American History since 1865

What was the Free Silver issue? In the aftermath of 2008 financial crisis, it becomes increasingly clear to more and more Americans that it is specifically the proper functioning of America’s financial system, which should be considered the foremost key to ensuring this country’s economic well-being.Advertising We will write a custom essay sample on American History since 1865 specifically for you for only $16.05 $11/page Learn More Therefore, making inquiries into the history of this system’s functioning appears especially important – by learning about the past, we will be in a position to have a better understanding of what may account for the financial challenges of the future. In my essay, I will aim to substantiate the validity of this suggestion at length in regards to the so-called Free Silver issue, which used to define the essence of American socio-economic discourse during the course of late 19th and early 20th centu ries. The Free Silver issue is best defined in terms of the debate, which taken place between the supporters of maintaining a single Gold standard, as the mean of ensuring the buying power of U.S. Dollar, on the one hand, and the advocates of monetary bimetallism, which promoted the institutionalization of an additional Silver standard, on the other. The reason why bimetallists pursued with promoting their monetary agenda is that they believed that without being provided with the sufficient ‘monetary mass’, the American economy will not be able to maintain its functional vitality.1 Given the fact that at the end of 19th century America’s gold reserves were severely limited and the fact that at that time, U.S. Dollar enjoyed the status of a freely converted currency (in a sense that it could be converted into gold upon demand), the only way to increase the amount of U.S. Dollars in circulation, which in turn would stimulate the American economy, was adopting silve r as yet another precious metal, which could be exchanged for paper money in banks.Advertising Looking for essay on history? Let's see if we can help you! Get your first paper with 15% OFF Learn More The monetary initiatives, on the part of advocates of Free Silver (associated with Democratic Party) were particularly supported by American farmers in the Midwest and the South, as the adoption of a Silver monetary standard would naturally result in increasing the prices for their agricultural products. These initiatives, however, used to be strongly opposed by the Republican Party, affiliated with the majority of American bankers. By 1913, the Free Silver debate effectively ended due to the passing of Federal Reserve Act, which introduced an entirely new principle for the functioning of the country’s financial system. From today’s perspective, it appears that the adoption of Silver standard would indeed prove rather beneficial to the American economy at the time, as it would result in increasing the commercial effectiveness of American manufacturing and agricultural enterprises, which in turn would lead to the creation of many new jobs. It is understood, of course, that one of the consequences of adopting such a standard would be the significant increase of the inflation rate. Nevertheless, the earlier mentioned positive aspects of allowing Silver coinage would overweigh this negative consequence.2 At the same time, however, the very principle of increasing the sheer amount of money in circulation, as the only mean of revitalizing the economy’s functioning, has been proven conceptually deficient during the course of Great Depression and during the course of 2008 financial crisis. This is because this practice necessarily results in making the specifically speculative sectors of national economy particularly profitable (banking), which in turn creates objective preconditions for triggering the outbreaks of financial crises.Adver tising We will write a custom essay sample on American History since 1865 specifically for you for only $16.05 $11/page Learn More Therefore, just as it was implied initially – the studying of Free Silver issue should not only be referred to in terms of a historical inquiry, but also in terms of a contemporarily relevant discursive inquiry. Why was the Versailles Treaty ultimately a failure? After the outbreak of WW1, this war used to be commonly referred to by Allies as the ‘war to end all wars’. Yet, as we are being well aware of, WW1 did not only fail to result in ‘ending all wars’, but this war’s actual consequence (the signing of Versailles Treaty) established objective preconditions for the outbreak of WW2 twenty one years later. The reason for this is quite apparent – The Treaty of Versailles had nothing do to with the notion of justice. The foremost provision of the Versailles Treaty was the recogni tion of Germany as the only guilty party for the outbreak of WW1.3 Yet, it were France, Britain and Russia that declared war on Germany initially. As of today, there is a plenty of historical evidence as to the fact that ever since the beginning of 20th century, Britain and France were looking for an excuse to declare war on Germany, because these countries felt threatened by the process of Germany growing ever more economically powerful. Instead of competing with Germany fairly, these countries decided to simply destroy Germany militarily. However, the Allies failed even at that – right until the signing of the Versailles Treaty in 1919, no enemy soldier had ever set its foot onto German territory.Advertising Looking for essay on history? Let's see if we can help you! Get your first paper with 15% OFF Learn More By 1918, German Army had defeated Russia (the whole territory of Ukraine was occupied by Germany) and was about to defeat France (German troops were only 100 km away from Paris). In other words, there were no objective reasons for Germany to consider signing the Versailles Treaty, in the first place. The worst thing about the Versailles Treaty, however, was the fact that due to its harsh terms, German people rightly perceived it as nothing less of the mechanism of depriving Germany of a chance of normal development.4 For example, according to the Treaty, Germany was forced to pay $442 billion in reparations (the equivalent of U.S. Dollar 2011 monetary value) – the sum that could not be repaid until 1988. The German territories of Alsace-Lorraine, Northern Schleswig, East Upper Silesia, Upper Silesia, Saar, Rhineland and the city of Danzig were separated from Germany, with many of them becoming the part of the countries that prior to the outbreak of WW1 did not even exist (Pol and, Czechoslovakia and Lithuania). German colonies in Africa were divided between Britain and France. German army was reduced to the size of 100.000 strong and was forbidden to have tanks, artillery and aviation. German people were declared ‘innately wicked’ and had to be continuously instilled with the complex of historical guilt. The financial assets of German companies abroad were seized. Therefore, it does not come as a particular surprise why during the course of thirties, the overwhelming majority of German voters used to support Hitler’s National-Socialist Party, which proclaimed its foremost political agenda to be concerned with ending to the legacy of the Versailles Treaty’s injustices. Apparently, they considered Hitler a right person to effectively address the shame of Versailles. In other words, had the Treaty of Versailles been perceived by Germans as being even moderately fair, the phenomenon of Hitler rising to power in the post-WW1 Germany would never take place. Therefore, just as it is was stated earlier, the failure of the Versailles Treaty came as result of the Allied signatories having been endowed with the hypertrophied sense of greed and irrational vindictiveness, which in turn prevented them from adjusting this Treaty to correspond to the notion of sanity. What was the ‘Germany first’ strategy? In the light of what now became known to the general public in America about the circumstances that surrounded the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor in 1941, there can be very few doubts as to the fact that it is not only that, contrary to his promises to the voters, Franklin Roosevelt did actively strive to get America involved into the WW2, but he also never hesitated lying to Americans as to what were his real intentions, in this respect. The so-called ‘Germany first’ strategy, adopted by the Roosevelt’s administration through 1940-1942, illustrates the validity of this statement. The ‘Germany first’ was the 1940 secret agreement between Roosevelt and Churchill to have the American army primarily committed towards supporting the British military cause against Germany at the expense of adopting a defensive stance towards Japan in the Pacific, extrapolated by Roosevelt’s willingness to simply abandon American troops to the west of Hawaiian islands, in case of war with Japan. The agreement partially explains why throughout the course of 1940, the American Navy has been participating in a full-scale war against German submarines, without having the American government declared the state of hostilities with Germany, and also why Hitler did end up declaring war on U.S. in 1941 – de facto speaking, America has been fighting Germans ever since 1940, when the ‘Germany first’ strategy was adopted by Roosevelt.5 One of the foremost aspects of this strategy was Roosevelt’s insistence on keeping it in secret from the American ord inary citizens, whom he promised to work hard on keeping America non-involved into another European war, â€Å"The American people were unaware that their President and his military chiefs had secretly committed the United States to defeating Germany as its top priority†.6 Roosevelt desperately sought a legitimate excuse to became a ‘war-time President’, which is why despite having been fully aware of the Japanese impending attack on Pearl Harbor (British intelligence had cracked the Japanese JN-25 naval code as early as in 1939), he nevertheless did not even move a finger to have the American troops in Hawaii prepared for this attack, which in turn would have resulted in admiral Yamamoto returning his carriers back to Japan, without having attacked Pearl Harbor. After all, he was only allowed to proceed with the attack if his attack-preparations were kept in a complete secrecy from Americans.7 Therefore, the â€Å"Germany first’ strategy can be well disc ussed as yet another example of Britain’s ability to fight its own wars with foreign-born men. Just as it used to be the case with Indians, Malayans, Canadians, Australians, South-Africans, etc., in the eyes of Churchill, Americans were nothing but expendable ‘cannon meat’. In this respect, Roosevelt proved himself being nothing less of the Churchill’s puppet. Contrary to his obligation to act on behalf of American people, Roosevelt did not only forsake such his obligation, but he intentionally allowed the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor to proceeded unopposed, so that his good ‘buddy’ Churchill would be appeased. Thus, just as it was implied out earlier, the ‘Germany first’ strategy may be well considered as yet an additional proof to the validity of a suggestion that, contrary to what they would like for the ordinary citizens to think of themselves, American high-ranking politicians do not always prove themselves ‘peopleâ €™s servants’. On the contrary – as the secret and utterly unconstitutional adoption of ‘Germany first’ policy indicates, these politicians are being quite capable of assuming the role of ‘people’s enemies’. What was the Space Race? Nowadays, it became a commonplace practice among many people to discuss the Space Race, which took place between U.S. and USSR during the course of the Cold War, as the proof that it is the matter of time, before humanity will begin sending spaceships to the distant stars, as seen in Star Trek films. Yet, it has been a while now, since humanity accomplished any significant breakthroughs, while exploring cosmos. The reason for is quite apparent – as of today, there are no ideologically opposite and technologically competing superpowers in the world, which would consider making investments into space exploration as the foremost mean of maintaining their geopolitical prestige. The term Space Race is being concerned with what used to account for the ongoing competition between U.S. and Soviet Union on the way of exploring space. In the aftermath of WW2, both: U.S. and USSR had captured German V-2 rockets and German rocket scientists, who designed them. In its turn, this eventually allowed both countries to develop a qualitatively new weapon – Intercontinental Ballistic Missiles (ICBM).8 Given the fact that Soviets never ceased being concerned with trying to expose the advantages of Socialism over Capitalism, they were the first upon which it had dawned to use ICBMs as not the actual weapon but rather as the propaganda weapon, by the mean of launching Sputnik (1957) and the first cosmonaut Yuri Gagarin (1961) into space.9 This alarmed Americans rather substantially, as the Soviet presumed superiority in space exploration negatively affected the America’s prestige in the world. In 1969, Americans succeeded in landing two astronauts on the Moon and bringing them safel y back to the Earth. As a result, USSR sustained a huge blow to its reputation the as leading space-exploring state. Soviet space-prestige sustained even more damage in 1981, when Americans had launched their first space-shuttle Columbia. There can be few doubts as to the fact that these both blows to the Soviet space-reputation did contribute rather significantly to the country’s eventual collapse in 1991. The accomplishments of Space Race are too numerous to be mentioned in this essay in their entirety. Nevertheless, it is quite possible to define the most important of them: people had physically reached the Moon; a number of telecommunication technologies were developed and perfected; humanity has gained a qualitatively new insight into the very essence of celestial laws. The reason why the process of space exploration appears to have stalled (the cancelation of space-shuttle mission may alone cause one to come to such a conclusion) is that, in order for people to be capab le of exploring space, they must be capable of deriving pleasure out of overcoming different obstacles and out of sacrificing their personal well-being for the sake of some higher cause. It is turn; this would require them to profess essentially masculine existential virtues.10 Yet, in the today’s feminized Western countries, affected by the ideological plague of political correctness, citizens are not being encouraged profess these virtues, as it would make them less enthusiastic about ‘celebrating diversity’. Just as it was the case with degenerate Romans in the 5th century, a growing number of contemporary Americans become increasingly preoccupied with experiencing sensual pleasures, while ceasing to care about such rather abstract categories as space-exploration altogether. What adds even more to the problem is the fact that, as of today, the only superpower in the world (U.S.) is simply being in no position to continue investing heavily into space exploratio n, because its geopolitical dominance in the world remains undisputed. I believe that this conclusion fully correlates with the initially articulated thesis. Bibliography Bowen, James. â€Å"Despite Pearl Harbor, America Adopts a ‘Germany first’ Strategy.† http://www.pacificwar.org.au/GermanyFirst/GermanyFirst.html Brzezinski, Matthew. Red Moon Rising: Sputnik and the Hidden Rivalries that  Ignited the Space Race. New York: Times Books – Henry Holt and Co., 2007. Crouch, Tom. Aiming for the Stars: The Dreamers and Doers of the Space Age. Washington: Smithsonian Institution Press, 1999. DeCanio, Samuel. â€Å"Populism, Paranoia, and the Politics of Free Silver.† Studies  in American Political Development 25, no. 1 (2011): 1-26. Gramm, Marshall Gramm, Phil. â€Å"The Free Silver Movement in America: A Reinterpretation.† The Journal of Economic History 64, no. 4 (2004): 1108-1129. Nelson, Graig. Rocket Men: The Epic Story of the First Men o n the Moon. New York: Viking, 2009. Rasmussen, Mikkel. â€Å"The History of a Lesson: Versailles, Munich and the Social Construction of the Past.†Review of International Studies 29, no.5 (2003): 499–519. Rusbridger, James Nave, Eric. Betrayal at Pearl Harbor: How Churchill Lured  Roosevelt into War. London: Michael O’Mara, 1991. Toland, John. Infamy: Pearl Harbor und It’s Aftermath. Garden City, N.Y: Doubleday, 1982. Trachtenberg, Marc. â€Å"Versailles after Sixty Years.† Journal of Contemporary  History 17, no. 3 (1982): 487-506. Footnotes 1 Samuel DeCanio, â€Å"Populism, Paranoia, and the Politics of Free Silver.† Studies in American Political Development 25, no. 1 (2011): 3. 2 Marshall Gramm Phil.Gramm, â€Å"The Free Silver Movement in America: A Reinterpretation.† The Journal of Economic History 64, no. 4 (2004): 1127. 3 Marc Trachtenberg, â€Å"Versailles after Sixty Years.†Journal of Contemporary History 17, no. 3 (1982): 493. 4 Mikkel Rasmussen, â€Å"The History of a Lesson: Versailles, Munich and the Social Construction of the Past.† Review of International Studies 29, no.5 (2003): 508. 5 John Toland, Infamy: Pearl Harbor and it’s Aftermath (Garden City, N.Y: Doubleday, 1982), 32. 6 James Bowen, Despite Pearl Harbor, America Adopts a ‘Germany first’ Strategy. 7 James Rusbridger Eric Nave, Betrayal at Pearl Harbor: How Churchill Lured Roosvelt into War (London: Michael O’Mara, 1991), 45. 8 Graig Nelson, Rocket Men: The Epic Story of the First Men on the Moon (New York: Viking, 2009), 13. 9 Matthew, Brzezinski, Red Moon Rising: Sputnik and the Hidden Rivalries that Ignited the Space Race (New York: Times Books – Henry Holt and Co., 2007), 92. 10 Tom Crouch. Aiming for the Stars: The Dreamers and Doers of the Space Age (Washington: Smithsonian Institution Press, 1999), 310. This essay on American History since 1865 was written and submitted by user Rodolfo O. to help you with your own studies. You are free to use it for research and reference purposes in order to write your own paper; however, you must cite it accordingly. You can donate your paper here.