With Sails Whitening Every Sea

Many Americans in the Early Republic era saw the seas as another field for national aggrandizement. With a merchant marine that competed against Britain for commercial supremacy and a whaling fleet that circled the globe, the United States sought a maritime empire to complement its territorial ambitions in North America. In With Sails Whitening Every Sea , Brian Rouleau argues that because of their ubiquity in foreign ports, American sailors were the principal agents of overseas foreign relation