Essay on Manifest Destiny and American Politics - 658 Words

During the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries the United States saw many problems come and go. Some problems were more important than others, however all led to further division of American politics. The most divisive issue in American politics during this time frame was the idea of Manifest Destiny, or territorial expansion. Manifest Destiny was the idea that it was the United States’ destiny to take over all of North America from the Atlantic to the Pacific. Most of the public was in favor of territorial expansion, though some politicians felt it contradicted the constitution. Strict constructionists were against territorial expansion, while loose constructionists felt expansion was the United States’ destiny.†¦show more content†¦One of the supporters of Manifest Destiny was, democrat, James Polk who served as president from 1844 to 1848. Polk was strongly in favor of expanding the United States to the Pacific. This opinion won him the election of 1844. That year Henry Clay, a well known and loved figure in American politics, ran and was expected to blow, little known, Polk of the charts. The only problem was Clay was nervous about territorial expansion. He did not want was with Mexico and was unsure of the constitutionality of expanding. Polk won because the majority of the public believed in Manifest Destiny. Along with influencing presidential elections, Manifest Destiny played a role in the slavery issue. Entering the mid eighteen hundreds slavery was a very sensitive subject, and some of the bad feelings that caused this sensitivity were caused by territorial expansion. With more lands being acquired the number of slave state and free state representatives in Congress became unbalanced. This caused great distress among the senators and representatives. For instance, free state members of Congress began accusing the slave state members of conspiracies. One such accusation was made by Charles Sumner. He proposed the idea that southerners wanted to acquire more land so they could implant slavery in the territories. With more slave oriented territories that would eventually became slave states, the South would have control of Congress. This isShow MoreRelatedThe United States Essay1243 Words   |  5 Pagesknown as Manifest Destiny. Over the five decades that Manifest Destiny las ted politics and the government changed along with the geographic face of the United States while the country expand to cover most of North America. Of these political changes, the death of the Federalists, birth of the Whigs and reformation of the Democratic party were among the most prominent. However an underlying conflict began to progress with each new purchase and acquisition of territory. Manifest Destiny led to multipleRead MoreManifest Destiny Of The United States1202 Words   |  5 PagesManifest destiny is one of the beliefs that existed in the United States. 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