Treaty of Paris (1898)Spanish-American War and the Debate Over Imperialism

US AND HAWAII

1893

• US Marines support uprising against Queen Liliuokalani that led her to abdicate. A new provisional government is established in its place. Annexation blocked by incoming President Grover Cleveland.

1898

• US annexes Hawaii.

1959

• Hawaii becomes 50th state.

SPANISH-AMERICAN WAR

• Treaty of Paris (1898)

• Spain Surrendered Puerto Rico and Guam to the U.S.

• Spain Surrendered Philippines to the U.S. for $20M

• Spain gave up all rights to Cuba

WAR WITH PHILIPPINES1899-1902

• U.S. sought to squelch Philippine independence. After experiencing only 345 combat deaths in the Spanish American War, it would suffer 4,234 –6,165 deaths battling Filipino guerillas.

• Reports of American atrocities and use of concentration camps to control the independence movement.

• “Now here is a unique spectacle –the Filipinos fighting for liberty, the American people fighting to give them liberty.”- Filipino writer.

• War ended in 1902 with creation of provincial Filipino government. Full independence granted after World War II.

Andrew Carnegie

• Offered to pay $20M to free the Philippines."I would gladly pay twenty million today to restore our republic to its first principles."—

• "To be popular is easy; to be right when right is unpopular, is noble... I repudiate with scorn the immoral doctrine, 'Our country, right or wrong.'"

Mark Twain

“It should, it seems to me, be our pleasure and duty to make those people free, and let them deal with their own domestic questions in their own way. And so I am an anti-imperialist. I am opposed to having the eagle put its talons on any other land.”

Former General and Senator Carl Schurz

They are wolves in sheep’s clothing, capacious land-grabbers posing as unselfish champions of freedom and humanity, false pretenders who have proved the truth of all that has been said by their detractors as to their hypocrisy and greed.

Vice President Teddy Roosevelt

If we ever come to nothing as a nation it will be because . . . [of] Carl Schurz . . . and the futile sentimentalists of the international arbitration . . . which eats away the great fighting features of our race.

Senator Henry Cabot Lodge

“While we regard the welfare of these people as a sacred trust, we regard the welfare of the American people first. We see our duty to ourselves as well as to others. We believe in trade expansion.”

President William McKinley

• Sounds of White Man’s Burden:

“. . . there was nothing left for us to do but to take them all, and to educate the Filipinos, and uplift and civilize and Christianize them, and by God’s grace do the very best we could by them, as our fellow-men for whom Christ also died.”

• Senator Knute Nelson:

“Providence has given the United States the duty of extending Christian civilization.”