Manifest Destiny
TL;DR — O’Sullivan’s 1839 essay — the argument for American expansion, from the man who named it.
⬇ Download the archived copy — kept here so the document survives its source going dark. Public domain by age (pre-1929).
1839. “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…”
O’Sullivan argues American expansion as a moral consequence of the founding principle rather than as conquest — which is what made the doctrine so durable and so useful.
The primary source under a phrase everyone uses and few have read. Filed alongside Manifest Destiny — Primary Document Worksheet, which pairs it with Melish’s map.
Where this came from
2 pages. A copy is archived locally against link rot; the header links the original source.