Word.ws English Dictionary

manifest destiny

manifest destiny noun: the political doctrine or belief held by the United States of America, particularly during its expansion, that the nation was obviously destined to expand toward the west.

Noun (1)

manifest destiny (uncountable)

  1. The political doctrine or belief held by the United States of America, particularly during its expansion, that the nation was obviously destined to expand toward the west.
  2. The political doctrine or belief held by many citizens of the United States of America that their system is best, and the idea that all humans would like to become Americans.
    • Near-synonym: American exceptionalism
    Synonyms:
    w:American exceptionalism
  3. The belief that God supports the expansion of the United States of America throughout the entire North American continent except Mexico.

Verb

manifest destiny (third-person singular simple present manifests destiny, present participle manifesting destiny, simple past and past participle manifested destiny)

  1. (informal) To exercise and realize manifest destiny; to enable the cultural and political expansion of the United States of America.
    • The Homestead Acts allowed millions of settlers to populate unclaimed land and manifest destiny out on the frontier.

Noun (2) capitalized: Manifest Destiny

Manifest Destiny (uncountable)

  1. Alternative letter-case form of manifest destiny.

manifest destiny meaning in Vietnamese

manifest destiny in Vietnamese

cultural belief in the 19th-century United States that American settlers were destined to expand across North America
vận mệnh hiển nhiên

Synonyms of manifest destiny

  • w:American exceptionalism

Forms of manifest destiny

Noun
alternative formManifest Destiny
Verb
third-person singular presentmanifests destiny
present participlemanifesting destiny
past participlemanifested destiny
pastmanifested destiny

Origin of manifest destiny

Popularly attributed to newspaper editor John O'Sullivan (1813–1895). The phrase was first used primarily by Jackson Democrats in the 1840s to promote the annexation of much of what is now the Western United States.

Questions about manifest destiny

What does manifest destiny mean?
Manifest destiny means the political doctrine or belief held by the United States of America, particularly during its expansion, that the nation was obviously destined to expand toward the west.
What is manifest destiny in Vietnamese?
Manifest destiny in Vietnamese is vận mệnh hiển nhiên. See Manifest destiny meaning in Vietnamese.
What part of speech is manifest destiny?
Manifest destiny can be a noun or a verb.

Words near manifest destiny in the dictionary

  1. manifaceted
  2. manifaxine
  3. manifer
  4. manifers
  5. manifest
  6. manifest destiny
  7. manifest file
  8. manifest files
  9. manifest typing
  10. manifestable
  11. manifestant

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: manifest destiny (page history and authors); Manifest Destiny (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

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Cite this entry: “manifest destiny.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/manifest_destiny. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.