jan 1, 1889 - Latin America: Pan-American Conference

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Continuing on the Monroe Doctrine’s positioning of the U.S. as a protector of the republics of the Western Hemisphere, Secretary of State James G Blaine helped organize the meeting of the first Pan-American Conference in Washington in 1889 which brought together leaders from all over the American continents. The representatives at the conference decided to create an international organization to facilitate collaboration on issues like trade. The organization was named the Pan-American Union, and it still exists today as a part of the Organization of American States (est. 1948). However, one of Blaine’s key objectives of cooperatively reducing tariffs did not come to fruition during this first conference.

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