The Mikado
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« on: March 19, 2015, 11:34:23 PM » |
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Ernest, while you're right that Congress shot down the proposals to acquire the Dominican Republic and then St. Thomas, President Grant was totally gung-ho about both about the potential for having forward naval bases in the Caribbean in the event of a war with the UK. The worry about the Dominican Republic in Congress was mostly racial because of the size of the territory and the inevitability it'd eventually be a state, a majority-"black" state (yes, Dominicans aren't generally considered black today). Guadeloupe and Martinique are small enough that statehood would never be a question (until the acquisition of the rest of what is now the USVI as one unit).
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