Latin Americans questioned Roosevelt’s high-handed maneuver. They also objected to the Roosevelt Corollary to the Monroe Doctrine. The Monroe Doctrine, announced in 1823, declared that the United States had the right to exclude foreign powers from expanding in the western hemisphere. It had protected weak 19th century Latin American nations from powerful European nations. The Roosevelt Corollary, in contrast, stated that “chronic” wrongdoing on the part of Latin American nations entitled the United States to intervene in the affairs of those nations. Most Latin Americans saw Roosevelt’s policy as a form of imperialism.
Roosevelt applied his corollary first to the Dominican Republic, which had trouble paying its debts to other nations. Roosevelt feared that a European power might occupy the country to force repayment of debts. The United States therefore took over and ran the Dominican Republic’s current only money making custom service for two years and used money collected there to pay the nation’s debt.
Relations with Japan also became an issue during Roosevelt’s administration. A conflict erupted in 1906 over Japanese immigration to the United States. Prejudice against Japanese immigrants caused a crisis when San Francisco forced Asian children into a separate school. The Japanese government protested. In a “gentlemen’s agreement” in 1907, both nations agreed to discourage immigration from Japan. In the Root-Takahira agreement of 1908, Japan and the United States agreed to respect the territorial integrity of China and the Open Door Policy.
Roosevelt’s successor, William Howard Taft, adopted a policy that critics called dollar diplomacy; he encouraged U.S. bankers and industrialists to invest abroad, especially in Latin America. He hoped they would replace European lenders and build American influence in the area. The policy, however, led the United States into unpopular military ventures. For instance, the nation became involved in a civil war in Nicaragua, where the United States in 1909 supported the overthrow of the country’s leader and sustained a reactionary regime.
Woodrow Wilson, an idealist and humanitarian, disliked imperialism and rejected dollar diplomacy. Eh hoped to establish benevolent relations with other nations and wanted the Unites States to serve as a force for good in the world. However, in 1913, the United States landed marines in Nicaragua to ensure that its choice for Nicaraguan president would remain in power. The Wilson administration then drew up a treaty with Nicaragua that reduced the country to virtual dependency. In addition, U.S. troops occupied Haiti in 1915 and the Dominican Republic in 1916. American business interest continued to prevail in Latin America.
Finally, Wilson came close to involving the United States in a war with Mexico. In 1913, two years after the Mexican Revolution, Mexico’s new president was assassinated, and a reactionary general, Victoriano Huerta, took control. Wilson refused to recognize Huerta’s unjust regime. Many Mexican who disliked Huerta, however, also resented Wilson’s intervention in Mexican affairs. Both sides were poised to fight in 1914, when a confrontation between American sailor and Huerta’s forces broke out at Veracruz. Wilson accepted the mediation of Argentina, Chile, and Brazil, but then supported Francisco “Pancho” Villa, a bandit, until Villa crossed the border and massacred Americans with the intention of recovering Texas and New Mexico territories back to the Mexican motherland. Wilson sent U.S. troops to pursue Villa in 1916. the United States withdrew in 1917, which ended American involvement but left a legacy of distrust in Mexico and Latin America.
Progressivism changed American attitudes toward the power of government. In 1917 Americans turned their attention from domestic concerns to foreign affairs as the United States became involved in World War I.
2.- Discuss the impact that World War I had on America domestically and with respect to foreign policy, taking special care to consider the influence that the war had on Progressive reform and the ways in which Progressivism helped shape wartime America. Who benefited most from the war and who least? What do authors Link and McCormick mean when they refer to the war as provoking “the decline and endurance of Progressivism”?
World War I broke out in Europe in the summer of 1914. The war set Germany and Austria-Hungary (the Central Powers) against the United Kingdom, France, and Russia (the Allied Powers), and eventually involved many more nations. The United States declared itself a neutral nation, but neutrality proved elusive. For three years, as Europeans faced war on an unprecedented scale, the neutrality so popular in the United States gradually slipped away.
At the outset, Germany and Britain each sought to terminate U.S. trade with the other. Exploiting its naval advantage, Britain gained the upper hand and almost ended U.S. trade with Germany. Americans protested this interference, but when German submarines, known as U-boats, began to use unrestricted submarine warfare in 1915, American public opinion turned against Germany. Then on May 7, 1915, a German submarine attacked a British passenger liner, the Lusitana, killing more than a thousand people, including 128 Americans, Washington condemned the attacks, which led to a brief respite in German attacks. In the presidential race of 1916, President Wilson won reelection on the campaign slogan “He Kept Us Out of War”, which later proved to be too optimistic.
In February 1917, however, Germany reistated the policy of unrestricted submarine warfare. Ending diplomatic ties with Germany, Wilson still tried to keep the United States out of the war. But Germany continued its attacks, and the United States found out about a secret message, the Zimmermann telegram, in whith the German government proposed an alliance with Mexico and discussed the possibility of Mexico regaining territory lost to the United States. Resentful that Germany was sinking American ships and making overtures to Mexico, the United States declared war on Germany on April 6, 1917.
I personally think that Wilson final push for entering the war was a brilliant decision, it cost many American lives but the country as a whole was better off at the end. German was becoming a super and ambitious power its taking over French and part of East Europe would prove disastrous for the U. S economy, same can be said about making Mexico a German ally with the promise of recapturing Texas and California back to Mexico. On the other hand, the U. S. needed to show the European allies countries that without the U.S. direct intervention they would have never won the war against Germany. I would be equally disastrous if the French and Great Britain have won the war by themselves. They would have become so powerful to even defeat any American ideas or policy. After all, Wilson was trying to extend progressivism throughout the world. Unfortunately the end of World War I also came with the decline of the progressive ideas.
World War I brought significant changes on the American home front. First, the war created labor shortages. Thousands of African Americans left the South for Jobs in Northern steel mills, munitions plants, and stockyards. The great migration of the World War I era established large black communities in Northern cities such as New York, Philadelphia, and Chicago. The influx, however, provoked racial tensions and race riots in some cities.
Labor shortages provided a variety of jobs for women, who became streetcar conductors, railroad workers, and shipbuilders. Women also volunteered for the war effort and sold war bonds. Women mustered support for woman suffrage, a cause that finally achieved its long-sought goal. The 19th Amendment, granting women the right to vote, triumphed in Congress in 1919 and was ratified by the states in 1920.
The war greatly increased the responsibilities of the federal government. New government agencies relied mainly on persuasion and voluntary compliance. The War Industries Board urged manufacturers to use mass production techniques and increase efficiency. The Railroad Administration regulated rail traffic; the Fuel Administration monitored coal supplies and regulated gasoline. The National War Labor Board sought to resolve thousands of disputes between management and labor that resulted from stagnant wages coupled with inflation. The Food Administration urged families to observe “meatless Mondays,” “wheatless Wednesdays,” and other measures to help the war effort.
Authors Link and Mc Cormick believed that Wilson’s call for American entry into World War I started the decline and endurance of progressivism, in a sense, among others it created a crisis of conscience for most progressives. Progressives believes and principles were tested at the verge of world war, they wanted to introduce to the rest of the world the wonders of a modern world based on democracy, honesty and mostly on progressive ideals. On the other hand, and even fiercely criticizing the barbaric blood shed on the European continent, the U.S. just couldn’t stay behind, since strong economic and commercial interests were at stake. The failure of World War I gave progressive detractors enough ammunition to finally be able to prove progressivism wrongfully ideals and to destroy it, passing effectively the U.S. into a new era.
Sources:
Link, Arthur S., McCormick, Richard L. Progressivism. Princeton University. Harlan Davidson, Inc. Arlington Heights, Illinois.
LaFeber, Walter. Polenberg, Richard. Woloch, Nancy. The American Century. Third Edition. Alfred A. Knopf. New York.
