IV.

Growth and an Outward Perspective

Change was evident as the 19th century came to a close. After the Civil War (1861-1865), the United States’ rapid industrial growth made its isolationist stance increasingly difficult to maintain. The country’s historically rural population was rapidly becoming more urban and diverse. Desire for more markets began to overtake the appetite for more land. Similar changes took place in other countries as the limits of domestic markets touched off enthusiasm for new outlets. Competition with other countries for influence and for overseas markets became inevitable.

American naval officer Alfred T. Mahan wrote in The Influence of Seapower Upon History (1890) that the United States could not permit itself to be left behind in the growing international competition. A powerful navy, he insisted, was vital for that goal. Just a few years after the publication of Mahan’s book, Republicans wrote into their platform a call for 'the achievement of the manifest destiny of the republic in its broadest sense.' Manifest destinywas a term created by journalist and diplomat John Lewis O’Sullivan and was long a rallying cry for the nation’s westward expansion. With the new Republican platform, the concept of manifest destiny now extended to include interests overseas, particularly Latin America.

The U.S. presence in Latin America faced its first major challenge in 1895. President Grover Cleveland strongly objected to British interference in a boundary dispute between Venezuela and British Guiana (present-day Guyana). The situation briefly threatened a military conflict between the United States and Britain. Cleveland successfully invoked the Monroe Doctrine’s ban against European incursions into the Western Hemisphere.

Cleveland’s success was due in part to Britain’s recognition of U.S. power and to concerns about the growing strength of Germany, which made Britain eager to cultivate the United States as an ally. In 1903, for similar reasons, the British favored U.S. claims in determining the boundary between the Alaskan Panhandle and Canada.