Essay On Should The United States Have Annexed The Philippines

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Recommended: Similarities of Spain and Americas colonization in the Philippines

Should the United States have annexed the Philippines?


The United States of America accompanied the Philippines to fight for the independence from Spain. Spain colonized the Philippines for 333 years. Without the assistance of the United States of America the Philippines will still be under Spain without freedom. Even though United States of America aided the Philippines, the United States shouldn’t have annexed the Philippines.

There are several reasons why the United States of America shouldn’t have annexed the Philippines. First, Filipinos were certainly against this conception and a considerable numbers of Americans were opposing this. In Document A, a Platform of the American Anti-Imperialist League stated their opinion about the subject. They said, “ We protest against the extension of American Sovereignty by Spanish methods…” Annexing the Philippines was truly an immoral method to deal with the Philippines. The filipinos …show more content…

President William Mckinley states his opinion about the subject in James Rusling, “Interview with President William Mckinley.” William Mckinley said, “...we could not leave them to themselves - they were unfit for self-government - and hey would soon have anarchy and misrule over there worse than Spanish’s was…” Considering the fact that they were just liberated from the Spanish, the Philippines was definitely incapable of self-governing. The idea of freedom was new to them and they might misuse that power over themselves. The Philippines will struggle to govern their country due to lack of experience and the guidance of the United States will help them to start it but the United States will over empowered the philippine sand will end up acting similar to Spain. Therefore, there were legit reasons to annex the Philippines but immorality of it is the most reasonable argument why the United States should not annex the

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