"We have never dreamt of incorporating into our Union any but the Caucasian race—the free white race. To incorporate Mexico, would be the very first instance of the kind, of incorporating an Indian race; for more than half of the Mexicans are Indians, and the other is composed chiefly of mixed tribes. I protest against such a union as that! Ours, sir, is the Government of a white race. ... The greatest misfortunes of Spanish America are to be traced to the fatal error of placing these colored races on an equality with the white race."
— Senator John C. Calhoun, speech in the Senate, 1848
The ideas expressed in the excerpt most directly reflect which of the following debates surrounding Manifest Destiny in the 1840s?
- AThe proposal to establish military alliances with Latin American nations to enforce the Monroe Doctrine against European interventions.
- BThe belief that the federal executive branch held the sole authority to decide the legal status of slavery in new territories through popular sovereignty.
- The assertion that U.S. territorial expansion was bounded by racial ideologies that sought to preserve the nation's political institutions for white Americans.Cevap
- DThe support for federal policies designed to assimilate indigenous peoples by allocating them individual plots of reservation land.
Cevap
The correct answer is the assertion that U.S. territorial expansion was bounded by racial ideologies that sought to preserve the nation's political institutions for white Americans.
The correct option is correct because John C. Calhoun's speech highlights how the expansionist goals of Manifest Destiny were shaped and limited by beliefs in white supremacy. Calhoun argues that the United States is a government for white people and opposes annexing territory with large non-white populations, demonstrating how racial ideologies bounded the geopolitical ambitions of westward expansion.
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The intersection of Manifest Destiny and racial ideologies in 19th-century U.S. expansion.
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