiges of
progress.2452
The Spanish regime expressed its concern at the American
reaction when W oodford met with the Queen and then with
Segismundo Moret, Spanish Minister for Colonies, on January
15 and 16, respectively. Repeating the Queen’s assurances, Moret
said that Blanco had the situation in Cuba w ell in hand and that
W eyler would never return to the island. The Spanish Minister
then added that, since “we have done all that you asked or sug
gested,” would W oodford “urge the President to do something
that shall show the Cuban rebels that they had better accept
autonomy and give up their struggle? I feel that we are entitled
to this after what we have done.” He then recalled that the Cleve
land administration had offered to do this if Spain granted auton
omy. W oodford’s reply was significant in revealing the American
position. Since “our American idea is that Governments de
rive their just authority from the consent of the governed,” the
American Minister retorted, the United States could not interfere
“to keep a people under monarchical rule, who are seeking to es
tablish a republic.” In reporting this to M cKinley, W oodford
made explicit the assumption of such an American position:
“W hen it becomes clear that [Blanco] cannot succeed or that
the United States must intervene, the Queen w ill have to choose
between losing her throne or losing Cuba at the risk of war with
us.” W oodford believed Spain would try to save the dynasty.20
The American Minister was apparently attempting to under
mine Spanish influence in Cuba in every possible way. One of his
24 Pittsburgh Press, Jan. 25, 1898, 1:1; Journal of Commerce , Jan. 25,
1898, 1:3; Barclay to Salisbury, Jan. 26, 1898, F.O. 72/2062. W oodford
to Sherman, Jan. 24, 1898, Spain, Despatches, N A , R G 59, contains in
formation on the commercial treaty.
25 W oodford to McKinley, Jan. 17,1898, Spain, Despatches, N A , R G 59.
346 The N e w Empire
best opportunities for doing this was through a new commercial
treaty which he was negotiating with Spain. In late January
he commented: “I regard the successful and early consum
mation of this treaty as very important. It seems to me vital. U n
less some accident shall occur, such a treaty should obtain for us
the practical control of the Cuban market.” On February 4, how
ever, W oodford notified Sherman that the discussions had re
vealed that the commercial privileges given to Cuba in the reform
program were not as extensive as the American Minister had first
thought. Cubans could only offer suggestions, “while the actual
making of the treaty is to be under the control of Spain.” This
interpretation of the reform program not only detracted from
Cuba’s autonomy, but it allowed merchants in Spain, who were
bitterly anti-American, to influence the final terms o f the
pact.26
Five days after W oodford’s report, another episode profoundly
weakened not only American hopes for a favorable commercial
treaty, but the administration’s confidence in Spain’s good faith
in all realms of diplomacy. John J. McCook, a dapper, handsome,
and wealthy N ew York lawyer of the venerable firm of Alex
ander & Green, had often called in 1897-1898 on his good friends
from Ohio, M cKinley and D ay. The President had considered
McCook as a possibility for Secretary of the Interior, a post
which McCook rejected because it did not give full rein to his
interest in foreign affairs. M cKinley refused to offer the N ew
Yorker the Attorney General’s post because, as the President
remarked to a caller, “I do not understand Col. McCook’s interest
in Cuban affairs.” McCook had become deeply involved in the
N ew York Junta, so much so, in fact, that he had created an
international syndicate to purchase Cuba from Spain and present
it to the Junta. His ties with M cKinley and w ith American busi
nessmen in Cuba had proved invaluable in this venture, but the
,
The Far East ¡897 to March 1898 ,
The growing involvement of the United States in the Cuban
straggle was matched, although in a less intensive manner, by
American concern with events in the Far East. The United States
did not suddenly realize the value of the far Pacific area after
D ew ey’s victory at Manila on May 1. U ntil the de Lome letter
incident and the “Maine” sinking in mid-February, events in Cuba
shared prime newspaper space with stories relating Russian and
German threats to the open door in China and Manchuria. This
interest in the Far East trailed off only in a relative fashion after
March 1.
The M cKinley administration continued O lney’s attempts to
open new areas of China for American merchants and mission
aries. An important result of this policy was the first movement
of American missionaries into the rich Hunan province in 1897.
In a long report to Washington, Denby reiterated his belief that
the trader would follow the missionary into Hunan, listed the
limitless economic possibilities of the province, but strangely ne
glected the religious significance of the event. After State D e
partment prodding, Hangchow was also opened to American
merchants for the first time.36
Such State Department action, along with the opening of new
concession and trading areas by the major European powers, en
couraged American concessionaires and exporters to pay close
attention to the Far Eastern scene. T w o of the more prominent
and colorful promoters were W harton Barker and James Harri
son W ilson. Barker, a Philadelphia banker and publisher, had been
an agent of the House of Baring until the 1890 crash. H e had
worked closely with the Russians since 1878, when he had been
knighted by Alexander II, and he never tired of quoting Tocque-
ville’s phrase regarding “the tw o great nations in the world which
seem to tend toward the same end.” W ith Russian cooperation
he had nearly succeeded in selling the Chinese a $20,000,000 tele-
36 McCormick, “ ‘Fair Field and N o Favor,’ ” 130-132.
Reaction: Approach to W ar 353
graph, telephone, and banking project in 1887. Ten years later
Barker was passionately advocating bimetallism and working with
Chinese and Russian agents to obtain railroad concessions in the
Orient.37
W ilson agreed with Barker that China was a “Russian pro
tectorate.” W ith assistance from John J. McCook and Jacob
Schiff of Kuhn, Loeb, and Company, W ilson attempted to work
through St. Petersburg to obtain rail and mining rights in Man
churia and China. But W ilson concerned himself more with the
fundamentals of the situation than did Barker. W ilson, McCook,
Schiff, Theodore Search of the N .A .M ., Theodore Roosevelt, and
Lodge, among others, visited the W hite House to urge McKinley
to place McCook in the cabinet, Roosevelt in the N avy Depart
ment, W ilson in St. Petersburg as American Minister, and to ap
point W illiam W . Rockhill, an expert on Asiatic affairs and an
intimate of W ilson’s schemes, as Minister to China. O nly Roose
velt received the desired position; the others fell before the Presi
dent’s distrust of McCook’s and W ilson’s Cuban schemes and
M cKinley’s desire for an even geographical distribution of pa
tronage. The President’s decision marked the last opportunity
for pro-Russian sentiment to appear in policy-making circles.38
Other promoters enjoyed more success than did Barker or
W ilson. The American China Development Company had lost
a rich railroad concession to a Belgian group in 1896, but within
four years after its founding in 1895, the American company
boasted a $1,000,000 war chest and listed Rockefeller representa
tives, Schiff, E. H . Harriman, the American Sugar Refineries
Tribune, Jan. 20, 1898, 6:1; Feb. 7, 1898, 6:1; Journal of Commerce, Feb.
7, 1898, 6:1-2; Boston Herald, Feb. 8, 1898, 6:3; Public Opinion, Jan. 6,
1898, 4-6; N ew York Tribune, Jan. 23, 1898, 6:1.
47 Philadelphia Press, Jan. 7,1898,6:4; Jan. 23, 1898, 8:4 and 6:2; Camp
bell, Anglo-American Understanding, 15-16,18; Garraty, Lodge, 204-205.
Reaction: Approach to W ar 359
Far East. The British then turned to Germany. The Kaiser, trust
ing neither British motives nor dependability, refused the ad
vances.48
D ay’s refusal did not mean that the State Department had de
serted the Far East. It could hardly have done so in view of the
business clamor for action and in view of the rumor, assiduously
circulated by the Journal of Commerce, that the world money
markets were sinking not only because of the Cuban crisis but
also because of the dangers in China. The M cKinley administra
tion first demonstrated its interest in the Far East when it changed
its ministerial appointment for the Chinese post. The appoint
ment of Charles Page Bryan, an inexperienced diplomat (the
Journal of Commerce always condescendingly referred to him
as “the young Mr. Bryan”) had aroused little opposition until the
Kiaochow incident. But in December, the editors of those com
mercial journals that had apotheosized the China market attacked
the nomination. M cKinley, working rapidly, withdrew Bryan’s
name from the Senate. Senator Frye later recalled that James
Harrison W ilson appeared to have the President’s approval, then
Bryan’s backers changed to Edwin Conger, Minister to Brazil,
in order to block W ilson. Bryan went to Brazil. Conger, an ex
perienced and older diplomat, was welcomed by the special
China interests. The Journal of Commerce viewed the appoint
ment as an indication that M cKinley had gained “a growing per
ception . . . of the gravity of the situation in the Far East in
respect to its bearing on the future of American trade.” Meeting
in March with the Committee on American Interests in China,
Conger “decidedly impressed” his listeners with the statement
that he “regarded commerce and not politics as the best guide in
diplomacy.” The committee departed “with the idea that the care
of American interests in China had been committed to eminently
safe and capable hands.” 48
1:3; March 7, 1898, 1:3; N e w York W orld , Dec. 23, 1897, 7:1; Frye to
W ilson, March 5 and Jan. 13, 1898, W ilson MSS.
60 N ew York W orld , D ec. 19, 1897, 8:1; W olff to Salisbury, Jan. 4,
1897, F.O. 72/2033; N cN air to Herbert, Area 10 file. Box 15, Oct.-Dec.,
1896, folder, N A , RG 45; Long, N ew American N avy, 168-169.
Reaction: Approach to W ar 361
Saxons. Roosevelt watched Far Eastern events closely. H e told
the W ar College in June, 1897: “The enemies we may have to
face w ill come from Asia. . . . Our interests are as great in the
Pacific as in the Atlantic.” Roosevelt also communicated such
thoughts, no doubt with characteristic vigor, to President Mc
Kinley when the tw o men enjoyed long rides through W ashing
ton parks on warm autumn afternoons. The President and the
Assistant Secretary became close friends in late 1897. In a conver
sation in 1898 M cKinley, as hoary legend relates, could not es
timate within a couple thousand miles where those “darn” islands
were. H e nevertheless could, after his long conversations with
Roosevelt, judge their location closely enough to agree to N avy
Department orders of December, 1897, which instructed Com
modore George D ew ey to strike the Philippines should war oc
cur between the United States and Spain.51
Papers in the M cKinley manuscripts indicate that the W hite
House followed the course of the Philippine insurrection in early
1898. Thus when Roosevelt, taking advantage of Long’s absence
on the afternoon of February 25, ordered D ew ey to prepare for
war, it is not strange that M cKinley and Long did not bother
to countermand the orders. Historians have too long overlooked
this crucial aspect of Roosevelt’s order-sending spree. Although
the President and the Secretary of the N avy rescinded more than
half of Roosevelt’s other plans, they allowed D ew ey to prepare
to strike Manila. The Assistant Secretary’s actions, moreover,
did not result from a sudden inspiration; Roosevelt acted after
months of conversations with Mahan, Adams, Lodge, and, be it
not forgotten, M cKinley.662
1
T w o weeks later Long received a letter from a Boston lawyer
who urged seizure of the Philippines, noted rumors of “a good
Hawaii
In the context of this intensified attention on the Far East,
M cKinley submitted a treaty to annex the Hawaiian Islands in
1897. Congress later passed a joint resolution, but the Hawaiian
debate, which raged for a year follow ing the President’s re
quest for ratification, offers several insights into the policies
which shaped the new empire during the months preceding
the war with Spain. First, strong Japanese protests destroyed key
assumptions of the Cleveland-Gresham argument against annex
ation and forced new empire expansionists to change their Ha
waiian policies. Second, the annexation treaty nearly passed
Congress in the early months of 1898, before the war with Spain,
because expansionists had begun to emphasize the relationship
between formal control of Hawaii and maintenance of the Amer
ican commercial rights in the Far East.
As early as 1891 M cKinley had fought for the retention of
Pearl Harbor and had worried about the encroachment of foreign 35
B9W ashington Evening Star, Jan. 12, 1898, 4:2; Jan. 19, 1898, 14:1;
Russ, The Hawaiian Republic, 240.
60 N e w York Tribune, Jan. 11,1898,1:1; Jan. 13,1898,4:4; Feb. 2, 1898,
1:1; W ashington Evening Star, Jan. 13, 1898, 14:1.
$68 The N e w Empire
Japanese danger. The Chief Executive no doubt was talking
about territorial, not commercial, shares. Hoar went away satis
fied and provided influential support for the treaty, but a year
later he exhibited more than a little bitterness when M cKinley
forced him to take a stand on the annexation of the Philippines.81
Many other points of the Hawaiian discussion, both inside and
outside of Congress, presaged the Philippine debate of 1899. Few
of the antiannexationists spoke about commercial benefits; they
tended instead to emphasize the constitutional and racial argu
ments. W hen they did mention commercial advantages, they
believed that control of Pearl Harbor and the present trading ar
rangements would suffice to keep the trade in American hands.
The annexationists polished off that argument by noting that
Pearl Harbor was useless against an enemy unless the United
States controlled the hinterland of the naval base as w ell. As for
the trading arrangements, any foreign power which gained in
fluence over the island government could abrogate the commer
cial treaties at w ill. W hen the antiannexationists urged the con
tinuation of a de jacto protectorate instead of assuming new and
unknown political responsibilities, the W ashington Evening Star
printed the rebuttal: “A protectorate is a half and half measure,
involving endless complications with the other strong powers
which are soon to develop active competition for the possession
and control of the Pacific ocean.” A ll these questions would arise
in the Philippine discussion, and the answers would be nearly the
same.82
The Japanese threat and the renewed concern over Far East
ern events nearly provided enough impetus to drive the annexa
tion treaty through the Senate in February and March, 1898.
The de Lome letter and the “Maine” catastrophe focused primary
ei George F. Hoar, Autobiography of Seventy Years (N e w , York,
1903), II, 306-308.
82 W ashington Evening Star, Jan. 24, 1898, 9:6. For a similar argument
on the weaknesses of protectorates, see the Senate Foreign Relations
Committee’s majority report on Hawaiian annexation, Senate Report
N o. 681, 55th Cong., 2nd Sess. (serial 3267), 1-119.
Reaction: Approach to W ar 369
attention on Cuba, and the beet sugar lobby exerted much in
fluence on wavering senators, but at one point in late February,
Cushman Davis believed that he had all but four of the sixty
votes necessary for ratification. The administration forces then
suddenly switched tactics. On March 16 the Foreign Relations
Committee reported a joint resolution for annexation, which
required only a majority of both houses. The resolution appeared
to be so certain of quick passage that the next day, the seven
teenth, sugar prices broke sharply downward on the N ew York
Stock Exchange. Again, affairs in Cuba prevented debate. But in
June the House passed the resolution 290-91 amidst arguments
eulogizing the bottomless Asian markets and the necessity of
preserving American interests in the far Pacific. On July 6 the
Senate passed the measure 42-21 and M cKinley made annexation
official the follow ing day.63
The President proclaimed that the annexing of Hawaii marked
the “inevitable consequence” of three-quarters of a century of
American interest in those islands. Few if any events in history
are inevitable. Certainly the Cleveland administration had proven
that the issue of Hawaiian annexation was not blessed with kismet
in 1893. But during the next five years American policy makers
began to view the matter in a new light. Both Cleveland, during
his later years in office, and M cKinley accepted the D ole regime
as a stable government; the United States forgot about the meth
ods which that government had employed to assume power.
Second, Americans lost much of their fear of bringing new races
into the Union, especially when a third factor became evident—
a Japanese threat posing a danger with which Cleveland and
Gresham had not been forced to deal. Finally, and most impor
tant, the United States had decided that its interests in the far
Pacific could be preserved only if the Hawaiian Islands were po
litically stabilized and if American naval and commercial hold
ings were freed from all foreign threats. T he Battle of Manila
63 Stevens, American Expansion in Hawaii, 290-29^; W ashington
Evening Star, March 17, 1898, 2:7.
ß jo The N e w Empire
Bay raised this last argument into full prominence, but the argu
ment had been popularized many months before D ew ey con
jured up new visions o f the Asian market during the dawn o f
that May morning.
74 Public Opinion , July 15, 1897, 91; N ov. 18, 1897, 666-667; W illiam
Barnes and John Heath Morgan, The Foreign Service of the United
States: Origins, Development, and Functions (W ashington, 1961), 149-
150; Journal of Commerce , Jan. 26, 1898, 8:2; Commercial Advertiser ,
Jan. 27, 1898, 6:3.
75 Quotation o f Iron Trades Review of London in Journal of Com -
merce , Oct. 7, 1897, 4:4; Vagts, Deutschland und die Vereinigten Staaten,
346; Sherman to T ow er, Dec. 14, 1897, Austria, Instructions, N A , R G
59-
578 T he N e w Empire
of Foreign Affairs of the Austro-Hungarian Empire, declared in
a formal address that Europe was engaged in a life-and-death
commercial struggle w ith “countries beyond the seas.” H e urged
all European nations to “fight shoulder to shoulder against this
common danger” and to “go into this contest armed w ith every
weapon o f defense that their resources can afford.” T he State
Department interpreted this speech as more than a declaration
of commercial war. In the summer of 1896 O lney had believed
that Goluchowski had inspired Spain’s attempts to line up a com
mon European front against the United States. Perhaps Golu
chowski was now making another such attempt. The Journal of
Commerce interpreted the Minister’s speech as another indication
o f the growing Russian menace. Austria, the Journal premised,
was only “third-rate” commercially; thus Goluchowski must be
acting as front man for the grasping Czar. But although Ameri
cans worried about the political meaning o f Goluchowski’s
speech, few were concerned about the throwing down of the
gauntlet if this meant commercial warfare. As the Gncinnati
Commercial Tribune commented in a direct reply to G oluchow
ski, “A power higher than that o f thrones and ministries has
decreed that Europe shall play second fiddle to U ncle Sam in
the commerce of the world, and you fight against fate when you
try to prevent it.” TÄ
As the United States entered the new year o f 1898, new syn
dicates and lobbying groups were organizing to advance Amer
ican economic interests in the Orient. The Bureau o f American
Republics was having difficulty in meeting the mounting demand
from businessmen who sought information and aid in finding new
Latin-American markets. In March, 1898, the N ew York Com
mercial Advertiser could justifiably brag of the existence of “a
new Monroe doctrine, not o f political principles, but of com -67
85 Julius Pratt discusses this opposition in detail in ch. vii o f his Ex
pansionists of 18$8; see also Boston Herald, March 6, 1898, 12:13; ^ d
Journal of Commerce, April 1, 1898, 6:2-3.
8«Louisville Commercial, April 14, 1898, 4:1; March 5, 1898, 4:2;
386 T he N e w Empire
The Pittsburgh Press represented one of the special interests
that would benefit from war. T he Pittsburgh Chamber of Com
merce also advocated the use of force, and the Chattanooga
Tradesman suggested one reason why: the “small prospect” of
conflict, the Tradesman noted on March i, “has decidedly stim
ulated the iron trade.” This journal, which did not want war, also
commented, “Actual war would very decidedly enlarge the
business of transportation,” especially railroads. W illiam E. Curtis
wrote from W ashington that the “belligerent spirit” which had
infected everyone in the N avy Department, with the possible
exception of Secretary Long, had been encouraged “by the con
tractors for projectiles, ordnance, ammunition and other supplies,
who have thronged the department since the destruction of the
M aine” These contractors, Curtis charged, had also assisted “cor
respondents of sensational newspapers in manufacturing canards
and scare news.” 87
A strong possibility exists that the antiwar commercial jour
nals in N ew York spoke for the less important members of that
financial community. Russell Sage, claiming that he spoke “not
only m y own views on this point, but those of other moneyed
men with whom I have talked,” demanded that if the “Maine”
was blown up by an outside force “the time for action has come.
There should be no wavering.” If war did occur, “There is no
question as to where the rich men stand”; they would buy gov
ernment bonds as they had during the G vil W ar and do all in
their power to bolster the nation’s war resources. W . C. Beer,
w ho attempted to make a thorough survey of leading business
men’s opinion, concluded that “the steady opponents of the war
among financiers were simply the life insurance men and small
bankers.” Beer found such giants as John Jacob Astor, John
Gates, Thomas Fortune Ryan, W illiam Rockefeller, and Stuy-
91 Lee to Day, N ov. 27, 1897, Consular, Havana, and H yatt to Day,
March 23, 1898, Consular, Santiago, N A , R G 59; enclosure in Levi P.
Morton to M cKinley, March 20, 1898, M cKinley MSS.
92 Atkins’ views are in Lodge to Charles Francis Adams, Jan. 22, 1897,
Letterbooks, Lodge MSS; Lee to Day, Jan. 18, 1898, Consular, Havana,
N A , R G 59; N ew York Tribune , March 14,1898,1:6; Barrington to Salis
bury, N ov. i i , 1897, Salisbury MSS.
ßpo T he N e w Empire
Perhaps the American business community exerted the most
influence on the administration during the last tw o weeks in
March when influential business spokesmen began to welcome
the possibility of war in order to end the suspense which
shrouded the commercial exchanges. Although other historians
have touched briefly on this important change,93 it should be
noted that some important business spokesmen and President
M cKinley apparently arrived at this decision at approximately
the same time.
During the first tw o months of 1898 the United States began
to enjoy prosperous conditions for the first time in five years.
T he de Lome and “Maine” incidents affected business condi
tions only in the stock exchanges, and even there the impact
was slight. Business improved, especially in the W est and N orth
west. In early March very few business journals feared a return
of depression conditions, and with the gold influx resulting
from discoveries in Alaska and from the export surplus, even
few er business observers displayed anxiety over the silver
threat.94
But in mid-March financial reporters noted that business in
commodities as w ell as stocks had suddenly slowed. H enry Clay
Frick had been optimistic in his business reports to Andrew
Carnegie, who was vacationing in Scotland. But on March 24,
Frick reported that “owing to uncertainty . . . of the Cuban
trouble, business is rather stagnant.” A W all Street correspond
ent wrote on March 22 that “the last tw o days have been the
dullest for many a month.” On March 26 the Commercial and
Financial Chronicle summarized the situation. N o “sudden and
violent drop in prices” had occurred. But the rapid progress in
trade had stopped and now “frequent complaints are heard. The
97 Ibid., March 10, 1898; Economist, April 9, 1898, 556; Pratt, Expan
sionists of 1898, 246; Journal of Commerce, March 14, 1898, 6:2-3; March
23, 1898, 6:1; Pittsburgh Press, March 19, 1898, 1:1; Philadelphia Press,
March 21,1898,6:2; Lodge to M cKinley, March 21,1898, M cKinley MSS.
Reaction: Approach to W ar 393
wanted first of all is relief from the suspense. . . . Even a dec
laration of war would be preferred by bankers and stockbrokers
to the continuance o f a stagnant market, with hourly flurries,
caused by sensational journalism and the rumors of impending
hostilities,” the Tribune reported. If war occurred, a “specu
lators’ movement” might result in a “temporary flurry in Amer
ican stocks.” But other investors would hold their securities “in
confident expectation that these w ill rise with the increased
movement of railway traffic caused by war.” 98
T w o days after the receipt of Reick’s telegram, M cKinley
and D ay presented an ultimatum to Spain. This move climaxed
a week of hurried consultations and policy changes. Before
March 20 the President had considered purchasing the island
or attempting to work out a plan which would ensure American
control while maintaining the trappings of Spanish sovereignty.
Spain refused to sell the island, however, and the Junta and the
rebels on the island would not listen to the second proposal. N ow
in the new climate created by Proctor’s speech and the changing
ideas o f the business community, M cKinley prepared to take
more forceful steps. For the first time in the crisis the President
called in a number o f Democratic senators for consultations on
March 22. Doubtlessly reflecting the changed attitudes of both
M cKinley and some business spokesmen, the war party in the
Senate now claimed for the first time a majority of the forty-
three Republicans, including representatives of the large cor
porations. These changes threatened to provoke Congress into
its most belligerent outbursts on March 29 and 30."
107 Chadwick denies “that the desolation o f Cuba was w holly or even
mainly the work o f the Spanish administration” and justifies “the right
under international law” of Spain to use the reconcentrado policies to
stop the revolution. On the other hand, Chadwick believes American
feeling correct in protesting the Spanish carelessness in feeding and car
ing for the reconcentrados ( United States and Spain, 486-503).
ios W oodford to M cKinley, April 11, 1898, Spain, Despatches, N A , R G
59-
400 The N e w Empire
N o sovereign nation could be threatened with a time limit and
uncompromising demands without fighting back. The fact that
Spain would not grant M cKinley’s demand for immediate Cuban
independence makes the Spanish-American W ar which began
in April, 1898, by no means an inevitable conflict. A ny conflict
is inevitable once one proud and sovereign power, dealing with
a similar power, decides to abandon the conference table and
issue an ultimatum. The historical problem remains: which
power took the initiative in setting the conditions that resulted
in armed conflict, and were those conditions justified?
By April 10 M cKinley had assumed an inflexible position.
The President abjured this second alternative and demanded not
only a truce, but a truce which would lead to a guarantee of
immediate Cuban independence obtained with the aid of Amer
ican mediation. H e moreover demanded such a guarantee of
independence before the Cortes or the Cuban parliament, the
tw o groups which had the constitutional power to grant such
independence, were to gather for their formal sessions.109
The central question is, o f course, w hy M cKinley found him
self in such a position on April 10 that only the third alternative
was open to him. The President did not want war; he had been
sincere and tireless in his efforts to maintain the peace. By mid-
March, however, he was beginning to discover that, although
he did not want war, he did want what only a war could provide:
the disappearance of the terrible uncertainty in American po
litical and economic life, and a solid basis from which to resume
the building of the new American commercial empire. W hen
the President made his demands, therefore, he made the ultimate
demands; as far as he was concerned, a six-month period of
negotiations would not serve to temper the political and eco
nomic problems in the United States, but only exacerbate them.
T o say this is to raise another question: w hy did M cKinley
109 W ashington Evening Star, April 11, 1898, 2:3, has an interesting
comment from an unidentified cabinet member on the meaninglessness of
the Spanish truce offer.
Reaction: Approach to W ar 401
arrive at this position during mid-March? W hat were the factors
which limited the President’s freedom o f choice and policies at
this particular time? The standard interpretations of the war’s
causes emphasize the yellow journals and a belligerent Congress.
These were doubtlessly crucial factors in shaping the course of
American entry into the conflict, but they must be used care
fully. A first observation should be that Congress and the yellow
press, which had been loudly urging intervention ever since
1895, did not make a maiden appearance in March, 1898; new
elements had to enter the scene at that time to act as the catalysts
for M cKinley’s policy. Other facts should be noted regarding
the yellow press specifically. In areas where this press supposedly
was most important, such as N ew York City, no more than one-
third of the press could be considered sensational. The strongest
and most widespread prowar journalism apparently occurred
in the Midwest. But there were few yellow journals there. The
papers that advocated war in this section did so for reasons other
than sensationalism; among these reasons were the influence of
the Cuban Junta and, perhaps most important, the belief that
the United States possessed important interests in the Caribbean
area which had to be protected. Finally, the yellow press ob
viously did not control the levers of American foreign policy.
M cKinley held these, and he bitterly attacked the owners of
the sensational journals as “evil disposed . . . people.” An in
terpretation stressing rabid journalism as a major cause of the
war should draw some link to illustrate how these journals
reached the W hite House or the State Department. T o say that
this influence was exerted through public opinion proves nothing;
the next problem is to demonstrate how much public opinion
was governed by the yellow press, how much of this opinion
was influenced by more sober factors, and which of these tw o
branches of opinion most influenced M cKinley.110
116 Leech, Days of M cKinley, 176; Philadelphia Press, March 13, 1898,
8:3; Garraty, Lodge, 191.
117 Bradstreet’s, April 9, 1898, 234, also April 30, 1898, 272, 282.
Epilogue
ARCHIVES (UNPUBLISHED)
Great Britain, Records of the Foreign Office, Public Records Office.
London.
United States, Records of the Department of State and Department
of the Navy, National Archives. Washington, D.C.
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BOOKS
Adams, Brooks, 61-62, 80-85, 95- Allen, Horace, 57,137-138, 304, 307,
101, 188, 326, 372; and westward 313, 321-322
movement of empire, 26; and J. Allen, W illiam F., 96
Strong, 79, 80; and A. T . Mahan, American Asiatic Association, 410
93-95; leads bimetallist club in American China Development
Boston, 157; views o f Asia, 360- Company, 303, 321, 353
American Federation of Labor, 174,
361
Adams, Charles Francis, 81 286, 363
Adams, H enry, 14, 24, 31, 75, 83, American Historical Association,
96, 250, 318, 322, 326, 328, 332, 70-71
407, 417 American Interests in China, 355
Adams, John Quincy, 1, 54, 80, 95, American Socialist party, 14
318; influence on Seward, 25, 27 American Sugar Refineries Com
Adams, Robert, Jr., 236 pany, 353
Adee, A lvey A ., 132, 205; fears American Trading Company, 303
Great Britain, 145-146, 227-228, Anglo-Saxon mission, 73; J.
246, 264 Strong’s views of, 78-79; and in
Africa, i, 52-53, 76, 78, n o , 186 tellectuals, 98-99; and mission
Agriculture, 9-10,20-21,27, 34,104- aries, 305-306; see also Manifest
105, 117, 151, 160, 165-172; disap destiny
pearance of self-sufficient farm Annexationist Club, 144
er, 173; to be sacrificed for in Argentina, 48, 113, 118, 136, 232
dustrial power, 182-183; see also Armour, P. D ., 274-275
Cotton, Tobacco, and W heat Arthur, Chester A ., 47
Alaska, 318, 390; Seward’s purchase Asia, i, 9, i i , 23; as the “Far W est,”
and views of, 28-29, 31, 404, 408 5; and U.S. in 1850’s, 24; Seward’s
Aldrich, Nelson, 235 views of, 26-31; Grant’s and Fish’s
Alger, R. A ., 249, 402 views of, 35-36; and U.S. desire
Allen, Col. Ethan, 387 for foreign markets, 41, 186-187,
430 Index
Asia ( cont .) Bates, George H ., 139
190, 219-220, 321; Evarts’ views Battleship fleet, see United States
of, 43-46; and Isthmian canal, 49; N avy
and Cleveland administration’s Bayard, Thomas F., 68; and Cana
views of, 1885-1889, 53-58; F. J. dian reciprocity, 1887, 34; as Sec
Turner’s views of, 71; J. Strong’s retary or State, 1885-1889, 53-58;
views of, 74, 78-79; B. Adams’ and Haiti, 1889, 127; and Samoa,
views of, 84,94-95; A. T . Mahan’s 139; and Hawaii, 208; and N ic
views of, 86, 96; as noncolonial aragua, 222, 228; and Venezuela,
area, 91; intellectuals place em 243, 244-245, 247, 252, 262-264,
phasis upon, 100-101; and bimet 266-269, 278, 315
allism, 108, 157-158; M cKinley’s Beard, Charles A ., 6
and Harrison’s views of, 111-112; Beer, W . C., 386
and 1890 naval debates, 125; and Belgium, 23, 52-53, 303
Hawaiian revolution, 1893, 148; Bellamy, Edward, 15
and U.S. gold policies, 155; and Benedict, E. G , 280
U.S. N avy, 230-231; and expan Benham, Rear Admiral Andrew E.
sion of U.S. N avy, 236; and Sino- K., 215-216, 235, 236
Japanese W ar, 1894-1895, 238; Bering Sea dispute, 107, 135, 313,
U.S. involvements in, 1894-1897, 318
284-285, 300-311; and Cuba, 295; Beringause, Arthur F., 85
and Anglo-American relations, Berkeley, Bishop George, 74, 86
316-317; and Russian-U.S. rela Berlin Conference, 1884, 52
tions, 318-325; and U.S., 1897- Bethlehem Iron [Steel] Company,
1898, 330, 333, 352-362, 365-367, . 239» 35<5
378, 379- 383» 4 0 5 » 4 0 7 » 4 0 9 ». 4 ! 0- Bimetallism, 83, 108, 155-156, 193,
417; see also China, Hawaii, Ja 330-33r; see also Silver
pan, Korea, Open-Door N otes, Bismarck, Count Herbert von, 139
and Open-door policy Bismarck, Otto von, 98, 258; mod
Astor, John Jacob, 386-387 erates stand on Samoan issue, 138-
Atkins, Edwin, 38, 287, 389 140
Atkinson, Edward, 271-272, 314, Blaine, James G., 20, 36, 46, 68, 86,
412-413 188, 284, 320, 376; and foreign
Atlanta Exposition of 1895, 190-191 policies o f Harrison administra
Australia, 147, 404 tion, 1889-1893, 102-149; outlines
Austro-Hungarian Empire, 378 anticolonial and trade policies,
A very, J. W ., 190-191 105-106; and Haitian revolution,
127-130; and Chilean revolution,
Bacon, Eben, 273 130-136; and Asia, 1889-1891,136-
Baker, Lewis, 222-225 138; and Samoa, 1889-1892, 138-
Baldwin Locomotive W orks, 307, 140; and Hawaii, 1881-1893, 140-
375 149; and M cKinley, 328, 331
Balmaceda government, 130-136 Blanco y Arenas, Gen. Ramón, 339-
Banks, Nathaniel P., 29 340, 343, 345
Barclay, Robert, 157 Bliss, Cornelius N ., 356
Baring Brothers (H ouse of Baring), Bliss, Tasker H ., 336
1 5 1 * 352 Blount, James H ., 204
Barker, Wharton, 352-353 Boutelle, Charles A ., 124, 126, 238-
Barrett, John, 312-313 239
Index W
Brazil, 43, 48, 190; and U.S. tariff Butler, Ben, 34
act of 1890, 119; revolution in, Butterfield, Gen. Daniel, 387
1893-1894, 210-218, 229, 232, 236-
237; and Venezuelan boundary Caffery, Jefferson, 290
crisis, 243, 246-247 California, 174, 366; as gateway to
Breckinridge, Clifton R., 323 Asia, 7; Seward’s vision of, 29;
British Guiana and Venezuelan and Hawaii, 1893, 146
boundary crisis, 243-282 Call, W ilkinson, 290
British W est Indies, 48-49 Cameron, James Donald, 290, 298
Brockett, Linus P., 12, 13 Campos, Gen. Martinez, 292
Brooks, Peter, 289 Canada, 3, 9, 23, 28, 39, 112, 314;
Bryan, Charles Page, 359 and Grant administration, 32-34;
Bryan, W illiam Jennings, 13-14, 83, Evarts’ views of, 41; as proposed
314; and antiexpansionism in 1900 U.S. frontier, 68; fisheries and
election, 416 Blaine’s policies, 107; and 1890
Bryce, James, 65, 80 reciprocity, 114; and Hawaii, 143,
Bureau o f Foreign Commerce, 311 145, 207-208; Gresham’s desire
Bureau of the American Republics, for, 201
113, 202, 218 Canadian Pacific Railroad, 143
Burgess, John W ., 97, 99 Cannon, H enry W ., 180
Burke, Edmund, 1 Cannon, Joseph G., 349
Burlingame Treaty, 27, 30 Canovas del Castillo, Antonio, 291,
Business, U.S., 62, 81-82, 150, 407- 299» 335. 337
408; attitudes and policies, 1865- Caribbean area: and Seward’s views,
1889, 16-24; and issuance o f 28, 31; and Grant administration’s
monthly consular reports, 41; and policies toward, 36-39; impor
Asia in 1880’s, 56; trapped in ten tance for Hawaii and Isthmian
ets of Social Darwinism, 97-98; canal, 147; U.S. expansion into,
supports reciprocity, 1890, 114, 401,41 r, 416; see also Haiti, Latin
119; and 1893-1897 depression, America, and Santo Domingo
150-196; views o f on tariff o f Carlisle, John G.: analyzes 1893-
1894, 162-164, 171-172; fears so 1897 depression, 153, 155, 181; at
cial crisis of 1893-1894, 175-176; tacks bimetallism, 158-159; notes
analyzes causes o f 1893-1897 de hoarding of money, 179; and
pression, 176-185; advocates solu Venezuela, 259, 267; urges eco
tions for depression, 186-196; in nomic expansion, 282
Brazil, 215; in Nicaragua, 219- Carnegie, Andrew, 8-9, 390; Gospel
229; and U.S. N avy, 238, 241; and of W ealth of, 17, 305; “Law o f
Venezuela, 242-243, 271-276, 279, Surplus” of, 17; and Social Dar
282; and Asia, 1894-1897, 300-311; winism, 98; and tariff o f 1890,
and M cKinley’s views of depres 163, 189; and U.S. N avy, 239; and
sion, 326-327; and Cuba, 341; and Venezuelan boundary crisis, 272,
Asia, 1897-1898, 352-354, 355-362; 273n; and Russia, 319; and Asia,
and Hawaii, 1897-1898, 365-366; 354.
and search for markets, 1897-1898, Caroline Islands, 92
370-379; and approach of war, Carpenter, Frank, 328
384-393, 400, 403-406; and U.S. Cary, Clarence, 356, 382, 384
expansion in 1890’s, 412; see also Central America, 4, 28, h i , 124;
Finance capital, U.S. see also Latin America
432 Index
Chamberlain, Joseph, 276, 317, 358 Colonialism, 68; impact o f on anti
Chandler, W illiam E., 264 expansionist thinking, 1865-1869,
Chandler, Zachariah, 34 31-32; U.S. aversion to in 1880’s,
Chanler, W inthrop, 406 60-61; and Turner’s frontier the
Chile, 42,48, 229; opposes 1889 rec sis, 68-69; and J. Strong’s views,
iprocity proposal, 113; revolution 78; and A. T . Mahan’s views, 91-
in and Harrison administration, 93; Blaine’s and Harrison’s views
130-136, 149 of, 105, 109-111; and U.S. Naval
China, 231, 380-383, 408; and U.S. Policy Board report o f 1889,123;
before i860, 5, 7; as a market for and Hawaiian annexation, 140-
U.S., 21; and treaty of 1868 with 149, 363-370; Gresham’s abhor
U.S., 27; Seward’s visions of, 30; rence of, 200-201; Cleveland ad
Evarts’ views of, 43-46; and ministration’s views of in Hawai
Cleveland administration, 1885- ian debate, 1893-1895, 203-209;
1889, 56-58; and Harrison ad and Isthmian canal, 220; and U.S.
ministration, 137; and Hawaii, N avy, 237; O lney’s view of, 258,
209; fear of, 236-237; and U.S., 293; summary o f U.S. attitude to
1894-1897, 301-311; and U.S., ward, 408-417
1897-1898, 352-362; see also Asia Commerce, see Exports, U.S.
China and Japan Trading Com Commercial Bureau o f the Ameri
pany, 303, 356 can Republics, 113, 202, 218
Cigar Makers* Union, 286 Committee on American Interests
Civil Service reform, 17, 23 in China, 359
Civil War: influence o f on U.S. Comte, Auguste, 97
foreign policy, 2, 5, 6-7, 37; re Conger, Edwin, 359
tards U.S. economic growth, 6; Congo, African, 52-53, 70; see also
impact o f on U.S. merchant Africa
marine, 19; and Seward’s diplo Congress, see United States Con
macy, 25, 31 gress
Clay, H enry, 3-4 Consular Service, 23,376-377
Clayton-Bulwer Treaty, 50-51, 189, Conwell, Russell H ,, 305
3*7 Corinto, see Nicaragua
Cleveland, Grover, 85; administra Costa Rica, h i , 191, 232
tion of, 1885-1889, and foreign Cotton, 9 -1 0 ,1 3 ,1 8 ,2 1 -2 2 ,1 6 4 ,181-
policies, 22-23,5°» 53"58,112,127; 182, 190, 195, 235; and the Asian
and Asia, 45-46, 300-311; and market, 219-220, 303, 354, 356
Hawaii, 148-149, 203-209, 362, Coudert, Frederic R., 299
369; and depression of 1893-1897, Coxey’s Army, 174, 205
150-283; views of on gold stand Cramp Shipbuilding Company, 303,
ard and American commercial 3*9
mission, 158; and Brazil, 210-218; Crossman & Brothers, W . S., 215
and Nicaragua, 218-229; and U.S. Cuba, 39, 48-49, 215; and U.S. be
naval expansion, 229-241; and fore i860, 4; and T en Years’
Venezuelan boundary crisis, 242- W ar, 1868-1878, 37-38, 288; ex
283; and Cuba, 284-300, 342, 345 panding U.S. interests in, 1878-
Clews, Henry, 156, 287 1895, 38; Blaine’s desire for, n o ;
Clyde, W illiam P., 128-129 and 1890 tariff, 119-120; W .
Cockran, Bourke, 166-167 W hitney’s views of, 157; imports
Colombia, 43, 48, 119, 167, 187 textiles from U.S., 190; new re-
Index 433
Cuba {corn.) 149, 150-283 (espec. 192, 230-240,
volt in, 1895, 23&» 284-300; and 242-243, 256), 327, 329-333, 372,
Venezuela, 246; and Asia, 301; 373-374, 390; see also Industrial
and Great Britain, 315-318; and revolution
Ü.S., 1897-1898, 327, 333-352, 364, D ew ey, Commodore George, 352,
368-369, 379-406,415-416 361, 410
Cuban League of the United States, Díaz, Porfirio, 42
286, 387 Dickinson, Don, 250-251, 254
Cullom, Shelby, 104,227, 333 Dilke, Sir Charles, 313
Cummings, Amos, 239 Dingley, Nelson, 374, 376
Curtis, W illiam £ ., 112, 386 Dodge, Grenville M., 42
D ole government o f Hawaii, 204,
Dana, Charles A., 387 206, 369
Danish W est Indies, 31,110 Dolliver, Jonathan, 125, 234
Darwin, Charles, 82,86 Dos Passos, John R., 387
Darwinism, 305; see also Social Dar Douglass, Frederick, 129
winism
Davis, Cushman, 84, 358, 364, 367- Eckels, James H ., 152
369 Eddy, Sherwood, 305
Dawes, Charles, 402 Egan, Patrick, 130-136
Day, W illiam R., 334, 337, 342, 344, Elkins, Stephen B., 103
346-348, 350-351, 358-359, 364, Ellicott, Lieut. John M., 233
381, 389, 394- 396, 398, 4°2 El Salvador, 48,111,188, 227
Debs, Eugene, 68, 256 Emory, Frederic, 208-209, 282-283,
D efoe, Daniel, 86 3”
Democracy, American: threat to England, see Great Britain
by 1877 strike, 14; views of in Europe, 9, 371; J. Strong’s fear of,
1877, 16; John H ay’s view of in 74; Blaine’s attitude toward, 114;
1880’s, 17; and dependence upon threatens intervention in Cuba,
expanding frontier, 65-67, 68, 95; 294-295, 338, 405; and Asia, 300-
J. Strong’s views of, 77, and so 311, 354-362; see also individual
cial crisis of 1894, 184-185; views nations
Russia, 319; views Germany, 324- Evarts, W illiam M., 36, 39-46, 311;
325; threatened b y expansion, summary o f foreign policies of,
1898-1899, 415 4 I"42
Democratic party: views on tariff Exports, U.S.: in 1838-1849 period
in 1892, 159-160; and Venezuelan compared with 1850-1873, 1-2; in
boundary crisis, 279-280; and i860 and 1897, 18; agricultural
Cuba, 286, 333-334; and Grover and industrial exports compared,
Cleveland, 293; British views of, 21-22; necessity for, 40-41; to
314; in Ohio, 328 Latin America, 42-43, 49-50; to
D enby, Charles, 56, 302-310, 322, Asia, 45, 300-311, 354; Blaine’s
352, 354-355 opinions on, 46-47; relationship
Denby, Charles, Jr., 355 or to closed landed frontier, 71;
DePew, Chauncey, 272, 387 A. T . Mahan’s views of, 88-89;
Depressions, causes and results of, Harrison administration’s views
6, 19-21; 1873-1878, 8-9, 14, 34, of, 104-112; and Pan-American
35; 1882-1886, 14-15, 20,65; 1893- policy of Harrison administra
1897, 61, 64-65, 81-83, 88, 148- tion, 112-121; and U.S. interests
434 Index
Exports, U.S. ( cont.) 63-64; and Federalist, N o . 10, 68;
in Samoa, 138-140; relationship of B. Adams’ view of, 83-84; A . T .
to economic problems of 1890- Mahan’s view of, 88-90; and the
1897, I 5i - i 55> *77- , 79. l8 4; “ “ideological consensus,” 95-101;
1897» 371* 374-377 U.S. desire for no more landed
areas, 147-148; and 1894 tariff de
Fairbanks, Charles W ., 348 bates, 167; repels Americans in
Farmers’ Alliance, 104, 117 1893-1895, 174; and U.S. naval
Federalist, N o . 10,184; and frontier expansion, 235; business journal
thesis, 68 view of, 372, 412; see also W est,
Field, Marshall, 274 American
Finance capital, European: in U.S., Frye, W illiam P., 78, 112, 359, 365-
1874-1895, 18; and Monroe D oc 366
trine, 36-37; in U.S., 1892-1893,
151; Cleveland favors, 154; need
for in U.S., 176-185, 314-315 Galt, Sir Alexander, 121
Finance capital, U.S., 314-315; Gama, Admiral Saldanha da, 213-
change of flow of from U.S. to 218
Europe, 9; in Mexico, 36, 42; in Garfield, James, 46
Cuba, 38, 287, 289, 296-297, 334; Garland, Hamlin, 15-16
in Latin America, 51-52, 186-188; Gates, John, 386
Harrison’s view of, 121; increases Germany, 23, 84,120, 218, 248, 284-
in strength after 1893, 177-180; in 285, 317, 360, 376; and U.S. in Pa
Nicaragua, 218-229; in Asia, 1894- cific area, 35; in Latin America,
1897, 300-311; see also Business 36-37, 131; and Samoa, 55, 122-
Firmin, Anténor, 129 123, 138-140, 187; and Venezue
Fish, Hamilton, 32-39, 243 lan boundary crisis, 276; and
Fish, Stuyvesant, 386-387 Asia, 308, 312, 316, 321, 352, 355,
Fiske, John, 77,99-100 357, 358-359; relations with U.S.
Flower, Benjamin Orange, 15 cool, 1890-1898, 323-325; and Ha
Foord, John, 356-357, 382 waii, 363
Foraker, Joseph B., 328,415-416 Gherardi, Rear Admiral Bancroft,
Ford, Patrick, 103 129
Ford, W orthington C., 179, 182, Gilroy, Thomas F., 387
186, 190 Godkin, E. L., 22,97
Foster, John W ., 49, 140, 144-148, Gold: U.S. losses, 1889, 114; and
334 U.S. economic problems, :89o-
France, 30-31, 45, 92, 127, 155, 195, 1895, 151-196; U.S. business com
246-248, 308, 310, 312, 330, 355, munity view of, 176-185; and
358, 37<5, 405 Venezuelan boundary crisis, 273-
Frederic, Harold, 320 274; impact o f on 1898 war, 404
Frelinghuysen, Frederick T ., 36, Goluchowski, Count Agenor, 377-
46- 53» 57-58 378
Frick, H enry Clay, 390 Gómez, Máximo, 286, 345
Frontier, American, 9-16; supposed Gompers, Samuel, 174, 286, 329
closing in 1880’s, 12-13; and an Goodrich, Commander C. F., 233
nexation of Canada, 33; and Ha Gorman, Arthur Pue, 169-172, 198,
waii, 35; F. J. Turner’s views of, 239
63-72; supposed closing in 1890’s, Gould, Jay, 14, 42
Index 435
Government, U.S.: role in expand ezuela, 244-255, 280, 282; and
ing trade, 20, 22-23; Evarts’ view Asia, 302-303, 308-309, 316; views
o f as agent for expanding U.S. Russia, 320
markets, 40-41; to act as agent for Grosvenor, Charles H ., 264
businessmen in Africa, 52; and J. Guatemala,42, h i , 191,232
Strong’s ideas of continued cen G ulf of Mexico, 124
tralization, 75; and B. Adams’ Gullón, Pio, 394
theories on centralization of so
ciety, 81-82, 84; danger to noted
b y journal, 185; N .A .M . wants Haiti, 39, 119, 149, 323; revolution
more help from, 193-194; M cKin in, 1889-1891,127-130
ley ’s views of, 329-330 Hale, Eugene, 114,122-126
Grace, W illiam L., 113 Hallowell, N . P., 273
Grace, W illiam R., & Company, Halstead, Murat, 103, 324
*35« Hanna, Marcus, 328, 332,410
Granger movement, 13 Harcourt, Sir W illiam, 156, 277
Grant, Ulysses S., 32-39 Harmon, Judson, 259
Great Britain, 2, 9, 23, 41-42, 107- Harriman, E. H ., 42, 353
108, 155, 158, 162, 185, 330; as Harris, Benjamin W ., 59
competitor o f U.S. in Latin Harris, Isham, 170
America, 21-22, 36-37, 42, 53, Harrison, Benjamin, 284, 320, 328,
130-131, 136, 150, 187, 195, 202- 407; administration’s foreign poli
203, 216, 218-229; as enemy of cies analyzed, 1889-1893, 102-149;
U.S. commercial expansion, 24; background of, 102-103; chang
and Canada, 33-34; fears U.S. in ing views of on industrial revolu
Pacific area, 35; and Hawaii, 35, tion, 120-121; initiates battleship
141,145-146, 207; and Asia, 44-46, navy, 126; and Haiti, 127-130; and
284-285, 303-310, 356-357, 358- Chile, 130-136; and Asia, 136-138;
359, 380-383; and Clayton-Bulwer and Samoa, 138-140; and Hawaii,
Treaty, 50-51; and Samoa, 55-56, 140-149, 203-204, 409; concept of
138-140, 408; J. Strong’s views o f empire, 149; warns about gold
as declining power, 78; U.S. in outflow, 151
tellectuals’ views of, 98-100; and Harvey, W illiam H . ( “Coin”), 65
U.S. N avy, 125, 234-240; attacked Hawaii, 1, 5, 46, n o , 112, 201, 232;
by N .A .M ., 193-194; and Vene viewed as gateway to Asia, 7, 29,
zuelan boundary crisis, 243-283; 31, 54, 91; U.S. treaty of 1875
and Spain, 295; growing A nglo- with, 35; and U.S., 1885-1889, 53-
American alliance, 313-318; and 54; and tariff of 1890, 120; and
Cuba, 338, 405 Harrison administration, 140-149;
Greeley, Horace, 12, 32 and Cleveland administration,
Gresham, Matilda (Mrs. W alter 1893-1895, 203-209; and Japan,
Q uintín), 217 236; and Great Britain, 248, 316;
Gresham, W alter Quintín, 14, 68, and Venezuelan boundary crisis,
191, 329; on the crisis o f' 1893- 280; and Germany, 324; and U.S.,
1895, 173, 197-201; as anticolo 1897-1898, 362-370; reasons foj
nialist, 200-201, 412; summary of annexation of, 408-411,414,417
views of, 203; and Hawaii, 203- H awley, Joseph R., 125, 239
209, 362, 369; and Brazil, 210-218; H ay, John, 17, 92, 93, 328, 332, 3^8
and Nicaragua, 218-229; and V en- 380, 407
436 Index
Hayes, Rutherford B., 328; admin and U.S. economic supremacy,
istration’s foreign policies, 39-46 373-374
Haymarket Riot of 1886,15 Inter-American bank, 113
Hazeltine, Mayo, 332 Inter-American Conference, 1889,
Heidelbach, A. S., 179 48, 112-114, 120, 141, 149, 330
Helper, Hinton, 112 Interstate Commerce Commission,
Herbert, Hilary, 93, 208, 229-240, »7
259» 3° 9»360 Investments, see Finance capital
Herder, Johann Gottfried, 97 Irish vote in U.S., 33
Higgins, Anthony, 235-236 Isolationism, U.S.: myth of, 2; de
H ill, David B., 169 fined in 1880’s, 60-61; F. J. T ur
H ill, James J., 175 ner’s attack upon, 69-71
Hiscock, Frank, 126 Isthmian canal project, 36, 366;
H itchcock, Ethan A., 322 Seward’s views of, 28; Hayes ad
H itt, Robert, 291, 344 ministration’s views of, 40, 43;
Hoar, George F., 156, 367-368 relationship of to reciprocity
H ogan’s Army, 174 proposals, 1882-1885, 48-49; J.
Holliday, Ben, 39 Strong’s views of, 79; Mahan’s
H om e Missionary Society, 72-73 emphasis upon, 91; and Blaine’s
Homestead A ct, 7 fears o f Great Britain, 107; Har
Homestead Strike, 205 rison administration’s views of,
Honduras, h i , 195,221, 232 h i ; and 1890 naval debates, 125;
Hopkins, Albert J., 374, 376 and Samoa, 139; relationship of to
Hosmer, James K., 99 Hawaii, 146-149, 367; and grow
H ow e, E. W ., 15 ing U.S. interests, 1893-1897, 188-
H ow e, Julia W ard, 319 189; urged by N.A .M ., 194; and
Howells, W illiam Dean, 15-16 Nicaraguan incident, 1894-1895,
Hunt, William, 59 219-228; and Great Britain, 248;
Huntington, Collis P., 42 and Asia, 411-412
Hyppolite, 127-129 Italy, 23, 376
Imports, American, 18
Industrial revolution in U.S., 415, James, Thomas L., 387
417; significance of for U.S. for Japan, 30, 43-46, 76, 231, 284, 301-
eign policy, especially 1860-1889, 304, 306-311; as U.S. market, 21;
6-24; and resultant depressions of and Korea, 1876-1889, 56-58; and
1873-1878 through 1893-1897,8-9; Hawaii, 141, 145, 146, 207, 363-
in South, 1865-1877, 10-11; threat 365; as U.S. friend, 311-313; and
to democracy, 17; need for for open door, 321, 382; and Philip
eign markets, 1883-1885, 19-21; pines, 360
impact on agriculture by, 21-22; Jaquith, H . J., 273
and exports to Latin America, 43; Jefferson, Thomas, 1, 3-4
J. Strong’s views of, 74-80; A. T . Jews in Russia, 319-320
Mahan’s views of, 88-90; J. Fiske’s Johnson, Andrew, 40,47
views of, 99; Blaine’s views of, Johnson, Emory R., 189
119; and Hawaiian revolution, Jones, James K., 169
147; importance o f noted in 1894, Jordan, David Starr, 175
183-185; Gresham’s views of, 199- Junta, Cuban, 37, 286-287, 290, 298,
200; O lney’s views of, 256-257; 340, 346-347, 393, 398,401,403
Index 437
Kasson, John A., 46, 52, 59, 139 W . C. Ford, 186; viewed by
Kennan, George, 319-320 N .A .M ., 193-195; renewed U.S.
Kiaochow, 300, 354-355, 356, 359, interest, 202-203; and U.S. N avy
364-365 in 1890’s, 229-231, 236; and Great
Kimball, Lieut. W illiam W ., 360 Britain, 317-318; and Germany,
Kimberley, John W odehouse, First 323-324; and U.S. expansion,
Earl of, 224, 252, 254 1898-1899,415-416; see also Mon
Kipling, Rudyard, 313 roe Doctrine and individual na
Korea, 307, 312; Seward’s policies tions in Latin America
toward, 30-31; and American in Laughlin, G. M., 163
terests, 1876-1889, 56-58; J. Lee, Fitzhugh, 292, 336-337, 342,
Strong’s views of, 76; and Harri 343» 388, 389,402
son administration, 137-138; and Legitime, 127-128
U.S., 1894-1897, 301-311; and Leopold II, King of Belgium, 52
Russia, 321-322 Lesseps, Ferdinand de, 43
Kuhn, Loeb, and Company, 353 Libby, W illiam Herbert, 23-24
Kurino, Shinichiro, 313 Liberal Republican party, 39
Liliuokalani, Queen, 143-144, 204,
Labor, American, 14, 27, 40-41, 68, 206
161-172, 172-175, 198-200, 373; Livingston, Leonidas F., 249, 253
see also American Federation of Lodge, H enry Cabot: and Brooks
Labor Adams, 84-85; views o f colonial
LaFollette, Robert, 332 ism, 91; and Mahan on issue of
Lamont, Daniel, 175, 198, 259 Philippine annexation, 92; and
Latin America, 1,9, 20,44, 314; and growth o f U.S. N avy, 124, 239;
U.S. before 1865, 3-5; as market views bimetallism, 157; attitude
for U.S. industrial goods, 1860- toward Asia, 236, 358; fears Eu
1889, 21-22; Seward’s views of, ropean powers in Latin America,
27-28; as area for colonial expan 248-249; and Olney, 258; attitude
sion, 31, 91; and Grant adminis toward Venezuelan boundary
tration, 32, 36-39; Evans’ views crisis, 270, 273, 281; and Cuba,
of, 42-43; Blaine’s policies and at 290-29in, 297-298, 348, 384, 389,
titudes toward, 46-47, 105-108; 392, 406; fears Russia and China,
Frelinghuysen’s views of, 47-52; 306; views of Great Britain, 317;
and U.S. N avy in 1880’s, 59; as views of Philippine annexation
proposed American frontier, 68; and limiting American expansion,
mentioned by F. J. Turner, 70; 361, 415
and J. Strong’s views o f “mis Lome, Enrique Dupuy de, 293, 343,
sion,” 78; A . T . Mahan’s views of, 344» 346-348. 352» 368, 390
86; markets in envisioned by Long, John D ., 344, 350, 360, 361,
Harrison, 104; and reciprocity 364, 386
debate o f 1889-1890, 114-121; Low, Phillip B., 239
viewed as great potential market, Lowell, James Russell, 22,319
147, 186-196; and U.S. gold pol Luce, Henry, 305
icies, 1893, 155; and 1894 tariff, Luce, Rear Admiral Stephen B., 233
167; trade w ith increases under
1894 tariff, 171; and U.S. finance Madagascar, 2,41,355
capital in 1890’s, 177; competes Madison, James, 1,68,184
w ith U.S. wheat, 183; noted by Madriz, José, 224-225
438 Index
Mahan, Alfred Thayer, 61-62, 121, Cuba, 1897-1898, 333-352* 379-
232, 235, 250; and J. Strong, 78, 406; and Asia, 352-362, 379-406;
80; and B. Adams, 80, 85; life and and Hawaii, 362-370,409-410; and
views summarized, ideas on mer decision for war, 1898, 383-406;
cantilism analyzed, place in intel and Philippine annexation issue.
lectual consensus of 1890’s sug 411; views Isthmian canal, 4 ri
gested, 85-101; attitude toward 412; in debate over expansion.
Philippine annexation, 92, 360, 1898-1900, 413-416
361, 383, 411, 415-416; influences Meade, Commander Richard W ., 35
T racy’s 1889 report, 123; influ Mello, Admiral Custodio de, 211-
ences Herbert, 230; attacked by 218
Proctor, 237; fears Russia and Melville, Commodore G. W ., 383
China, 306; views Great Britain, Mercantilism, 85-95
317; views expansion in 1898- Merchant marine, American, 19,
1899,4*4 87-88, 89-93, IO9, 112-113, 120,
“Maine,” U.S.S., 344-345» 348» 352> 187, 194, 241
368, 390, 394,402 Mexico, 4, 28, 42, 43, 46, 48, 50, 51-
Manchuria, 301, 305, 352-354» 38°* 52, 78, 187, 191, 248, 266, 408
383; see also Asia M idway Islands, 29, 31,408
Manifest destiny: cited b y London Miller, W arner, 131, 192
Times , 51; and tariff of 1894, *67; Mills, Roger Q., 160-162, 168, 271,
in Latin America, 188; and V en 298
ezuelan boundary crisis, 279, 282; Missionaries, 5, 57, 72-80, 301, 304-
noted b y M cKinley, 366, 369; 308, 310, 352, 411
and Hawaii, 366; in U.S. com M ôle, St. Nicolas, n o , 112, 127-
mercial expansion, 373; see also 130
Anglo-Saxon mission M olly Maguires, 68
Manning, Daniel, 22 M oney, Hernando de Soto, 237
Marcy, W illiam , 7 Monroe Doctrine, 3, 136; O lney’s
Maritime Canal Company, 111,219- reinterpretation o f in 1895, 4; at
228 time o f Civil W ar, 5; Grant
Martí, José, 286 administration and nontransfer
Massó, Gen. Juan, 344-345 principle of, 36-37, 39; and A f
M cAdoo, W illiam, 59-60, 125, 229, rica, 1884-1885, 53; and Samoa,
301 55; mentioned by F. J. Turner,
McCook, John J., 346-348, 353 70; Blaine’s implementation of,
McCormick, Cyrus M., 39 108; and Hawaii, 148,208; viewed
McCreary, James B., 112 as protection for U.S. commer
McDearmon, James C., 167 cial expansion into Latin Amer
M cKinley, W illiam , 111-112, 285; ica, 186; resurgence o f noted by
administration admires B. Adams, Great Britain and France, 195-
85; tariff views o f praised by Ma 196; and Nicaragua, 226, 280; Ma
han, 86; views colonialism, 91; han’s views of, 232; and U.S.
supports Inter-American Confer N avy, 233, 236; and Venezuelan
ence, 112; manages 1890 tariff boundary crisis, 242, 253, 259-268,
bill, 115-119; speaks to N .A .M ., 270, 276-277, 281; H . C. Lodge
1895, 192-193; and Cuba, 1896, views, 249; and Cuba, 295, 298;
298; relations w ith British, 314; in commercial expansion o f 1898,
background of, 327-333; and 378-379
Index 439
Moore, John Bassett, 140, 200, 320, N e w York Stock Exchange, 273
337 Nicaragua, i n ; U.S. proposes vir
Moret, Segismundo, 345, 349, 399 tual protectorate, 50-51; and U.S.,
Morgan, J. Pierpont, 156, 387 1894- 1895, 218-229; and U.S.
Morgan, John T ., 52, h i , 112, 219, N avy, 232; and Venezuelan
227-228,235,290,412 boundary crisis, 243, 246, 248,
Morgan-Belmont syndicate, 172, 251, 263-264, 280; see also Isth
178 mian canal project
Mormons, 77 Nietzsche, Friedrich W ilhelm , 98
Morrill, Justin, 32-33,116 Norris, Frank, 15
Morse, James R., 304
Morton, Levi P., 137, 388 Olney, Peter B., 271
Morton, Sterling, 267 Olney, Richard: reinterprets M on
Mosquito Reservation, 220-228, 246 roe Doctrine, 4; Venezuela note
Mun, Thomas, 86 of, compared w ith W ashington’s
Farewell Address b y J. Strong,
National Association o f Manufac 79; and Atlanta Exposition, 190;
turers, 189,191-195, 203. 3*4» 33°. and commercial museums, 191;
332» 3<56,370-371, 377 and Hawaii, 1895-1896, 208; and
National Board of Trade, 189,374 Nicaragua, 227-228; discusses
National Cordage Company, 152 A . T . Mahan and U.S. N avy,
National Lead Trust, 169 240-241; and Venezuelan bound
National Nicaragua Canal Conven ary crisis, 242-283; background
tion, 219 and views of, 255-256; and Cuba,
Nativism, 20 1895- 1897,285-300; and Asia, 300-
Naval Advisory Board, 1881,59 311; policies toward Japan and
Naval Policy Board, 1889,123 Korea, 313; views England, 317
Naval W ar Board, 383 O pen-Door N otes, 92-93, 311-313,
Naval W ar College, 59,94,122,233, 4*7
312, 361, 364 Open-door policy, 30,43-44, 52, 54»
N avy, U.S., see United States N avy 69-70, 72, 92-93, 112, 316-318,
N e w empire: concept o f defined, 1; 352-362, 380-383
historical background of in U.S., Orinoco River, 243-244, 246, 249-
3-5; and Canada, 33; formal be 255,260, 262, 278,281
ginnings of in central and south
ern Pacific, 35-36; and Latin Page, W alter Hines, 70
America in 1870’s, 36; Freling- Pago Pago, see Samoa
huysen’s role in, 47; Blaine’s state Panama, 43, 51, 248; see also Isth
ment of, 105; differs from Euro mian canal project
pean views, 408, 414; summary Pan-American movement, 112-121;
of, 416-417 see also Inter-American Confer
“N e w N avy,” see United States ence
N avy Panics o f 1837, 1857, 1873, 1882-
N e w York City Chamber of Com 1883, 1890, 1893, see Depressions
merce, 40, 52, 356 and Industrial revolution
N e w York Commercial Museum, Paschal, Thomas M., 264
191 Patterson, Josiah, 167
N e w York State Chamber o f Com Pauncefote, Sir Julian, 107-108,199-
merce, 21, 374 200,263-264, 316-317,358
440 Index
Peffer, W illiam, 237 Railroad strike of 1877: G rêsham’s
Peixoto, Floriano, 210, 214 reactions to, 198
Pendleton, John O., 235 Railroads, U.S., 12, 13, 14, 27, 31,
Pennsylvania Railroad Company, 42 40,42,56,65,75,112-113,177,187
Pepper, W illiam, 191 Raw materials: importance o f to
Perry, Commodore Matthew G , 5, expanding exports, 22-23; Ffe~
383 linghuysen’s views of, 48; Ma
Peru, 42, n o , 130 han’s desire for, 88; and reciproc
Phelps, Prof. Austin, 77 ity debate in 1889-1890, 113-114,
Phelps, E. J., 244 116; and tariff o f 1894, 161-172;
Phelps, W illiam W ., 139 W . C. Ford’s views of, 182;
Philadelphia and Reading Railroad Gresham’s views of, 200
Company, 152 Reciprocity, 21, 112; and Hawaii,
Philadelphia Commercial Museum, 29; Morrill’s views o f regarding
191, 240 Canada, 33; and Canada, 34; Fre-
Philippine Islands, 112, 360; A. T . linghuysen’s efforts for, 48-49;
Mahan’s reluctance to annex, 92; U.S. capital offsets defeat of,
J. Fiske’s views on annexation of, 1884-1885, 52; success of in 1890,
100; annexation of similar to ear 53, 149; renewed with Hawaii,
lier policies in Samoa, 140; O l- 53-54; wanted by Mahan, 86; tied
ney’s views of, 258; and Cuba, to merchant marine, 109; and
344; and M cKinley administra Harrison administration’s Latin-
tion before 1898 war, 361-362; American policies, 112-121; 1890
and Hawaii, 368; U.S. attacks, tariff and Hawaii, 141-143;
382-383; reasons for annexation Blaine’s proposal of for Hawaii,
of, 408,410-411 ,413,416-417 1890, 142; 1890 clause debated in
Picking, Commander H enry, 212 1894, 159-172; new interest ap
Pierce, Gilbert, n 6 n pears, 1895, 189-190; “with a
Pitkin, Horace, 305 club,” 202; in 1897, 376
Platt, Orville, 235 Reconstruction era in U.S., 9-14,
Platt Amendment, 142,416 29,58-59
Playfair, Sir Lyon, 276-277 Reddaway, W . F., 63-64
Point Barima, see Orinoco River Reed, Thomas B., 157,402
Populists, 13, 65-68, 70, 125, 165, Reick, W . C., 392-393
175,184,198, 237, 239,290 Reid, W hitelaw, 103,110,147, 382
Portugal, n o Republican party, 25, 117, 157, 159-
Proctor, John R., 322 160,279-280,286, 333, 384,393
Proctor, Redfield, 237, 391-393 Rockefeller, W illiam, 23, 215, 386
Puerto Rico, 48-49,110 Rockhill, W illiam W ., 353
Pullman strike, 175, 205, 256 Rojas, P. Ezequiel, 252-253
Roman Catholicism, 77
Quay, Matthew, 239 Roman Republic and Empire, 96,
Queen Regent of Spain, María Cris 185, 201,408
tina, 340, 345, 398-399 Roosevelt, Theodore, 32, 387; and
F. J. Turner, 64, 71-72; and
Racism, 306; U.S. fears o f in Cuba, Brooks Adams, 84-85; views co
38; U.S. fears in Santo Domingo lonialism, 91; reviews Mahan’s
and Haiti, 38-39; J. Strong’s views writings, 93; and Olney, 258;
of, 78-79; and Hawaii, 363 fears Russia and China, 306, 322,
Index 44*
Roosevelt, Theodore (cont.) Scruggs, W illiam L., 253-254
360-361; views Great Britain, 317; Seal dispute, see Bering Sea dispute
and M cKinley, 332-333; and J. J. Search, Theodore, 353,373, 377
McCook, 353; and Hawaii, 364; Senate, U.S., see United States Con
and Asia, 383 gress
Rostow, W alt W ., 6 Seward, Frederick W ., 28-29
Russia, 284-285; Seward’s attitude Seward, George F., 31
toward, 30; interested in Korea Seward, W illiam, 1,11, 32, 383,407;
in 1880’s, 57; Brooks Adams fears, in 1850’s, 5, 7; and Asia, 5, 311,
84; competes with U.S. wheat, 417; background and foreign pol
183; Gresham confers with Min icies of, 24-32; influences Evarts,
ister from, 204; and Hawaii, 207; 40; ideas of revived in 1880’s, 56;
and Spain, 295; and Asia, 303, and continentalism, 101; Blaine
307, 308, 312, 316, 352-362, 380- changes policies of, 137
383; relations with U.S. cool, 318- Shaw, Albert, 93, 227, 383
325; and Goluchowski speech, Sherman, John, 291, 328, 334, 340-
1897, 378; and 1898 war, 405 341, 346, 347-348, 350-351, 354-
Russian-Chinese Bank, 321-322 355» 379-380
Ryan, Thomas Fortune, 386 Sherman, Gen. W illiam T ., 335
Sherman Silver Purchase A ct, 108,
Sagasta, Práxedes Mateo, 337*340, *53» 156, 159* *76, 199
342, 349, 383-384, 395 Shufeldt, Commodore Robert W .,
Sage, Russell, 42, 386 52, 57-58, 137
Salisbury, Robert Arthur Talbot Sill, John M. B., 313
Gascoyne-Cecil, Third Marquis Silver: B. Adams’ views of, 83; and
of, 107, 227, 245, 258, 262-263, 1889 Inter-American Conference,
265-270, 276, 315, 339 112-113; and depression of 1893-
Samoa: origins of U.S. interests in, 1897, 154-195; and Anglo-Ameri
35-36; markets in, 41; and Cleve can relations, 314, 317; McKin
land administration, 1885-1889, ley’s views of, 330; influence in
55-56; viewed as gateway to Asian approach o f 1898 war, 385, 390;
market by Bayard, 1887, 55-56; see also Democratic party and
and U.S. isolation in 1880’s, 61; Populists
mentioned by F. J. Turner, 70; Simmons, J. Edward, 271, 387
and U.S. N avy in 1889, 112-123; Simpson, Jerry, 166-167, 237
and Harrison administration, 138- Smith, Charles Emory, 358
140; and German-American rela Smith, Charles Stewart, 271
tions, 323-324; U.S. hold on, 408 Smith, Goldwin, 16
Santo Domingo, 39, 48, n o , 149, Smith, H oke, 158
247-248; and Seward, 31; and Social Darwinism, 97-100
Grant administration, 38-39; and Socialism, 77
Blaine, 130; N e w York bankers South (U .S.): and U.S. foreign pol
control finances of, 187-188; im icy, 1865-1877, 9-16; displays in
ports textiles from U.S., 190 creased interest in overseas mar
Santo Domingo Improvement Com kets, 190-191, 371-372; and Isth
pany, 247-248 mian canal, 219
Schiff, Jacob, 353 South America, see Latin America
Schomburgk, Robert, 243 Spain: and T en Years’ W ar, 37- 38;
Schurz, Carl, 201, 205,412-416 reciprocity agreements with in
442 Index
Spain ( cont .) Tariff, U.S.: during Civil W ar, 7;
1880’s, 49; B. Adams’ views of Seward’s views of, 27; Mahan’s
war with, 84-85; and Cleveland views of, 86; o f 1890, 141-146,
administration, 1895-1897, 284- 160, 163, 409; of 1890 and Brazil,
300; and Cuba, 1897-1898, 327, 210-215; of 1894, 157, 159-172.
333-352* 376, 378,379-406,408 214-215, 280; of 1894 and Hawaii,
Spencer, Herbert, 97-98, 313 207; o f 1894 and Cuba, 286; and
Spofford, Tileston & Company, 39 Great Britain, 314; M cKinley’s
Spreckels, Claus, 148 views of, 328-332; o f 1897, 374-
Spring-Rice, Cecil, 96 377; with Cuba, 416; see also
Standard Oil Company, 23-24, 169, Reciprocity
215» 307* 356 Taylor, Hannis, 294, 295, 335, 341
Stanley, H enry M., 52 Teller Amendment, 415
Stanton, Rear Admiral Oscar F., Tetuán, Duke of, 293-295, 338
212 Thomas, Allen, 255
Stead, W . T ., 319 Thompson, Thomas S., 211-218
Stevens, John L., 141-146 Thurston, Lorrin A ., 144
Stewart, John A., 272 Tobacco, 18, 340
Stewart, W illiam, 227 Tocqueville, Alexis de, 74, 352
Stillman, James, 172 Tow nes, W illiam T ., 212
Strategic bases: Frelinghuysen’s Tracy, Benjamin F., 94, 122-127,
views of, 49-50; A. T . Mahan’s 128-129, 131-134, 144-146
views of, 91-93; Harrison ad Transvaal Free State, 276
ministration’s policies in regard Treaties: with China, 1844, 5, 30;
to, n o -1 1 1 ,127-130; Hawaii, 140- with China, 1868, 27, 30; with
149, 204-209, 362-370; Schurz’s England and Canada, 1871, 34;
desire for, 201,413-414 with Hawaii, 35, 54, 142, 409;
Straus, Isidor, 22, 215 w ith Samoan native chiefs, 1878,
Straus, Oscar, 22, 272, 377 35-36; with Colombia, 1846, 43;
Strong, Josiah, 61-62, 72-80, 85, 95- with Japan, 1878, 44-45; with
101, 326 China, 1880, 44-45; w ith N ic
Student Volunteers for Foreign aragua (Frelinghuysen-Zavala),
Missions, 305 1884, 49-50; with Great Brit
Sugar: and 1875 treaty with H a ain ( Clayton-Bulw er), 1850, 50-
waii, 35; and 1890 tariff bill, 115- 51, 189, 317; with Korea, 1882,
119; Hawaiian dependence upon, 56-57; proposed arbitration trea
142, 366-367, 369; in 1894 tariff ties at 1889 Inter-American Con
debate, 163-170; and Cuba, 334, ference, 112-113; with Brazil,
342 1891, 210-215; of Managua, i860,
Sulzer, W illiam, 290 220, 228; proposed Anglo-Am eri
Sumner, Charles, 39 can arbitration treaty, 1896-1897,
Sumner, W illiam Graham, 97, 287- 317; proposed commercial treaty
288 with Spain, 1897-1898, 346-347
Supreme Court, see United States Trinidad, 243
Supreme Court Turkey, 238
Turner, Frederick Jackson, 61,
62-72, 74, 80, 85, 88, 95-101,
Talbott, J. Fred, 236, 237 149
Tappen, Frederick D ., 271 Twain, Mark, 15-16, 319
Index 443
Union Iron W orks, 303 origins and results o f boundary
Union League Club, 271 crisis, 100, h i , 149, 150, 157, 228,
United States Congress: and for 242-283, 288, 314, 324; and 1890
eign policy during Civil W ar, tariff, 119; N .A .M . builds sample
6-7; rejects Frelinghuysen-Zavala warehouse in, 194; and U.S.
Treaty, 50; rejects agreement of N avy, 229, 238
Berlin Conference, 1884-1885, 52- Vest, George, 109,117,414
53; and Hawaiian reciprocity Voorhees, Daniel, 168
treaty, 54; uses Mahan’s ideas,
93-94; and reciprocity proposal
of 1889-1890, 114-121; and Chil W alker, Francis A., 22
ean revolution, 1892, 135; and Sa W allach, Capt. Richard, 312
moa, 1889,138; and tariff o f 1894, W ar of Pacific, 42
159-172; and Nicaragua, 219; and Warner, John D eW itt, 287
development of U.S. N avy, 231- W ashington’s Farewell Address, 79,
240; and Venezuela, 243, 270- 256-257, 261
271; and Cuba, 298, 337, 349-350; W eadock, Thomas A. E., 235
and Anglo-American arbitration W eaver, Gen. James B., 13
treaty, 317; almost annexes Ha W ebster, Daniel, 7
waii, 366-369; and 1897 tariff, W ells, David Ames, 19, 22
374-376; and approach to war W est, American, 9-16; Seward’s
w ith Spain, 393-406; annexes H a views on, 27; impact of on anti
waii, 409-410; and expansion, expansionist thinking, 31-32; and
1898-1899, 414-415; see also G ov frontier thesis, 63-72; J. Strong’s
ernment, U.S. views on, 72-80; B. Adams views
United States N avy, 3, 43; in Asia, Asia as Far W est, 84; desire o f
44, 309, 312, 360, 361-362, 382- for Samoa, 138; starting point for
383; influences Latin-American labor unrest, 1893-1895, 174; see
policies of U.S., 48; in Panama, also Frontier, American
1885, 51; origins of m odem navy, W estward movement of empire,
58-60; influence of Mahan upon, concept of, 25-26, 74, 77-78, 83-
85, 88, 93; development of, 1889- 84, 306
1892, 121-127; and Haitian revo W eyler, Gen. Valeriano y Nicolau,
lution, 1889-1891, 127 -130; and 292, 294, 339, 343, 345, 399
Chilean revolution, 1891-1892, W harton, Joseph, 163
130-136; and Brazilian revolt, W heat, U.S., 9-10, 12-13, 18, 21,
1893-1894, 210-218; and N ica 119,181-183,354
ragua, 224-225; development of, W heeler, Joseph, 264
1893-1897, 229-241; and Great W hite, Andrew Dickson, 80, 319,
Britain, 248; and Spain, 341; and 325
sinking of the “Maine,” 348; and W hite, H enry, 315
Cuba, 350; and Hawaii, 1898, 364; W hite, Stephen M., 363
and Philippines, 382-383 W hitney, W illiam C., 59,157,198
United States Supreme Court, 85, W ilhelm II, Kaiser, 276, 323-324,
169, 171 359
W ilson, James, 366
W ilson, James Harrison, 56, 347,
Van Voorhis, John, 237 352-353» 355» 359. 365
Venezuela: trade w ith U.S., 42-43; W ilson, W illiam L., 160-172, 373
m Index
W ilson, W oodrow , 71,261 W orld’s Fair o f 1893,65, 232
W ise, George D ., 220 W right, Carroll D ., 8
W itte, Count Sergei, 320-321
W olff, Sir H enry Drummond, 339 “Yellow Press,” 348,401
W oodford, Stewart L., 335-336, Young, John Russell, 44
338, 342» 345- 35*. 379. 394- 397.
399 Zelaya, Gen. J. S., 219-228