In 1848, many European nations were in political upheaval as the most widespread revolutionary wave in European history took place. It was known as the Spring of Nations, also the Year of Revolution. The revolutionaries aimed to throw off the shackles of the old feudal system, demanding more participation in government, freedom of the press, and better conditions for the working class. But, quickly within a year, reactionary forces had regained control and the revolutions collapsed. As Europe, burned, Millard Fillmore and America stood by. In Millard Fillmore's last address to congress, he defended his policy of isolationism, that America, the beacon of liberty, should not get involved in European affairs. Fillmore stated that as much as we love liberty, we can not intervene in every revolution, and history proved that those who try, fail .
"This is a most seductive but dangerous appeal to the generous sympathies of freemen. Enjoying, as we do, the blessings of a free Government, there is no man who has an American heart that would not rejoice to see these blessings extended to all other nations. We can not witness the struggle between the oppressed and his oppressor anywhere without the deepest sympathy for the former and the most anxious desire for his triumph. Nevertheless, is it prudent or is it wise to involve ourselves in these foreign wars? .... France had no sooner established a republican form of government than she manifested a desire to force its blessings on all the world ... Here was the false step which led to her subsequent misfortunes. She soon found herself involved in war with all the rest of Europe."Fillmore continued, with a warning, that liberty and revolution don't always go hand-in-hand.
"Let us remember that revolutions do not always establish freedom. Our own free institutions were not the offspring of our Revolution. They existed before. They were planted in the free charters of self-government under which the English colonies grew up, and our Revolution only freed us from the dominion of a foreign power whose government was at variance with those institutions. But European nations have had no such training for self-government, and every effort to establish it by bloody revolutions has been, and must without that preparation continue to be, a failure. Liberty unregulated by law degenerates into anarchy, which soon becomes the most horrid of all despotisms."
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