Open Door Policy in China: spheres of influence; Boxer Rebellion; Hay’s second round of notes (nov 2, 1899 – sep 7, 1901)

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In the 1890s, McKinley’s secretary of state, John Hay, grew concerned that foreign powers were establishing exclusive trading ports and regions in China known as “spheres of influence.” Fearing that the U.S. might become locked out of trade with China, Hay asked other nations to adopt an Open Door Policy in which all nations would share equal rights for trading with China – and although the nations didn’t really accept this proposal, they also didn’t reject it completely, so Hay declared the Open Door Policy a triumph anyway. In 1900, a secret society of Chinese nationalists, angered by the growing influence of foreign powers, started an uprising that became known as the Boxer Rebellion in which many foreign settlers and missionaries were attacked. The rebellion was quickly shut down by an international force that included some American soldiers and China was forced to pay out compensations to the foreign nations that were afflicted by the uprising. Fearing that this international force might try to take advantage of (and subjugate) the weakened Chinese empire, Hay sent out a second round of notes in which he pledged that the U.S. was devoted to conserving the integrity of China’s territory and to protect the equal share of trade with all of China. While his notes set the important precedent of the United States’ Open Door Policy (which would define U.S. relations with Japan just a couple decades later), it did not deter European countries from pouncing on China like scavengers so much as the nations’ own internal rivalries did.

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