Pacific and Asiatic Doctrines Akin to the Monroe Doctrine

Extract

The late Professor Edward Bourne, of Yale, used to say that the Philippine Islands were attached to the Spanish West Indies till after 1823, and therefore it ought to be presumed that Monroe intended his doctrine to apply to that Asiatic archipelago. The quip leads the mind to the important fact that the relations of the Pacific Coast of America, the Pacific Ocean, and the nations of Asia, are all bound together. The first Asiatic trade went from Philadelphia, Boston, Providence, and other Atlantic ports via the Northwest Coast to China. The relation of the original Monroe Doctrine to Oregon is familiar to all students of the Monroe Doctrine. It is curious that the objection to “colonization” which was intended to block the way of Russia, has been applied almost entirely to the West Indies and the eastern coast of North and South America. The clause in Monroe’s declaration had little to do with the process by which the United States came to have a Pacific front.