For more than a century and a half, the Monroe Doctrine, which championed civil liberty in the so-called “Western hemisphere” and asserted mutual non-intervention between the Old and New World, has been a crucial factor in making American foreign policy. To this writer's understanding, it somehow survived the end of the Cold War.
Consequently, a large number of studies on the Monroe Doctrine have appeared in the field of American diplomatic history. Few of them, however, examined the implementation of the Monroe Doctrine right after its promulgation in 1823. None seems to have analyzed it fully.
Therefore, this essay focuses on how the Monroe Doctrine was applied to American diplomacy in the 1820s, especially her policy toward Latin America. At the time, matters that related closely to the Monroe Doctrine came into question. They are: (1) a resolution in the House of Representatives introduced by Speaker Henry Clay supporting the principle of non-intervention (by European powers in Latin America) of the Monroe Doctrine; (2) overtures from Columbia, Brazil, and Argentina, each proposing an alliance or partnership with the United States against reactionary powers of Continental Europe; and, above all, (3) the first Pan-American congress (the Panama Congress) initiated by Colombian President Simon Bolívar.
Contrary to the Monroe Doctrine, the United States government took a quite negative attitude toward these questions. The reason was that, even relating to Latin America, the United States, still a young nation, continued to adhere to the established isolationist policy which had been adopted in connection with Europe, because Latin America had been in the European spheres of influence. And also, in relation to the Panama Congress, the United States did not want to commit itself to Pan-Americanism led by Latin American countries owing to its desire of establishing hegemony in the Americas. The former style of American foreign policy may be named negative “unilateralism” and the latter style can be labeled positive “unilateralism.”
Until the middle of the nineteenth century, the Monroe Doctrine was practically forgotten in American foreign policy. In that sense, the Monroe Doctrine may be called a “pledge without commitment.”
The Monroe Doctrine, which had declared the United States to be a guardian of newly independent Latin American republics, was revitalized in the mid nineteenth century, when the United States committed itself to territorial expansion in the American Continent, excluding the influence of England and France. Later, it became what is called an “invented tradition” of American foreign policy when the United States, having become a global power, assumed a paternalistic but imperialistic posture toward Latin America at the turn of the century.
The historical development of the Monroe Doctrine indicates that sometimes deeds have betrayed ideals in American foreign policy.
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