from Europe and heightened the effect of the advice given by the first President when he warned the country to avoid entangling alliances. In the early nineteenth century the United States was a country apart, for in the days when there was neither steamship nor telegraph the Atlantic in truth separated the New World from the Old. After the close of the "second war of independence," in 1815, the possibility of foreign complications seemed remote. The attention of the young nation was directed to domestic concerns, to the building up of manufactures, to the extension of the frontiers westward. The American nation turned its back to the Atlantic. There was a steady and welcome stream of immigrants from Europe, but there was little speculation or interest as to its headwaters.

Governmental relations with European states were disturbed at times by crises of greater or less importance. The proximity of the United States to and interest in Cuba compelled the Government to recognize the political existence of Spain; a French army was ordered out of Mexico when it was felt to be a menace; the presence of immigrant Irish in large numbers always gave a note of uncertainty to the national attitude towards Great Britain. The export of cotton from the Southern States created industrial relations of such importance with Great Britain that, during the Civil War, after the establishment of the blockade on the Confederate coast, wisdom and forbearance were needed on both sides to prevent the breaking out of armed conflict. But during the last third of the century, which was marked in this country by an extraordinary industrial evolution and an increased interest in domestic administrative issues, the attitude of the United States towards Europe, except during the brief Venezuelan crisis and the war with Spain, was generally characterized by the indifference which is the natural outcome of geographical separation.

In diplomatic language American foreign policy, so far as Europe was concerned, was based upon the principle of "non-intervention." The right to manage their affairs in their own way without interference was conceded to European Governments and a reciprocal attitude was expected of them. The American Government followed strictly the purpose of not participating in any political arrangements made between European states regarding European issues. Early in the life of the nation Jefferson had correlated the double aspect of this policy: "Our first and fundamental maxim," he said, "should be never to entangle ourselves in the broils of Europe; our second, never to suffer Europe to intermeddle with cis-Atlantic affairs." The influence of John Quincy Adams crystallized this double policy in the Monroe Doctrine, which, as compensation for denying to European states the right to intervene in American politics, sacrificed the generous sympathies of many Americans, among them President Monroe himself, with the republican movements across the Atlantic. With the continued and increasing importance of the Monroe Doctrine as a principle of national policy, the natural and reciprocal aspect of that doctrine, implying political isolation from Europe, became more deeply imbedded in the national consciousness.

There was, it is true, another aspect to American foreign policy besides the European, namely, that concerning the Pacific and the Far East, which, as diplomatic historians have pointed out, does not seem to have been affected by the tradition of isolation. Since the day when the western frontier was pushed to the Golden Gate, the United States has taken an active interest in problems of the Pacific. Alaska was purchased from Russia. An American seaman was the first to open the trade of Japan to the outside world and thus precipitated the great revolution which has touched every aspect of Far Eastern questions. American traders watched carefully the commercial development of Oriental ports, in which Americans have played an active rôle. In China and in the maintenance of the open door especially, has America taken the keenest interest. It is a matter of pride that American policy, always of a purely commercial and peaceful nature, showed itself less aggressive than that of some European states. But the Government insisted upon the recognition of American interest in every Far Eastern issue that might be raised, and was ready to intervene with those of Europe in moments of crisis or danger.

A fairly clear-cut distinction might thus be made between American pretensions in the different parts of the world. In the Americas the nation claimed that sort of preëminence which was implied by the Monroe Doctrine, a preëminence which as regards the Latin-American states north of the Orinoco many felt must be actively enforced, in view of special interests in the Caribbean. In the Far East the United States claimed an equality of status with the European powers. In the rest of the world, Europe, Africa, the Levant, the traditional American policy of abstention held good absolutely, at least until the close of the century.

The war with Spain affected American foreign policy vitally. The holding of the Philippines, even if it were to prove merely temporary, created new relations with all the great powers, of Europe as of Asia; American Caribbean interests were strengthened; and the victory over a European power, even one of a second class in material strength, necessarily altered the traditional attitude of the nation towards the other states of Europe and theirs towards it. This change was stimulated by the close attention which American merchants and bankers began to give to European combinations and policies, particularly to the exploitation of thinly populated districts by European states. Even before the Spanish War a keen-sighted student of foreign affairs, Richard Olney, had declared that the American people could not assume an attitude of indifference towards European politics and that the hegemony of a single continental state would be disastrous to their prosperity if not to their safety. Conversely Europeans began to watch America with greater care. The victory over Spain was resented and the fear of American commercial development began to spread. The Kaiser had even talked of a continental customs union to meet American competition. On the other hand, Great Britain, which had displayed a benevolent attitude during the Spanish War and whose admiral at Manila had perhaps blocked German interference, showed an increasing desire for a close understanding. The friendship of the United States, itself once a British dependency, for the British colonies was natural and American interests in the Far East had much in common with those of Great Britain.

External evidence of the new place of the United States in the world might be found in the position taken by Roosevelt as peacemaker between Russia and Japan, and, more significantly, in the rôle played by the American representative, Henry White, at the Conference of Algeciras in 1906. Not merely did the American Government consent to discuss matters essentially European in character, but its attitude proved almost decisive in the settlement then drafted. It is true that the Senate, in approving that settlement, refused to assume responsibility for its maintenance and reiterated its adherence to traditional policy. But those who watched developments with intelligent eyes must have agreed with Roosevelt when he said: "We have no choice, we people of the United States, as to whether we shall play a great part in the affairs of the world. That has been decided for us by fate, by the march of events." Yet it may be questioned whether the average American, during the first decade of the twentieth century, realized the change that had come over relations with Europe. The majority of citizens certainly felt that anything happening east of the Atlantic was none of their business, just as everything that occurred in the Americas was entirely outside the scope of