Monroe Doctrine

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MONROE DOCTRINE

The Monroe Doctrine, the foundation for U.S. foreign policy in the western hemisphere throughout most of its history, was declared on December 2, 1823, by President James Monroe (1817–1825) in his annual message to Congress. In the first two decades of the nineteenth century the remarkable success of movements for independence in Spanish America set the foundation for the Doctrine. By the end of 1822 Spain was driven from its major colonies in North and South America by nationalist insurgencies. European powers now remained in control of only Belize, Bolivia, and the Guianas. But, fearing that European powers might move to restore Spain to its colonies, the Monroe administration felt compelled to issue a formal declaration regarding U.S. policy.

Four principles formed the Monroe Doctrine. The Americas were no longer to be considered objects for future colonization or control by any European power. The political systems of the European powers were alien to the United States and any attempt to export it to the Americas would be considered dangerous to American interests. The United States would not interfere with the existing colonies or dependencies of the European powers. Finally, the Monroe Doctrine reaffirmed that the United States would not take part in the wars of the European powers.

Great Britain earlier had prodded the Monroe administration to make a similar but joint declaration on preserving the independence of the new Latin American republics. Under the influence of John Quincy Adams (1767–1848), Monroe rejected the idea, reasoning that the United States would then be cast as the junior partner of Britain, overshadowed by its vastly superior naval power. Furthermore, the motives of the United States diverged significantly from those of Britain. The British were intensely interested in expanding their already valuable trading links with independent Latin America—ties that would be jeopardized if Spain and its mercantilist policies were restored. Although Monroe was certainly aware of the commercial value of Latin America, he placed security and ideological considerations above economic interests when he framed his declaration.

Although the Monroe Doctrine declared unilateral U.S. protection over the entire Western Hemisphere, the United States did not have the military or economic muscle to support such an ambitious policy at that time. Not surprisingly the European powers ignored the Doctrine when it suited them. However, by the end of the American Civil War (1861–1865), the United States had considerable military and economic resources at its disposal. In the first major application of the Monroe Doctrine, U.S. forces massed in 1867 on the Rio Grande River to support U.S. demands that France abandon its puppet regime in Mexico, headed by the Hapsburg prince, Maximilian. France eventually complied, marking a significant victory for U.S. coercive diplomacy.

The Maximilian affair demonstrated that the fortunes of the Monroe Doctrine were closely linked to the expansion of U.S. power. Indeed, as American industrial development and trading and investment ties with Latin America grew in the latter half of the nineteenth century, the United States became more willing not only to enforce the Monroe Doctrine, but also to add to its self-assumed rights and responsibilities. Latin America's subservience to the United States was amply demonstrated in 1904, when President Theodore Roosevelt (1901–1909) developed the Roosevelt Corollary to the Monroe Doctrine.

In the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries political, economic, and social instability plagued much of Latin America. In these perilous conditions, durable and enforceable economic transactions between Latin American and European parties often foundered. Latin American politicians frequently treated European investors capriciously, while European traders and bankers often cheated or exploited their Latin American customers. The European powers increasingly intervened to resolve disputes involving their nations, as when the dictator of Venezuela refused to honor debts owed to European citizens. In response, Germany and Britain blockaded Venezuelan ports and attacked Venezuelan harbor defenses and naval assets. Such incidents were the proximate cause of Roosevelt's decision to revise the Monroe Doctrine, although it is true that the American president was already disposed to expand American power whenever and wherever possible.

The Roosevelt Corollary, which was included in a message to Congress in December 1904, reiterated that the Monroe Doctrine forbade European intervention in Latin American affairs. However, Latin American states had to honor their obligations to foreign nationals and governments. Roosevelt declared that the United States would act as hemispheric policeman, forcing Latin American governments to put their economic houses in order and pay their debts, eliminating the need for European intervention. Over the next three decades, U.S. forces took control of the governments and customs houses of the Dominican Republic, Haiti, and most of Central America. Although this forceful intervention produced a measure of economic and political stability to the region, it aroused increased and intense resentment among the local populace, which viewed the Monroe Doctrine and the Roosevelt Corollary as pretexts for the pursuit of U.S. interests in the region.

The presidential administrations of Herbert Hoover (1929–1933) and Franklin Roosevelt (1933–1945) responded to brewing anti-U.S. nationalism. In 1930 the Hoover administration renounced the Roosevelt Corollary by declaring that the Monroe Doctrine did not justify U.S. intervention in the domestic affairs of Latin America, however turbulent they might be. For his part, Roosevelt withdrew American military forces from Central America and the Caribbean, replacing troops with the "Good Neighbor Policy."

None of these new policies had an immediate and substantive impact on the U.S. tendency for unilateral intervention in Latin America. Rather, they marked a change in U.S. strategies and rhetoric. Thus when the Cold War began the United States moved to combat Soviet subversion in the region, both real and imagined. The United States sponsored a failed invasion of Cuba (1960); engineered the overthrow of democratically elected governments in Guatemala (1954) and Chile (1973), and trained and armed counter-revolutionary forces in Nicaragua.

When the end Cold War and the collapse of the Soviet Union (1991) removed the strategic rationale for intervention, U.S. policy began to move away its long-standing commitment to unilateralism. As the U.S. contemplated armed intervention in Haiti in 1994 to restore democratic government, it sought formal authorization from the United Nations. This dramatic embrace of multilateralism reflected the increased efforts of the United States during the 1990s to pursue both its ideals and its interests through international institutions, both regional (the North American Free Trade Agreement) and global (the United Nations, the General Agreement on Trade and Tariffs, etc.) The question that remained unanswered at the beginning of the twenty-first century was whether the unilateralism of the Monroe Doctrine will revive—in whole or in part—if multilateralism failed to meet perceived American goals in Latin America.

See also: General Agreement on Trade and Tariffs, James Monroe, North American Free Trade Agreement