By: Paige Shrum

The Monroe Doctrine was articulated in President James Monroe's seventh annual message to Congress on December 2, The European powers, according to Monroe, were obligated to respect the Western Hemisphere as the United States' sphere of interest. Monroe Doctrine

The Monroe Doctrine is the best known U.S. policy toward the Western Hemisphere. Buried in a routine annual message delivered to Congress by President James Monroe in December 1823 The doctrine warns European nations that the United States would not tolerate further colonization or puppet monarchs.

Monroe Doctrine The Monroe Doctrine was invoked in 1865 when the U.S. government exerted diplomatic and military pressure in support of the Mexican President Benito Juárez. In 1895, Grover Cleveland attempted to invoke the Monroe Doctrine to compel the British to accept arbitration in a border dispute between Venezuela and British Guiana

Monroe Doctrine In 1962, the Monroe Doctrine was invoked symbolically when the Soviet Union began to build missile-launching sites in Cuba. Theodore Roosevelt devised what became known as the Roosevelt Corollary to the Monroe Doctrine. In it, Roosevelt acknowledged that at times, chaos in a small country could necessarily lead to the intervention of a great power, and that in the Western Hemisphere, that great power would always be the United States.

Monroe Doctrine The countries of Latin America found that they had much more reason to fear intervention by the United States than by any European power.

19 th Century * US pushes Spain to relinquish its claim to Florida, which becomes a territory of the US * Anglo-American settlers in Texas revolt against Mexico, establish an independent nation, and finally join the United States. 1840s * Rise of Manifest Destiny, the belief by many Americans that westward and outward expansionism represented God's plan for the nation * US mobilizes troops along the Mexican border as a threat to the French occupying army of Louis Napoleon, whose troops arrived there in * Spanish-American War / US intervention in Cuba US takes control of Puerto Rico, Guam, and the Philippines.

20 th Century * Under the Platt Amendment, US forces occupy Cuba and direct its political and economic development * US Marines intervene in Haiti * US army lands in Panama to protect United Fruit plantations * US Marines occupy Nicaragua and fight against the nationalistic forces led by Augusto Cesar Sandino * CIA overthrows constitutional government of Jacobo Arbenz in Guatemala.

20 th Century Cont * US forces, fearing a Communist takeover, occupy Dominican Republic * Reagan orders US forces to invade the island of Grenada to halt Cuban work on an airstrip. 12/1989 * George Bush orders "Operation Just Cause," the invasion of Panama to capture CIA collaborator and dictator Manuel Noriega. 1990s * High levels of drug trafficking, massive foreign debt, economic dependency, rain forest and coral reef destruction, illegal immigration to the US, and other problems continue to face the US and Latin America.