American Empires: Past and Present* (Critical Essay‪)‬

OF COURSE, MANY AMERICANS DENY THEY ever had an empire. But this is not unique. So did many nineteenth-century Brits, for whom the term also possessed negative connotations. They said they were only spreading freedom around the world. Since British history textbooks of the time had as their main theme the growth of freedom, most of them took the American side in the War of Independence (Porter 2005:66-72). Of course, British actions often differed from rhetoric. Prime Minister Gladstone was a noted anti-imperialist, an upholder of "the rights of the savage," but under his administrations the Empire expanded more than under his supposedly proimperial predecessor Disraeli. So to equate empire with freedom, or to avoid the word while doing empire, is nothing new. CONCEPTS AND THEORIES