Summary of Foreign Affaris

In this chapter “Foreign Affairs in the Young Nation” there were a lot of events from the beginning from when Washington took office to how the country has grown with the passing of years.

How it all started was when George Washington took office and became the first president on 1789. This time America was looking bad. The army the George Washington sent to the war just went home. The army didn’t not get replaced for two reasons. The first reason was that the government did not have enough money to get another army. And the second reason was that the people in America knew if that a standing army could be used to take away their liberty. There where many threats that America was surrounded by Britain in Canada and they also had some forts in Ohio Valley. And to the south and west Spain controlled Florida and Louisiana. Some things that happened in Europe also affected the US. In 1789 the French and a revolution. But then on 1793 France and Britain went into war. The US and France were alliances. They made an agreement that they would help each other in a time of war. President Washington knew that US weren’t ready for the war. So he announced a policy of neutrality. So they didn’t help France with the war. So before Washington left he finished his foreign policy. He said we couldn’t gain nothing by becoming involved with other nations.

While George Washington was President he created two policies to be used and followed in the future. The first was the neutrality policy and second, isolationism policy. In 1789 the army was going to be replaced, but wasn’t because the government did not have the money to replace it and the army would have to remove their liberty. This was when the neutrality policy was announced. Following it came the isolationism policy.

As you can tell, there were multiple dilemmas while being president. When our first president, George Washington was in office he had the future decisions of America on his shoulders. Since he had already created the isolationism and neutrality policies, he had to follow those in his first major dilemma, the Jay Treaty.

A man named John Jay was sent out by George Washington to make a peace treaty with Britain to take their troops out of the US. And after many compromises, they agreed just to take their troops out of the Ohio Valley. This was then call the Jay treaty. Although this was a good thing at first, things turned around very quickly. France and Britain bounded together and formed their own plan against America. The got ships and sent out sailors to the Mediterranean and on July of 1769, they seized about 316 American ships. This was a great downfall towards the American side since most of their trading and war ships were out of their reach.

It was not much later when the XYZ affair occurred. John Adams was now president of America and held up all the responsibilities that Washington once had. President Adams had sent out a group of men to go to France and talk to the French Foreign Minister Talleyrand about the ships that were taken from them. When these American envoys got to France, the minister would not receive them. It was only unless they paid a tribute would he meet with them. The envoys were soon called X, Y, and Z since they met in secret with representatives of the minister, but didn’t seem to work. They wanted to talk to the minister in person without a tribute. There was no way that Adams would buy into having to pay a tribute, just to meet and talk. Although George Washington had the policy of isolationism, Adams had to do something to get his ships back. He got 10,000 men, including privateers (privately owned ships) to go to France and retrieve them. Even if they hadn’t gotten back all 316 American ships, they managed to get about 80 armed French vessels.

In February of year 1799, John Adams continued to do his job as President. He strived for peace between America and all other countries. That month he sent out a peace mission all the way to France. Napoleon Bonaparte already had ended to the seizure of the American ships and released any of the captured sailors. United States and France at once been alliances for the Revolutionary War and even so, President Adams ended this alliance. Since they had taken all those ships from America Adams was going to have France pay for them, but then decided not to, for the sake of the country.

Adams was then out of office and came our third president, Thomas Jefferson. His dilemma was to deal with pirates. The British had come to America and started impressing the sailors. They took them right off the ships and forced them to serve in the British navy and/or toil on Britain’s, “floating hells”. Impressments were a big problem at this time because Jefferson was loosing people to defend him and his country. Also so many lost family members from them being kidnapped from the British. It hurt the Americans, but it was great leverage for the British. After this, piracy began. Sea Pirates preyed for any merchant ships on the Mediterranean and seized them. It was Washington and Adams who sent a tribute to Barbary States of North America for the safety of the American ships. The tribute was a total of two million dollars and yet they asked for more. By this time Jefferson was officially president and he had a decision to make, pay the tribute or go to war.

In 1802 he sent a small fleet of ships to protect the American shipping in the Mediterranean. Two years later the war was in action and a ship called the Philadelphia and the crew on it were captured and held for ransom. The ship (and its crew) returned to America after the US had paid a 60,000 fee to Tripoli. US also signed a peace treaty with them to end the war once and for all. The pirates were active until the year 1815, where all the pirate bases were destroyed.

The phrase, “dambargo” originated from the embargo act. As Jefferson desperately tried to convince Britain and France to stop taking his ships, they would continue to ignore his request. Over the years 1803-1807, they collected over 1,500 American ships (France 1,000, Britain 500). This was enough; Jefferson proposed an embargo in 1807 which also stopped them from being able to trade with foreign countries leaving many sailors without jobs or homes. Yet in 1809 the embargo ended and ships were being attacked, once again.

Once Jefferson was out of office, Madison was next up and he strived for peace. He looked for different ways to stop this madness between America, France, and Britain. So, he made an offer to both countries: Agree to stop attacking, and we’ll stop trading with the enemy. France at first agreed, but it was a false agreement. After he approved of this he had med secretly go and continue seizing their ships. On the other hand, Britain completely turned down this offer and started a war. Although Madison didn’t want to go to war and follow the isolationism policy, the south and west wanted America to go to war. There were two reasons for this; the resented Britain’s policy of impressing sailors and they thought war would make the Appalachian Mountains safer.

Thought they thought these mountains would become safer, settlers started to migrate towards the Ohio and Mississippi rivers and valleys. All the Indians that had lived here were pushed out of their homelands. This did not stick well with a chief, Tecumseh and his brother who was a prophet. They got together and decided to create a Indian nation. This great nation did succeed; they even had a center called Prophetstown. Harrison and his men (settlers) had a war with the Indians. Both sides lost men on November 7, 1811. After the war, Harrison’s men found a british gun, meaning the British militia troops in Canada provided weapons to Chief Tecumseh. After their chief had died, they were driven out of the Ohio Valley.

Madison finally abandoned the isolationism policy and invaded Canada for the war of 1812. The US troops were completely unprepared for this war, and thought they would be welcomed into Canada as heroes. Turned out they were wrong, they were completely unwelcome, and intruders in their land. But the US troops didn’t end up conquering Canada; instead they made the west much safer for settlers.

The year 1817, Monroe was in office. Mexico and Spain began to revolt due to the priest Miguel Hidalgo and his memorable speech. It was remembered as “Cry Dolores” and it dragged this revolution on for a decade. Mexico, in the end won their freedom from Spain.

Down in South America, two leaders lead their people through historical moments. First, in 1810 a man named Simon Bolivar launched a revolution in the north. And second, Jose de San Martin was from Argentina and in 1825 lead a revolution in the south for their independence. He drove the last of the Spanish troops out of South America. In the new Latin American Nations the British supported all the revolutions. Spain and its colonies had stop trading with other nations, but if they were free from the Spanish ruling then they would start foreign trading again. Britain and US started caring for this cause and sent messages to the leaders and asked to leave Latin America alone.

August of 1814, the British had come into the United States and were in Washington DC. By one simple flame and a few men they started burning down the entire city, all the landmarks, everything. And after Washington DC the continued this behavior and also started to burn down Baltimore. The harbor was guarded by fort McHenry. On September 13, 1814 warships began to bomb and a red glow shown over the harbor. After this bombardment, the flag still stood waving overhead. A few months later General Andrew Jackson helped defeat the British when they attacked New Orleans. They freed African Americans, Indians, and Pirates. The war was brutal on the British side since about 200 of their men were injured or killed compared to 20 for the Americans. This was the greatest battle of the year 1812, but it was all unnecessary. It was only a few weeks before that they had signed a peace treaty between America and Britain. The news just hadn’t reached New Orleans before the war started.

Monroe created a doctrine with the advice from Thomas Jefferson and James Madison. This doctrine showed that North and South America were not available to colonize by European powers. It would affect their peace and safety. Although it didn’t sit well with France, Latin Americans were glad the US would support them. This doctrine also joined in with George Washington’s isolationism policy as a basic principle. It showed that the US would not accept any influences with Europe.

So to end it all the US has grown a lot during a short amount of time. The US got larger and stronger within the passing of years and is now a confident nation.