Manifest Destiny and Western Expansion

Move westward at any cost.

The citizens of the United States had a God-given right to conquer the land to the Pacific Ocean.

The final dispute was between the US and Great Britain, which divided the area in 1846.

Four nations claimed Oregon Country at one time: Spain, Russia, Britain, and the United States. Spain dropped out of America with the Florida Treaty of 1819 and Russia dropped out with the treaties of 1824 and 1825. Britain controlled the portion north of the Columbia River. By 1846, about 5,000 Americans settled south of the Columbia River. The British had a lesser population but it did not want to give up its claims to the Columbia River. The disputed territory in Oregon Country became an issue in the election of 1844.

Manifest destiny led to Texas becoming a part of the United States and lead to a war with Mexico.

False.

The United States should own the land between the Atlantic and the Pacific.

The land hungry American supported the manifest destiny as they believed it was the Anglo-Saxon responsibility to spread their civilization across the nation. This also allowed expansionist to remove Indians from the territories they desired.

The increased number of slave holding states would upset the delicate balance of power that existed in the US legislature where the lower house was in the hands of the more populated northern states and equality ruled in the Senate. Slave Power was something that the Whigs considered a threat to both Freedom and to Democracy.

James K. Polk strongly believed in Manifest Destiny because during his presidency (1845-1849), America was already expanding. In addition to this expansion, Polk believed that God manifestly destined America to expand across the North American continent.

Sorry, if this incorrect. Feel free to add or correct anything.

The study of history places the historian in a delicate situation. In many cases the result is to take current ideas and plant them in the minds of the persons that existed in the past. The question to be answered about "manifest destiny" is already loaded and now requires some examples to make a myth to explain, or even cause disdain among a group of people and their actions. This I maintain is why the so-called manifest destiny over shadows the reality of the times. In this case the reason that the "West" was settled. The term overlooks ordinary commonsense to explain that a belief that there was a "divine" sanction that caused the United States to stretch from the east coast to the west coast.

What most historians have written is this: When the Harvard educated journalist coined the term "Manifest Destiny" in 1845, it was a description of why American vision was drawn, by God's will, to stretch from coast to coast.

This idea ignores the common sense of the era, and also implies that "divinity" was not on the side of the Great Britain and Mexico. It also takes an opinion poll as to why so many Americans were influenced by two words. There was no opinion poll, and the logic that brought Americans to St. Louis, was not influenced by manifest destiny.

In 1803, Napoleon need cash to carry out his adventures in Europe and Thomas Jefferson ( an "agnostic? " ) knew a good real estate deal when he saw one. At three cents an acre, the Louisiana Purchase almost doubled the size of the United States, but France, for all practical purposes had left North America. Thus one potential adversary was gone.

The West was already in the process of being settled when the Mormons were forces west of the Mississippi. Their founder, Joseph Smith had already been murdered, so Brigham Young led his group, with very "un-American" ideas about bigamy, to Utah.

In 1844, under US President John Taylor, a treaty with China was the opening door for a prosperous trading future.

Around this same time, Mexico and Great Britain were geo-political problems for the US. The British had been negotiating with Sam Houston, trying to lure the Texas republic away from the US.

Mexico was conspiring with the British to give them a stronger hold on California.

The Mexican War in 1846, was not a religious war. The peace terms provided, which was important then as it is now, for land the Mexico could not control anyway.

1846-- US President Polk signs deal with Great Britain over the "Oregon problem". Somehow, Great Britain moved it's Canadian "territory" from coast to coast with no apparent divine approval.

!849-- Gold Rush!

The list is long. When the Federal government was giving away lands west of the Mississippi, it was a good deal for people to make a new start. The lavish land grants to railroads were not driven by the "Lord's Will".

The bottom line here is clear. Americans went on a land grabbing spree because they believed it was God's destiny that they should. This was not the case.

Polk new the importance of settleing in the west which is why he came up with the theory of Manifest Destiny. The significance of Manifest Destiny was due to the growth in population and people needed more land and resources. The western land was prosperous and would help the United States economically.

Fear, as it would inevitably lead to conflict. The War of 1812 (1812-1815) between the United States and Britain and the Mexican-American War (1846-1848) were direct results of such policies.

anywayDark Side of the Chant

That it could be a selfish and self centered way to think and a justification for expansion.

Expansionists believed that acquiring new territories was justified since the United States was spreading democracy into new areas. When writing in favor of the U.S.'s claims to all of the Oregon Territory, journalist John O'Sullivan wrote, "The American 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 federative self-government entrusted to us."

The nation's mission was to expand into Latin America. The nation should help Latin American countries achieve independence

Manifest Destiny was the idea that the US would stretch from sea to sea, covering everything that it now covers.

Manifest means "Obvious" and destiny usually refers to God's will. So it was something that people felt would just happen because that's what happening anyway.

i couldent of said it better myself lol

Manifest

Obviously since Manifest Destiny was the belief that the USA had the right to control the Americas from Alaska to the Straights of Magellan at the end of South America, the USA did it best to expand where ever it could. It bought the Louisiana Purchase from France. It purchased Florida from Spain. It sized land from Mexico in the Mexican American War. It purchased Alaska from Russia. It invaded and tried to grab Canada on several occasions, and was defeated every time. Native Americans who stood in the way of USA expansion were massacred and the survivors forced onto reservations.

It was the “destiny” of the United States to expand from the Atlantic to the Pacific and, some believed, we would also benefit the economy of the nation if we expanded south into Mexico and north into Canada. Americans in the mid 1800s came to believe that they had an obligation to increase the domain over which their democracy and liberty would benefit all. Economically, Manifest Destiny was favored by industrialists, businessmen, and the developing transportation industry. We would acquire the needed raw materials and also provide products to sell to the peoples in the areas we controlled. Politicians favored Manifest Destiny because it would expand our system of government into areas that were corrupt or incompetent. Most of the public supported Manifest Destiny because it brought a feeling of pride in our nation, a patriotic and nationalistic duty to help others.

Manifest Destiny, completed by our 11th President, James K. Polk. The meaning of Manifest Destiny was to stretch the American land and people to the Pacific Coast. The treaty of Guadalupe-Hidalgo and the Gadsden Purchase completed the idea of Manifest Destiny.

The US believed it was God's will for the US to stretch from the East Coast to the Pacific Ocean. They wanted to travel to the west and settle, making it part of the US.

The belief that the U.S. was meant to expand over all the land in North America.

In 1819, John Quincy Adams expressed what many Americans were thinking when he said expansion to the pacific was as inevitable "as that the Mississippi should flow to the sea." -8th grade history teacher, Rodriguez

James K. Polk Manifest Destiny is a term that was used in the 19th century to designate the belief that the United States was destined, even divinely ordained, to expand across the North American continent, from the Atlantic seaboard to the Pacific Ocean. No single man or woman promoted the idea of manifest destiny it was built into the Americans hearts and minds that it was fate to claim all of North America as their own. So not only 1 president was around for this ideal. It was in the minds of all Americans until we made the whole territory ours. The first couple of presidents were probably all involved in this tenure from George Washington to Abraham Lincoln.