The Pros and Cons of American Imperialism and The Efforts Against It

Between 1890 and 1913, the United States worked under a thing called imperialism. Under imperialism, stronger nations attempt to create empires by dominating weaker nations -economically, politically, culturally, or military. The reason why this imperialism grew was because of economic factors, nationalist factors, military factors, and humanist factors. Well, in the United States, there were people who didn’t agree with this and there were people who did. The people who disagreed with imperialism were called anti-imperialist. In this report, I will give you the pros and cons of imperialism, and I will also tell you how anti-imperialist tried to stop expansion and imperialism.

After seeing Europe dominating other territories, the United States also wanted to this. Even though they didn’t want to annex foreign lands, they did anyway. The United States wanted control of some Pacific islands to use as refueling and repair stations for its naval vessels. Again, some people argued that the U.S. should avoid foreign affairs, and some argued that they should become more involved. Some people thought this would be a good idea because of the economic growth. America was manufacturing too much food and goods in their nation. They needed expansion. This would be a great idea to expand their markets internationally. The U.S. also needed a bigger navy. The Naval Act of 1890 called for the construction of more battleships, gunboats, torpedo boats, and cruisers. This was probably a bad idea because one day, Theodore Roosevelt sent a ship called the U.S.S. Marine to Cuba. This ship exploded. The Americans blamed it on the Spanish, and this lead to a war between the Spanish and Americans. This finally led to the Americans to the annexation over the Philippines. After this, more and more people began to dislike imperialism. The Philippines established the anti-imperialism league.

The main reason why they disliked imperialism was the fact that it was taking the liberty of those territories that the U.S. was over. They also thought that it was too much responsibilities. They said if the navy kept bringing more countries under America’s control, things could soon get out of hand. Other anti-imperialist saw racism in imperialism. The Southerners feared the fact that they could have more races coming to the nation. They also thought that expansion would cost too much. If they were trying to keep the navy, America would probably get into debt. They feared that laborers from other countries would compete with Americans for jobs. Of course, they would get the job because the laborers would work cheaper than the Americans would. So, in conclusion to all of this, imperialism had both good and bad sides to it. The anti imperialist always tried their best to stop imperialism. They were always debating on this subject.

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