Woodrow Wilson And Theodore Roosevelt

After the assassination of President McKinley, Theodore Roosevelt inherited a growing empire. The U.S. had annexed Hawaii in 1898 and Spanish-American War granted the U.S. control of the Philippines. It also led the U.S. to establish a protectorate over Cuba and grant territorial status for Puerto Rico. By taking on the Philippine Islands as an American colony after the Spanish-American War he had ended the U.S.'s isolation from international politics. Theodore Roosevelt believed that nations should do their part to maintain peace and order. It was also a belief that civilized nations had the duty of modernizing the barbarous ones. In foreign affairs, Wilson was determined to revise the imperialist practices of earlier administrations, promising independence to the Philippines and making Puerto Ricans American citizens. But his administration intervened militarily more often in Latin America than any of his predecessors.

Woodrow Wilson and his secretary of state, William Jennings Bryan, came into office with little experience in foreign relations but with a determination to base their policy on moral principles. "Wilson had limited success applying a high moral standard to foreign relations. He and Secretary of State William Bryan hoped to demonstrate that the United States respected other nation's rights and would support the spread of democracy ."# Convinced that democracy was gaining strength throughout the world, they were eager to encourage the process. "In his campaign for president in 1912, Democratic candidate Woodrow Wilson called for a New Freedom in government and promised a moral approach to foreign affairs. Wilson said he opposed imperialism and the big-stick and dollar-diplomacy policies of his Republican predecessors."# Also, Wilson declared that the United States hoped "to cultivate the friendship and deserve the confidence" of the Latin American states, but he also emphasized that he believed "just government" must rest "upon the consent of the governed." Latin Americans were pleased by the prospect of being free to conduct their own affairs, but Wilson's insistence that their governments must be democratic weakened the promise of self-determination. The next year, Puerto Rico achieved territorial status, and its residents became U.S. citizens. Working with Secretary of State Bryan, Wilson signed 30 treaties which agreed to cooling-off periods and outside international commissions as alternatives to war.

On the other hand, Wilson like Roosevelt had imperialistic tendencies when dealing with foreign nations, especially in Latin America. In 1915, Wilson responded to chronic revolution in Haiti by sending in American marines to restore order, and he did the same in the Dominican Republic in 1916. The military occupations that followed failed to create the democratic states that were their main objective. In 1916, Wilson practiced an old-fashioned form of imperialism by buying the Virgin Islands from Denmark.

Roosevelt was dedicated to the idea of order in world affairs, rather than occupation or colonization, eventual independence for undeveloped or developing nations once they had conformed to the American model of government, and a world in which international disputes would