It is impossible to try and put up really nice airs about US imperialism. At the time the United States was completely open about imperialism.
The New York Evening Post wrote:There is no question that our men do 'shoot N*****' somewhat in the sporting spirit, but that is because war and their environments have rubbed off the thin veneer of civilization...Undoubtedly, they do not regard the shooting of Filipinos just as they would the shooting of white troops. This is partly because they are "only N*****," and partly because they despise them for their treacherous servility...The soldiers feel they are fighting with savages, not with soldiers."
Boston Herald wrote:Our troops in the Philippines...look upon all Filipinos as of one race and condition, and being dark men, they are therefore 'N*****,' and entitled to all the contempt and harsh treatment administered by white overlords to the most inferior races.
Hell, the
Anti-Imperial League was specifically founded specifically to oppose the United States getting involved with the Philippines.
Later there were attempts to make this into a Jeffersonian ideal of, "The Empire of Liberty." Two problems with that—the concept was from Citizen Genet in an attempt to tie the American Republic and the French Republic into a single unit as much as possible. Something that Jefferson did support, while Hamilton opposed it as he wanted into that sweet British Empire's market. In neither case were they at all espousing any kind of anti-imperialism as we think about it.
Incidentally, despite conservative's lies to the contrary, Jefferson enthusiastically endorsed the Reign of Terror by the French Republican government in murdering its own citizens that weren't enthusiastic enough about the republic:
Jefferson wrote: The tone of your letters had for some time given me pain,3 on account of the extreme warmth with which they censured the proceedings of the Jacobins of France. I considered that sect as the same with the Republican patriots, and the Feuillants as the Monarchical patriots, well known in the early part of the revolution, and but little distant in their views, both having in object the establishment of a free constitution, and differing only on the question whether their chief Executive should be hereditary or not. The Jacobins (as since called) yeilded to the Feuillants and tried the experiment of retaining their hereditary Executive. The experiment failed completely, and would have brought on the reestablishment of despotism had it been pursued. The Jacobins saw this, and that the expunging that officer was of absolute necessity, and the Nation was with them in opinion, for however they might have been formerly for the constitution framed by the first assembly, they were come over from their hope in it, and were now generally Jacobins. In the struggle which was necessary, many guilty persons fell without the forms of trial, and with them some innocent. These I deplore as much as any body, and shall deplore some of them to the day of my death. But I deplore them as I should have done had they fallen in battle. It was necessary to use the arm of the people, a machine not quite so blind as balls and bombs, but blind to a certain degree. A few of their cordial friends met at their hands the fate of enemies. But time and truth will rescue and embalm their memories, while their posterity will be enjoying that very liberty for which they would never have hesitated to offer up their lives. The liberty of the whole earth was depending on the issue of the contest, and was ever such a prize won with so little innocent blood? My own affections have been deeply wounded by some of the martyrs to this cause, but rather than it should have failed, I would have seen half the earth desolated. Were there but an Adam and an Eve left in every country, and left free, it would be better than as it now is. I have expressed to you my sentiments, because they are really those of 99 in an hundred of our citizens. The universal feasts, and rejoicings which have lately been had on account of the successes of the French shewed the genuine effusions of their hearts. You have been wounded by the sufferings of your friends, and have by this circumstance been hurried into a temper of mind which would be extremely disrelished if known to your countrymen.
"Adam and Eve" and, "The Tree of Liberty," are usually used by stupid reactionaries for the opposite reason in an Orwellian attempt to get the stupid on board.
But, more on track, this was Jefferson's endorsement of an Empire of Liberty that included the French Empire. It was not, in any way, an anti-imperial stance.
There is no American exceptionalism. For that matter, there's no European exceptionalism. There is
capitalism.
Kicking out the Americans is a good start for the Philippines.
But they're going to have to follow it up with the guillotine for their own bankers, businessmen, and other traitors as Jefferson hinted at.
With apologies to
James Connolly, if you remove the American army tomorrow and hoist the three stars and a sun over Manila, unless you set about the organization of the Socialist Republic your efforts would be in vain.
Alis Volat Propriis; Tiocfaidh ár lá; Proletarier Aller Länder, Vereinigt Euch!