U.S. History

1. U.S. History ContentStandard3: The student will analyze the changing role of the united states in world affairs at the turn of the 20th century.

2. Standard Three p 330 • America had stayed off the world stage for its early history. • In the 1800’s this started to change in the age of imperialism. • Imperialism is where strong nations extend their political, military, and economic might over weaker nations. • This period lasted from mid-1800’s to 1900-s

3. Standard Three • The main reason for the rush to grab colonies was a need for raw materials. • This was important for Europe and Japan, the search for natural resources. • These economies of colonies were called extractive colonies. The imperial country extracted the raw material and sent it home to the mother country.

4. Standard Three. • For the U.S. economy the problem was a surplus of goods, not a shortage of raw materials. • Alfred T. Mahan a military historian and officer in the navy wrote The influence of Sea power upon history. • He asserted that the United States needed to become a naval power, establish bases on other nations to re-fuel ships, and have a modern navy.

5. Standard Three. • The United States started to modernize its navy, it built modern steel plated battleships powered by steam like the U.S.S. Maine. • By 1900 the United States had the third largest navy in the world.

6. Standard Three • Imperialists around the world used ideas of racial, national, and cultural superiority to justify Imperialism. • One of the ideas was Social Darwinism, this was the belief that life consists of competitive struggles in which only the fittest survive. • Many people in the United States embraced this because they believed that God had made it their manifest destiny to expand to the Pacific ocean, and if the United States remained isolated that Europe would gobble up lands and America would not survive.

7. Standard Three. • In the mid-1800’s America stepped onto the Imperialism stage with little fanfare. • In 1853 Commodore Matthew Perry sailed a fleet of American war ships into Tokyo Bay in Japan. • Japan had always denied entry into their country before. Most Japanese people had never seen steam ships so they thought he had a fleet of dragons on the water. This showed the Japanese how far behind they were in technology.

8. Standard Three • Perry won the Emperor’s favor by showering him with gifts, and within a year Perry had signed a trade treaty with Japan. • In 1867 the U.S. took possession of the Midway Islands, Treaties in 1875 and 1887 increased trade with the Hawaiian Islands and gave the United States the right to build the naval base at Pearl Harbor.

9. Standard Three. • In 1867 William Seward Secretary of State bought Alaska $7.2 million from Russia. The general public made fun of him and dubbed it Seward’s Folly or icebox. It proved to be a good investment because of the timber, oil, and other natural resources.

10. Standard Three. • Since the 1790’s Hawaii had been linked economically to the United States. • Americans had established plantations there and in 1887 convinced the Hawaiian King Kalakaua to amend the constitution where only wealthy land owners could vote. These were all the white plantation owners. • Queen Liliuokalani was the next ruler of the Hawaiian Islands, she was a nationalist. She abolished the constitution and took rights away from the wealthy land owning class.

11. Standard Three. • In 1893 the planters overthrew the queen U.S. minister John Stevens ordered the Marines to help. • The new government was led by wealthy planter Sanford B. Dole. He asked President Benjamin Harrison to annex Hawaii, He signed it but couldn’t get Senate approval before Cleveland became president. • Cleveland refused to sign the agreement, In 1897 McKinley became president and in 1898 Hawaii was a territory of the United States.

12. Standard Three p. 336 • Many people referred to Hawaii and the Philippines as the “White Mans Burden” because they saw it as their Christian duty to Americanize every culture they came across. • Developing nations where natural resources were extracted were often referred to as Banana Republic because they were islands. • The most important event that helped America become a world power was the Spanish-American War.

13. Standard Three. • At the end of the 19th century the once mighty Spanish Empire had dwindle to a few possessions and Cuba, America held $50 million in interests there. • The Cubans would constantly rebel against Spanish rule. Rival newspaper publishers Joseph Pulitzer and William Randolph Hearst helped heighten the publics dislike of the Spanish.

14. Standard Three. • There was a saying that imperialists used to describe their over seas possessions, often they would call them banana republics because they were islands. Also they saw it as their duty to enforce the culture of the mother country on these people, “White Mans Burden.

15. Standard Three. • The publications of Joseph Pulitzer and William Randolph Hearst heightened the dislike for the Spanish as stated earlier, they were also known as the Yellow Press. • They were known as this because of a popular comic strip character called the yellow kid. • They would also paste sensational headlines and pictures on the front pages that exaggerated Spanish atrocities and compared the Cuban rebels to the American revolutionaries.

16. Standard Three. • President McKinley warned the Spanish to quickly establish peace or the United States would take what action necessary to procure this result. • McKinley finally ordered the battleship Maine to Havana Harbor to protect American citizens in Cuba. • In 1898 the Maine exploded in Havana Harbor, 350 officers on board and crew were on board 266 died. McKinley ordered an investigation and it was concluded a mine had blown up the Maine, but most people blamed Spain.

17. Standard Three. • The phrase “Remember the Maine!!!” echoed through all the newspapers and calls to go to war. • On April 11, 1898 McKinley asked Congress for authority to use force against Spain to end the fighting. • Eight days later Congress enacted four resolutions that amounted to a declaration of war on Spain.

18. Standard Three. • The fourth resolution the (Teller Amendment) stipulated that the United States had no intention of annexing Cuba. • The Navy blockaded Cuban ports, and McKinley called for more than 100,000 volunteers to join the army. Spain declared war on the United States. • On May 1, 1898 Commodore George Dewey steamed his squadron of vessels into manila Bay in the Spanish Philipines.

19. Standard Three. • Dewey gave the order to fire and the American ships destroyed the Spanish fleet. • No Americans died but 400 Spanish sailors died. • On land the Filipino nationalist Emilo Aguinaldo was defeating was defeating the Spanish Army. • In August that year 15,000 U.S. soldiers landed on the islands Spanish troops surrendered to the United States.

20. Standard Three. • In June of 1898 U.S. Marines captured Guantanamo Bay Cuba and another force of 17,000 went ashore U.S. Army General William Shafter in command east of Santiago. • The troops suffered harsh conditions, they were poorly trained, they had wool uniforms left over from the plains wars, and obsolete weapons.

21. Standard Three. • The army mainly consisted of national guard units and the African American 9th and 10th cavalry that came in from the frontier. • Future president Theodore Roosevelt organized a volunteer cavalry unit called the “rough riders” They were known for taking the Kettle and an Juan Hills outside of Santiago. Two days after the Battle of San Juan Hill the Spanish Navy was destroyed and they surrendered. 3,000 Americans died but only 380 from combat, the rest was disease.

22. Standard Three. • Spain signed the Treaty of Paris in 1898, Spain gave up control of Cuba, Puerto Rico, Pacific island of Guam, and sold the Philippines to the U.S. for 20 million. • The United States came up with the “open Door Policy” when it was seeking trade in China. It stated that America did not want colonies, just trading rights. The U.S. reaffirmed this by bringing Chinese students to America to study during the Boxer Rebellion.

23. Standard Three. • Roosevelt won approval of Congress to build a new fleet of battle ships to protect Americans Asian interests. • In 1907 Roosevelt sent the armada of 16 battleships know as the Great White fleet on a goodwill tour of the world. • Really it was to show America was a growing naval power.

24. Standard Three. P 348 • In 1900 Congress passed the Foraker act which established a civil government in Puerto Rico. • The U.S. did not withdraw military from Cuba until 1902, they could not take control but they would make sure they had influence on the region so no superpower could establish a base that close to the U.S.

25. Standard Three. • The United States had the Cubans add the Platt Amendment to their constitution. It stated that Cuba could not sign a treaty without American approval, required Cuba to lease naval bases to the U.S., and it granted the U.S. the right to intervene in Cuba when it wanted to avoid war. • President McKinley was assassinated and Theodore Roosevelt became President.

26. Standard Three. • Roosevelt had a different philosophy of dealing with foreign affairs. He promoted a new kind of diplomacy that involved the United States throwing its military might every time it had too. This was based off the United States successes in the war. • History calls this “big stick diplomacy” after one of his favorite sayings “ I speak softly and carry a big stick” • Roosevelt believed America had a duty to civilize and uplift weaker nations.

27. Standard Three. • In 1903 The United States bought a failed French Canal route through Panama for 40 Million. The Columbian government owned Panama back then. • ^The United States offered money for it but the Colombians wanted more. So President Roosevelt sent U.S. warships to back a Panamanian rebellion, Colombia backed down when the Navy arrived.

28. Standard Three. • The U.S. paid Panama $10 Million, and an annual rent of $250,000. America was granted control of the canal zone. • 35,000 workers helped dig the canal. 5,000 canal workers died from disease or accident. • When the canal opened in 1914 it cut 8,000 nautical off the trip from ocean to ocean. • This also helped with America’s growing economic interests with the orient.

29. Standard Three. • Starting in the earlier 1900’s the inability of Latin American nations to pay debts to foreign investment led for a greater chance of European intervention. • In 1903 Germany and Britain blockaded Venezuelan ports to make sure European Bankers were repaid. • He proclaimed the Roosevelt Corollary, that stated the United States would step in and be the police power and restore peace. • He stated it merely reasserted Americas policy of no European intervention in South America.

30. Standard Three. • William Howard Taft was hand picked by Roosevelt to run for the Republican nomination in 1908. • Taft switched from “big stick diplomacy” to “dollar diplomacy” he wanted to trade bullets for dollars. The idea was to increase American investments in bank and other goods overseas. • Taft still used troops when necessary. The best example is went he sent in troops to protect a new government in Nicaragua that was nice to U.S. interests.

31. Standard Three. • Woodrow Wilson became President in 1912, he criticized the foreign policy of his Republican predecessors. • He took a different direction he stated that the U.S. would never seek one additional foot of territory by conquest. He said that he would work to promote human rights, national integrity, and opportunity. He called this moral diplomacy.

32. Standard Three. • Wilson still practiced interventionism when he sent Marines to Haiti in 1915 to protect American interests against the French and Germans.

33. Standard Three. P 362 • Until 1914 there had not been a large scale European conflict for over 100 years. Europe was sitting on a powder keg of nationalism, regional tensions, economic rivalries, imperial ambitions, and militarism. • Nationalism was a driving force in Europe, they believed a nation should have a strong central ethnic group. • France wanted Alsace-Lorraine back a territory that it had lost when Germany was not a unified nation.

34. Standard Three. • A spirit of militarism hit Europe. This is the glorification of the military. Germany had the largest standing army and its navy rivaled Great Britain's. • Also there were two alliances that helped lead to war. The Triple Alliance had Germany, Austria-Hungary, and Italy(never fought on their side). • Triple Entente France, Russia, and Great Britain.

35. Standard Three. • As time passed European leaders thought less about peace and thought war might be better. • On June 28, 1914Archduke Francis Ferdinand that was the heir to the throne of the Austrian-Hungarian empire was killed with his wife Sophie In Sarajevo. They were killed by GavriloPrincip a Bosnian nationalist that saw him as a tyrant.

36. Standard Three. • Soon after the assassination Kaiser William II the German emperor assured the king of Austria-Hungary they would come to their aid. Austria issued a Ultimatum to Serbia demanding that the killer was tried in their country Serbia where Bosnia was located denied. Austria declared war on July 28,1914. Russia mobilized to help Bosnia and Germany declared war on Russia. France declared war to help Russia. Germany declared war on neutral Belgium so they could pass through there to France, this brought Great Britain into the war.

37. Standard Three. • As war spread in Europe President Wilson called for Americans to be impartial in thought as well as action. He didn’t want American turning on each other because the U.S. was a cultural melting pot. • Many American’s viewed the war as a European conflict and that it didn’t concern them. Most however tended to favor Great Britain and France because of historical ties to them.

38. Standard Three. • The main thing of the war that swayed American opinion against the Central power was how Germany committed war crimes against the Belgians. • Great Britain blockaded Germany with its navy. They seized contraband (defined as material used for war bombs etc.) it is against international law to seize food however. Great Britain contested what contraband and eventually added everything including food. • So they were trying to Starve the Central Power.

39. Standard Three. • Germany’s response was to blockade Great Britain with there U-Boats(submarines) They sank all allied ships, On May 7, 1915 a German U-boat sank the passenger liner Lusitania. There were 215 Americans on board. President Wilson protested but wanted to stay neutral. • To keep America out of the war, Germany promised not to sink anymore passenger ships, but violated that pledge when they sank the Sussex a French ship.

40. Standard Three. • In 1916 the National Defense Act was passed expanding the army and building more warships. Wilson still hoped for peace, he ran for re-election on the slogan “he kept us out of war” • In 1917 German foreign minister Arthur Zimmermann, minister to Mexico sent a telegram (Zimmermann note) to the Mexican government

41. Standard Three. • It stated that if the United States declared war on Germany, Mexico should declare war on the United States and when the Germans won Mexico would get back Texas, New Mexico, and Arizona which it had lost in the Mexican-American War in 1848. • Wilson asked Congress for a declaration of war against Germany on April 2, 1917, Congress did it on April 6, 1917.

42. Standard Three. P 372 • The federal government played little role in the lives of Americans before WWI, when the war started they stepped in and regulated many aspects of the economy. • In May 1917 Congress passed the Selective Service Act (draft) 24 million registered about 2.8 million were actually drafted. • The Committee on Public information was created to help American’s rally to the war. This was done through various forms of propaganda(sources that are meant to sway the opinion of people in favor of something). These can be pamphlets, posters, radio etc.

43. Standard Three. • Women went to work in the factories and joined various organizations that supported the war effort. Also women were well known for helping the Red Cross.

44. Standard Three. P 381 • In the end Germany lost, the Austria-Hungarian Empire, Ottoman Empire, collapsed, and the Russians overthrew the king and the Communist state was founded in Russia. The War ended on November 11, 1918 known as veterans day today. • Wilson proposed the concept of “peace without victory” and authored the Fourteen Points. Which underlying principals were noble, not greed and vengeance.

45. Standard Three. • Germany had to sign the Treaty of Versailles, which broke apart Germany and made them assume full responsibility for the war in reparations (money payments) to the allies. • Wilson’s 14 points were rejected basically when the Treaty of Versailles was passed and Germany was dealt its hand. • The League of Nations was created like Wilson wanted but had no real authority to help preserve peace,

46. Standard Three. • The Treaty of Versailles was never ratified by the Senate. Wilson failed to compromise on certain things like article 10 for example that said the member nations would preserve each other territorial boundaries. After the war several things happened like the flu epidemic that killed thousands of people worldwide.

47. Standard Three. P 391 • The most important event was the First Red Scare. • Russia became communist in 1917 promoting the workers revolution around the world. This scarred many Americans. • Many people were suspected of trying to start revolutions through out the world.