Mark Twain's Weapons of Satire
Mark Twain was the most prominent opponent of the Philippine-American War. In its annual report for 1910, the year he died, the Anti-Imperialist League noted that he "employed in the cause of Anti-Imperialism and in behalf of the Filipino those wonderful weapons of satire which were so absolutely at his command, and the members of the League were able to appreciate what is not yet justly understood: that, more than a brilliant humorist, he was a passionate and zealous reformer." What was "not yet justly understood" in 1910 remains so today. Nearly eclipsed by his deserved but overwhelming reputation as a humorist, Mark Twain's writings on the war are among his least known. His relationship with the Anti-Imperialist League has received even less attention.(1)The Philippine-American War, the United States' first protracted war in Asia, marked the beginning of what Henry Luce would later name the "American Century." When it purchased the Philippines from Spain at the end of the Spanish-American War, the United States held only Manila and its suburbs. The Filipinos, having waged a successful revolution for independence, controlled the rest of the country. To become a major power in Asia, with a naval coaling station in the Philippin
nd had a more significant impact on the United States than the three-month Spanish-American War that preceded it. 30. W. A. Croffut to SLC, Feb. 5, 1901, MTP. Part of this passage was quoted in Foner, Social Critic, 275. On his manipulation of this reaction, see Louis J. Budd, Our Mark Twain: The Making of His Public Personality (Philadelphia: Univ. of Pennsylvania Press, 1983), 165-91. Although they came late in the debate, Mark Twain's statements against the war made an important contribution to the anti-imperialist movement. His most influential article, "To the Person Sitting in Darkness," was published shortly after William McKinley was reelected in a contest widely viewed as a "referendum on imperialism." The essay sparked an intense controversy that revitalized the movement and restored some of the momentum it had lost following the election. The country's leading anti-imperialist newspaper, the Springfield Republican (Mass.), editorialized that "Mark Twain has suddenly become the most influential anti-imperialist and the most dreaded critic of the sacrosanct person in the White House that the country contains." His writings on the war are not only those of a great literary figure, they are those of a great anti-imperialist whose pro
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Approximate Word count = 843
Approximate Pages = 3 (250 words per page double spaced)
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