arned. In opposing war with Mexico,
Corwin presciently claimed, "Should we prosecute this war another
moment, or expend one dollar in the purchase or conquest of a single
acre of Mexican land, the North and the South are brought into
collision on a point where neither will yield. Who can foresee or
foretell the result!"
Not only was Manifest Destiny
morally wrong, critics argued, but its realization through territorial
expansion was unconstitutional. Those critics, called "strict
constructionists," maintained that the Constitution never expressly
gave the country a right to acquire new lands, so the government did
not have the right to acquire territory. That view had also been
expressed by opponents of the Louisiana Purchase.
In short, opponents questioned both the ideal of Manifest Destiny and its practical consequences. "I spurn the notion that patriotism can only be manifested
by plunging the nation into war or that the love of one's country can
only be measured by one's hatred to any other country," declared
Representative Robert Winthrop (Whig, Massachusetts) in congressional
debate in January 1846. He warned of the "danger of fixing our views so
exclusively on our own real or imagined wants as to overlook the rights
When O'Sullivan wrote the following words in the article "The Great Nation of Futurity," in The United States Democratic Review in 1839, he was giving voice to a sentiment that many American agreed with:
far-reaching, the boundless future will be the era of American
greatness. In its magnificent domain of space and time, the nation of
many nations is destined to manifest to
mankind the excellence of divine principles... [H]er high example shall
smite unto death the tyranny of kings, hierarchs, and oligarchs, and
carry the glad tidings of peace and good will where myriads now endure
an existence scarcely more enviable than that of beasts of the field.
Who, then, can doubt that our country is destined to be the great
nation of futurity?
At the time O'Sullivan
wrote the article, many Americans felt strongly that their nation was
ordained for great things by their Christian God. They believed that
the U.S. was destined to grow and prosper and that its expansion would
serve to benefit mankind. The goal of territorial expansion became the
expressed goal of many politicians, including Polk.
Motivated in part by this overarching belief, the U.S. built a
transcontinental railroad, peopled much of a continent and built a
prosperous nation. However, the principle also had its critics, who
pointed out that in the process the U.S. went to war with Mexico,
risked a war with Great Britain, and displaced tens of thousands of
Despite lack of agreement on the value of Manifest Destiny,
the U.S. would eventually expand from the Atlantic to the Pacific
Ocean, and from the 49th parallel in the North to the Rio Grande River
in the South. The U.S. would become a world power with seemingly
boundless resources, particularly since the end of World War II
1) What factors were responsible for fueling U.S. expansion across the
continent? Do you think it was inevitable that the U.S. would take
possession of the continent from ocean to ocean? Why or why not?
2) What did John O'Sullivan mean when he described the U.S. as the "great nation of futurity"?
3) Many critics of Manifest Destiny
claimed that it resulted in barbaric treatment of the Indians, who were
often forced off their lands to make room for white settlers. Could the
U.S. have expanded westward without displacing the Indians?
4) Describe what the U.S. would be like today if it had not followed an
expansionist agenda, and Spain, France and Russia still possessed
territory on the continent.
5) Imagine that you are a settler traveling to the territory of Oregon:
Write a letter to a friend back home describing your journey.
Boller, Paul F. Jr. Presidential Campaigns. New York: Oxford University Press, 1984.
Hartnett, Stephen. Democratic Dissent & The Cultural Fictions of Antebellum America. Champaign, Ill.: University of Illinois Press, 2002.
Horton, James Oliver and Lois Hor