What Roosevelt and Turner had noticed was a fact not just about the United States, but about the world. For industrializing societies, the nineteenth century had been one of relatively easy expansion. The United States spread west, Russia spread east, and the European powers turned south, toward colonies in Asia and Africa. Yet by the century’s end, it looked finished. Indian Country had been ground down to a small nub, Africa was carved up, and even the Pacific islands, save some in the far south, were under the flag of distant governments. Add into the accounting such areas as Latin America,
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