The United States in Central America, 1860-1911: Episodes of Social Imperialism and Imperial Rivalry in the World System (review)

356CIVIL WAR HISTORY military practices, logistics and communications. It then proceeds with chronological day-by-day entries, although not every day in the period 1861 through 1865 is documented. Like E. B. and Barbara Long's monumental work, Denney outlines the main events of each day. but he goes beyond the Longs by providing biographical sketches of military and civilian leaders and descriptions of ordinance. This unusual format provides a wealth of information but also becomes unwieldy. Information such as Joe Johnston's death is needlessly repeated (10, 38); events, such as the 1862 cabinet crisis, are poorly explained (244-46); errors, such as Stephen A. Douglas's burial in Springfield instead of Chicago (49), often mar this tome. The author does not mince words when describing the ability of individuals . George B. McClellan was "a legend in his own mind" (66); Henry Halleck was "a fusspot, a procrastinator, an envious man, and a fairly good administrator" (193); and Edwin M. Stanton "would draw much criticism during his tenure as Secretary of War, much of it deserved" (1 13). By compressing complex events into brief entries, traditional interpretations replace recent historiography. For example, Denney argues that the Emancipation Proclamation did not free a single slave and was issued for foreign policy effect . But Mark E. Neely, Jr., and James M. McPherson have effectively called into question these views, arguing that the proclamation was a domestic policy initiative formulated to emancipate slaves. Given the sheer mass of information, this books contains something of interest for everyone. Thomas Schwartz Illinois State Historical Library The United States in Central America, 1860-1911: Episodes ofSocial Imperialism and Imperial Rivalry in the World System. By Thomas D. Schoonover. (Durham: Duke University Press, 1991. Pp. 253. $32.50.) Reading this work in the wake of the Reagan-era interventions in Central America is a sobering experience. Just as in more recent times, when the region and its problems, vastly overstated as "strategic threats," can be seen as a bone thrown to the far Right, Schoonover shows how groups denied full power in domestic society (especially ex-Confederate statesmen such as G. M. Williamson) would be put in charge of shaping U.S. policy toward and actions in the region. If Southern expansionism in the postbellum period in history repeated as tragedy in Central America, then for all of its tragic local consequences the more recent "episode" must surely qualify as farce. The major analytical threads of this collection of "episodes" or vignettes are: 1) the role of Southern statesmen in forming U.S. policy in the region; 2) the outrageously racist behavior of U.S. diplomats and investors toward both the "locals" and expatriate U.S. blacks residing there; 3) the self- BOOK reviews357 serving definition of U.S. interests as not only contrary to European commercial dominance but also synonymous with local development needs; and 4) the difficulties the U.S. faced in dealing with the anti-Americanism that logically followed such self-indulgent rationalizing. Readers of this journal will probably find of greatest interest Schoonover's descriptions of Southern diplomats and his statistics on Gulf Coast trade with Central America, rather than his appendix attacking the U.S. "exceptionalist " tradition and the historiography on the King Cotton question. Indeed, while one recognizes that the strength of traditionalist, consensual, and exceptionalist tendencies within U.S. diplomatic historiography require direct attack, the author is given to repeating the same points within several of the different chapters or episodes. Virtually no Latin American historian would doubt the reality of what the author calls "social imperialism" (the export of both surplus goods and people to relieve domestic crises) and "imperial rivalry " (an inability to recognize the imperialist distortions one's own society brings to a client state, while denouncing similar intent on the part of one's rivals; the basis of both policymakers' delusions and the naively "exceptionalist " tradition). However, the frequent repetition of these claims/passages suggests quite the contrary in U.S. diplomatic history circles, at least according to Schoonover. Central Americanists will await the promised monographs on U.S., French, and German commercial relations with the region. While these case studies are of considerable interest...