![]() In 1845, O'Sullivan predicted that California would follow this pattern next and that Canada would eventually request annexation as well. After "Anglo-Saxons" emigrated to new regions, they would set up new democratic governments and then seek admission to the United States, as Texas had done. government or the involvement of the military. He believed that the expansion of the United States would happen without the direction of the U.S. O'Sullivan's original conception of Manifest Destiny was not a call for territorial expansion by force. O'Sullivan believed that Manifest Destiny was a moral ideal (a "higher law") that superseded other considerations. Because Britain would not use Oregon for the purposes of spreading democracy, thought O'Sullivan, British claims to the territory should be overruled. That is, O'Sullivan believed that God (" Providence") had given the United States a mission to spread republican democracy ("the great experiment of liberty") throughout North America. O'Sullivan argued that the United States had the right to claim "the whole of Oregon":Īnd that claim is by the right of our manifest destiny to overspread and to possess the whole of the continent which Providence has given us for the development of the great experiment of liberty and federated self-government entrusted to us. On December 27, 1845, in his newspaper the New York Morning News, O'Sullivan addressed the ongoing boundary dispute with Great Britain in the Oregon Country. O'Sullivan's second use of the phrase became extremely influential. Amid much controversy, Texas was annexed shortly thereafter, but O'Sullivan's first usage of the phrase "Manifest Destiny" attracted little attention. In an essay entitled "Annexation" published in the Democratic Review, O'Sullivan urged the United States to annex the Republic of Texas, because Texas desired this, and because it was America's "manifest destiny to overspread the continent". O'Sullivan, who was an influential advocate for the Democratic Party. The phrase was coined in 1845 by journalist John L. ![]() ![]() They are not, as we should expect, all compatible, nor do they come from any one source. This variety of possible meanings was summed up by Ernest Lee Tuveson, who wrote:Ī vast complex of ideas, policies, and actions is comprehended under the phrase 'Manifest Destiny'. While many writers focus primarily upon American expansionism when discussing Manifest Destiny, others see in the term a broader expression of a belief in America's "mission" in the world, which has meant different things to different people over the years. The term combined a belief in expansionism with other popular ideas of the era, including American exceptionalism, Romantic nationalism, and a belief in the natural superiority of what was then called the " Anglo-Saxon race." Manifest Destiny was always a general notion rather than a specific policy. policy makers early in the 20th century, but some commentators believe that aspects of Manifest Destiny, particularly the belief in an American "mission" to promote and defend democracy throughout the world, continued to have an influence on American political ideology. The term was revived in the 1890s with Republican supporters as a theoretical justification for U.S. The phrase "Manifest Destiny" was first used primarily by Jacksonian Democrats in the 1840s to promote the annexation of much of what is now the Western United States (the Oregon Territory, the Texas Annexation, and the Mexican Cession). ![]() Originally a political catch phrase of the 19th century, "Manifest Destiny" eventually became a standard historical term, often used as a synonym for the territorial expansion of the United States across North America towards the Pacific Ocean. Advocates of Manifest Destiny believed that expansion was not only good, but that it was obvious (" manifest") and certain (" destiny"). ![]() Manifest Destiny was a phrase that expressed the belief that the United States had a mission to expand, spreading its form of democracy and freedom. The American Indians and wild animals flee. The different economic activities of the pioneers are highlighted and, especially, the changing forms of transportation. Here Columbia, a personification of the United States, leads civilization westward with American settlers, stringing telegraph wire as she travels and carrying a school book. This painting (circa 1872) by John Gast called American Progress is an allegorical representation of Manifest Destiny. ![]()
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