Historedia
Episode 1 of 2

Declaration of War

When
April 21, 1898 (war start)
Where
Washington, D.C.
Part of
United States declares war on Spain after blockade of Cuban ports

After negotiations failed, President McKinley requested and signed Congress's declaration of war, beginning the Spanish–American War of 1898.

President McKinley signed a joint resolution on April 20, 1898, and an ultimatum was sent to Spain. When negotiations failed, McKinley requested and signed Congress's declaration of war to begin the Spanish–American War, which the sources date from April 21 to August 13, 1898. An exact April 25 declaration date is not stated in the supplied passages.

Sources

  1. Spanish–American War Wikipedia, revision of 2026-10-10
  2. William McKinley Wikipedia, revision of 2026-10-11

Machine-drafted from the cited Wikipedia passages and checked by a reviewing model, not by a human editor. Every passage cites the revision it was written from; dates and places follow those passages.