American Foreign Policy Milestones Washington's Farewell Address, 1796
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American Foreign Policy Milestones This activity has students analyzing 11 significant milestones and policies from America’s history. There are several ways you can use this in your classes: Expert Groups: break students up into 11 groups/pairs and give each group a different article and give them 7- 10 minutes to become experts on that topic. They then have to teach the class either through a butcher paper board or PowerPoint. As each group presents, the students fill in the chart. Station Activity: Paste the readings up around the room and have students in groups of 2-3 move through the stations. They should read about the policy, briefly discuss it together so that they all understand it, then take notes and complete the chart. Groups: Go over the 1st (Washington’s Farewell) together. Then, place students in groups of 5 and give each student 2 readings. They get 10 minutes to read and take notes on theirs. then they have to teach the other 4 people in their group about what they read. Whole Class: A final option for a class that needs more structure is to give everyone the chart and one reading at a time. Read each one together and fill in the chart before moving on to the next one. Google Doc: You can access a Google version here. This can be used to make this a homework assignment or digital version of any of the above activities. I didn’t include a key since all the info is right here from the readings and most students will have similar but slightly different takeaways from the policies. Best of luck!! Washington’s Farewell Address, 1796 To announce his decision not to seek a third term as President, George Washington presented his Farewell Address in a newspaper article September 17, 1796. Frustrated by French meddling in U.S. politics, Washington warned the nation to avoid permanent alliances with foreign nations and to rely instead on temporary alliances for emergencies. Washington’s efforts to protect the fragile young republic by steering a neutral course between England and France during the French Revolutionary Wars was made extremely difficult by the intense rhetoric flowing from the pro-English Federalists, led by Alexander Hamilton, and the pro-French, personified by Thomas Jefferson. In his farewell address, Washington exhorted Americans to set aside their violent likes and dislikes of foreign nations, lest they be controlled by their passions: “The nation which indulges toward another an habitual hatred or an habitual fondness is in some degree a slave.” Washington’s remarks have served as an inspiration for American isolationism, and his advice against joining a permanent alliance was heeded for more than a century and a half. The Monroe Doctrine, 1823 In his December 2, 1823, address to Congress, President James Monroe articulated America’s policy on the new political order developing in the rest of the Americas and the role of Europe in the Western Hemisphere. The statement, known as the Monroe Doctrine, was little noted by the Great Powers of Europe, but eventually became a longstanding tenet of U.S. foreign policy. Monroe and his Secretary of State John Quincy Adams drew upon a foundation of American diplomatic ideals such as disentanglement from European affairs and defense of neutral rights as expressed in Washington’s Farewell Address. The three main concepts of the doctrine—separate spheres of influence for the Americas and Europe, non-colonization, and non- intervention—were designed to signify a clear break between the New World and Europe. Monroe’s administration forewarned the imperial European powers against interfering in the affairs of the newly independent Latin American states or potential United States territories. As Monroe stated: “The American continents … are henceforth not to be considered as subjects for future colonization by any European powers.” Monroe outlined two separate spheres of influence: the Americas and Europe. The independent lands of the Western Hemisphere would be solely the United States’ domain. In exchange, the United States pledged to avoid involvement in the political affairs of Europe, such as the ongoing Greek struggle for independence from the Ottoman Empire, and not to interfere in the existing European colonies already in the Americas. By the mid-1800s, Monroe’s declaration, combined with ideas of Manifest Destiny, provided precedent and support for U.S. expansion on the American continent. In the late 1800s, U.S. economic and military power enabled it to enforce the Monroe Doctrine. John Hay and the Open Door Policy, 1899–1900 Secretary of State John Hay first articulated the concept of the “Open Door” in China in a series of notes in 1899–1900. These Open Door Notes aimed to secure international agreement to the U.S. policy of promoting equal opportunity for international trade and commerce in China, and respect for China’s territorial integrity. British and American policies toward China had long operated under similar principles, but once Hay put them into writing, the “Open Door” became the official U.S. policy towards the Far East in the first half of the 20th century. The idea behind the Open Door Notes originated with British and American China experts who felt their interests in China would be best protected and promoted by a formal agreement among the European powers on the principle of maintaining an Open Door for trade and commercial activity. Under their influence, Secretary Hay sent the first of the Open Door Notes on September 6, 1899, to the other great powers that had an interest in China, including Great Britain, France, Russia, Germany, and Japan. These nations maintained significant physical and commercial presences in China, and were protective of their various spheres of influence and trading privileges there. Hay proposed a free, open market and equal trading opportunity for merchants of all nationalities operating in China. Hay argued that establishing equal access to commerce would benefit American traders and the U.S. economy, and hoped that the Open Door would also prevent disputes between the powers operating in China. The Open Door Notes served the important purpose of outlining U.S. policy toward China and expressing U.S. hopes for cooperation with the other foreign powers with a stake in the region. Roosevelt Corollary to the Monroe Doctrine, 1904 President Theodore Roosevelt’s assertive approach to Latin America and the Caribbean has often been characterized as the “Big Stick,” and his policy came to be known as the Roosevelt Corollary to the Monroe Doctrine. Although the Monroe Doctrine of 1823 was essentially passive (it asked that Europeans not increase their influence or recolonize any part of the Western Hemisphere), by the 20th century a more confident United States was willing to take on the role of regional policeman. In the early 1900s Roosevelt grew concerned that a crisis between Venezuela and its creditors could spark an invasion of that nation by European powers. The Roosevelt Corollary of December 1904 stated that the United States would intervene as a last resort to ensure that other nations in the Western Hemisphere fulfilled their obligations to international creditors, and did not violate the rights of the United States or invite “foreign aggression to the detriment of the entire body of American nations.” As the corollary worked out in practice, the United States increasingly used military force to restore internal stability to nations in the region. Roosevelt declared that the United States might “exercise international police power in ‘flagrant cases of such wrongdoing or impotence.’” Over the long term the corollary had little to do with relations between the Western Hemisphere and Europe, but it did serve as justification for U.S. intervention in Cuba, Nicaragua, Haiti, and the Dominican Republic. Dollar Diplomacy, 1909–1913 From 1909 to 1913, President William Howard Taft and Secretary of State Philander C. Knox followed a foreign policy characterized as “dollar diplomacy.” Taft shared the view held by Knox, a corporate lawyer who had founded the giant conglomerate U.S. Steel, that the goal of diplomacy was to create stability and order abroad that would best promote American commercial interests. Knox felt that not only was the goal of diplomacy to improve financial opportunities, but also to use private capital to further U.S. interests overseas. “Dollar diplomacy” was evident in extensive U.S. interventions in the Caribbean and Central America, especially in measures undertaken to safeguard American financial interests in the region. In China, Knox secured the entry of an American banking conglomerate, headed by J.P. Morgan, into a European-financed consortium financing the construction of a railway from Huguang to Canton. In spite of successes, “dollar diplomacy” failed to counteract economic instability and the tide of revolution in places like Mexico, the Dominican Republic, Nicaragua, and China. World War 1 & Wilsonian Diplomacy, 1914–1920: During his tenure as President, Woodrow Wilson encouraged the country to look beyond its economic interests and to define and set foreign policy in terms of ideals, morality, and the spread of democracy abroad. The United States continued its efforts to become an active player on the international scene. It engaged in action both in its traditional “sphere of influence” in the Western Hemisphere and in Europe during the First World War. The Wilsonian vision for collective security through U.S. leadership in international organizations, like the newly established League of Nations, appealed to the public. However, the United States ultimately declined membership in the League due to Article X of its charter that committed the United States to defend any League member in the event of an attack. In voting down U.S. participation, Congress challenged the informal tradition of the executive branch determining U.S.