Mark Twain's War Against Imperialism

In the late 1800’s America started to expand across the world. America went to areas like Alaska, Hawaii, Japan, and the Philippines. The U.S. wanted to expand and tried to annex many countries. Many people wonder if the American expansion was justifiable or not.

Imperialism was motivated by, “political ambitions… Nation’s will to power… or glory or national greatness,” (Doc 3). Imperialism for many countries is caused to improve the nation’s overall power. Additionally, according to President Mckinley, the U.S.’s involvement of Imperialism in the Philippines, was due to the fact that, “They were unfit for self-government,”(Doc. 7). The U.S. believed that there was nothing else for them to do, but take them over. Expanding territory, and a country's overall power by imperialism, was the major reason, politically

A lot of these effects were based on the US economy and the high amount of money that the US had to spent to annex the Philippines. This was not a smart investment. In William Jennings Bryan 's speech “Paralyzing Influence of Imperialism”, he mentions that “We dare not educate them [Filipinos] lest they learn to read the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution of the United States and mock us for our inconsistency.” (Doc D). Bryan was running candidate for the president of the United States. Bryan was an anti-imperialist who believed that annexing the Philippines and educating them was very hypocritical because Great Britain had to broken away by only one colony, which was the United States. This reflected negatively on the US because it had shown other nations that the United States were violating its’ own principles. The United States say their the “land of the free”, but still tried to govern people overseas. The second evidence “PBS - Crucible of Empire” (The Crucible Film) demonstrates that the US had to pay $20 million (USD) to govern the Philippines through The Treaty of Paris. The cost for the US to keep fighting and still keep the Philippines under their control was $4 million (USD). The US had sent 100,000 soldiers to fight and over 3,000 people died during the war. The fact that the US spent millions of USD was outrageous because they were already in a state of economic depression due to the Stock Market Crash of 1902. The US was so greedy for power that even after the success of winning The Spanish American War of 1898 and gaining allies overseas. It still wasn’t enough, they still wanted more power and because of this, they decided to annex the Philippines. Annexing the Philippines lead the US to financially unstable and thousands of deaths, which is why the US should not have annexed the

Both Nell Irvin Painter and Kristin L. Hoganson have two different prospective on the annexation of the Philippines. Painter’s approach of explaining the annexation was more of an economic view rather then Hoganson’s, which was a more sexiest view. An example of Painter’s view is when he said,” the culprit, it seemed, was agricultural and industrial overproduction” (Painter). He is saying the America simply produced too much, and they did not care. Business thought taking over The Philippines would help American gain access to trading with China. They saw it as the “perfect stepping-stones” trade with China and the rest of Asia. American business men felt it was necessary for the government to show some authority and capitalize on this opportunity. American saw Manila as their

Theodore Roosevelt is considered as one of the most active and energetic Presidents in American history. The 26th President of the United States had a reputation of bringing attention to Progressive issues at national level. His speech, “The Strenuous Life” reflects his own life experiences, efforts and hardships in life. Roosevelt gave the speech to a group of wealthy people before the Hamilton Club, Chicago on April 10, 1899 after the America Senate signed agreement with Spain that established Philippines as a colony of American state. In his speech, Roosevelt addresses the American nation to shoulder their responsibilities nationally and internationally. He believes that only the strenuous life can play great role in the prosperity and welfare of the individuals and nation as well. Practically, Roosevelt was an ardent supporter of imperialism and wanted America to play integral role in world affairs and politics. This speech also depicts his policy of interventionism and imperialism. Roosevelt defends American imperialism by taking America’s national interests into consideration. However, his imperialist approach in foreign policies raises many questions for the audience sitting outside the borders of America.

In The War Prayer by Mark Twain,he talked about soldiers going to war and it relates kind of to all the wars that have happened before. He talks a lot about describing what the soldiers would go through and their families. He explained how soldiers were really patriotic about the war and the families saying a “ long prayer”. Twain uses satire to express what he thinks about war throughout his prompt he's describing about war and all the praying they did towards the soldiers who left to fight.

“We hold with Abraham Lincoln, that ‘no man is good enough to govern another man without that other’s consent’... ‘that is despotism (rule by a tyrant),”(document A). Even though he was not alive, Abraham Lincoln posed a great point as to why the Philippines should not be annexed; they did not give their consent. The Philippines was taken over and annexed against their will by the US. Document A also says that annexing the Philippines extinguishes “the spirit of 1776 in those islands”. The spirit of 1776 was independence and by annexing the Philippines the US took away the independence of the Philippines as well as the Filipino people. Taking away the independence of another colony/nation is hypocritical because it goes against the values of which the US was founded on.

The first sentence of The War Prayer causes one to think that there is great and exalting excitement because Mark Twain said, “This was a time of great and exalting excitement.” When we read the next line, Mark Twain says, “The country is up in arms.” In those first two sentences, your mind switches the perspective of what is happening from good to bad. In The War Prayer, there is also a lot of emphasis to exaggerate certain points like the soldiers swung by instead of marched. Other examples of this are cyclones of applause, and the deepest deeps of their hearts. The type of language that Mark Twain uses really puts a clear picture of what is happening and he makes it so that you can imagine what it would look like in the church.

In the beginning of the 19th century, the United States had minimal interest in becoming an empire who controlled overseas countries. Instead, Americans decided to just use Manifest Destiny on their own continent as their form of expansion. In the late 1800s, the frontier was announced to be “closed”, so Americans were forced to look overseas in order to expand trade by looking for new markets. After America made the decision to support Cuba in its revolt against Spain during the Spanish-American war, the United States gained its own colonial empire when it defeated Spain in 1898. Once the war ended, Americans had to debate between becoming an imperialist empire or remaining in isolationism. The national debate over imperialism became a major

Throughout human history, war has been a common solution to settle conflict or disagreements between people. War has and will always be apart of this world, because no matter how much death it causes humans will never change. Some people have come to see the idiocy in war and have even written about it in poems, short stories, etc. One of these people, Samuel Clemens, better known as Mark Twain, has mocked this absurd and pointless practice. Twain’s essay The War Prayer satirizes the customs of praying for safety and victory in war and for equating war with patriotism.

In the late 19th century the U.S. got possession of Cuba, Puerto Rico, and the Philippines and the Anti-imperialist league were people who disagreed with U.S. 's colonial expansion and how it was becoming an imperial power. Both Moorfield Storey and Carl Schurz were Anti-imperialist. Storey believed that a country 's worth should not be measured by its might or size rather it should be measured by its moral standing. Carl Schurz believed that fake patriots always call for war but are unwilling to fight it, they do it just so they can be called brave and patriots. The War prayer was the antiwar piece that was written by mark twain. The point of that piece was to portray how religion was used as justification and motivation for war. It was an

To what extent was late nineteenth-century and early twentieth-century United States expansionism a continuation of past United States expansionism and to what extent was it a departure?

Mark Twain uses satire to portray different issues that were going on during the time period. In The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, author Mark Twain uses Huck Finn and Tom Sawyer to represent romanticism and realism. Doing so formed the characters into two drastically different persons. Mark Twain uses satirical elements to contrast the two main characters in their personalities and views.

Called “The Father of American Literature” by William Faulkner, Mark Twain was the one of the greatest writers of the nineteenth century and realized the accomplishment of the American Dream that has eluded so many other authors. “He was America 's greatest humorist, yet he ended up mankind 's darkest cynic and most savage critic”(Otfinoski). Mark Twain stands out as one of the most impactful writers of his time and depicted the America that he knew with his literature and with his life.