idening their boundaries; grasping at promised riches. Unlike
other peoples they have accomplished the task without any real
opposition. Their "promised land" lay all about them, isolated from the
factional warfare of Europe; virgin; awaiting the master of the Western
World.

The United States has followed the path of empire with a facility
unexampled in recent history. When has a people, caught in the net of
imperialism, encountered less difficulty in making its imperial dream
come true? None of the foes that the American people have encountered,
in two centuries of expansion, have been worthy of the name. The Indians
were in no position to withstand the onslaught of the Whites. The
Mexicans were even less competent to defend themselves. The Spanish
Empire crumpled, under attack, like an autumn leaf under the heel of a
hunter. Practically for the taking, the American people secured a
richly-stocked, compact region, with an area of three millions of square
miles--the ideal site for the foundation of a modern civilization.

The area of the United States has increased with marvelous rapidity. At
the outbreak of the Revolution (1776) the Colonies claimed a territory
of 369,000 square miles. The Northwest Territory (275,000 square miles)
and the area south of the Ohio River (205,000 square miles) were added
largely as a result of the negotiations in 1782. The official figures
for 1800 give the total area of the United States as 892,135 square
miles. The Louisiana Purchase (1803) added 885,000 square miles at a
cost of 15 millions of dollars. Florida, 59,600 square miles, was
purchased from Spain (1819) for 5 millions of dollars; Texas, 389,000
square miles was annexed in 1845; the Oregon Country, 285,000 square
miles, was secured by treaty in 1846; New Mexico and California, 529,000
square miles, were ceded by Spain (1848) and a payment of 15 millions
was made by the United States; in 1853 the Gadsen Purchase added 30,000
square miles at a cost of ten millions of dollars. This completed the
territorial possessions of the United States on the mainland (with the
exception of Alaska) making a continental area of 3,026,798 square
miles. Between 1776 and 1853 the area of the United States was increased
more than eight fold. What other nation has been in a position to
multiply its home territory by eight in two generations?

These vast additions to the continental possessions of the United States
were made as the result of a tr