Manifest Destiny

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Manifest destiny, the name given by John L. O’Sullivan to an aggressive territorial expansion, is responsible for the face of America today. O’Sullivan coined the movement, “Manifest Destiny” in 1845. The ideology originated long before the philosophy was named. Traces of the movement can be seen in Columbus’ exploration, and even in the developmental Jamestown colonies. Throughout America’s history, examples of the “Manifest Destiny” are apparent as ("Manifest destiny - the philosophy that created a nation") Americans gradually expanded settlements westward to increase their boundaries, however, during the 1830s and 1840s, Americans pushed farther across the continent. After the natural and inevitable travels of the new White Americans, the phenomenon of land expansion was then publicised and advertised in newspapers as the “Manifest Destiny”, it was the fuel for American expansion and for America to maintain its overall power and good morality as a country. The concept of the “Manifest Destiny” is pivotal to the nation and its future.
Whether driven by greed or ambition, Americans desired to expand their country from the Atlantic coast all the way out to the Pacific coast and the fact that lands in the western parts of the continent were already inhabited by and settled for centuries by Native American Indian tribes, as well as Spanish-speaking Hispanics, was ignored in American’s plans to expand. Nevertheless, through the “Manifest Destiny”, white settlers found numerous Native American tribal settlements that had long been before established but unknown to most Americans. The regions of the Great Plains, the Great Basin, and many others in the West were home to nearly 325,000 Indians (George and David), and Mexicans inhabit...

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Compare and contrast America’s “Manifest Destiny” of the mid-19th century with its “Imperialism” of the late 19th century.
1056 Words | 3 Pages
America’s Manifest Destiny first surfaced around the 1840’s, when John O’Sullivan first titled the ideals that America had recently gained on claiming the West as their ‘Manifest Destiny.’ Americans wanted to settle in the West for multiple reasons, from the idea that God wanted them to settle all the way to the West co...
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Little Bighorn Mission Command Analysis
1599 Words | 4 Pages
It had previously been the policy of the American government to remove and relocate Indians further and further west as the American population grew, but there was only so much...
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Manifest Destiny: The Abolitionist Movement
747 Words | 2 Pages
Behind the scenes of Manifest Destiny, what really transformed the country was the ability to move products across great distances and the Erie Canal was a huge turning point for economic growth in America. Opened in 1825, the Erie Canal was the engineering breakthrough of the nineteenth century: Its four waterways would connect manufacturing and eastern ports with the rest of the country. Farmers could now ship their goods, they could move out, come down the Hudson River and this way of commuting became a part of a global economy. This Moment would bring about the thought of expansion which will become the fuse to enormous economic growth that will ultimately in the next century, become the belief of manifest destiny. The nation that both reflected the pride which reflected American nationalism, and the idealistic image of social perfection through God and the Church caused the nation to separate.
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Native America, Discovered and Conquered: Manifest Destiny
789 Words | 2 Pages
Man has always had the desire to expand, venture forth to develop greater wealth. With the acquisition of the Louisiana Territory and the prospects of future land acquisition, Americans used the idea of Manifest Destiny to justify their actions for moving westward and their treatment of Native Americans. The idea of Manifest Destiny was created directly by the European-used Doctrine of Discovery and industrialization; this direct correlation was proven to be true from the verdict of the court case Johnson v. M’Intosh.
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Manifest Destiny and the Genocide of the Native American Indian
1365 Words | 3 Pages
In the 1830’s America was highly influenced by the Manifest Destiny Ideal. Manifest Destiny was the motivating force behind the rapid expansion of America into the West. This ideal was highly sponsored by posters, newspapers, and various other methods of communication. Propaganda was and is still an incredibly common way to spread an idea to the masses. Though Manifest Destiny was not an official government policy, it led to the passing of the Homestead Act. The Homestead Act gave applicants freehold titles of undeveloped land outside of the original thirteen colonies. It encouraged Westward colonization and territorial acquisition. The Homestead Act was signed into law by President Abraham Lincoln in 1862. To America, Manifest Destiny was the idea that America was destined to expand across the North American continent, from the Atlantic, to the Pacific Ocean. Throughout this time Native Americans were seen as obstacles because they occupied land that the United States needed to conquer to continue with their Manifest Destiny Ideal. Many wars were fought between the A...
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Reginald Horsman’s Race and Manifest Destiny
1961 Words | 4 Pages
Manifest Destiny was the belief that the United States was destined to expand from the Atlantic seaboard to the Pacific Ocean; it has also been used to advocate for or justify other territorial acquisitions. Advocates of Manifest Destiny believed that expansion was not only good, but that it was obvious and certain. Originally a political catch phrase of the 19th century, "Manifest Destiny" eventually became a standard historical term, often used as a synonym for the expansion of the United States across the North American continent.In the early 1840s John L. O’Sullivan, editor of the Democratic Review, inaugurated the expression Manifest Destiny to depict American expansionism. O’Sullivan described the nation’s extension as inevitable and criticized those that delayed that progression "for the avowed object of thwarting our policy, limiting our greatness and checking the fulfillment of our manifest destiny to overspread the continent allotted by Providence for the free development of our yearly multiplying millions."(Horsman 219) Horsman notes that even though O’Sullivan laid claim to the phrase manifest destiny, the idea was embedded in Anglo-Saxon heritage. In chapter one of Horsman the concept of ...
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Manifest Destiny and American Politics
665 Words | 2 Pages
Manifest Destiny was the idea that it was the United States’ destiny to take over all of North America from the Atlantic to the Pacific. Most of the public was in favor of territorial expansion, though some politicians felt it contradicted the constitution.
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Westward Expansion Thesis
688 Words | 2 Pages
John L. O’Sullivan, an editor, coined the term “Manifest Destiny” and gave the expansionist movement its name in 1845. The “Manifest Destiny” was the belief that Americans had the divine right to occupy North America. The Americans believed they were culturally and racially superior over other nations and other races such as the Native American Indians and Mexicans. The notion of the ‘Manifest Destiny’ was that the Americans were morally superior and therefore morally obligated to try to spread enlighten and civilization to the less civilized societies. According to World History Group, “The closest America came to making ‘Manifest Destiny’ an official policy was The Monroe Doctrine, adopted in 1823, it put European nations on notice that the U.S. would defend other nations of the Western Hemisphere from further colonization” (World History, 2015). This divine American mission caused Anglo-Saxon Americans to believe they had the natural right to move west and bring blessings of self-government and religion, more specifically-
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Manifest Destiny
542 Words | 2 Pages
Americans throughout history have always felt that they were superior. The concept of “Manifest Destiny” has been the fuel to the fire of superiority. Manifest Destiny is the belief that it is American’s are the chosen ones and have the obvious right to conquer and own land between the eastern and western seaboards and that such expansion was inevitable. Manifest Destiny along with Christianity were two reasons that drove and encouraged both expansion within North Amer...
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Manifest Destiny: Western Expansion of America
566 Words | 2 Pages
The Manifest Destiny was a progressive movement starting in the 1840's. John O'Sullivan, a democratic leader, named the movement in 1845. Manifest Destiny meant that westward expansion was America's destiny. The land that was added to the U.S. after 1840 (the start of Manifest Destiny) includes The Texas Annexation (1845), The Oregon Country (1846), The Mexican Cession (1848), The Gadsden Purchase (1853), Alaska (1867), and Hawaii (1898). Although this movement would take several years to complete, things started changing before we knew it.
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Stripped of Personal Freedom: Native Americans in the West
904 Words | 2 Pages
While the US may have prided themselves in the fact that we didn’t practice imperialism or colonialism, and we weren’t an Empire country, the actions conquering land in our own country may seem to rebuff that claim. In the 19th century, the West was a synonym for the frontier, or edge of current settlement. Early on this was anything west of just about Mississippi, but beyond that is where the Indian tribes had been pushed to live, and promised land in Oklahoma after policies like Indian removal, and events like the Trail of Tears. Indian’s brief feeling of security and this promise were shattered when American’s believed it was their god given right, their Manifest Destiny, to conquer the West; they began to settle the land, and relatively quickly. And with this move, cam...
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Westward Expansion and Those It Affected
289 Words | 1 Pages
America was expanding at such a rapid pace that those who were in America before us had no time to anticipate what was happening. This change in lifestyle affected not only Americans, but everyone who lived in the land. Changing traditions, the get rich quick idea and other things were the leading causes of westward expansion. But whatever happened to those who were caught in the middle, those who were here before us? One of those many who roamed the land before Americans decided that they owned it were the Native Americans.
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Manifest Destiny
1130 Words | 3 Pages
The Manifest Destiny that was painted on the fabric of this nation in red, white and blue was finished before the dawn of the twentieth century. With the nature of polictics and the temperament of political leadership, the ink from that painting spread its pigment across the Western Hemisphere and well into the blue waters and pulsing tides of the Pacific Rim. The stars and stripes would expand from the earth to the moon in the latter half of the twentieth century, they will continue to expand until that day when providence my sign his name to the master piece titled, “Destiny, Manifested.”
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Manifest Destiny
1323 Words | 3 Pages
...spaper in the early nineteenth century, to building a nation, Manifest Destiny has changed not only the United States but possibly the world.
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The Subjugation Of The American West
1214 Words | 3 Pages
Manifest Destiny! This simple phrase enraptured the United States during the late 1800’s, and came to symbolize an era of westward expansion through numerous powerful entities. The expansion can be inspected though many different contextual lenses, but if examined among the larger histories of the United States, this movement can be classified as one of the most influential developments of the post-Civil War period. While very influential to the larger part of American history, the seemingly barbaric methods that were used conquer the western lands and their peoples took physical and economical forms that proved to be a plague upon the West.
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Manifest Destiny

Compare and contrast America’s “Manifest Destiny” of the mid-19th century with its “Imperialism” of the late 19th century.

Little Bighorn Mission Command Analysis