Imperialism is known to be the economic and political domination of a stronger nation over weaker ones. To many people the United States of America has been an empire from the start. From when the first Europeans arrived who became Americans who wanted to expand westward and conquer territories by pushing the Native Americans out, to when Mexico lost their sovereignty in 1848. These were all acts of imperialism. However, empires from the late 19th century and early 20th century were different because America would rule other places but not settle in them or remove the Native people.
In the 1880's the United States felt like Europe was their competition economically and military wise. The United States also felt like Europe was culturally superior which convinced Americans that the United States should become a world power. A major cause for American imperialism was economics because it needed places to sell what it was producing. The United States wanted to have markets overseas to keep its economy strong. American was also in a decade of crisis. The inundation of more immigrants and crowded cities worried the U.S. on what would become of the country's future. Also a British bank failure in 1893 caused the U.S. to fall into an economic depression. This caused 1500 business failures and an unemployment of 17%. Imperialism was used to help the United States get out of its economic depression. .
In 1890, captain Alfred Thayer Mahan published The Influence of Sea Power upon History, 1660–1783 and argued to be a great power the U.S. needed to control the seas and dominate international commerce. He helped build public support for the idea that the U.S. needed a large fleets of ships to trade around the world and a larger Navy. Support from influential government officials convinced congress authorize the making of a much larger Navy. When looking markets overseas the U.S. looked at the Pacific.