America\'s Rise to World Power

America's rise to world power during the Gilded Age (1877-1914) and the nature of the Civil Rights movement in the United States following World War II (1945-1969).

Discuss America's rise to world power during the Gilded Age (1877-1914). Include commentary on relevant leading personalities, issues, and events. In your opinion, did American imperialism contradict the principles in the Declaration of Independence? Explain.

America is a nation founded upon the principles of constitutional democracy -- even though it has often contradicted those principles in its practice. The Declaration of Independence does not merely endorse the ideals of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness for all human beings, but the right of self-determination in governance, and the right of the people to free itself from a tyrannical sovereign. When a government is no longer for the people and by the people it is no longer a legitimate government, according to the Declaration. Imperialism, which means dictating the government of other nations, directly contradicts the principle of national and personal self-determination.

Even before the development of America into a world power during the Gilded Age, the right of self-determination had really come to mean, in actual American practice, the right of white Americans to land, not the right of native tribes to their historical territories. The Gilded Age oversaw the rise of America's industrial power and expansion of its territorial outreach into the West through the technological innovation of rail roads which allowed for a more integrated transportation infrastructure within America's borders. The Gilded Age also was an age in which American influence extended into the Pacific, when America annexed what would become the 50th state of Hawaii in 1898.

But the era's most significant foreign policy development was America's expanded use of the Monroe Doctrine, which in 1828 proclaimed that the United States was the self-appointed protector of all the Americas, and that Europe could no longer extend its colonial influence into any territory in the hemisphere. This essentially meant that America declared its sphere of influence extended into Central America. Shifting from its isolationist past, America became increasingly embroiled in international affairs as a result of this doctrine. In 1898, whipped into a frenzy by William Randolph Heart's yellow journalism and specious allegations that an about the Spanish violations of human rights, Americans railed in support of the Spanish-American War. The idea that the supposedly oppressed Cuban freedom fighters were like American rebels of old was used to justify American determination of the situation abroad.

Under the leadership of Theodore Roosevelt at the helm of the navy and President McKinley, America exercised its dominance and declared war on Spain in April of 1898. The suspicious sinking of the U.S.S. Maine sealed the fate of Spain, although it is not even certain why the Maine sank today. However, rather than merely guarantee freedom for Cubans, Americans actions actually resulted in its colonial domination of the territory. The rhetoric of freedom and protecting America was used to justify imperialism to the American public.