De Lôme Letter

The first page of the De Lôme Letter.

The last page of the letter.

The De Lôme Letter, which set off an 1898 diplomatic incident, was written by Enrique Dupuy de Lôme, the Spanish Minister with the Portfolio of Cuba. In a personal letter, which was stolen despite being under diplomatic protection, he referred to the US President : "...McKinley is weak and catering to the rabble and, besides, a low politician who desires to leave a door open to himself and to stand well with the jingos of his party." On February 9, 1898, the letter was published in the New York Journal, headlining it "the end of the world started this day ".^{[citation needed]}

This event fired up an otherwise inactive President McKinley and helped stir public sentiment in favor of the Cuban Junta and against the Spanish, and is seen as one of the principal triggers of the Spanish-American War of 1898.

Aftermaths

Whilst the State Department was demanding for De Lôme's dismissal, De Lôme had already cabled his resignation to Madrid.^{[citation needed]} United States officials realized that what Yellow journalism had construed of the De Lôme letter were to a large extent, mere exaggerations of a comic diplomatic blunder.^{[citation needed]} The leaking of the De Lôme letter is often attributed as one of the key events leading to the Spanish-American War.^{[citation needed]}

See also

• Yellow journalism
• William Randolph Hearst
• Joseph Pulitzer

Sources

• Centennial Website
• The Great Republic by Master Historians
• W.A. Swanberg, from Citizen Hearst: A biography of William Randolph Hearst: (Charles Scribner's Sons, 1961)

External links

• OurDocuments.gov
• Engaging Students in American History