MANIFEST DESTINY

MANIFEST DESTINY: translation

This term, which may have originated with John L. O’Sullivan’s 1839 treatise Manifest Destiny, refers to a concept that is a basic subtext of all Westerns from the classic and silent eras: that because the United States was blessed and chosen by God to be a blessed nation, it was manifestly destined to march forth across the entire continent and transform the frontier from red savagery to white civilization. In virtually every instance of cinema contact between Native Americans and whites prior to Dances with Wolves(1990), it is assumed that the whites are right in subduing and displacing the Native Americans. Any character who aids Native Americans in their fight against whites is considered an evil person of the worst sort. Thus, gunrunners, as in The Plainsman (1936), They Died with Their Boots On (1941), or The Man from Laramie (1955), are automatically seen as despicable, while the white cavalry with its abundance of weaponry is hailed as heroic.

See also FRONTIER AS ESCAPE FROM THE CITY.