The Battleship of Maine: For Educators

Song #5 from Teacher's Guide: The Story of the United States in 12 Songs

Contents

• • Audio Investigation Slide
  • Recommendations
  • Vocabulary
  • Additional Resources

Recommendations

This song is useful in introducing a unit on imperialism or a lesson on the Spanish-American War.

After students share their responses to the second set of questions and you provide the additional information and any clarification necessary, you can ask them whether the reasons they listed for countries going to war and for citizens volunteering to fight are reflected in the lyrics. Reviewing the reasons they identified and comparing them with the story as told in the song can create a foundation for explaining the concept of vital national interests and the role it plays in determining a nation’s foreign policy as a prelude to discussing the United States’ emergence as an imperialist world power in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Content to cover as it pertains to the conditions in this period includes the shift to a more industrially-based economy, the desire for cheap, abundant raw materials, protection of existing economic interests abroad, cementing hemispheric dominance, and expanding influence as a world power. This will enable students to see the big picture more clearly and to distinguish between the public’s perception of the immediate causes of the war and the underlying causes that drove McKinley’s actions in his negotiations with Spain for Cuba’s independence and Congress’ ultimate decision directly. Additionally, encourage students to think about the imperialist period in terms of the continuity and change over time in American foreign policy that it reflects.

Public perception of foreign and domestic affairs, as well as of the motives and actions of their government, is important nonetheless and warrants attention when covering this period, and the lyrics provide an opportunity to explore the significance of those perceptions more closely. In the song, the soldier enlists in response to the president’s request for volunteers and expresses hope that he will be honored for his efforts after the war’s end. This suggests a sense of patriotism and duty, as well as belief in the righteousness of the country’s cause, both of which, likely, were part of students’ responses. (You may find it helpful here to ask students to define patriotism and, if necessary, help them to refine the definition, as it will be useful as you proceed through the unit to contrast patriotism with nationalism.) At the same time, the soldier’s unwillingness to fight, his inclination to flee, and the repetition of the “Battleship of Maine” as the cause of the war contradict those initial ideas. This is an opportunity for students to use what they have learned about the United States’ vital national interests to consider and discuss what this contradiction might imply about the perceptions of both the public and soldiers about the righteousness of the ostensible cause and the underlying causes of the war. This can set the stage for future lessons about the annexation of Hawaii, the acquisition of Puerto Rico and Guam, and the Philippine-American War, as well as pro- and anti-imperialist public sentiment.