Were there any famous/important Americans against the idea of Manifest Destiny in the 1800s?

by NSA_Agent_008

Did they gain any support?

Irishfafnir

Well first the obvious example is that the Native peoples of the Americas were generally opposed to the notion of the expansion of the United States (conceived as Protestant and Anglo-Saxon expansion at the time). After all expansion of the United States usually came at the expense of their own land, but you are probably directing your answer to if any famous/important White Americans were opposed to Manifest Destiny. For starters lets look at the first use of the term in 1845.

It is time now for opposition to the annexation of Texas to cease." The integration of Texas into the Union represented "the fulfilment of our manifest destiny to overspread the continent allotted by Providence for the free development of our yearly multiplying millions."

The first use of the term quite clearly refers to territorial expansion sanctioned by God. The problems with identifying who supported and opposed Manifest Destiny is that plenty of American political figures seemed to embrace a similar ideal (like Jefferson and Jackson) well before the creation of the term. Indeed the entire concept of assimilation of the native population rests on a belief in Americans own divine superiority to the native (and for that matter Spanish and Mexican) civilizations. In regards to the territorial expansion of the United States, division among prominent Americans tended to come down along political lines of Whig/Democrat. For those less prominent, religion played a role with territorial expansion often coached in terms of saving the continent from Catholic Mexico whose "cruel,ambitious and licentious priesthood stood ever ready to establish the inquisition".

American Whigs opposed the territorial expansion of the United States, however they promoted their own form of manifest destiny in which the United States still retained a superior civilization that should work to make other states in their own image. Henry Clay sums up this idea well when he wrote a public letter stating

The United States ought to provide its less fortunate sister republics with support, and assume the role of a sublime moral empire, with a mission to diffuse freedom by manifesting its fruits, not to plunder,crush and destroy.

To quote Daniel Walker Howe "Whigs believed in America's postmillennial role too, but interpreted it differently." Whigs were more focused on inner improvement, but still assumed a superiority to neighboring civilizations. For instance Daniel Webster ( a Whig Secretary of State) supported Christian missions to foreign countries and the use of economic imperialism (by extending the Monroe Doctrine to Hawaii) as an example of the Whig use of Manifest Destiny. Most importantly both Whigs and Democrats sought to remake the world in an image that they viewed as superior, they merely used different tools and had differing interpretations.

In short, I would say no( or there would be very few). Denying Manifest Destiny meant denying the place of the United States as an exceptional state within the world, an express rejection of the "City upon a hill". If your question was more directed to those who opposed territorial expansion then sure, there is a whole slew of prominent Whig politicians to choose from.... although the more noted ones like Clay and Adams had actually added quite a lot of territory early in their careers or attempted to do so.