The dominant view in the early days of the Republic was that the nascent American nation could best serve the cause of democracy by practicing its virtues at home. In the words of Thomas Jefferson, a “just and solid republican government” in America would be “a standing monument and example” for all the peoples of the world.9 A year later, Jefferson returned to the theme that America was, in effect, “acting for all mankind”: …that circumstances denied to others, but indulged to us, have imposed on us the duty of proving what is the degree of freedom and self-government in which a society may
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