According to the Oxford English Dictionary, “Manifest Destiny” is defined as “the 19th century doctrine or belief that the expansion of the United States into all the American continents was justified and inevitable” (Manifest). It's easy to see how this thinking influenced the people and events of this era, and it's hard to find another era (despite the fact that Manifest Destiny is a 19th century event) that displays more similar thinking. In our reading this week, manifest destiny was evident in many of the events that occurred. Say no to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on "Why Violent Video Games Shouldn't Be Banned"? Get an Original Essay First, and probably most noticeably, 19th-century Americans were influenced by Manifest Destiny thinking in their efforts against Native Americans. The conflicts, in their essence, were due to the fact that Native Americans, according to our textbook, occupied “the very same land that white Americans wanted” (Ripper 170). Because, as the doctrine of Manifest Destiny enunciated, at least in their minds, Americans felt that the land was rightfully theirs and that Native Americans represented troublesome obstacles to their deserved destiny; Men and women known colloquially as “Long Knives” “believed that the Indians were a nuisance best driven away” (Ripper 173). In fact, 19th century white Americans were willing to do anything to get that land, including signing questionable treaties that gave them “legal right” to their land (Ripper 171). Besides being inevitable in the eyes of Americans, they justified it in many ways. Hypocritically, as evidenced by Jackson's thought processes, the Americans believed they were doing so for the benefit of the Native Americans and that "no one can indulge a friendlier feeling than I [Jackson]", but in reality the thinking was more along the lines of what Jackson said in our textbook, "The Cherokee [and all Indian tribes by extension] 'have neither the intelligence, industry, moral habits, nor the desire for improvement which are essential to any favorable change in their condition" (Ripper 192, 193) which was actually the thinking behind the Indian Removal Act. Since expansion across North America was inevitable, to white Americans Native Americans had no right to be there and they could rightfully be removed by any means necessary. Finally, although it did not involve land conquests, the thinking behind the doctrine of Manifest Destiny also influenced slavery in the 19th century. In the case of Harriet Jacobs, her owner, James Norcom considered her property and needed to control every aspect of her life. Manifest Destiny states that it was destiny for Americans to conquer the continent, including all the property there, which to them meant slaves. In our textbook it says that Norcom "regarded her as uncooperative property, as someone who would have to do whatever she asked" (Ripper 224). According to the article “Manifest Destiny and the Pacific” by Dan E. Clark, a historian, noted that Manifest Destiny included a heavenly mandate as if God himself had designated white people as masters of the earth. Thus, it is thought that they were superior to all other races living there, so slaves who disobeyed their masters were by extension also disobeying a heavenly command. In his quest to control all aspects of Jacobs' life, Norcom also took it upon himself to possess her children and use them as bargaining chips to manipulate her (Ripper 225). Furthermore, in the case of Solomon Northup, it was 234).?