Essay On Reconstruction After The Civil War
The integrity of the United States has been ensured as an indivisible country by the victory of the North in the American Civil War, but in the course of the conflict much had been destroyed. The second war aim, the abolition of slavery was achieved only partially.
Reconstruction
The victory over the Confederate States (Southern) had the most productive agricultural region of the country economically ruined and destroyed its rich culture. The legal abolition of slavery also meant no equality of former slaves. Immediately after the war tried legislative powers in the south to prevent African Americans from the election. They were afraid, as former slaves would use their right to vote, and they were trying to save as much as possible from their …show more content…
previous lifestyle. They conducted so-called "black codes" a, with which the freedom of former slaves was restricted. Although "radical" Republicans in Congress were trying to protect the civil rights of African-Americans and to integrate them into American society, but President Andrew Johnson was opposed their efforts. He came from the southern states, had remained during the Civil War the Union loyal. He served as Republican vice-president and was after the assassination of President Lincoln.
In March 1868 members of the House of Representatives Johnson tried to overthrow because of his opposition to radical changes. The accusation was groundless, and the request to depose the president, was not adopted by the Senate. His acquittal was an important victory for the central principle of the balance of power after the power of the legislative, executive and the judiciary are separate. Johnson's acquittal helped to maintain the delicate balance of power between the President and Congress.
The Congress won proceed with its program of "Reconstruction" or reform the occupied after the war by the North South. 1870 were the Southern states of African-Americans, whites and cooperative migrant Northerners (called "carpetbeggar") ruled. Many African-American Southerners were elected to the national governments and in the Congress. Even if it "reconstructed" in these governments have been cases of corruption, so they did but a lot to improve the education system, social services developed and protected civil rights.
Most white Southerners, however, were against the reconstruction. Some formed the Ku Klux Klan, a violent society that was hoping by the intimidation of African-Americans and the prevention of their social advancement, to protect the interests and benefits of whites. 1872 was the Ku Klux Klan suppressed the federal government, but white Democrats continued to use violence to maintain control of the state governments. The period of reconstruction ended in 1877, had been ratified as new constitutions in all southern states and the federal troops had withdrawn from the south.
Despite the guarantees of the Constitution African-American Southerners were now "second-class citizens". They were the White subordinate, even though they had limited civil rights. In some Southern African Americans were able to choose and be chosen. There were racial segregation in schools and hospitals, but trains, parks and other public bodies could still be used by members of both races in general.
Towards the end of the century, this system of segregation and oppression of African-Americans was always strict.
1896 put the Supreme Court determined in the case Plessy against Ferguson that the constitution separate facilities and services for the two races authorizes, as long as these facilities and services are equally valid. The southern facing promptly thereafter separate - but by no means equivalent - Facilities for African-Americans. Law provided for a strict separation in public transport, theaters, sports, and even in elevators and in cemeteries. Most African Americans and many poor whites lost the right to vote because they were unable to pay the poll tax (which had been introduced in order to exclude them from participating in politics) and because it is the test of reading and spelling ability failed. Because smaller offenses accused African Americans were sentenced to forced labor and violence of mobs sometimes directed against them. Many African-Americans remained in the southern states as a result of their poverty and their ignorance sharecroppers. Although African Americans were by the law freely, lived and they were treated like …show more content…
slaves.
The train to the west
In the years after the Civil War, the Americans began to settle in the western half of the United States. Miners looking for gold and silver penetrated in the Rocky Mountains. Farmers, under PROVIDE YOU WITH many immigrants from Germany and Scandinavia, settled in Minnesota and the Dakotas. Huge herds of cattle grazing on the prairies of Texas and other western states. They were guarded by horsemen (Cowboys), who became the most celebrated and glorified figures in American culture. Most of them were former soldiers from the southern states or former slaves. Both groups moved to the defeat of the South to the West. The cowboy was America's hero: he worked long hours in the prairie for a small salary. However, he was by far not as violent as it was shown later in films.
The settlers and the army of the United States fought frequently against the Indians, on whose land spilled the stream of white settlers. But the scale of the bloodshed has been exaggerated. Overall, an estimated 7,000 white and 5,000 Indians were killed in the course of the 19th century. Many more Indians died of starvation and disease, which have been brought by the spread of settlers westward. White men forced the Indians to leave their land and destroyed almost all the buffalo, the main source of food and furs for the tribes of the Great Plains.
Industrial Growth
During this period, the United States developed into the leading industrial power in the world, and shrewd businessmen acquired great wealth. The first transcontinental railroad was completed in 1869. Between 1860 and 1900, the entire rail network over all lines increased from 5,000 to 322,000 km, in Europe. In order to encourage this growth, the government loans and free land distributed to Western railways.
The oil industry grew, dominated by John D. Rockefeller's Standard Oil Company gigantic. Andrew Carnegie, who had come as a poor Scottish immigrant to America, built a vast empire of steel mills and iron mines. He sold it in 1901 for nearly 500 thousand million dollars. Textile mills multiplied in the South, and in and around Chicago emerged factories for processing meat. The electrical industry has developed due to a number of inventions - the telephone, the phonograph, the light bulb, cinema, and the alternator and transformer. The architect Louis Sullivan in Chicago used a steel frame construction to make a particular contribution to American cities throughout the world - the high-rise.
Unlimited economic growth but also managed many serious problems. Some companies were too big and powerful. The United States Steel Corporation was founded in 1901, the world's largest companies, and produced 60 percent of the national steel. To keep the competition low, certain railway companies on mergers and standardized shipping rates. "Trusts" - giant mergers of companies - tried the monopoly in some industries to achieve, particularly in the oil business.
These giant enterprises could produce products efficiently and sell inexpensive, but they also laid prices fixed and destroyed smaller competitors. Particularly farmers complained that the railways demanded high prices for transporting goods. Most Americans then and now admired business success and believed in the free market economy, but they were also of the opinion that the power of monopoly companies should be restricted in order to protect the individual.
A solution to this problem were official government regulations. Thus, the Interstate Commerce Commission in 1887 created to control the railway prices. The Sherman Antitrust Act of 1890 banned trusts, mergers, and business agreements. First, these measures were not very effective, but they established the principle that the federal government could regulate the industry for the common good of the people.
Workers, immigrants and farmers
Industrialization also brought the organization of the working with him. The American Federation of Labor founded in 1882, was a coalition of trade unions. It operated no agitation for socialism strongly, but for better wages and shorter working hours. In 1900 had the unskilled workers, on average, a 52-hour week and a weekly wage of 9 dollars. In the 1890s it was due to dissatisfaction with low wages and adverse health working conditions in numerous work stoppages, - some of them violent. Some workers and security personnel were killed in 1892 during strikes in the Carnegie steel plant in Homestead, Pennsylvania. 1894 were sent to Chicago to finish a railway strike forces of the army.
Many workers in these new industries were immigrants. In the years 1865 to 1910, 25 million people came to the United States. Many settled in certain districts in American cities. At the urging of workers, the Asian immigrants because of their willingness to perform unskilled labor at low wages, feared that the government banned in 1882 the influx of Chinese. 1907, most of the Japanese were excluded. But most other immigrants could fully enter into the land. However, often they met prejudices of native-born Americans - the course also descended from immigrants. Nevertheless, America offered to immigrants greater religious freedom, political freedom and more economic opportunities than their home countries. The first generation of immigrants often lived in poverty, but already her children and grandchildren speak the language and had a successful career. In the years between the founding of the first permanent settlement Jamestown (1607) and 1992, the United States took up about two thirds of migrants worldwide - 50 million people.
For American farmers, the late 19th century was a difficult time. Food prices fell, and they had to bear the cost of the high rail rates for high-interest loans, high taxes and tariffs on consumer goods. Several associations at the national level have been set up to protect the interests of small farmers - the Grange (1867), the National Farmers' Alliance (1877) and the People's Party in the 1890s.
Expansion overseas
With the exception of the purchase of Alaska from Russia (1867) was completed in the United States in 1848, territorial expansion. By 1890, as many European countries acquired colonies, new voices were heard in US foreign policy, mainly oriented to the European approach. Politicians, newspaper editors and Protestant missionaries declared that the obligation of the "Anglo-Saxon race" is to bring the advantages of Western civilization to the inhabitants of Asia, Africa and Latin America.
At the height of this period (1895) a revolt against the Spanish colonial rule in Cuba broke out. The Spanish army drove Cuban civilians in the camp, where up to 200,000 people died of disease and starvation. In the United States published newspaper owners like William Randolph Hearst and Joseph Pulitzer sensationalist reports on the Spanish offense and encouraged the public sentiment that the United States intervene and liberate the island should.
The United States had been able to build a modern navy and in January 1898, the battleship Maine was on a visit to Havana, Cuba, sent. On February 15, the Maine sank after a mysterious explosion in Havana harbor. It is still unclear what this disaster had caused, but at that time most Americans were convinced that the Spaniards were responsible for the sinking of the ship. The United States demanded that Spain withdrew from Cuba and began to mobilize volunteer troops. Spain then declared the United States to war.
American troops landed in Cuba, and the United States Navy destroyed two Spanish fleets. In July, the Spanish government proposed peace talks. The United States received a substantial part of the Spanish empire - Cuba, the Philippines, Puerto Rico and Guam. Regardless of these developments, the United States annexed Hawaii also on their territory.
Compared with the activities of European countries, the United States acquired new territories only during a short period of time and on a small scale. After the Spanish-American War, the Americans justify their actions to themselves, arguing that they would help developing countries to prepare for democracy. But could the Americans be imperialists? They had been finally colonized himself once and had rebelled against foreign rule. The basic principle of national self-government had been included in the Declaration of Independence. In the Philippines, fighting rebels who once fought against the Spanish colonialism, the American occupation forces. Many intellectuals, as the philosopher William James and the president of Harvard University, Charles Eliot, denounced the action as a betrayal of American ideals.
Despite criticism of the anti-imperialists, most Americans were of the opinion that the conflict with Spain had been justified and were eager to assert American power. President Theodore Roosevelt proposed the construction of a canal in Central America. In 1903 he wanted the Colombian government buy a piece of land, today's Panama. When Colombia refused the offer, burst into the space reserved for the construction of the canal piece of land from a riot. Roosevelt supported him and recognized the independence of Panama region rapidly. Few days later, sold the Panama Canal Zone to the United States. 1914 Panama Canal was opened to traffic.
The American troops left Cuba in 1902, but the new republic had to concede to the United States naval bases. Furthermore, Cuba was not allowed until 1934 to meet the Agreement through which the island would come into the sphere of influence of other powers. 1907 received the Philippines were given limited self-determination; full independence followed 1946. 1953 Puerto Rico became a self-governing commonwealth within the United States and in 1959 Hawaii was admitted as the 50th state in the union of states.
Progress Movement
At the same time as the Americans went overseas, they turned their attention also to the social problems at home. Although the economy grew and spread prosperity, yet up to 50% of all industrial workers were living in poverty - many of them women and children. New York, Boston, Chicago and San Francisco were able to demonstrate impressive museums, universities and public libraries - as well as overcrowded slums. By 1900 the economy followed mainly the laissez-faire principle - the idea that the government should interfere as little as possible. After 1900, the hip ideology was the "progressiveness" (progressivism) - a movement that wanted to change society and the individual by means of the government.
Social workers now visit the slums to establish homes where health services and leisure facilities for the poor were offered. Alcohol opponents demanded to ban the sale of alcohol - partly to prevent the suffering alcoholics workers their wives and children were doing. In the cities fought politicians corruption, regulated public transportation, urban buildings and utilities lowered their taxes by administrative reforms. Many states enacted laws that restrict child labor, working hours have been reduced and introduced compensation for workers. Women called for more rights, and in 1914 had several States granted them the right to vote.
Popular Magazines published sensational articles by so-called "Mudrakers" by investigative journalists who put unfair commercial practices, government corruption and poverty in the cities open. 1906 attacked Upton Sinclair in his book "The Jungle" the meat-processing industry. Readers of the middle class were shocked when they found out what was contained in their breakfast sausage, and soon a federal law for the inspection of meat was introduced. The "Pure Food and Drug Act" of 1906 curtailed the sale of adulterated food and fraudulent medicines. By "Harrison Act" (1914) for the first time effective controls on drugs were introduced by the federal government.
President Theodore Roosevelt strengthened the federal laws on the railways and put the "Sherman Antitrust Act" against several large companies such as Standard Oil Company by. 1902 Roosevelt threatened to end a strike in coal mines through the use of troops. You should not take action against the workers, but against uncooperative owners. This was a crucial turning point in the American industrial policy: The government would confront the future in labor disputes no longer automatically on the side of management. Under Roosevelt and the conservation was promoted. Huge reserves of wood, coal, oil, minerals, and water have been preserved for future generations. The Progressive Movement consisted mainly of economists, sociologists, skilled workers and people from the public service together
Some Americans preferred radical ideologies. Thus, the Socialist Party joined with Eugene V. Debs for a peaceful, gradual, democratic transition to a state economy. The Industrial Workers of the World called for a general strike, which they wanted to overthrow the government. The IWW never had an extensive following and existed in 1920 is no longer practical. Although some Socialists were elected at the municipal level, but their party could never reach more than six percent of the vote in the presidential election. Socialism was in the United States at any time particularly well received, and debates on the economy revolved around the question of whether and to what extent the government should regulate the free economy.
In 1912 elected president Democrat Woodrow Wilson was of the opinion that it is the task of the government to protect smaller businesses against big business. He led the income tax a reinforced anti-trust laws and established the Federal Trade Commission to control unfair business practices. With the "Federal Reserve Act" of 1913, a system of 12 regional banks has been set up under government control, so that the public control of national credit was. Wilson also put laws against child labor, for low-interest loans to farmers and the 8-hour day for railroad workers in force.
War and peace
As in Europe broke out of the First World War in August 1914, Wilson sat for strict neutrality in foreign policy a. Many Americans, however, were indignant at the German invasion of Belgium, and the press published reports (often exaggerated) about German crimes against Belgian civilians. Americans also came in anger than in May 1915, a German submarine the British cruise ship Lusitania sank and 128 Americans died. In January 1917, Germany declared unrestricted submarine warfare against all ships, including neutral merchant ships that were approaching Allied ports. In February Wilson learned that the German Foreign Minister was planning in case of war between Germany and the United States to pursue an alliance with Mexico and Japan. Mexico should receive the promise that it would get back all the lands which it had lost in 1848 to the Americans. Meanwhile, the Americans had delivered munitions and other goods amounting to thousands of millions of dollars, mostly on credit, to the Allies.
In April 1917, Wilson asked Congress to declare war - not only to defeat Germany, or to exit the submarine warfare, but to "... all the rights and freedoms of all people" to safeguard. For Wilson the war would be a great crusade for world peace and national self-determination. "The world must be made safe for democracy," said Wilson, as the United States in the "war to end all wars" occurred.
The war forced the United States, as had happened in Britain and Germany, extend the authority of the federal government. They now had the right to the railways, important war industries to manage relations between employers and employees and the food production.
At entry into the war the American army had only 200,000 soldiers. Million men were drafted and shipped across the ocean to Europe. It took a full year, until the United States could contribute a great contribution to the war effort of the Allies.
In spring 1918, the Germans started to reach in the hope Paris before the American army was ready, one last, desperate offensive. But few American divisions could assist in the defense of the attack, the French and the British. In the autumn the situation in Germany was hopeless and his armies retreated in the face of American armament.
In January 1918 Wilson put the "Fourteen Points Plan" its war aims. It inter alia calls for open diplomacy, freedom of the seas, international free trade, disarmament and equitable settlement of colonial disputes. Would the borders in Europe, so his idea to be redrawn and each ethnic group would get an independent state. To protect the peace, a world organization of nations would be established. Wilson hoped by offering more lenient conditions for peace to be able to convince the Germans to cease hostilities. In October Germany asked for peace and on 11 November the ceasefire was declared.
1919 Wilson traveled to Europe to negotiate a peace treaty.
He was enthusiastically received by the population in the Allied capitals, but the enthusiasm faded when the negotiations began in Versailles. Despite Wilson's protest, the Allies submitted to the German reparation payments and shared his devastating colonies among themselves. Wilson succeeded indeed to create the League of Nations (League of Nations), but many Americans feared that such a world organization would involve the United States in the future in another war. A group of Republican senators tied conditions at the Treaty of Versailles. They would only accept the League of Nations as long as the US Congress, would not retain the League of Nations to take control of the American forces. Britain and France had no objection, but Wilson refused to amend the contract. The President and the Congress came to no agreement. The United States consequently neither ratified the Treaty of Versailles, nor do they have joined the League of
Nations.
Reconstruction
The victory over the Confederate States (Southern) had the most productive agricultural region of the country economically ruined and destroyed its rich culture. The legal abolition of slavery also meant no equality of former slaves. Immediately after the war tried legislative powers in the south to prevent African Americans from the election. They were afraid, as former slaves would use their right to vote, and they were trying to save as much as possible from their …show more content…
previous lifestyle. They conducted so-called "black codes" a, with which the freedom of former slaves was restricted. Although "radical" Republicans in Congress were trying to protect the civil rights of African-Americans and to integrate them into American society, but President Andrew Johnson was opposed their efforts. He came from the southern states, had remained during the Civil War the Union loyal. He served as Republican vice-president and was after the assassination of President Lincoln.
In March 1868 members of the House of Representatives Johnson tried to overthrow because of his opposition to radical changes. The accusation was groundless, and the request to depose the president, was not adopted by the Senate. His acquittal was an important victory for the central principle of the balance of power after the power of the legislative, executive and the judiciary are separate. Johnson's acquittal helped to maintain the delicate balance of power between the President and Congress.
The Congress won proceed with its program of "Reconstruction" or reform the occupied after the war by the North South. 1870 were the Southern states of African-Americans, whites and cooperative migrant Northerners (called "carpetbeggar") ruled. Many African-American Southerners were elected to the national governments and in the Congress. Even if it "reconstructed" in these governments have been cases of corruption, so they did but a lot to improve the education system, social services developed and protected civil rights.
Most white Southerners, however, were against the reconstruction. Some formed the Ku Klux Klan, a violent society that was hoping by the intimidation of African-Americans and the prevention of their social advancement, to protect the interests and benefits of whites. 1872 was the Ku Klux Klan suppressed the federal government, but white Democrats continued to use violence to maintain control of the state governments. The period of reconstruction ended in 1877, had been ratified as new constitutions in all southern states and the federal troops had withdrawn from the south.
Despite the guarantees of the Constitution African-American Southerners were now "second-class citizens". They were the White subordinate, even though they had limited civil rights. In some Southern African Americans were able to choose and be chosen. There were racial segregation in schools and hospitals, but trains, parks and other public bodies could still be used by members of both races in general.
Towards the end of the century, this system of segregation and oppression of African-Americans was always strict.
1896 put the Supreme Court determined in the case Plessy against Ferguson that the constitution separate facilities and services for the two races authorizes, as long as these facilities and services are equally valid. The southern facing promptly thereafter separate - but by no means equivalent - Facilities for African-Americans. Law provided for a strict separation in public transport, theaters, sports, and even in elevators and in cemeteries. Most African Americans and many poor whites lost the right to vote because they were unable to pay the poll tax (which had been introduced in order to exclude them from participating in politics) and because it is the test of reading and spelling ability failed. Because smaller offenses accused African Americans were sentenced to forced labor and violence of mobs sometimes directed against them. Many African-Americans remained in the southern states as a result of their poverty and their ignorance sharecroppers. Although African Americans were by the law freely, lived and they were treated like …show more content…
slaves.
The train to the west
In the years after the Civil War, the Americans began to settle in the western half of the United States. Miners looking for gold and silver penetrated in the Rocky Mountains. Farmers, under PROVIDE YOU WITH many immigrants from Germany and Scandinavia, settled in Minnesota and the Dakotas. Huge herds of cattle grazing on the prairies of Texas and other western states. They were guarded by horsemen (Cowboys), who became the most celebrated and glorified figures in American culture. Most of them were former soldiers from the southern states or former slaves. Both groups moved to the defeat of the South to the West. The cowboy was America's hero: he worked long hours in the prairie for a small salary. However, he was by far not as violent as it was shown later in films.
The settlers and the army of the United States fought frequently against the Indians, on whose land spilled the stream of white settlers. But the scale of the bloodshed has been exaggerated. Overall, an estimated 7,000 white and 5,000 Indians were killed in the course of the 19th century. Many more Indians died of starvation and disease, which have been brought by the spread of settlers westward. White men forced the Indians to leave their land and destroyed almost all the buffalo, the main source of food and furs for the tribes of the Great Plains.
Industrial Growth
During this period, the United States developed into the leading industrial power in the world, and shrewd businessmen acquired great wealth. The first transcontinental railroad was completed in 1869. Between 1860 and 1900, the entire rail network over all lines increased from 5,000 to 322,000 km, in Europe. In order to encourage this growth, the government loans and free land distributed to Western railways.
The oil industry grew, dominated by John D. Rockefeller's Standard Oil Company gigantic. Andrew Carnegie, who had come as a poor Scottish immigrant to America, built a vast empire of steel mills and iron mines. He sold it in 1901 for nearly 500 thousand million dollars. Textile mills multiplied in the South, and in and around Chicago emerged factories for processing meat. The electrical industry has developed due to a number of inventions - the telephone, the phonograph, the light bulb, cinema, and the alternator and transformer. The architect Louis Sullivan in Chicago used a steel frame construction to make a particular contribution to American cities throughout the world - the high-rise.
Unlimited economic growth but also managed many serious problems. Some companies were too big and powerful. The United States Steel Corporation was founded in 1901, the world's largest companies, and produced 60 percent of the national steel. To keep the competition low, certain railway companies on mergers and standardized shipping rates. "Trusts" - giant mergers of companies - tried the monopoly in some industries to achieve, particularly in the oil business.
These giant enterprises could produce products efficiently and sell inexpensive, but they also laid prices fixed and destroyed smaller competitors. Particularly farmers complained that the railways demanded high prices for transporting goods. Most Americans then and now admired business success and believed in the free market economy, but they were also of the opinion that the power of monopoly companies should be restricted in order to protect the individual.
A solution to this problem were official government regulations. Thus, the Interstate Commerce Commission in 1887 created to control the railway prices. The Sherman Antitrust Act of 1890 banned trusts, mergers, and business agreements. First, these measures were not very effective, but they established the principle that the federal government could regulate the industry for the common good of the people.
Workers, immigrants and farmers
Industrialization also brought the organization of the working with him. The American Federation of Labor founded in 1882, was a coalition of trade unions. It operated no agitation for socialism strongly, but for better wages and shorter working hours. In 1900 had the unskilled workers, on average, a 52-hour week and a weekly wage of 9 dollars. In the 1890s it was due to dissatisfaction with low wages and adverse health working conditions in numerous work stoppages, - some of them violent. Some workers and security personnel were killed in 1892 during strikes in the Carnegie steel plant in Homestead, Pennsylvania. 1894 were sent to Chicago to finish a railway strike forces of the army.
Many workers in these new industries were immigrants. In the years 1865 to 1910, 25 million people came to the United States. Many settled in certain districts in American cities. At the urging of workers, the Asian immigrants because of their willingness to perform unskilled labor at low wages, feared that the government banned in 1882 the influx of Chinese. 1907, most of the Japanese were excluded. But most other immigrants could fully enter into the land. However, often they met prejudices of native-born Americans - the course also descended from immigrants. Nevertheless, America offered to immigrants greater religious freedom, political freedom and more economic opportunities than their home countries. The first generation of immigrants often lived in poverty, but already her children and grandchildren speak the language and had a successful career. In the years between the founding of the first permanent settlement Jamestown (1607) and 1992, the United States took up about two thirds of migrants worldwide - 50 million people.
For American farmers, the late 19th century was a difficult time. Food prices fell, and they had to bear the cost of the high rail rates for high-interest loans, high taxes and tariffs on consumer goods. Several associations at the national level have been set up to protect the interests of small farmers - the Grange (1867), the National Farmers' Alliance (1877) and the People's Party in the 1890s.
Expansion overseas
With the exception of the purchase of Alaska from Russia (1867) was completed in the United States in 1848, territorial expansion. By 1890, as many European countries acquired colonies, new voices were heard in US foreign policy, mainly oriented to the European approach. Politicians, newspaper editors and Protestant missionaries declared that the obligation of the "Anglo-Saxon race" is to bring the advantages of Western civilization to the inhabitants of Asia, Africa and Latin America.
At the height of this period (1895) a revolt against the Spanish colonial rule in Cuba broke out. The Spanish army drove Cuban civilians in the camp, where up to 200,000 people died of disease and starvation. In the United States published newspaper owners like William Randolph Hearst and Joseph Pulitzer sensationalist reports on the Spanish offense and encouraged the public sentiment that the United States intervene and liberate the island should.
The United States had been able to build a modern navy and in January 1898, the battleship Maine was on a visit to Havana, Cuba, sent. On February 15, the Maine sank after a mysterious explosion in Havana harbor. It is still unclear what this disaster had caused, but at that time most Americans were convinced that the Spaniards were responsible for the sinking of the ship. The United States demanded that Spain withdrew from Cuba and began to mobilize volunteer troops. Spain then declared the United States to war.
American troops landed in Cuba, and the United States Navy destroyed two Spanish fleets. In July, the Spanish government proposed peace talks. The United States received a substantial part of the Spanish empire - Cuba, the Philippines, Puerto Rico and Guam. Regardless of these developments, the United States annexed Hawaii also on their territory.
Compared with the activities of European countries, the United States acquired new territories only during a short period of time and on a small scale. After the Spanish-American War, the Americans justify their actions to themselves, arguing that they would help developing countries to prepare for democracy. But could the Americans be imperialists? They had been finally colonized himself once and had rebelled against foreign rule. The basic principle of national self-government had been included in the Declaration of Independence. In the Philippines, fighting rebels who once fought against the Spanish colonialism, the American occupation forces. Many intellectuals, as the philosopher William James and the president of Harvard University, Charles Eliot, denounced the action as a betrayal of American ideals.
Despite criticism of the anti-imperialists, most Americans were of the opinion that the conflict with Spain had been justified and were eager to assert American power. President Theodore Roosevelt proposed the construction of a canal in Central America. In 1903 he wanted the Colombian government buy a piece of land, today's Panama. When Colombia refused the offer, burst into the space reserved for the construction of the canal piece of land from a riot. Roosevelt supported him and recognized the independence of Panama region rapidly. Few days later, sold the Panama Canal Zone to the United States. 1914 Panama Canal was opened to traffic.
The American troops left Cuba in 1902, but the new republic had to concede to the United States naval bases. Furthermore, Cuba was not allowed until 1934 to meet the Agreement through which the island would come into the sphere of influence of other powers. 1907 received the Philippines were given limited self-determination; full independence followed 1946. 1953 Puerto Rico became a self-governing commonwealth within the United States and in 1959 Hawaii was admitted as the 50th state in the union of states.
Progress Movement
At the same time as the Americans went overseas, they turned their attention also to the social problems at home. Although the economy grew and spread prosperity, yet up to 50% of all industrial workers were living in poverty - many of them women and children. New York, Boston, Chicago and San Francisco were able to demonstrate impressive museums, universities and public libraries - as well as overcrowded slums. By 1900 the economy followed mainly the laissez-faire principle - the idea that the government should interfere as little as possible. After 1900, the hip ideology was the "progressiveness" (progressivism) - a movement that wanted to change society and the individual by means of the government.
Social workers now visit the slums to establish homes where health services and leisure facilities for the poor were offered. Alcohol opponents demanded to ban the sale of alcohol - partly to prevent the suffering alcoholics workers their wives and children were doing. In the cities fought politicians corruption, regulated public transportation, urban buildings and utilities lowered their taxes by administrative reforms. Many states enacted laws that restrict child labor, working hours have been reduced and introduced compensation for workers. Women called for more rights, and in 1914 had several States granted them the right to vote.
Popular Magazines published sensational articles by so-called "Mudrakers" by investigative journalists who put unfair commercial practices, government corruption and poverty in the cities open. 1906 attacked Upton Sinclair in his book "The Jungle" the meat-processing industry. Readers of the middle class were shocked when they found out what was contained in their breakfast sausage, and soon a federal law for the inspection of meat was introduced. The "Pure Food and Drug Act" of 1906 curtailed the sale of adulterated food and fraudulent medicines. By "Harrison Act" (1914) for the first time effective controls on drugs were introduced by the federal government.
President Theodore Roosevelt strengthened the federal laws on the railways and put the "Sherman Antitrust Act" against several large companies such as Standard Oil Company by. 1902 Roosevelt threatened to end a strike in coal mines through the use of troops. You should not take action against the workers, but against uncooperative owners. This was a crucial turning point in the American industrial policy: The government would confront the future in labor disputes no longer automatically on the side of management. Under Roosevelt and the conservation was promoted. Huge reserves of wood, coal, oil, minerals, and water have been preserved for future generations. The Progressive Movement consisted mainly of economists, sociologists, skilled workers and people from the public service together
Some Americans preferred radical ideologies. Thus, the Socialist Party joined with Eugene V. Debs for a peaceful, gradual, democratic transition to a state economy. The Industrial Workers of the World called for a general strike, which they wanted to overthrow the government. The IWW never had an extensive following and existed in 1920 is no longer practical. Although some Socialists were elected at the municipal level, but their party could never reach more than six percent of the vote in the presidential election. Socialism was in the United States at any time particularly well received, and debates on the economy revolved around the question of whether and to what extent the government should regulate the free economy.
In 1912 elected president Democrat Woodrow Wilson was of the opinion that it is the task of the government to protect smaller businesses against big business. He led the income tax a reinforced anti-trust laws and established the Federal Trade Commission to control unfair business practices. With the "Federal Reserve Act" of 1913, a system of 12 regional banks has been set up under government control, so that the public control of national credit was. Wilson also put laws against child labor, for low-interest loans to farmers and the 8-hour day for railroad workers in force.
War and peace
As in Europe broke out of the First World War in August 1914, Wilson sat for strict neutrality in foreign policy a. Many Americans, however, were indignant at the German invasion of Belgium, and the press published reports (often exaggerated) about German crimes against Belgian civilians. Americans also came in anger than in May 1915, a German submarine the British cruise ship Lusitania sank and 128 Americans died. In January 1917, Germany declared unrestricted submarine warfare against all ships, including neutral merchant ships that were approaching Allied ports. In February Wilson learned that the German Foreign Minister was planning in case of war between Germany and the United States to pursue an alliance with Mexico and Japan. Mexico should receive the promise that it would get back all the lands which it had lost in 1848 to the Americans. Meanwhile, the Americans had delivered munitions and other goods amounting to thousands of millions of dollars, mostly on credit, to the Allies.
In April 1917, Wilson asked Congress to declare war - not only to defeat Germany, or to exit the submarine warfare, but to "... all the rights and freedoms of all people" to safeguard. For Wilson the war would be a great crusade for world peace and national self-determination. "The world must be made safe for democracy," said Wilson, as the United States in the "war to end all wars" occurred.
The war forced the United States, as had happened in Britain and Germany, extend the authority of the federal government. They now had the right to the railways, important war industries to manage relations between employers and employees and the food production.
At entry into the war the American army had only 200,000 soldiers. Million men were drafted and shipped across the ocean to Europe. It took a full year, until the United States could contribute a great contribution to the war effort of the Allies.
In spring 1918, the Germans started to reach in the hope Paris before the American army was ready, one last, desperate offensive. But few American divisions could assist in the defense of the attack, the French and the British. In the autumn the situation in Germany was hopeless and his armies retreated in the face of American armament.
In January 1918 Wilson put the "Fourteen Points Plan" its war aims. It inter alia calls for open diplomacy, freedom of the seas, international free trade, disarmament and equitable settlement of colonial disputes. Would the borders in Europe, so his idea to be redrawn and each ethnic group would get an independent state. To protect the peace, a world organization of nations would be established. Wilson hoped by offering more lenient conditions for peace to be able to convince the Germans to cease hostilities. In October Germany asked for peace and on 11 November the ceasefire was declared.
1919 Wilson traveled to Europe to negotiate a peace treaty.
He was enthusiastically received by the population in the Allied capitals, but the enthusiasm faded when the negotiations began in Versailles. Despite Wilson's protest, the Allies submitted to the German reparation payments and shared his devastating colonies among themselves. Wilson succeeded indeed to create the League of Nations (League of Nations), but many Americans feared that such a world organization would involve the United States in the future in another war. A group of Republican senators tied conditions at the Treaty of Versailles. They would only accept the League of Nations as long as the US Congress, would not retain the League of Nations to take control of the American forces. Britain and France had no objection, but Wilson refused to amend the contract. The President and the Congress came to no agreement. The United States consequently neither ratified the Treaty of Versailles, nor do they have joined the League of
Nations.