Strong Continental Empire Essay, Research Paper

Building and Keeping a

Continental Empire Alive

There are five key ingredients in building a continental empire. A strong

continental empire must be able to up-hold these five key things to survive. These five all

important things are a strong central government; foreign policy, to deal with other

countries; manifest destiny, to deal with matters of land; infrastructure, which deals with

state business, transportation, and financial matters; and the ability to solve internal

problems such as social, economic, and political problems. America is a continental

empire and runs itself using these five things. The most important of these is probably the

strong central government. A strong central government insures that the government will

be able to run smoothly in a time of crisis and have the capability to make sound decisions

that will benefit the American populace. Foreign policy was developed so that America

would know where it stood when it came to dealing with other countries. It was

important that America dealt with international problems in a uniform manner. Manifest

destiny deals with the issue of how America and Americans will acquire land.

Infrastructure is America working together. America depends on many things to keep it

running, when these things cross paths we develop an infrastructure. America must solve

internal problems all of the time. What these problems are and how we solve them is what

shapes America. America slowly began to build a continental empire.

In order to achieve the five things needed to create a continental empire America

had to start slow. They first had to gain the trust of their people and settle the differences

between them. This trust was partly gained by heroes of the Revolutionary War becoming

politicians. An example of this was George Washington. He led troops into battle during

the war and then became president. American people found it very difficult to start a

rebellion or disagree with someone that had led them to victory against Britain. With

George at the helm of America we were well on our way to developing a continental

empire. This trust in America was secured by actions. Our government kept making the

people happy by writing a bill of rights and a constitution that gave Americans the

freedom that they had wanted when they went to war with Britain. The people wanted

rights that they felt were fair and necessary to their existence. The government outlined

these rights in the Bill of Rights. The people agreed with them. The constitution outlined

rules to form a more perfect Union. Americans excepted the contents of the Constitution

and began to build their lives around it. With this a continental empire was developed,

now all they had to do was keep it running.

America had built a continental empire when it broke away from the rule of Britain

in the late 1700’s and the early 1800’s. As America moved into the mid 1800’s it had to

keep its continental empire alive. To keep it alive America continued to make wise

decisions that kept Americans happy. There were a lot of compromises between the

government and its people. These compromises kept both parties happy. One of these

compromises was the Compromise of 1850. The issue of whether the new states would

be slave or free states arose. To solve this problem Henry Clay developed a plan that made

most everyone happy. His plan was to admit California as a free state, to give popular

sovereignty to Utah and New Mexico, and allow slavery but not slave trade to exist in

Texas. This compromise did not sit well with extreme abolitionists or extreme southerners

but made most everyone else happy. In the early times of the continental empire it was

important to keep everyone believing in America. To reestablish that Lincoln wrote the

Gettysburg Address. It restated what Americans believed in and got them fired up for

their country. The Gettysburg Address fueled America’s continental empire. The United

States was running smoothly on all fronts except that of slavery.

Slavery nearly split America into two separate countries. Had the South won they

would have seceded from the Union and continued to practice slavery on their half of the

continent. The North did not want the South to secede from the Union. At first they tried

to solve the problem peacefully but they ended up going to war over it. The North won

the Civil War and slavery was abolished. America also got to stay together as a whole

country. The continental empire was preserved throughout the mid 1800’s.

America’s continental empire has survived the 1800’s and now the 1900’s as well.

To get this far we have built on the original ideas of the continental empire to suit our

needs today. After the Civil War ended, slavery was outlawed. This, however, did not

end the mistreatment of black people. Up until the 1960’s blacks could not go to school

with whites, eat with them, or drink from the same water fountain as them. These were

only a few of the racial problems. In the 60’s the civil rights movement changed all of that.

When the civil rights movement succeeded black people gained all of the rights that white

people enjoyed. This built from the original idea of outlawing slavery. In the late 1800’s

abolitionists were looked down on for helping blacks and in the 60’s the leaders of the civil

rights movement were also persecuted for wanting equal rights. In both time periods the

black people and those who tried to help them succeeded. Both of these examples solved

an internal problem. In the 1800’s it was slavery and in the 1960’s it was equal rights.

History continuously builds on itself.

The Vietnam War was fought to uphold capitalism. The Russians were trying to

take over Vietnam and turn it into a communist country. America did not want this to

happen because the growth of communism was bad for capitalism. America needed to

defeat communism in order to maintain their position as a world power. America was not

only fighting this war to defeat communism but to make sure that a form of government

was not forced upon an unwilling country. Part of the United States foreign policy was

that they would not let a country force their ways onto another country. It was also in

their best interest not to let a country dominate the world. All of this is sort of an

extension of the Monroe Doctrine. The Monroe Doctrine states that if a foreign country

owned a colony in America then it could stay as long as it did not try to expand. The war

in Vietnam was to keep communist Russia from expanding into noncommunist Vietnam.

America briefly expanded the Monroe Doctrine to apply to all countries. They did not put

it down on paper but only used it to defend their power.

America developed a strong continental empire by accomplishing the five things

needed for a strong continental empire. America started slowly by developing a

government that was trusted by the people. Once they accomplished this they started

filling in the pieces of the continental empire puzzle. They developed a strong central

government. Then America began gaining land, which led to conflicts with foreign

nations. As the United States of America grew, its’ infrastructure of money,

transportation, and other aspects grew. With this grew the need to solve internal

problems. Some of the roots of these internal problems are based in economic, social, and

political matters. Not only did America develop into a continental, empire it has stayed

one. It has stood up to many challenges since its humble beginning and will continue to

into the new millennium.