4. Differences: Politics of Annexation

About this Lecture

Lecture

In this module, we turn to examine the last difference for US foreign policy in this period, namely the politics of annexation. In early America, it was always assumed that new territories would enter as new states; but by the end of 19th century this view began to change and many Americans began to see the value in annexation territory not as full and equal states but as subordinate colonies.

Course

In this course, Professor Jay Sexton (University of Missouri) explains the similarities and differences in attitudes about the US’s proper role in the world in the period 1865-98. We start by looking at the key continuities in US foreign policy for this period in comparison to earlier decades. After this, we'll turn to explain the key differences in this period which included: (i) the international and economic context; (ii) pro-imperialism; and (iii) the politics of annexation. After this, we'll then turn to examine the role and arguments of the anti-imperialists.

Lecturer

Jay Sexton is the Rich and Nancy Kinder Chair of Constitutional Democracy and Professor of History at the University of Missouri. He is also a former Director of the Rothermere American Institute (RAI), a Distinguished Fellow of the RAI and an Emeritus Fellow of Corpus Christi College, Oxford. He specialises in the political and economic history of the nineteenth century and has written a number of books including A Nation Forged by Crisis: A New American History, Debtor Diplomacy: Finance and American Foreign Relations in the Civil War Era, 1837-1873, and The Monroe Doctrine: Empire and Nation in Nineteenth-Century America.