The Significance of Isolationism to the American Anti-Imperialist Movement

This paper examines the significance of isolationist ideas to the American anti-imperialist movement. The paper begins with William James’ politicization with the Venezuela boundary crisis (1895-96), when he and other soon-to-be prominent anti-imperialists were first activated in his public politics. The paper then tracks the application of long-standing notions – and invocations of Washington, Jefferson, and Monroe – in arguments against American intervention and imperialism as expounded by an array of anti-imperialist leaders (James, to Carl Schurz, Mark Twain, W.E.B. Du Bois, David Starr Jordan, others).
    The paper situates this anti-imperial political philosophy in a new light, casting it as a fiercely updated and modernized form of traditional isolationism.  The paper explores the deeper intellectual and political roots of these notions for the major figures involved in anti-imperialist politics. The crux of this argument is to show that these refined forms of isolationism as part of a robust anti-colonial stance were far from “walled and bounded.” Anti-imperialism was a capacious philosophy and isolationist values played a significant part as a natural outgrowth for some, like James, of his psychological and philosophical studies, value of the individual against “bigness” in all its forms, and for many others prizing isolation derived directly from a contrarian yet thoroughly traditionalist “mugwump” view of American society and the nation’s proper relationship to the world.  Thus, this paper asserts a new genesis moment, chronology, and developmental pattern for the advent of modern isolationism by that showing isolationist ideas were explicitly significant to U.S. anti-imperialism.