Minding our own business: American foreign policy has moved away from the prudent non-interventionism of the founders to the present policy of global police action and empire building. (Isolationism).

If you allow a political catchword to go on and grow, you will awaken some day to find it standing over you, the arbiter of your destiny, against which you are powerless, as men are powerless against delusions.

William Graham Sumner

Since September 11th, the manufacturers of public opinion have written epitaphs for isolationism. "Farewell to isolationism," ran one typical entry in a recent Newsweek article entitled "The Death of a Founding Myth." "The terrorist attacks permanently altered America's self-identity. We must now embrace the global community we ourselves built." Robert Kagan, the Washington Post's "world columnist," wrote on January 29th that "Sept. 11th must spur us to launch a new era of American internationalism. Let's not squander this opportunity."

On the contemporary political scene, nothing provokes more quivering indignation than the heresy of "isolationism." To be accused of "isolationism" is to be exiled, with "conspiracy theorists," "racists" and "homophobes," to the outer darkness of official irrelevancy. It wasn't always so. There was a time when the sentiment now derided as "isolationist" had leverage in American politics. Elected leaders and citizens alike once understood the imprudence of meddling in foreign quarrels. But America has moved away from the Founders' prudent non-interventionism to our modern-day policy of open-ended, worldwide militarism, a policy that is transforming the United States from a republic to an empire and earning the ill will of peoples who once admired our freedom and prosperity.

Soon after the founding of the United States, during the administration of President Washington, the temptation to go adventuring overseas in defense of the mythical "national interest" was already in evidence. America had signed treaties of commerce and of alliance with France in 1778, but, with the political upheavals during the French Revolution that culminated in the execution of Louis XVI in 1793, America no longer felt bound by the terms of the treaties. Revolutionary France, who had been America's ally during the Revolutionary War, found herself in the 1790s embroiled in war with Austria, Prussia, the Netherlands, and Great Britain. During this period, France sent to the United States as ambassador one Citizen Genet, a seasoned subversive who began trying to drag America into the European conflict on the side of the French. Genet began violating American neutrality by commissioning American ships to attack British vessels, and by enlisting American citizens.

Neutrality of the Founders

Troubled by Genet's actions, President Washington issued on April 22, 1793, his Proclamation of Neutrality enjoining "conduct friendly and impartial toward the belligerent powers," to be followed both by the state and by private citizens.

In 1796, Washington clarified and offered justification for the principles of neutrality and non-interventionism in his Farewell Address:

Observe good faith and justice towards all nations; cultivate peace and harmony with all. Religion and morality enjoin this conduct, and can it be that good policy does not equally enjoin it?

In other words, Washington foresaw the allure of foreign interventionism, but believed that the power of example, rather than the force of arms, would win more friends and allies in the long run.

Washington continued:

Against the insidious wiles of foreign influence ... the jealousy of a free people ought to be constantly awake; since history and experience prove, that foreign influence is one of the most baneful foes of republican government.... The great rule of conduct for us, in regard to foreign nations, is, in extending our commercial relations, to have with them as little political connection as possible....

It is our true policy to steer clear of any permanent alliance with any portion of the foreign world....

Europe has a set of primary interests, which to us have none, or a very remote relation. Hence, she must be engaged in frequent controversies, the causes of which are essentially foreign to our concerns.... Why quit our own to stand upon foreign ground? Why, by interweaving our destiny with that of any part of Europe, entangle our peace and prosperity in the toils of European ambition, rivalship, interest, humor, or caprice?

This, then, is the "isolationism" that our modem-day sophisticates hold in such low esteem: Mind our own business; maintain impartiality about foreign quarrels, whose tangled ramifications we can't fully appreciate in any case; lead by example rather than by political maneuvering or military force; and encourage non-political relations with all who will accept our friendship. At most, Washington was espousing political isolationism, if there is any justice to the term at all. He and all the Founders -- many of whom were men of letters with a keen interest in foreign languages, history and culture -- certainly favored private and commercial association with foreign nations.

In the decades to follow, America's leaders had numerous opportunities to lead America into war in response to threats overseas, but refrained from doing so. The so-called "Holy Alliance" of European powers, for example, an early effort to create a pan-European order, attempted -- among other things -- to mediate between Spain and the revolting Spanish colonies in Latin America. In a 19th-century echo of the modern concept of "peacekeeping," the members of the Alliance were seriously contemplating using force against Spain and her colonies, if necessary, to compel them to observe any terms of agreement mediated by the Alliance. The Alliance also sought to ensure, by entangling the United States with European affairs, that the United States would not ally itself with the rest of the New World, in opposition to the Old. The United States was accordingly invited to participate in a conference in Madrid to consider the relationship between Spain and her colonies. According to historian W. Alison Phillips:

[The proposal to invite the United States to Madrid] was initiated ... in a memorandum on the "perils of the New World" which, in view of what has happened since and is occurring still, is certainly a remarkable document. In isolation, [the memorandum] argued, the United States would not constitute a danger; but it would be different were the Latin American states to imitate their institutions. "A complete republican world, young, full of ardour, rich in the products of all climates and with soil of incomparable fertility, establishing itself in the presence of a Europe grown old, everywhere ruled by monarchs, overcrowded with inhabitants, shaken by thirty years of revolutionary shocks ... would certainly present a spectacle worthy of the most serious reflections and a very real danger." The United States should be invited to cooperate with the Allies, partly to gain time, partly "in order to attach the United States to the general system of Europe and to prevent a spirit of rivalry and hatred establishing it self between the Old and the New World." [Emphasis added.]

In other words, from the very early days of the American republic, certain European powers regarded the United States and her free constitution as a threat, a threat they sought to mitigate by involving America in European affairs and by hindering, wherever possible, the establishment of republican systems elsewhere in the New World. The general sentiment in the United States regarding the Holy Alliance and its involvement in European and Spanish American intrigue is typified in Secretary of State John Quincy Adams' remarks to Mr. Middleton, American minister to Russia:

The political system of the United States is ... essentially Extra-European. To stand in firm and cautious independence of all entanglement in the European system, has been a cardinal point of their policy under every administration.... Yet in proportion as the importance of the United States as one of the members of the general Society of civilized Nations increases in the eyes of others, the difficulties of maintaining this system, and the temptations to depart from it increase and multiply with it.... [F]or the repose of Europe as well as of America, the European and American political systems, should be kept as separate and distinct from each other as possible. If the United States, as members of the Holy Alliance could acquire a right to ask the influence of its most powerful member in their controversies with other States; the other members must be entitled in return to ask the influence of the United States, for themselves or against their opponents.

Elsewhere Adams asserted:

America goes not abroad in search of monsters to destroy. She is the well-wisher to the freedom and independence of all. She is the champion and vindicator only of her own.... She well knows that by once enlisting under other banners than her own, were they even the banners of foreign independence, she would involve herself beyond the power of extrication in all wars of interest and intrigue, of individual avarice, envy and ambition, which assume the colors and usurp the standards of freedom.

The Monroe Doctrine 

It was Secretary of State Adams, along with President Monroe, who, in 1823, formulated the famous Monroe Doctrine, which was not only a response to events in Europe and Latin America, but also a positive formulation of American foreign interests. The doctrine warned against future European colonization in the New World, or attempts to "extend their [political] system to any portion of this hemisphere." The Monroe Doctrine declined to interfere with "existing colonies or dependencies of any European power" and expressed a policy of "leaving [Spain and her colonies] to themselves, in the hope that other powers will pursue the same course." Fundamentally, then, the Monroe Doctrine, in conjunction with our already-established policy of neutrality, could be distilled into two cardinal principles, which Thomas Jefferson expressed in a letter to President Monroe:

Our first and fundamental maxim should be, never to entangle ourselves in the broils of Europe; our second, never to suffer Europe to intermeddle with cis-Atlantic affairs. America, North and South, has a set of interests distinct from those of Europe.... She should therefore have a system of her own, separate and apart from that of Europe.

The Founders, then, far from being backward idealists on foreign policy, understood the danger of getting involved in European affairs. They declined to participate in multinational "peacekeeping" organizations, or to fight to defend the freedom of any other country. They feared not only the direct, short-term consequences -- the human and economic toll -- of waging war overseas; they also anticipated that such entanglements would compromise and corrupt, by protracted association with Old World politics, the American republican system of government.

Because of the Founders' foresight, America remained for more than a century essentially free from overseas military involvement. Even as late as the First Hague Conference in 1899, an early peace confab organized by the nascent internationalist coterie, the United States delegation could still insist that:

Nothing contained in this Convention shall be so construed as to require the United States of America to depart from its traditional policy of not intruding upon, interfering with, or entangling itself in the political questions or policy of international administration of any foreign State.

Embracing Empire

Ironically, by the time of this declaration, the United States had already begun a dramatic swing away from the policies it claimed to reaffirm. The concept of "Manifest Destiny," a term coined in 1845 by editor John O'Sullivan, had been for decades applied to what many Americans saw as a divinely-appointed mission to expand and fill the territory of North America. But by the 1890s, the connotations of the word "destiny" were expanding as well -- to include an assumption of overseas supremacy and global overseership.

The Hawaiian Islands were the first target of American overseas expansionism. By the mid-1890s, American sugar cultivators in Hawaii were exerting pressure on Washington to annex the subtropical island chain 2,000 miles from America's west coast. In an impassioned debate in Congress in 1898, just after the outbreak of the Spanish-American war and just before Hawaiian annexation was finalized, Representative Richard P. Bland, a Democrat from Missouri, warned of the long-term consequences of America's new expansionist fervor:

The prime movers for the annexation of Hawaii boldly assert on this floor ... that Hawaii is necessary to us in our new policy. This new policy is defined as being the permanent occupation of the Philippine Islands, Cuba, Puerto Rico, and whatever other territory we may conquer during this war, and more still, they tell us that we must make alliances with England and Japan ... to the end that we may participate in carving up and parceling out the Chinese Empire.... Such a policy as this is intended and is urged by its promoters for the purpose of building up in this country a centralized power of wealth with big standing armies and navies to protect this plutocratic control.... You are on the road to imperialism, with a large Navy and standing armies and oppressive taxation ... and adopting a military government instead of republican institutions and constitutional liberty.

To this warning, Republican James F. Stewart of New Jersey replied contemptuously:

The silly argument of national isolation, the outgrowth of fear and timidity, is lame and impotent.... Every nation must at all times be prepared to protect its citizens and interests abroad, and in order to do this we must have mid-stations as bases of supply and resort, in order that our just resentment against foreign nations may be sure and certain of management and control.... Gentlemen on the other side, with tearful solicitude for our Constitution, and knowing our tender regard for that majestic instrument, interpose it as a bar.... Our country has arisen from lusty youth to vigorous manhood. We must share the responsibilities as well as the blessings of modern civilization. We must participate in the world's destiny.

Unfortunately, the inflated and specious rhetoric of men like Congressman Stewart carried the day. After the annexation of Hawaii, the Boston Transcript observed:

The Rubicon has at last been crossed. The country now enters upon a policy that is entirely new. It has thrown down its former standards, cast aside its old traditions, has extended its first tentacle two thousand miles away, and is growing others for exploitation in southern and eastern seas.

Even as the Hawaiian annexation was being consummated, the Spanish-American War broke out, in which the United States acquired not only Guam and Puerto Rico, but also the Philippines. With these new territories, wrested from a debilitated Spain as a result of a very dubious provocation, the United States became a true international imperial power. And, as with all far-flung empires, the new dominions provided built-in rationalizations for further overseas interventionism. For one thing, the United States authority soon faced a bloody insurrection in the Philippines, which was suppressed only at a cost of thousands of lives, mostly Filipino. For another, the Philippines now provided a convenient base of operations for further interventionist activities in what had become our new sphere of interest in East Asia. The Philippines were used, for example, as a staging ground for U.S. intervention in China during the Boxer Rebellion of 1900.

The Spanish-American War decisively undermined America's resistance to overseas interventionism. Contemporary essayist William Graham Sumner claimed, in his magnificent essay "The Conquest of the United States by Spain" that, because of the changes the war had wrought in the United States, the ideological victory had been won by Spain. After all, this ancient Old World imperial power, though decrepit, still embodied the principles of European expansionism that America's Founders had so carefully repudiated. Sumner wrote:

[E]xpansion and imperialism are at war with the best traditions, principles, and interests of the American people, and they will plunge us into a network of difficult problems and political perils.... The people ... who now want us to break out, warn us against the terrors of "isolation." Our ancestors all came here to isolate themselves from the social burdens and inherited errors of the old world.... What we are doing is that we are abandoning this blessed isolation to run after a share in the trouble.

Sumner accurately forecast many of the consequences of America's newfound expansionist enthusiasm, but he did not foresee the rise of other influences that sought to harness American militarism to serve aims far more inimical to American self-interest than old-fashioned territorial conquest.

Beginning with World War I, internationalist Utopians began making the case for using war to cleanse the world of despotism. It was Woodrow Wilson who, with the support of most of the American political and financial establishment, dragged America into the European quagmire in 1917 -- after being re-elected on a pledge to keep us out of the conflict overseas. Wilson argued that America's immediate national self-interest must be subordinated to the gauzy, inexact cause of global humanitarianism:

The world must be made safe for democracy. Its peace must be planted upon the tested foundations of political liberty. We have no selfish ends to serve. We desire no conquest, no dominion.... We are but one of the champions of the rights of mankind.

Global Policeman

After World War I, even as America's enthusiasm for territorial expansion waned, a new spirit of promiscuous interventionism arose to take its place. This new impulse was -- as Wilson had stated -- less concerned with overt, old-fashioned territorial conquest than with the imposition of a geopolitical ideal. But while "democracy" was the public selling point, the real objective was -- and remains -- a permanent socialist world order backed by allegedly enlightened military interventionism. Most American interventionism since World War I, therefore, has served not American nationalist interests but the interests of internationalist elites, including organizations -- like the United Nations -- that advance their agenda.

The Second World War more firmly cemented the cause of benevolent empire in American minds, thanks to the ideological evils of Nazism and Fascism and the horrors that they wrought. During the Cold War, the largely illusory Soviet military threat -- which we ourselves helped the Russians to build, with generous foreign aid -- was a convenient foil to justify further overseas expansion. With the end of the Cold War, as the "world's only superpower," we have now assumed the role of global policeman. So steeped have we become in the terminology of world domination that the very term "empire" is now used unabashedly, as in a January 17th article in The Christian Science Monitor that referred to America as a "reluctant empire."

It has come to this: The America of the Founding Era and most of the 19th century -- a prudently non-interventionist country that managed to avoid the conflicts and intrigues of the Old World that its citizens had fled -- has become, in conjunction with the United Nations and its subsidiaries, a world-encircling empire, with more than 250,000 troops stationed in roughly 140 countries besides our own. Our supposedly benign interventionist policy has created almost constant conflict, commencing with no-win debacles in Korea and Vietnam.

The last decade began with the ill-advised war in the Persian Gulf, a war whose long-range consequences, including an endless air campaign in Iraq, are still unfolding. In addition, we saw the Somalia debacle, which cost the lives of thousands of Somalis and 18 American servicemen; the invasion of Haiti to replace one dictator with another; air wars in Bosnia and Kosovo, costing many thousands of lives; missile attacks on the Sudan and Afghanistan; and of course, the still-developing war on terrorism, which has already provided an excuse for the United States to occupy Afghanistan, and to station military forces in Pakistan, Tajikistan, Kyrgyzstan, and Uzbekistan as well. Moreover, thanks to the war on terrorism, our troops are now back in the Philippines, only 10 years after Subic Bay Naval base closed. And there's talk of revisiting Somalia, Sudan, and Iraq. This last is a particularly bitter irony, considering that Saddam Hussein, a bloodthirsty dictator if ever there was one, is still firmly in command, w hile the supposed champions of global freedom and democracy who opposed him -- George Bush, Sr., John Major, and Bill Clinton -- are long gone from the political stage.

Unfortunately, the self-perpetuating rationale of empire is very difficult for politicians to resist. Once in place, overseas entanglements, like domestic special interests, clamor for protection. The paladins of Pax Americana argue that withdrawing American military forces from overseas commitments would bring chaos. But the nations of the world are perfectly capable of managing their affairs by themselves without American "adult supervision."

Sadly, all of the consequences of interventionism and empire that the Founders predicted have come to pass: We are now literally spread across the world, actively seeking for monsters to destroy -- terrorists are the bogeymen of the hour -- and defending each new missile salvo as a blow on behalf of freedom or its cleverly-disguised rhetorical counterfeit, "democracy." Unfortunately, some of those monsters are now discovering ways to strike back in kind, by attacking American embassies, ships and now, even the American homeland itself. And as Jefferson, Monroe, and John Quincy Adams all feared, our vigorous republican system has been vitiated with bad ideas emanating from the Old World, like socialism, militarism, and the fetish for unrestrained democracy, all of which were practiced in Europe long before they filtered into the United States.

The historical precedents are not encouraging. Seldom if ever do empires, at the height of their power, unilaterally renounce violence and conquest abroad and revert to national affairs. It usually remains for other powers to unite against them and destroy them: That which is created by force, unfortunately, is usually undone in the same way or not at all. Our choice, then, is stark. Either we continue our descent into empire, spending our strength waging war across the globe; or we summon the character as a nation to return to our republican roots, replacing internationalism and endless war with the old-fashioned virtue of minding our own business.