Against Empire: The Anti-Imperialist Reader: Patriotic Dissent for America's 250th

On the 250th anniversary of the Declaration of Independence, one question remains unanswered: what happened when the republic became an empire?

In 1898 the United States went to war to free Cuba from an empire, and ended the year ruling the Philippines by force. A republic born in revolt against empire now had to decide whether to become one. The opposition came not from the fringes but from the summit of American life: a former president, the richest man in the country, a Harvard philosopher, a founder of the NAACP, and the most famous writer alive. They and many others formed the American Anti-Imperialist League, and they were certain they were not betraying the republic but defending it.

Against Empire gathers the fiercest essays, speeches, satires, and poems of that fight. Here is Mark Twain deploying his devastating wit against the “Blessings-of-Civilization Trust.” Here are Carl Schurz, Andrew Carnegie, William James, Jane Addams, and W. E. B. Du Bois turning the founders’ own words against the empire-builders, warning that the force it takes to rule subject peoples abroad will inevitably hollow out the Constitution at home.

This edition adds the voices rarely heard in American anthologies: the Filipino leaders Emilio Aguinaldo and Apolinario Mabini, writing from the receiving end of empire. Their testimonies, newly translated from the original Spanish for this volume, stand as the ultimate verdict on the imperial debate.

This original Time Warp Edition includes:

• A critical introduction: “Patriotic Dissent is the Highest Form of Loyalty”

• First new English translations of Filipino anti-imperialist writings

• A biographical directory of all 22 contributors

• A historical timeline of the anti-imperialist movement, 1898–1920

• Annotations and a closing essay tracing American empire from 1898 to today

For readers of Stephen Kinzer’s The True Flag, Daniel Immerwahr’s How to Hide an Empire, and Howard Zinn’s A People’s History of the United States, and for anyone asking what the 250th anniversary of the Declaration of Independence actually demands of a free people.

Recover the patriotism the anniversary forgot.