Bemis, Samuel Flagg

Bemis, Samuel Flagg

(bē`mĭs), 1891–1973, American historian, b. Worcester, Mass. He received his Ph.D. from Harvard in 1916 and taught history at various schools before becoming Farnum professor of diplomatic history at Yale (1935). In 1945 he was appointed Sterling professor of history and international relations. Considered one of the nation's leading diplomatic historians he twice received the Pulitzer Prize, once for history, Pinckney's Treaty (1926, rev. ed. 1960), and once for biography, John Quincy Adams and the Foundations of American Foreign Policy (1950). His other works include Jay's Treaty (1923, 2d ed. 1962), The Diplomacy of the American Revolution (1935), A Diplomatic History of the United States (1936, 5th ed. 1965), The Latin American Policy of the United States (1943), and John Quincy Adams and the Union (1956). He was the editor of The American Secretaries of State and Their Diplomacy (18 vol., 1963–72).

Bemis, Samuel Flagg

 

Born Oct. 20, 1891, in Worcester, Mass. American historian; one of the leading representatives of the foreign policy school in US historiography.

From 1934 to 1945, Bemis taught at Harvard University. Beginning in 1935 he worked at the Institute of International Affairs at Yale University. In 1937–38, 1945, and 1956 he delivered a series of lectures in various Latin American countries. Bemis was one of the leaders (in 1961, president) of the American Historical Association. He is the author of monographs and scholarly popular books on the history of the foreign policy of the USA, particularly on questions of US relations with Latin American countries. An advocate of the geopolitical theory, Bemis justified the expansionist policies of the USA and its striving for world domination.

WORKS

John Quincy Adams and the Foundations of American Foreign Policy. New York, 1949.
A Diplomatic History of the United States. New York, 1936.
The Latin American Policy of the United States: An Historical Interpretation. New York, 1943.

REFERENCE

Zubok, L. I. “Apologiia amerikanskoi imperialistich. reaktsii v trudakh S. Bemisa.” Voprosy istoriia, 1954, no. 1.