By Scott Lively
Published March 21, 2022 at 7:03pm
In 1823, when the emperor of Tzarist Russia invited the United States to negotiate a resolution of contested coastal lands along the northwest of the North American continent, President James Monroe responded with a proclamation in an address to Congress that would forever-after be called the Monroe Doctrine. In his own words, he said that when "the rights and interests of the United States are involved … the American continents … are henceforth not to be considered as subjects for future colonization by any European powers. … We owe it, therefore, to candor and to the amicable relations existing between the United States and those powers to declare that we should consider any attempt on their part to extend their system to any portion of this hemisphere as dangerous to our peace and safety."
Our official government summary of the Monroe Doctrine adds that "the doctrine warns European nations that the United States would not tolerate further colonization or puppet monarchs. … [emphasis mine]
"[I]n 1904, European creditors of a number of Latin American countries threatened armed intervention to collect debts. President Theodore Roosevelt promptly proclaimed the right of the United States to exercise an 'international police power' to curb such 'chronic wrongdoing,' in his so-called Roosevelt Corollary (or extension) to the Monroe Doctrine.