NATIONALISM AND THE THOUGHT OF THE GREAT NATION
Nationalism is the patriotism that to love of country and willingness to sacrifice for it, and is a term referring to a doctrine or political movement which holds that a nation, usually defined in terms of ethnicity or culture. According to John L. O’Sullivan who is the one of the best nationalism’s advocates, nationalism is an emotion that is stronger than all these definitions.
O’Sullivan was an American columnist and editor and born on the North Atlantic Ocean during the War of 1812. He believed that God had given the United States a mission to spread republican democracy. His writing which is The Great Nation of Futurity supports this thought, it is about United states is the great nation as democracy and government because of America’s basic differences against to other countries. Well, what are these basic differences? First of all, The American people having derived their origin from many other nations, and the Declaration of National Independence being entirely based on the great principle of human equality, these facts demonstrate at once their disconnected position as regards any other nation. He states in this document that there is a little connection with the past history of other countries’ history. There is a system so new, not trying until now and which seperated from past. He especially emphasizes that all these differences create the destiny of Amerika, the destiny of being the great nation of futurity.
John L. O’Sullivan was an influential political writer and advocate for the Democratic Party. O'Sullivan's phrase provided a label for sentiments which had become particularly popular during the 1840s, but the ideas themselves were not new. O'Sullivan himself had earlier expressed some of these ideas, notably in an 1839 essay entitled "The Great Nation of Futurity". In 1841, he was elected to the New York State Assambly. This essay appeared in the Democtaric Review and presents a theme eagerly taken up in Congress in the 1840s. It reflects a religious impulse as well as nationalist one-a sense that ‘ God, the republic, and democracy alike demanded that Americans press on west, to setle and civilize, republicanize and democratize. ’ ( Johnson, A History of the American People ).
‘ The Great Nation of Futurity ’ is about generally America’s difference from other countries and that’s why the reason that shows us the destiny of being great nation. At that time-when it was written- O'Sullivan co-founded and served as editor for The United States Magazine and Democtaric Review (generally called the Democratic Review), a highly regarded journal meant to champion Jacksonian Democracy, a movement that had usually been disparaged in the more conservative North American Review. Andrew Jackson was the seventh president of United States and he was the leader of the democratic movement. John O’Sullivan was the advocate of him. In these years, America’s destiny was written by these pioneers.
O’Sullivan, finally stated in his essay that American patriotism is not a land issue or not an ethnicity issue because they consist of all nations, their patriotism includes right of election personaly because of Benjamin Franklin’s thought : ‘ It is the country where live in freedom is my country’.
The Great Nation of Futurity (1839)
By John O’Sullivan
