Yesterday, as I was attending my U.S. foreign policy class, I had the most delightful surprise. When you can find a professor of history at the University of Kentucky lauding the efforts of J. Reuben Clark, you know that at least one Mormon in the world has made a splash, has refused to hide his light under a bushel. Some background...
Since the Monroe Doctrine in 1823, the United States has taken a serious interest in maintaining its influence throughout the Western Hemisphere. In the early 20th century, Wilson sent raiding expeditions into Northern Mexico to capture Pancho Villa. Wilson also intervened in the elections of Dominican Republic and Haiti, threatening to impose democracy unless they complied. The United States pursued an even more aggressive policy in Nicaragua, where U.S marines were stationed in order to keep revolutionary governments out of power. No less than 5 presidents--from Taft to Franklin D. Roosevelt--supported or at least were apathetic about the occupation. By Herbert Hoover's time, the question had begun to loom large on the American psyche--why are we in Nicaragua? Universities, intellectuals, and pundits debated the question; prospects were glum for US interests in their "sphere of influence."
Enter J. Reuben Clark, once ambassador to Mexico and later Calvin Coolidge's Undersecretary of State. In December 1928, months before Hoover would take office, Clark maintained that the Monroe Doctrine and more specifically the Roosevelt Corollary (Theodore Roosevelt's doctrine that the US could intervene in the internal affairs of Western Hemisphere--basically, think the Monroe Doctrine but with soldiers to enforce it) could not be used to justify military intervention in the affairs of Latin America. While this memo was kept quiet initially, it eventually was leaked into a government publication in the 1930. Everyone in the administration repudiated it as unofficial musings--including Clark himself--but public opinion had essentially cornered the nation. Soon thereafter, Roosevelt withdrew the troops from Nicaragua and thus began the "Good Neighbor Policy" in Latin America-U.S. relations. The United States would treat Latin America as a good neighbor would--lend them goods, invest in them and avoid military intervention all the while.
Historians have debated the significance of the Clark Memorandum, questioning whether it was the cause of this shift in policy or if it simply marked the culmination of already improved relations between the U.S. and its hemispheric neighbors. Whatever the case, the Clark Memorandum demonstrates a tremendous accomplishment of a fellow Latter Day Saint, one that, at the very least, articulated (even if he did not actually help instigate) changes in U.S. imperial policy that can be counted as a humanitarian feat (a rare occurence in U.S.-Latin American relations).
Since the Monroe Doctrine in 1823, the United States has taken a serious interest in maintaining its influence throughout the Western Hemisphere. In the early 20th century, Wilson sent raiding expeditions into Northern Mexico to capture Pancho Villa. Wilson also intervened in the elections of Dominican Republic and Haiti, threatening to impose democracy unless they complied. The United States pursued an even more aggressive policy in Nicaragua, where U.S marines were stationed in order to keep revolutionary governments out of power. No less than 5 presidents--from Taft to Franklin D. Roosevelt--supported or at least were apathetic about the occupation. By Herbert Hoover's time, the question had begun to loom large on the American psyche--why are we in Nicaragua? Universities, intellectuals, and pundits debated the question; prospects were glum for US interests in their "sphere of influence."
Enter J. Reuben Clark, once ambassador to Mexico and later Calvin Coolidge's Undersecretary of State. In December 1928, months before Hoover would take office, Clark maintained that the Monroe Doctrine and more specifically the Roosevelt Corollary (Theodore Roosevelt's doctrine that the US could intervene in the internal affairs of Western Hemisphere--basically, think the Monroe Doctrine but with soldiers to enforce it) could not be used to justify military intervention in the affairs of Latin America. While this memo was kept quiet initially, it eventually was leaked into a government publication in the 1930. Everyone in the administration repudiated it as unofficial musings--including Clark himself--but public opinion had essentially cornered the nation. Soon thereafter, Roosevelt withdrew the troops from Nicaragua and thus began the "Good Neighbor Policy" in Latin America-U.S. relations. The United States would treat Latin America as a good neighbor would--lend them goods, invest in them and avoid military intervention all the while.
Historians have debated the significance of the Clark Memorandum, questioning whether it was the cause of this shift in policy or if it simply marked the culmination of already improved relations between the U.S. and its hemispheric neighbors. Whatever the case, the Clark Memorandum demonstrates a tremendous accomplishment of a fellow Latter Day Saint, one that, at the very least, articulated (even if he did not actually help instigate) changes in U.S. imperial policy that can be counted as a humanitarian feat (a rare occurence in U.S.-Latin American relations).
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