Source 1
Theodore Roosevelt
in hunting costume.
Source 2
Photos taken by a U.S. colonial administrator of a
tribal Filipino in the U.S.-led police force.
U.S. Imperialism Museum Activity
Chris Endy, Department of History, Cal State Los Angeles, cendy@calstatela.edu
Source 3
Philippine Assembly, established by U.S.
colonial administrators in 1907
Source 4
Harper’s Weekly, 1898
Source 6
Theodore Roosevelt, telegram to Washington, 7 July 1898,
two days after his Rough Riders fabled charge up San Juan
Hill, and one day after the outbreak of yellow fever in the
U.S. camps.
We are within measurable distance of a terrible military
disaster…. We must have help—thousands of men, batteries
and food and ammunition…. The mismanagement has been
beyond belief…. The lack of transportation, food and
artillery has brought us to the very verge of disaster.”
(Source, Pérez, War of 1898, 92).
Source 7
President George W. Bush, 17 September 2002
“All our history says we believe in liberty and
justice for all, that when we see oppression we
cry. . . . Our history shows that we’re not a nation
which conquers; we’re a nation which liberates.”
Source 5
Portrait of Emilio Aguinaldo, leader of the
Filipino revolution against Spain and then
the United States. Captured by U.S. troops
in 1901.
Source 8
A U.S. Army medic describing the Cuban revolutionary
troops
I think that 80 percent of them are the worst specimens of
humanity I ever saw…. a majority of them are ignorant and
very filthy.”
(Source, Pérez, War of 1898, 95).
Source 9
The Platt Amendment (1901), a set of U.S. demands
incorporated into the Cuban constitution in 1902 and
lasting until 1934.
Source 10
Article I. That the government of Cuba shall never
enter into any treaty or other compact with any
foreign power or powers which will impair or tend to
impair the independence of Cuba, nor in any manner
authorize or permit any foreign power or powers to
obtain by colonization or for military or naval
purposes or otherwise, lodgement in or control over
any portion of said island.
General García [Calixto García, a Cuban revolutionary general)
received numerous visits at his headquarters. American
commanders and officers, marines and naval officers,
newspaper reporters and representatives of foreign governments
consulted with him. American troops conducted frequent
movements, while their officers were completely disoriented.
They besieged us with questions and heaped attention upon us.
They needed us; they knew that without our cooperation, their
failure was imminent.”
(Source, Pérez, War of 1898, 81).
Article III. The Government of Cuba consents that the
United States may exercise the right to intervene for
the preservation of Cuban independence, the
maintenance of a government adequate for the
protection of life, property, and individual liberty…
Article VII. That to enable the United States to
maintain the independence of Cuba, and to protect the
people thereof, as well as for its own defense, the
government of Cuba will sell or lease to the United
States lands necessary for coaling or naval stations....
-From a Cuban history of the war, written in 1900.
Source 11
-Stephen Crane, war journalist and novelist, 14 July 1898.
It becomes necessary to speak of the men’s opinions of the
Cubans. To put it shortly, both officers and privates have the
most lively contempt for the Cubans. They despise them. They
came down here expecting to fight side by side with an ally, but
this ally has done little but stay in the rear… manifesting an
indifference to the cause of Cuban liberty which could not be
exceeded by some one who had never heard of it.
(Source, Pérez, War of 1898, 81).
Source 13
Senator Albert J. Beveridge, Republican from Indiana,
speaking in September 1898 on “The March of the Flag.”
Source 12
It is a mighty people that He has planted on this [United
States] soil; a people sprung from the most masterful blood
of history; a people perpetually revitalized by the virile, manproducing working-folk of all the earth; a people imperial by
virtue of their power, by right of their institutions, by
authority of their Heaven-directed purposes—the
propagandists and not the misers of liberty….. Shall the
American people continue their march toward the
commercial supremacy of the world? Shall free institutions
broaden their blessed reign as the children of liberty wax in
strength, until the empire of our principles is established over
the hearts of all mankind?
Have we no mission to perform, no duty to discharge to
our fellow-man? Has God endowed us with gifts beyond our
deserts and marked us as the people of His peculiar favor…?
The commercial supremacy of the Republic means that
this Nation is to be the sovereign factor in the peace of the
world. For the conflicts of the future are to be conflicts of
trade—struggles for markets—commercial wars for
existence. And the golden rule of peace is impregnability of
position and invincibility of preparedness. . . .
Source 14
Platform of the American Anti-Imperialist League, adopted in Chicago, 18 October 1899.
Much as we abhor the war of "criminal aggression" in the Philippines, greatly as we regret that the blood of the Filipinos is
on American hands, we more deeply resent the betrayal of American institutions at home. The real firing line is not in the
suburbs of Manila. The foe is of our own household. The attempt of 1861 was to divide the country. That of 1899 is to
destroy its fundamental principles and noblest ideals.
Source 15
Source 16
Source 17
Source 18
Source
20
Source 19
Literary Digest, 1901
1904
1877
Chinese Exclusion Act, 1882
• 1. What is the “thesis” of the drawing or
photograph?
• 2. What details in the image perhaps reveal
the motives or assumptions of the artist or
photographer?
• 3. What questions does your image raise?
What more do you want to know?
Thomas Gast, American Progress, 1872
The
Open
Door
Notes
1899
&
1900
1904