<P> The Kingdom of Hawaii was closely linked by missionary work and trade to the U.S. by the 1880s . In 1893 business leaders overthrew the Queen of Hawaii and sought annexation . President Grover Cleveland strongly disapproved, so Hawaii set up an independent republic, the Republic of Hawaii . Southern Democrats in Congress strongly opposed a non-white addition . President William McKinley, a Republican, secured a Congressional resolution in 1898, and the small republic joined the U.S. All its citizens became full U.S. citizens . One factor was the need for advanced naval bases to fend off Japanese ambitions . The Hawaiian Islands officially became an incorporated territory of the U.S. in 1900 . Following 94% voter approval of the Admission of Hawaii Act, on August 21, 1959 the Territory of Hawaii became the state of Hawaii, the 50th state . </P> <P> With Hawaii came two remote coral atolls: the Palmyra Atoll which had been annexed by the U.S. in 1859, abandoned, then claimed in 1862 by the Kingdom of Hawaii, and the Stewart Islands, which had joined the Kingdom a few years before Palmyra . At Hawaiian statehood in 1959, Palmyra and arguably the Stewarts were excluded from the new state . Palmyra remained an incorporated U.S. territory, while the Stewarts were claimed and are now controlled by the Solomon Islands . </P> <P> Puerto Rico, Guam, and the Philippines (for which the United States compensated Spain $20 million, equivalent to $588 million in present - day terms), were ceded by Spain after the Spanish--American War in the 1898 Treaty of Paris . Spain relinquished all claim of sovereignty over Cuba, but did not cede it to the United States, so it became a protectorate . All four of these areas were under United States Military Government (USMG) for extended periods . Cuba became an independent nation in 1902, and the Philippines became an independent nation in 1946 . </P> <P> This era also saw the first scattered protests against American imperialism . Noted Americans such as Mark Twain spoke out forcefully against these ventures . Opponents of the war, including Twain and Andrew Carnegie, organized themselves into the American Anti-Imperialist League . </P>

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