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Expansionism in the us during the 19th century
1800s america expansion
Expansionism in the us during the 19th century
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Throughout the nineteenth century, Americans advanced westward at an unparalleled pace. Motivated by greed, these pioneers plundered through the previously plush territory, believing the nation’s resources to be inexhaustible and failing to contemplate possible consequences. In particular, anxious lumbermen and ranchers rapaciously ravaged the land in pursuit of instant profits. Fortunately, a few prudent people recognized the need for protective legislation. This nascent environmentalist movement was officially recognized when the federal government claimed responsibility over the preservation of the nation’s natural resources in 1877, with the passage of the Desert Land Act. Though this legislation was insignificant in itself, its creation
The Frontier Thesis has been very influential in people’s understanding of American values, government and culture until fairly recently. Frederick Jackson Turner outlines the frontier thesis in his essay “The Significance of the Frontier in American History”. He argues that expansion of society at the frontier is what explains America’s individuality and ruggedness. Furthermore, he argues that the communitarian values experienced on the frontier carry over to America’s unique perspective on democracy. This idea has been pervasive in studies of American History until fairly recently when it has come under scrutiny for numerous reasons. In his essay “The Trouble with Wilderness; or, Getting Back to the Wrong Nature”, William Cronon argues that many scholars, Turner included, fall victim to the false notion that a pristine, untouched wilderness existed before European intervention. Turner’s argument does indeed rely on the idea of pristine wilderness, especially because he fails to notice the serious impact that Native Americans had on the landscape of the Americas before Europeans set foot in America.
Even tho the green revolution had stopped starvation in some of the world, it has also caused some. The green revolution was the use of new technology to grow food for the people of the world that started in the 1950’s. These new technology were such things as Gmo’s, pesticides, fertilizers. The main goal was to stop hunger and make second and third world countries better and not living in poverty. The green revolution Raised the amount of food in the world, made the world's population increase in a dangerous rate and harmed and damaged the earth and its people.
Magoc, Chris J. Environmental Issues in American History: A Reference Guide with Primary Documents. Westport, CT: Greenwood, 2006. Print.
December 15, 1971.. Alternate Citation:. Public Law 92-195; 85 Stat. 649 (GPO). United States Government Accountability Office, “Bureau of Land Management”.
On the east coast people were also being taken advantage of by the government. As a result of the building of the Transcontinental Railroad, the government began giving out land grants ‒through the Homestead Act of 1862‒ for Americans to live on and farm; the only problem was that another culture was already living on the land: the Sioux Nation. After the S...
The Tar Creek mining site was originally owned by a Native American tribe, the Quapaw. The Quapaw wanted to keep these lands, but the Bureau of Indian Affairs deemed members opposing a transaction with mining companies “incompetent” (1). In such a case, the business could continue and the Bureau of Indian Affairs sold the lands to mining companies. In essence, these lands were stolen from the Quapaw because they were ripe for mining. These mines were then used from approximately 1891 to 1970.
"Chapter 2 Western Settlement and the Frontier." Major Problems in American History: Documents and Essays. Ed. Elizabeth Cobbs Hoffman, Edward J. Blum, and Jon Gjerde. 3rd ed. Vol. II: Since 1865. Boston, MA: Wadsworth Cengage Learning, 2012. 37-68. Print.
In 1854, the federal government appointed a surveyor-general, who by 1880 had received over 1000 requests for land grant certification from Arizona and New Mexico. Of those, only 150 were passed along to Congress for approval, and only 71 of them were actually approved (Weber, p.157). Further, this lead to Anglo citizens arriving to the area to encroach on Mexican-American land as there was no real process to prevent them from doing so. These atrocities from their Anglo counterparts went far beyond political enterprises, however.
The Dust Bowl existed, in its full quintessence, concurrently with the Great Depression during the 1930's. Worster sets out in an attempt to show that these two cataclysms existed simultaneously not by coincidence, but by the same culture, which brought them about from similar events. "Both events revealed fundamental weaknesses in the traditional culture of America, the one in ecological terms, the other in economic." (pg. 5) Worster proposes that in American society, as in all others, there are certain accepted ways of using the land. He sums up the "capital ethos" of ecology into three simply stated maxims: nature must be seen as capital, man has a right/obligation to use this capital for constant self-advancement, and the social order should permit and encourage this continual increase of personal wealth (pg. 6) It is through these basic beliefs that Worster claims the plainsmen ignored all environmental limits, much ...
Starting from the beginning, natural resource consumption has been a process in environmental injustice. The Indian Removal Act passed in 1830 forced Americans Indians from the east to western reservations in a form of ethnic cleansing (Schaefer 146). Donald A. Grinde and Bruce E. Johansen, the authors of Ecocide of Native Americans: Environmental Destruction of Indian Lands and Peoples, make note of a specific quote that non-American Indian settlers phrased during the process, which is “kill the Indian, but save the man” (10). In the book they also point out an interesting fact about how the settlers spoke of the “final solution” well before the Nazis used the phrase. Anyhow, after reforming and internally colonizing Native Americans, the non-American Indian settlers pushed them even further into their corner. A specific occurrence would be the incident at the Great Sioux Reservation. Non-Indians were supposed to keep away from their land and not allowed to hunt. However, in 1874 non-Indians flooded the territory in search of...
Owens Valley lies to the east of the Sierra Nevada mountain and west of the White-Inyo mountain ranges, just to the west of the U.S.’s Great Basin. Early settlers to this area, as all other immediate surrounding area’s originally, were Indians, one of the Paiute tribes. This tribe lived by a simple and direct policy in terms of living with the environment. Their food supply was derived from seasonal crops of wild seeds and roots, fishing, and hunting of the deer, antelope, mountain sheep, jackrabbit, and waterfowl which flourished along the valley floor and hillsides. They took only what they required for food and trade. Unfortunately, pioneer expansion soon took precedence with the majority of them being miners who migrated to the region from the east following the Western mines (Sauder, 1994). With this colonization came agricultural expansion as well, which included cattle production and various farming crops. Of course, confrontation, the beginning of a lifetime of fight over Owens Valley, was spurred with the Paiutes over ownership of this rich valley abundant in usable resources. Due to the Paiute’s simple and peaceful attitude, the early pioneers took over the valley and every one of it’s resources, placing the Paiute’s out in the cold, where they continued urbanization and agriculture of the landscape.
The expansion of the United States is such a vital part of American history, yet some often forget how it all happened. Many thriving settlers were given an extraordinary opportunity starting on January 1, 1863 that would end up laying the floor work for many Midwestern and Western citizens today. The rights and responsibilities to live on and maintain 160 acres of land may seem like a lot to take in for a student learning about an Act about land from the 1860s. However, think about all the people the Homestead Act of 1862 affected. There was a lot of pressure on the original homesteaders to make good use of their newfound land, the government was giving out land that wasn’t exactly theirs, and the Native American would have some their rights stolen.
The Earth has tons of natural beauty, ranging from the peaks of mountains to the deepest ocean trenches, that is being destroyed by mankind due to the high demand of the resources originating from them. Entire forests are chopped down for wood, mountains blown up for their stones, wildlife poached for money. Conservation is the act of preserving and protecting the Earth’s natural resources. During the Progressive Era, some attempts were made to conserve the environment, by people such as Theodore Roosevelt, John Muir and Gifford Pinchot. If no movements for conserving were made, then the country may run out of resources and be forced to run on alternative. There would not be any beautiful national parks to admire. The land would
Crimes against Nature: Squatters, Poachers, Thieves, and the Hidden History of American Conservation, focuses primarily on the role of conservation in America’s national park system from the 19th-20th century and conservation’s consequences on the rural people of the parks. Specifically, he analyzes the connections between laws and social relations, giving the reader a different interpretation of this heavily scrutinized time period. Jacoby divides his analysis into three sections, Forest, Mountain, and Desert, and visits three case studies: Yellowstone, the Adirondacks, and the Grand Canyon. During the push for conservationism and preservationism, you mainly hear about the heroics behind the movement, but you rarely hear about the other side of the story. Jacoby does a good job of presenting the shadowed side of this historical period and the injustices experienced by the frontiersmen living in the area for many generations, suddenly being labeled as criminals and poachers. Societal transitions are always a messy process, with little thought of the minority, change can and must hap...
Today, we live in a world interwoven with women’s oppression, ecological degradation, and the exploitation of workers, race, and class. In the midst of these troubles, a movement known as ecofeminism appears to be gaining recognition. In the following, I hope to illustrate this revitalization movement . I will begin by characterizing a definition of ecofeminism; I will then bring to the forefront the ethical issues that Ecofeminism is involved with, then distinguish primary ideas and criticisms.