1. Manifesting Destiny through Art Link to analysis handout

3. Whose Destiny? Native American Lands in US History

4. John Gast, “American Progress,” 1872
Gast painted this image for an travel guide to the Pacific Coast

5. Frances F. Palmer, “Across the Continent,” 1869
Frances F. Palmer created this hand-colored lithograph during the construction of the nation’s first transcontinental railroad, which established a route from the Atlantic to the Pacific in 1869.

6. Frank Triplett, “The March of Destiny” from Conquering the Wilderness, 1883
Frontispiece of Frank Triplett’s illustrated history of the United States, featuring “the romantic deeds, lofty achievements, and marvelous adventures” of figures such as Daniel Boone and Davy Crockett.

7. Emanuel Gottlieb Leutze, Westward the Course of Empire Takes Its Way, 1862
Leutze was a German immigrant who is also known for his painting “Washington Crossing the Delaware,” portraying General Washington’s surprise attack on mercenaries in Trenton on Christmas Eve, 1776.

8. Albert Bierstadt, Oregon Trail (Campfire ), 1863

9. Part II: Before Destiny Manifested
What similarities and differences do you notice between the images in part 1 and the images in part 2?
What might account for or explain both similarities and differences in the images?

10. Map of the Plains Indians, Smithsonian

11. Karl Bodmer, “Indians Hunting the Bison,” 1836
Artist Karl Bodmer traveled up the Missouri River in 1834, in the company of a German prince. He observed the buffalo hunt, an essential activity of the Plains tribes in the nineteenth century.

12. Vaquero (Cowboy), 1830

13. “Carta agricola [Agricultura l Map],” 1885
Antonio García Cubas,
“Carta agricola [Agricultura l Map],” 1885
Agricultural Map. Plate VIII in the Picturesque and Historical Atlas of the United Mexican States. The atlas portrays Mexico’s natural resources in addition to political and cultural institutions.

14. Antonio García Cubas, “Carta agricola [Agricultural Map],” 1885
Detail of La Siembra (sowing) and La Cosecha (harvesting).

15. Seth Eastman (US Army), “Pueblo of Zuni New Mexico,” 1853

16. Part III: Manifest Destiny in US Literature
John O’Sullivan, "The Great Nation of Futurity," 1839.
In moral, political, and national life, we may confidently assume that our country is destined to be the great nation of futurity...We are the nation of progress, of individual freedom, of universal enfranchisement. Our future history will be to establish on earth the moral dignity and salvation of man -- the undeniable truth and goodness of God. America has been chosen for this mission among all the nations of the world, which are shut out from the life-giving light of truth. Her high example shall put an end to the tyranny of kings, and carry the happy news of peace and good will to millions who now endure an existence hardly better than that of beasts of the field. Who, then, can doubt that our country is destined to be the great nation of the future?
New York Herald, 1844
"The fact must no longer be disguised, that we, the people of the United States must hold, and govern, under free and harmonious institutions, the continent we inhabit."
Charles Wilkes, commander of the 1841 United States Pacific Exploring Expedition, on California
“This future state is admirably situated to become a powerful maritime nation possessed as it must be by the Anglo-Norman race, and having none to enter into rivalry with it but the indolent inhabitants of warm climates, is evidently destined to fill a large space in the world's future history."
John O’Sullivan, “American Claims to Oregon,” December 1845
“The American claim is by right of our manifest destiny to overspread and to possess the whole of the continent which Providence has given us for the development of the great experiment of liberty and our democratic government entrusted to us. It is a right such as that of the tree to the space of air and earth suitable for the full expansion of its principle and destiny of growth. It is in our future far more than in our past or in the past history of Spanish exploration…that our true title is found.”

17. Part III: Manifest Destiny in US Literature
Senator Thomas Hart Benton on Manifest Destiny (1846)
It would seem that the White race alone received the divine command, to subdue and replenish the earth: for it is the only race that has obeyed it-the only race that hunts out new and distant lands, and even a New World, to subdue and replenish…
The Red race has disappeared from the Atlantic coast; the tribes that resisted civilization met extinction. This is a cause of lamentation with many… Civilization, or extinction, has been the fate of all people who have found themselves in the trace of the advancing Whites, and civilization, always the preference of the Whites, has been pressed as an object, while extinction has followed as a consequence of its resistance…
The White race will take the ascendant, elevating what is susceptible of improvement-wearing out what is not… And thus the youngest people, and the newest land, will become the reviver and the regenerator of the oldest…
Editor, Baltimore American, 1846
“The commerce of the world is to be ours, and both oceans are to be subject to us. The splendors of Eastern cities which grew into greatness . . will shine but dimly an compared with the stately magnificence and colossal structure of the cities which are to concentrate the rich elements of the Valley of the Mississippi under the culture of a people who for enterprise, energy, and invention have no superiors—we may say no equals. "
Walt Whitman, Editorial, Brooklyn Daily Eagle, July 7, 1846.
"We love to indulge in thoughts of the future extent and power of this Republic--because with its increase is the increase of human happiness and liberty What had miserable, inefficient Mexico-- with her superstition, her burlesques upon freedom, her actual tyranny by the few over the many--what has she to do with the great mission of people in the New World with a noble race? Be it ours, to achieve that mission! Be it ours to roll down all the upstart leaven of old despotism, that comes our way!"
Daniel Dickerson, U.S. Senator (N.Y.) in a speech before Congress January 12, 1848.
"But the tide of emigration and the course of empire have since been westward. Cities and towns have sprung up upon the shores of the Pacific Nor have we yet filled the destiny allotted us. New territory is spread out for us to subdue and fertilize; new races are presented for us to civilize, educate and absorb; new triumphs for us to achieve for the cause of freedom. North America presents to the eye one great geographical system . . .; it is soon to become the commercial center of the world. And the period is by no means remote, when man yielding to ... laws more potent than those which prescribe artificial boundaries, will ordain it (North America) shall be united ... in one political system, and that, a free, confederated, self-governed Republic."