Examples Of Manifest Destiny

One of Andrew Jackson’s reason behind the Indian Removal Act was so that the United States could achieve their goal of Manifest Destiny, which is the belief Americans had that God meant for their country to be expanded from east to west coast.

Beginning in the early 1800s manifest destiny had no single root or cause, but became over time, a mindset which propelled the westward expansion of America. Manifest Destiny was the belief that the expansion of the United States throughout the continent of North America was both justified and inevitable. The actual term “Manifest destiny” was not coined until 1845 when an American columnist and editor, John O 'Sullivan, created it to promote the annexations of Texas and the Oregon Territory. However, before the term was coined, expansion had already been taking place in America for almost four decades. Beginning in 1803 with the Louisiana Purchase, America had set in stone from early in its beginnings that the frontier was the future. To fulfill this belief, the United States needed to purchase the West from the French.

By the 1830s, The United States had been booming. The economy had been growing and there was plenty of land out West from the Louisiana Purchase; however, there was a large population centered around the Eastern Coast. While there was plenty of land to the west, it was not being used and in the 1830s, Americans began moving west in the idea of Manifest Destiny. Manifest Destiny gave people the idea that they had the God-given right to move west and if the Indians need to be killed along the way, so be it. Many Americans supported this God-given right to expansion and many saw it as a way to equalize the number of slave versus non-slave states in the country.

Manifest Destiny was a widely held belief in the United States that its settlers were destined to expand across North America. It opened up opportunities for wealth, strengthened our position as a powerful nation in the world and begins to further define the “American Dream”. As a result, Manifest Destiny had a positive impact on U.S history. The United States benefited economically from adding territory. The Louisiana Purchase, made by Thomas Jefferson, doubled the size of the U.S.

The President of the United States could be classified a hero or a villain. Andrew Jackson could be considered both. He expanded the United States but he also killed a lot of indians to do that. He got rid of the National bank and helped the poor people but hurt the bankers in the north doing that and added fuel to the fire of the Civil War. This paper is about how he helped the US by hurting others, can’t make an omelet without breaking a few eggs right?

The implementation of these ideologies also showed political promises in the expansion of democracy. Manifest Destiny did not only encourage westward migration of Americans but also fueled Native American removal (Indian Removal Acts) and war with Mexico. The term of Manifest Destiny first appeared in John L. O’Sullivan’s article on the annexation of Texas (which the republic of Texas requested to be incorporated into the United States) in which he determined the increasingly prominent responsibilities of Americans to expand democracy and American civilization to uncivilized or inferior communities. The annexation of Texas along with border dispute (Rio Grande and Nueces River) and the desire of purchasing land in California, all contributed to the growing tension and ultimately the development of the Mexican American War. Polk declared war against Mexico ( declaring the shed of American blood on American land when Mexican troops crossed the Rio Grande and attacked American troops), however the nation went to war divided. The Louisiana Purchase (the acquisition of new American territory from France in 1803) had previously caused Americans both North and South to seek westward migration, however the opposing interests and motivations of the two regions contributed to the division of the nation in

People think of it as the official policy of territorial expansion and the idea that god had blessed America to become an ocean bound republic in the 19 centauries. The presidents did not use the phrase manifest destiny because at that time it was a slogan for a journalist John L. O'Sullivan and he had written about it when the boundary dispute with Brittan about the Oregon Territory and he had said that it was the Manifest destiny of the country. The phrase Manifest destiny was more used by critics than supporters. Northers thought it was used for spreading slavery. Manifest destiny was used for people that believed in territorial expansion. The people that had believed in manifest destiny thought they had failed because they thought the country

Manifest Destiny is the belief during the 19th century, that the United States of America not only could, but was destined to, stretch from coast to coast. The idea of Manifest Destiny helped to fuel the war with Mexico and the removal of Indians from the United States. The American people and government lived by this belief. Manifest Destiny had many good results like the expansion of the American territory. It also had many poor results like the killing of Indians who were "in the way" of the belief of Manifest Destiny. The president that followed through with the belief of Manifest Destiny the most is that of James K. Polk. His war with Mexico and strong stand against the British about the Oregon territory solidified Manifest Destiny.

Manifest Destiny is a term coined by John L. Sullivan in 1845 when talking about the annexation of Texas. He believed, along with other expansionists, that it’s inevitable that the US population would spread across North America because the land is given by Providence to the United States and that it’s natural that the land should be part of the country [Doc 1]. The idea of westward expansion and Manifest Destiny had positive and negative effects on the politics, society and the economics of the United States and

The story of the United States has always been one of westward expansion, beginning along the East Coast and continuing, often by leaps and bounds, until it reached the Pacific, what Theodore Roosevelt described as "the great leap westward." The acquisition of Hawaii and Alaska, though not usually included in discussions of Americans expanding their nation westward, continued the practices established under the principle of Manifest Destiny. Even before the American colonies won their independence from Britain in the Revolutionary War, settlers were migrating westward into what are now the states of Kentucky and Tennessee, as well as parts of the Ohio Valley and the Deep South. Westward expansion was greatly aided in the early 19th century in the year of 1803 by the Louisiana Purchase , which was followed by the Corps of Discovery Expedition that is generally called the Lewis and Clark Expedition; the War of 1812, which secured existing U.S. boundaries and defeated native tribes of the Old Northwest, the region of the Ohio and Upper Mississippi valleys, and the Indian Removal Act of 1830, which forcibly moved virtually all Indians from the Southeast to the present states of Arkansas and Oklahoma, a journey known as the Trail of Tears. In 1845, a journalist by the name of John O’Sullivan created the term "Manifest Destiny," a belief that Americans and American institutions are morally superior and therefore Americans are morally obligated to spread those institutions in order to free people in the Western Hemisphere from European monarchies and to uplift "less civilized" societies, such as the Native American tribes and the people of Mexico. The Monroe Doctrine, adopted in 1823, was the closest America ever came to making Manifest Destiny official policy; it put European nations on notice that the U.S. would defend other nations of the Western Hemisphere from further colonization. The debate over whether the U.S. would continue slavery and expand the area in which it existed or abolish it altogether became increasingly contentious throughout the first half of the 19th century. When the Dred Scott case prevented Congress from passing laws prohibiting slavery and the Kansas-Nebraska act gave citizens of new

The Indian Removal Act was very controversial during its time, receiving influence from individuals, local, state and mostly by the federal government. This act gave the president, Andrew Jackson, the authority to make transactions with Indian tribes in the Southern region of the United States. The Indian Removal Act was a deal made by President Andrew Jackson with the Indian tribes, forcing them to leave their occupied land, which happened to be federal territories west of the Mississippi River. President Andrew Jackson’s primary method in Indian Removal was his speech to Congress regarding his opinions on the act, which included many positive outcomes that would happen if the Indians were to leave the territory. He claimed that this act would not only benefit the United States as a whole, but it would also benefit the Indian people. This benefit was called “Manifest Destiny” or the idea of the United States expanding its territories from the Atlantic Ocean to the Pacific. This expansion would benefit the country not just economically, but agriculturally as well. However, “Manifest Destiny” was only an idea, and in order for this idea to become a reality, the governments had to take action. This action in entirety was the removal of the Indian tribes from the southern regions, making them travel through very harsh conditions so that Americans could settle in their former homeland. Overall, the American government wanted to rid the

Thomas Jefferson purchased land from the French during the Louisiana Purchase which gave the United States land west. He sent Lewis and Clark west to explore what he had just purchased. During the same time of the Louisiana Purchase, there was a concept of Manifest Destiny. Manifest Destiny was a main idea during the 1800s. It is the belief that the land west was the Americans land to settle and that the resources were theirs to use. This belief was self-centered and did not focus on the Native Americans. The Americans did not reach out to the Natives to build a strong nation and instead they took the tools, ideas, and materials to build their nation and left the Natives out of it. Americans saw their dream as a free country and it was their right to conquer others’ property without their consent. During westward expansion, American identity evolved into one image for all Americans that emphasized greed and power and the belief that American settlers should create their own sovereign land.

The Louisiana Purchase doubled the size of U.S in 1803. But it is not enough for ambitious Americans, we are not satisfied, we wanted more territory. So western expansion did not end, it actually keep moved. Westward Expansion is a very significant part in U.S history. It operated perfectly based on the ideology called manifest destiny. However, the creation of this theory is on purpose. It was used to push U.S territory to further west.

Manifest Destiny is a term that was first coined in 1845 by a journalist named John L. O’Sullivan, and was described as America’s destiny to expand, and that it was God’s will that America was to expand. According to Genovese, “The notion of westward expansion and domination of the white races struck a responsive chord in many Americans” (Genovese, 2017). The idea of expanding America’s territory was so popular that is was even later used in Congress to justify the claiming of Oregon’s territory. While the idea of expanding America seemed great to the Americans, it was not so great for those who were living on the land that the Americans would later claim. According to Hastedt, “The failure to assimilate and prosper was the fault of those receiving America’s goodness” (Hastedt, 2016). The Americans felt that they were superior to those whose lands they were trying to take, such as the Native Americans and Mexicans, and that they should be the ones to adopt American culture, even if they were there before the Americans claimed the land. The Americans even thought that those whose lands they were taking would be happy to convert to their way of living, as is stated by Hastedt, “The inherent superiority of American Values was sure to be recognized by those with whom they came in contact and would gladly be adopted” (Hastedt, 2016). This mindset would ultimately lead to the expansion of America, turning it into what we know today, but it would also ultimately result in conflict with those that the American’s were attempting to take the land from for the sake of expansion.

While Manifest Destiny and territorial expansion created conflict with foreign nations, including the Mexican-American War (1846-1848), and within the United States, it worked to unify the United States from 1830 to 1860 by strengthening the nation as a whole, creating economic opportunities for people from all different walks of life, and expanding the United States through the annexation of Texas and the acquisition of California from Mexico.