Unit 4:: American Empire
A Milestone Documents E-text
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Abstract

The origins of U.S. imperial ambitions in the latter nineteenth century lay in the long tradition of territorial expansion, religious missionary zeal, a belief in Anglo-Saxon racial superiority, the displacement of Native Americans, and the international repercussions of industrial capitalism. At the same time, however, many Americans harbored deep misgivings about the prospect of creating a colonial empire that stood in such stark contrast to the nation's founding principle of self-determination and the republican idea of rule with the consent of the governed.

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