Contextualizing Anti-Imperialism (1898-1905)
Although the site is dedicated to uncovering the perspectives within anti-imperialism, an understanding of the imperialist agenda and the perspectives of others is critical to fully comprehend the historical framework. The documents contained on this page present the argument of imperialism from its espousers to do just this.
Treaty of Peace between the United States and Spain, Paris, December 10, 1898. (Avalon Project, Yale)
The Treaty of Paris was signed between the United States and Spain, formally ceasing hostilities. Articles 1-3 cede Puerto Rico and Guam to the U.S., the Philippines for $20 million, and Cuba as a military protectorate. No representatives from any of the ceded territory was present. Senators Cushman Davis and William Frye were proponents of imperialism while George Gray was a reluctant anti-imperialist. Judge Day and Whitelaw Reid were loyal to the administration, yet wary of the Treaty's imperialist ambitions.
Bibliographical Note: Paolo E. Coletta, ‘Bryan, McKinley, and the Treaty of Paris,’ The Pacific Historical Review, Vol. 26, No. 2. (May, 1957); Paolo E. Coletta, ‘McKinley, the Peace Negotiations, and the Acquisition of the Philippines,’ The Pacific Historical Review, Vol. 30, No. 4. (November, 1961); Congressional Record, 55th Senate, 3rd Session, December 12, 1898 - February 18, 1899, p. 90-2130; Richard R. F. Pettigrew, Imperial Washington: The Story of American Public Life from 1870-1920 (Chicago: Charles H. Kerr and Co., 1922), p. 167-206.
"Benevolent Assimilation," William McKinley, December 21, 1898. (MSC, Philippines)
President McKinley's proclamation of "benevolent assimilation" came during the Senate's debate on the ratification of the Treaty of Paris. The President's policy ideologically represented the legal ideology presented by Senator Orville Platt that concluded national sovereignty allowed the U.S. to acquire the ex-Spanish territories to give them the blessings of liberty.
Bibliographical Note: Stuart Creighton Miller, Benevolent Assimilation: The American Conquest of the Philippines, 1899-1903, New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 1982; John Dobson, Reticent Expansionism: The Foreign Policy of William McKinley, Pittsburg, Pennsylvania: Duquesne University Press, 1988; Lewis L. Gould, The Spanish American War and President McKinley, Lawrence: University Press of Kansas, 1980.
The Spanish-American War through Political Cartoons
Online Exhibitions on the Spanish American War:
Acquiring Territory - The Legal Contentions
Three opinions concerning the legal ability of Congress to acquire and govern territory emerged as early as late 1898 even before the Treaty of Paris debates warmed up. The first two opinions were polar opposites. First, Elmer Adams and Carman Randolph proposed that the Constitution follows the flag ex proprio vigore or as it goes. The advocates of ex proprio vigore contended that statehood and extension of rights must be a condition of acquisition. Contrarily, Christopher Columbus Langdell among others in the government argued as War Secretary Elihu Root did, that the Constitution follows the flag, but does not "quite catch up." Langdell and the imperialists argued that Congress had plenary power to act in whatever way it should choose.
The final opinion and in many ways a sort of compromise came from Harvard's professor of government Abbott Lawrence Lowell. Lowell argued that Congress could not do whatever it chose, but was not restricted into rigorously and automatically applying the Constitution. The Congress, through its treaty making powers, could choose to incorporate territory--as it had to all previous territories--or keep territory unincorporated--as it planned to do with Puerto Rico, the Philippines, and Guam.
The following articles from prominent Ivy League law journals reflect these opinions:
Ex Proprio Vigore:
Plenary Power:
Incorporation:
Bibliographical Note: Further articles that exhibit these contentions include: Elmer Adams, 'The Causes and Results of Our War with Spain From a Legal Standpoint,' Yale Law Journal, Vol. 8, No. 3. (December, 1898), p. 119-133; Simeon Baldwin, 'The Constitutional Questions Incident to the Acquisiton and Government of the United States of Island Territory,' Harvard Law Review, Vol 12, No. 6. (January, 1899), p. 393-426; James Bradley Thayer, 'Our New Possessions,' Harvard Law Review, Vol. 12, No. 7. (February, 1899), p. 464-485; Harry Pratt Judson, 'Our Federal Constitution and the Government of Tropical Territories,' American Monthly Review of Reviews, Vol. 19. (1899), p. 67-75; John Kimberly Beach, 'Constitutional Expansion,' Yale Law Journal, Vol. 8, No. 5. (February, 1899), p. 225-234; George P. Costigan, 'The Third View of the Status of Our Possessions,' Yale Law Journal, Vol. 9, No. 3. (December, 1899), p. 124-133.
The Election of 1900
C o m i n g S o o n
The Organic Act, 1900 (a.k.a. The Foraker Act)
On April 2, 1900 President McKinley signed the Organic Act passed by Congress to give representative government to Puerto Rico. It established a court system, an executive council, a governor, and a legislative body elected by the people. Also important, all civil liberties enjoyed by Americans would be extended to Puerto Ricans, but not the right of citizenship.
Bibliographical Note: Forthcoming
The Insular Cases:
The Insular Cases were a series of Supreme Court cases (arguably as few as six cases or as many as twenty-five cases) decided between 1901 and 1922. They were the first legal challenge in the courts of the policy of imperialism. Initially the cases dealt exclusively with Puerto Rico and the tariff laws between the occupying U.S., but the implications of ruling on tariff law were obvious. Many of the cases taken up by the courts addressed the general relationship between the United States and the insular territories acquired after the Spanish-American War. The following cases defined the legal boundaries of Constitution and the liberties extended by it.
Neely v. Henkel, 180 U.S. 109, 1901.
De Lima v. Bidwell, 182 U.S. 1, 1901.
Goetze v. United States, 182 U.S. 221, 1901.
Crossman v. United States, 182 U.S. 221, 1901.
Armstrong v. United States, 182 U.S. 243, 1901.
Downes v. Bidwell, 182 U.S. 244, 1901.
Huus v. New York and Porto Rico S.S. Co., 182 U.S. 392, 1901.
Dooley v. United States, 183 U.S. 151, 1901.
Fourteen Diamond Rings v. United States, 183 U.S. 176, 1901.
Hawaii v. Mankichi, 190 U.S. 197, 1903.
Gonzalez v. Williams, 192 U.S. 1, 1904.
Kepner v. United States, 195 U.S. 100, 1904.
Dorr v. United States, 195 U.S. 138, 1904.
Rasmussen v. United States, 197 U.S. 516, 1905.
Dowdell v. United States, 221 U.S. 325, 1911.
Bibliographical Note: Bartholomew H. Sparrow, The Insular Cases and the Emergence of American Empire, Lawrence, Kansas: University of Kansas Press, 2006; James E. Kerr, Insular Cases: The Role of the Judiciary in American Expansionism, New York: Kennikat Press, 1982; Foreign in a Domestic Sense: Puerto Rico, American Expansion, and the Constitution, Ed. Christina Duffy Burnett and Burke Marshall. Durham: Duke University Press, 2001; Lanny Thompson, 'The Imperial Republic: A Comparison of the Insular Territories under US Dominion after 1898,' The Pacific Historical Review, Vol. 71, No. 4. (November, 2002), p. 535-574; supreme.findlaw.com; macmeekin.com.
M. Patrick Cullinane, Liberty and Anti-Imperialism, November 28, 2007.
