From Colony to Superpower: U.S. Foreign Relations Since 1776 (157 page)

Even if in decline, the United States will remain a crucial player in world affairs, and in coping with the challenges of a new and complex era the nation has a rich foreign policy tradition to draw on: the pragmatism of the peacemakers of the American Revolution; the basic realism of George Washington, Alexander Hamilton, and John Adams; the practical idealism of Thomas Jefferson and Abraham Lincoln; the worldliness and diplomatic skill of John Quincy Adams; the remarkable cultural sensitivity of diplomats such as Townsend Harris and Dwight Morrow; the commitment to public service of Elihu Root and Henry Stimson; the noble aspirations for a better world espoused by Woodrow Wilson; the intuitive understanding of the way diplomacy works—and its limitations—and the "world point of view" manifested by Franklin Roosevelt in World War II; the coalition-building of Dean Acheson and the Wise Men of the Truman years and the George H. W. Bush administration during the first Gulf War; the strategic vision of Richard Nixon and Henry Kissinger; the ability to adapt and adjust displayed by Ronald Reagan; the efforts of countless men and women who sought to share with other peoples the best of their country and to educate their fellow citizens about the world.

Americans must also "disenthrall" themselves, to borrow Lincoln's apt word, from deeply entrenched ideas about their country and its place in the world. They must "think anew, and act anew."
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They must cast away centuries-old notions of themselves as God's chosen people. In today's world, such pretensions cannot fail to alienate others. They should recognize the historical truth that the United States in its dealings with other people and nations has not been uniquely innocent and virtuous. It has done much good in the world, but in its drive to superpower status it has often violated its own principles and inflicted harm on other peoples. Unilateralism served the nation well for its first century and a half, but in the vastly shrunken and still very dangerous world of the twenty-first century, it is simply not viable. Most problems are global in scope and require multilateral solutions. The United States cannot resolve them by itself and on its terms, and efforts to do so, as the Iraq war has made clear, will likely be counterproductive. The United States must be more prudent in the use of
its still quite considerable power. In the aftermath of Iraq and Afghanistan, it must not withdraw from a seemingly hostile and ungrateful world. But it must also recognize that power, no matter how great, has limits. The nation cannot rid the world of evil, as
it
defines evil; it cannot impose its way on other peoples by military force or diplomatic pressures. "The American idea can still resonate," columnist Roger Cohen recently observed. But, he adds, U.S. "leaders must embody it rather than impose it."
¹⁴⁰
They must lead by example and especially by listening to other peoples and nations. The United States cannot dictate the shape of a new world order, but the way it responds to future foreign policy challenges can help ensure its security and well-being and exert a powerful influence for good or ill.

The literature on the history of U.S. foreign relations is enormous, and I am including in this brief and highly selective listing only those works most valuable to me and most likely to be useful to nonspecialists. The indispensable bibliography is Robert L. Beisner, ed.,
American Foreign Relations Since 1600
(2nd ed., 2 vols., Santa Barbara, Calif., 2003). Jerald A. Combs discusses trends in historical writing in
American Diplomatic History: Two Centuries of Changing Interpretations
(Berkeley, Calif., 1983). Michael J. Hogan, ed.,
America in the World: The Historiography of American Foreign Relations Since 1941
(New York, 1995) covers recent historiography. Bruce W. Jentleson and Thomas G. Paterson, eds.,
Encyclopedia of U.S. Foreign Relations
(4 vols., New York, 1997) is a valuable reference work. The State Department's
Foreign Relations of the United States
series, now publishing on the Nixon years, is an indispensable and splendidly edited collection of documents.

Numerous books set forth broad interpretations. George F. Kennan,
American Diplomacy, 1900–1950
(New York, 1951) outlines this scholar/diplomat's realist critique of U.S. foreign policy. William Appleman Williams,
The Tragedy of American Diplomacy
(3rd ed., New York, 1972) elaborates the highly influential interpretation of Open Door imperialism. Robert Dallek,
The American Style of Foreign Policy: Cultural Politics and Foreign Affairs
(New York, 1983) stresses domestic politics, and Michael H. Hunt,
Ideology and U.S. Foreign Policy
(New Haven, Conn., 1987) ideology. Walter A. McDougall,
Promised Land, Crusader State: The American Encounter with the World Since 1776
(New York, 1997) is a readable neo-realist interpretation. In
Special Providence: American Foreign Policy and How It Changed the World
(New York, 2001), Walter Russell Mead uses key figures to elaborate different approaches to U.S. foreign policy. Paul
Kennedy's
Rise and Fall of the Great Powers
(New York, 1987) places the U.S. ascension to great-power status in the larger context of world politics and especially economics. Surveys of specific topics include Melvin Small,
Democracy and Diplomacy: The Impact of Domestic Politics on U.S. Foreign Policy
(Baltimore, Md., 1996), Ralph B. Levering,
The Public and American Foreign Policy, 1918–1978
(New York, 1978), Ole Holsti,
American Opinion and American Foreign Policy
(Ann Arbor, Mich., 1996), Alexander DeConde,
Ethnicity, Race, and American Foreign Policy
(Boston, 1992), and Alfred E. Eckes,
Opening America's Market: U.S. Foreign Trade Policy Since 1776
(Chapel Hill, N.C., 1995).

There are countless books analyzing U.S. relations with individual countries and regions. Some of the most useful for this study were Warren I. Cohen,
America's Response to China: An Interpretative History of Sino-American Relations
(4th ed., New York, 2000), Charles E. Neu,
The Troubled Encounter: The United States and Japan
(New York, 1975), Walter LaFeber,
The Clash: A History of U.S.-Japan Relations
(New York, 1997), Robert J. McMahon,
The Limits of Empire: The United States and Southeast Asia Since World War II
(New York, 1999), John Lewis Gaddis,
Russia, the Soviet Union, and the United States: An Interpretive History
(rev. ed., New York, 1990), David Schoenbaum,
The United States and the State of Israel
(New York, 1993), Howard F. Cline,
The United States and Mexico
(rev. ed., Boston, 1963), Karl M. Schmitt,
Mexico and the United States, 1821–1973: Conflict and Coexistence
(New York, 1974), Lars Schoultz,
Beneath the United States: A History of U.S. Policy Toward Latin America
(Cambridge, Mass., 1998), Mark T. Gilderhus,
The Second Century: U.S.–Latin American Relations Since 1889
(Wilmington, Del., 2000), Kyle Longley,
In the Eagle's Shadow: The United States and Latin America
(Wheeling, Ill., 2002), Douglas Little,
American Orientalism: The United States and the Middle East Since 1945
(Chapel Hill, N.C., 2002), and Michael B. Oren,
Power, Faith, and Fantasy: America in the Middle East, 1776 to the Present
(New York, 2007).

1776–1815:
Max Savelle's
The Origins of American Diplomacy: The International History of Anglo-America, 1492–1763
(New York, 1967) is still valuable for the colonial background. Fred Anderson,
The War That Made America
(New York, 2005) is superb on the French and Indian War. Bradford Perkins,
The Creation of a Republican Empire, 1776–1865
(New York, 1993) and William Earl Weeks,
Building the Continental Empire: American Expansion from the Revolution to the Civil War
(Chicago, 1996) are excellent surveys of the beginnings of U.S. foreign policy.

Books that put Revolutionary War diplomacy in an international setting are Samuel Flagg Bemis,
The Diplomacy of the American Revolution
(rev. ed., Bloomington, Ind., 1957), Richard Van Alstyne,
Empire and Independence: The International History of the American Revolution
(New York, 1965), and Jonathan R. Dull,
A Diplomatic History of the American Revolution
(New Haven, Conn., 1985). Felix Gilbert,
The Beginnings of American Foreign Policy: To the Farewell Address
(New York, 1965) offers stimulating insights not only for the Revolutionary period but also for subsequent U.S. policies. Robert Middlekauff,
The Glorious Cause: The American Revolution, 1763–1789
(rev. ed., New York, 2005) is a richly detailed, readable account of the period. Major studies of key figures include James H. Hutson,
John Adams and the Diplomacy of the American Revolution
(Lexington, Ky., 1980) and Richard B. Morris,
The Peacemakers: The Great Powers and American Independence
(New York, 1965), which highlights John Jay's role. Gordon S. Wood,
The Americanization of Benjamin Franklin
(New York, 2004), Edmund S. Morgan,
Benjamin Franklin
(New Haven, Conn., 2002), and Stacy Schiff,
A Great Improvisation: Franklin, France, and the Birth of America
(New York, 2005) chronicle Franklin's major role. William Stinchcombe,
The American Revolution and the French Alliance
(Syracuse, N.Y., 1969) is a valuable monograph. James M. Merrell, "Declarations of Independence: Indian-White Relations in the New Nation," in Jack P. Greene, ed.,
The American Revolution: Its Character and Limits
(New York, 1987) covers a much neglected dimension of the Revolution.

There is no up-to-date study of diplomacy during the Confederation period. The older surveys by Merrill Jensen,
The New Nation: A History of the United States During the Confederation, 1781–1789
(New York, 1950) and Richard B. Morris,
The Forging of the Union, 1781–1789
(New York, 1987), are still useful. Jack N. Rakove,
The Beginnings of National Politics: An Interpretive History of the Continental Congress
(New York, 1997) has much to say about foreign policy. Charles R. Ritcheson,
Aftermath of Revolution: British Policy Toward the United States, 1783–1795
(New York, 1971) provides a British perspective, and Frederick W. Marks III,
Independence on Trial: Foreign Affairs and the Making of the Constitution
(2nd ed., Wilmington, Del., 1986) stresses the importance of foreign policy in the making of the Constitution. David C. Hendrickson,
Peace Pact: The Lost World of the American Founding
(Lawrence, Kans., 2003) puts a new "internationalist" twist on the origins of the Constitution.

Stanley Elkins and Eric McKitrick's
The Age of Federalism: The Early American Republic, 1788–1800
(New York, 1993) provides a richly detailed and eminently readable introduction to the period. Lawrence S. Kaplan analyzes the roles of two key figures in
Alexander Hamilton: Ambivalent Anglophile
(Wilmington, Del., 2002) and
Thomas Jefferson: Westward the
Course of Empire
(Wilmington, Del., 1999). For Hamilton, see also John Lamberton Harper,
Alexander Hamilton and the Origins of American Foreign Policy
(Cambridge, Eng., 2004). Richard H. Kohn,
Eagle and Sword: The Beginnings of the Military Establishment in America
(New York, 1984) is excellent on military policy. Drew R. McCoy,
The Elusive Republic: Political Economy in Jeffersonian America
(Chapel Hill, N.C., 1980) illuminates the connection between landed and commercial expansion in republican ideology. Harry Ammon,
The Genet Mission
(New York, 1973) is the standard account. With somewhat different emphases, Samuel Flagg Bemis,
Jay's Treaty: A Study in Commerce and Diplomacy
(rev. ed., New Haven, Conn., 1962) and Jerald A. Combs,
The Jay Treaty: Political Battleground of the Founding Fathers
(Berkeley, Calif., 1970) analyze that controversial accord. For Anglo-American relations subsequent to the treaty, see Bradford Perkins,
The First Rapprochement: England and the United States, 1795–1805
(Berkeley, Calif., 1967). Samuel Flagg Bemis,
Pinckney's Treaty: America's Advantage from Europe's Distress, 1783–1800
(rev. ed., New Haven, Conn., 1960), remains the best account. The crisis with France is studied in Alexander DeConde,
Entangling Alliance: Politics and Diplomacy Under George Washington
(Durham, N.C., 1958) and
The Quasi-War: The Politics and Diplomacy of the Undeclared War with France, 1797–1801
(New York, 1966), and William Stinchcombe,
The XYZ Affair
(Westport, Conn., 1981).

Jefferson's leadership is evaluated critically in Forrest McDonald,
The Presidency of Thomas Jefferson
(Lawrence, Kans., 1976) and more favorably in Merrill Peterson,
Thomas Jefferson and the New Nation
(New York, 1970), still the best one-volume biography. Robert W. Tucker and David C. Hendrickson,
Empire of Liberty: The Statecraft of Thomas Jefferson
(New York, 1990) is a provocative realist critique. Robert J. Allison,
The Crescent Obscured: The United States and the Muslim World, 1776–1815
(New York, 1995) treats the Barbary wars in the context of American attitudes toward Islam. Peter S. Onuf,
Jefferson's Empire: The Language of American Nationhood
(Charlottesville, Va., 2000) is a stimulating analysis of Jefferson's expansionist vision. Alexander DeConde,
This Affair of Louisiana
(New York, 1976) is the standard study, but see also Sanford Levison and Bartholomew Sparrow,
The Louisiana Purchase and American Expansion, 1803–1898
(Lanham, Md., 2006) and Frank L. Owsley Jr. and Gene A. Smith,
Filibusters and Expansionists: Jeffersonian Manifest Destiny
(Tuscaloosa, Ala., 1997). Steven E. Ambrose,
Undaunted Courage: Meriwether Lewis, Thomas Jefferson, and the Opening of the American West
(New York, 1996) provides a stirring account of that exciting and enormously significant venture. The importance of the
Haitian revolution, which cannot be overestimated, is analyzed in David Geggus,
The Impact of the Haitian Revolution in the Atlantic World
(Columbia, S.C., 2001). The origins of the War of 1812 have been one of the more controversial topics in early U.S. diplomatic history. Bradford Perkins,
Prologue to War: England and the United States
(Berkeley, Calif., 1961) is critical of Jefferson and Madison. Roger H. Brown,
The Republic in Peril: 1812
(New York, 1971) stresses party politics, while Reginald Horsman,
The Causes of the War of 1812
(1962) emphasizes sectional issues. The best recent analysis is J.C.A. Stagg,
Mr. Madison's War: Politics, Diplomacy, and Warfare in the Early Republic, 1783–1830
(Princeton, N.J., 1983). Steven Watts,
The Republic Reborn: War and the Making of Liberal America, 1790–1820
(Baltimore, Md., 1987) highlights generational anxieties. Burton I. Spivak,
Jefferson's English Crisis: Commerce, Embargo, and the Republican Revolution
(Charlottesville, Va., 1979) is good on the embargo. Clifford L. Egan,
Neither Peace nor War: Franco-American Relations, 1803–1812
(Baton Rouge, 1983) and Peter P. Hill,
Napoleon's Troublesome Americans: Franco-American Relations, 1804–1815
(Washington, 2005) deal with that sometimes neglected aspect of the larger crisis. The Indian "problem" is discussed from the Indian perspective in R. David Edmunds,
The Shawnee Prophet
(Lincoln, Neb., 1983), and
Tecumseh and the Quest for Indian Leadership
(New York, 1984). Donald R. Hickey,
The War of 1812: A Forgotten Conflict
(Urbana, Ill., 1989) is the best scholarly study. Robert Allen Rutland,
The Presidency of James Madison
(Lawrence, Kans., 1990) provides a balanced analysis of that president's much criticized war leadership. The military aspects are analyzed from a British/Canadian perspective in George F. G. Stanley,
The War of 1812: Land Operations
(Ottawa, 1983).