essay of mexican war

The Impact of the Mexican American War on American Society and Politics

On February 2, 1848, the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo was signed which officially ended the Mexican-American War. However, as the guns fell silent, and the men returned home, a new war was brewing, one that continues to shape the course of this country to this day.

While Ulysses S. Grant might have argued that the Civil War was God’s punishment for the Mexican-American War, a “wicked war" that was rooted in imperialism and the expansion of slavery, many Americans supported the Mexican-American War as they viewed it as the fulfillment of Manifest Destiny: the promise that the United States would extend from “sea to shining sea.” While Manifest Destiny remains a core of U.S. national identity, in the 1840s it encouraged a slew of ideological debates over this potential new territory, specifically if the territory should be free or enslaved. The Louisiana Purchase caused a major crisis over the organization of new states which Congress ultimately resolved with the Missouri Compromise, the compromise to end all compromises. It is important to note that the debates in 1820 were largely split among party lines, i.e. Democrats vs. Whigs . However, the Mexican American War reopened past wounds and sent the United States into another legislative crisis.

Even before the war was won and territory had been ceded, Congress was already discussing how to organize any potential new territory gained as reparations from Mexico. One of the most important of proposals was the Wilmot Proviso which Representative David Wilmot of Pennsylvania proposed in 1846, two years before the war ended. Under this proviso, any territory gained by war with Mexico should be free and thus reserved exclusively for whites. Wilmot was a free-soiler, which meant that he did not want to abolish slavery in the places it currently existed but rather prevent its expansion to new territories. However, Wilmot was also a Northern Democrat, and most Democrats supported slavery and protected it, even if they themselves did not own slaves. Many Northern Whigs believed in something called the Slave Power Conspiracy, a conspiracy theory in which slaveowners (the Slave Power) dominated the country’s political system even though they were a minority group, which was accomplished through a coalition with “dough-faced Democrats,” Northern Democrats who supported and protected slavery. While the Wilmot Proviso failed in the Senate, it passed in the House of Representatives because of a coalition between Northern Democrats and Northern Whigs and illustrates the first shift from party alliances to sectional alliances. Indignation over the Wilmot Proviso united southerners against northern threats to their most valuable institution, slavery. After this vote, the antebellum political landscape was forever changed.

The failure of the Wilmot Proviso only put off the issue of slavery for so long. With the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo, Mexico ceded over 525,000 square miles of territory to the United States in exchange for $15 million and the assumption of Mexican debts to American citizens, which reopened the slavery issue. In order to promote party loyalty without aggravating sectional tensions, the Whigs did not include specific resolutions on slavery in their official platform for the Election of 1848. The Democrats ran on popular sovereignty , which is the idea that the status of a territory will be determined by the people residing in that territory. Popular sovereignty is neither explicitly pro-slavery or anti-slavery; however, it does nullify the Missouri Compromise . Neither party adopted a firm stance on slavery in the 1848 election; however, the free-soilers made the election about slavery. Consequently, the Whigs and the Democrats developed campaign materials to be sectionally distributed which highlighted their candidate's support and opposition for slavery respectively. The separate campaign materials in this election reveal the growing sectional divide in antebellum America.

Despite the growing sectionalism, Zachary Taylor, a hero of the Mexican-American War and a slaveholding Whig was elected president in 1848 and served for two years before dying in office of natural causes. The Mexican-American War projected Taylor into a position of celebrity and enabled his election in 1848. After his election, Taylor promised not to intercede with Congress’s decision for the organization of the Mexican Cession. Many southerners felt betrayed by Taylor, a slaveowner from Louisiana, as they equated his position with those of a free-soiler. In this time of heightened sectional tensions, southerners believed that if one did not actively protect slavery and its expansion, one supported abolition.

As a direct result of the Mexican Cession, the California Gold Rush began in 1849 which caused a massive frenzy to organize and admit California into the Union. The Missouri Compromise stated that any territory north of the 36°30’ parallel would be free; however, the line would divide California into two sections. California was never a US territory and approved a free constitution, elected a Governor and legislature and applied for statehood by November 1849. Since California did not wish to be divided into two separate states, a new compromise was formed, aptly named the Compromise of 1850. Under the Compromise of 1850 , California was admitted as a free state without deciding the fate of the remainder of the Mexican Cession. Additionally, under this compromise, there was the federal assumption of Texas debt, the abolishment of the slave trade in the District of Columbia, and a stronger fugitive slave law. While controversial, the Compromise of 1850 alleviated the growing tensions over slavery and delayed a full-blown crisis over the issue.

However, in 1854 tensions over slavery once again skyrocketed over the organization of Kansas and Nebraska. While Kansas and Nebraska were not part of the Mexican Cession, their debates over their organization are linked to the Mexican-American War. As stated above, the Mexican-American War re-opened the discussions over how to organize territory, and one of the proposed solutions was popular sovereignty. While the Compromise of 1850 elected not to include popular sovereignty, it reemerged in 1854 with the Kansas-Nebraska Act , where Kansas and Nebraska would be organized using popular sovereignty. The Kansas-Nebraska Act caused Bleeding Kansas , where pro-slavery and anti-slavery Americans flocked to Kansas in an attempt to establish either a slave or free government in that state, which eventually erupted into violence where neighbor killed a neighbor in the name of slavery and abolition. Bleeding Kansas is also the first instance where John Brown , famous for his 1859 raid on Harper’s Ferry, used violence to enact his radical abolition vision. Moreover, the Kansas-Nebraska Act propelled future President Abraham Lincoln into the national spotlight. The Kansas-Nebraska Act was Senator Stephen Douglas of Illinois’s pet project and popular sovereignty is often associated with Douglas. Lincoln and Douglas engaged in a series of debates in 1858, which mainly focused on popular sovereignty and slavery’s expansion. While Lincoln lost the senatorial election in 1858 to Douglas, he became well known because of the debates, which positioned himself to be the Republican candidate for the Presidential Election of 1860. Additionally, the Kansas-Nebraska Act was the final nail in the coffin for the Whig Party and paved the way for the establishment of the Republican Party, the first prominent anti-slavery party which was rooted in sectionalism.

Ralph Waldo Emerson prophetically wrote, “Mexico will poison us.” The Mexican-American War and the massive territory gained reopened debates over slavery which diminished party alliances and increased sectional alliances. These debates over slavery eventually led to the demise of the Second Party System and paved the way for the rise of Republicanism. Sectional tensions had never been stronger and there were open discussions of disunion which increased as the 1850s progressed. All these tensions and issues would come to head with the Election of 1860 and eventually with the Civil War, where brother fought against brother. To say "Mexico poisoned" the United States is an understatement, the bloodshed during the Civil War rivaled any other American conflict and today we are still in the process of healing wounds that occurred over 150 years ago.

Hispanic-Americans in the Civil War

Federico Fernández Cavada: Union Ties and Cuban Roots

Tejano Heroes of the Texas Revolution

The Mexican-American War, 1846–1848

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Learning Objectives

By the end of this section, you will be able to:

Identify the causes of the Mexican-American War
Describe the outcomes of the war in 1848, especially the Mexican Cession
Describe the effect of the California Gold Rush on westward expansion

Tensions between the United States and Mexico rapidly deteriorated in the 1840s as American expansionists eagerly eyed Mexican land to the west, including the lush northern Mexican province of California. Indeed, in 1842, a U.S. naval fleet, incorrectly believing war had broken out, seized Monterey, California, a part of Mexico. Monterey was returned the next day, but the episode only added to the uneasiness with which Mexico viewed its northern neighbor. The forces of expansion, however, could not be contained, and American voters elected James Polk in 1844 because he promised to deliver more lands. President Polk fulfilled his promise by gaining Oregon and, most spectacularly, provoking a war with Mexico that ultimately fulfilled the wildest fantasies of expansionists. By 1848, the United States encompassed much of North America, a republic that stretched from the Atlantic to the Pacific.

JAMES K. POLK AND THE TRIUMPH OF EXPANSION

A fervent belief in expansion gripped the United States in the 1840s. In 1845, a New York newspaper editor, John O’Sullivan, introduced the concept of “manifest destiny” to describe the very popular idea of the special role of the United States in overspreading the continent—the divine right and duty of white Americans to seize and settle the American West, thus spreading Protestant, democratic values. In this climate of opinion, voters in 1844 elected James K. Polk, a slaveholder from Tennessee, because he vowed to annex Texas as a new slave state and take Oregon.

Annexing Oregon was an important objective for U.S. foreign policy because it appeared to be an area rich in commercial possibilities. Northerners favored U.S. control of Oregon because ports in the Pacific Northwest would be gateways for trade with Asia. Southerners hoped that, in exchange for their support of expansion into the northwest, northerners would not oppose plans for expansion into the southwest.

President Polk—whose campaign slogan in 1844 had been “Fifty-four forty or fight!”—asserted the United States’ right to gain full control of what was known as Oregon Country, from its southern border at 42° latitude (the current boundary with California) to its northern border at 54° 40′ latitude. According to an 1818 agreement, Great Britain and the United States held joint ownership of this territory, but the 1827 Treaty of Joint Occupation opened the land to settlement by both countries. Realizing that the British were not willing to cede all claims to the territory, Polk proposed the land be divided at 49° latitude (the current border between Washington and Canada). The British, however, denied U.S. claims to land north of the Columbia River (Oregon’s current northern border) ( [link] ). Indeed, the British foreign secretary refused even to relay Polk’s proposal to London. However, reports of the difficulty Great Britain would face defending Oregon in the event of a U.S. attack, combined with concerns over affairs at home and elsewhere in its empire, quickly changed the minds of the British, and in June 1846, Queen Victoria’s government agreed to a division at the forty-ninth parallel.

A map of the Oregon territory during the period of joint occupation by the United States and Great Britain shows the area whose ownership was contested by the two powers. The uppermost region is labeled “Rupert’s Land (British),” which lies in between the “54° 40′- Extreme U.S. Claim” and “49°” lines. The central region, which lies in between the “49°” and “42° - Extreme British Claim” lines, contains Oregon Country. Beneath the “42° - Extreme British Claim” line lies Mexico.

In contrast to the diplomatic solution with Great Britain over Oregon, when it came to Mexico, Polk and the American people proved willing to use force to wrest more land for the United States. In keeping with voters’ expectations, President Polk set his sights on the Mexican state of California. After the mistaken capture of Monterey, negotiations about purchasing the port of San Francisco from Mexico broke off until September 1845. Then, following a revolt in California that left it divided in two, Polk attempted to purchase Upper California and New Mexico as well. These efforts went nowhere. The Mexican government, angered by U.S. actions, refused to recognize the independence of Texas.

Finally, after nearly a decade of public clamoring for the annexation of Texas, in December 1845 Polk officially agreed to the annexation of the former Mexican state, making the Lone Star Republic an additional slave state. Incensed that the United States had annexed Texas, however, the Mexican government refused to discuss the matter of selling land to the United States. Indeed, Mexico refused even to acknowledge Polk’s emissary, John Slidell, who had been sent to Mexico City to negotiate. Not to be deterred, Polk encouraged Thomas O. Larkin, the U.S. consul in Monterey, to assist any American settlers and any Californios , the Mexican residents of the state, who wished to proclaim their independence from Mexico. By the end of 1845, having broken diplomatic ties with the United States over Texas and having grown alarmed by American actions in California, the Mexican government warily anticipated the next move. It did not have long to wait.

WAR WITH MEXICO, 1846–1848

Expansionistic fervor propelled the United States to war against Mexico in 1846. The United States had long argued that the Rio Grande was the border between Mexico and the United States, and at the end of the Texas war for independence Santa Anna had been pressured to agree. Mexico, however, refused to be bound by Santa Anna’s promises and insisted the border lay farther north, at the Nueces River ( [link] ). To set it at the Rio Grande would, in effect, allow the United States to control land it had never occupied. In Mexico’s eyes, therefore, President Polk violated its sovereign territory when he ordered U.S. troops into the disputed lands in 1846. From the Mexican perspective, it appeared the United States had invaded their nation.

A map titled “Texas Claims” indicates the borders of Mexico, Texas, the United States, and “Disputed Territory,” as well as the Rio Grande, the Arkansas River, and the Nueces River.

In January 1846, the U.S. force that was ordered to the banks of the Rio Grande to build a fort on the “American” side encountered a Mexican cavalry unit on patrol. Shots rang out, and sixteen U.S. soldiers were killed or wounded. Angrily declaring that Mexico “has invaded our territory and shed American blood upon American soil,” President Polk demanded the United States declare war on Mexico. On May 12, Congress obliged.

The small but vocal antislavery faction decried the decision to go to war, arguing that Polk had deliberately provoked hostilities so the United States could annex more slave territory. Illinois representative Abraham Lincoln and other members of Congress issued the “Spot Resolutions” in which they demanded to know the precise spot on U.S. soil where American blood had been spilled. Many Whigs also denounced the war. Democrats, however, supported Polk’s decision, and volunteers for the army came forward in droves from every part of the country except New England, the seat of abolitionist activity. Enthusiasm for the war was aided by the widely held belief that Mexico was a weak, impoverished country and that the Mexican people, perceived as ignorant, lazy, and controlled by a corrupt Roman Catholic clergy, would be easy to defeat. ( [link] ).

A lithograph shows several members of the clergy fleeing the Mexican town of Matamoros on horseback. Each man has a young woman behind him; the horse in the foreground also carries a basket laden with bottles of alcohol. The caption reads “The Mexican Rulers. Migrating from Matamoros with their Treasures.”

U.S. military strategy had three main objectives: 1) Take control of northern Mexico, including New Mexico; 2) seize California; and 3) capture Mexico City. General Zachary Taylor and his Army of the Center were assigned to accomplish the first goal, and with superior weapons they soon captured the Mexican city of Monterrey. Taylor quickly became a hero in the eyes of the American people, and Polk appointed him commander of all U.S. forces.

General Stephen Watts Kearny, commander of the Army of the West, accepted the surrender of Santa Fe, New Mexico, and moved on to take control of California, leaving Colonel Sterling Price in command. Despite Kearny’s assurances that New Mexicans need not fear for their lives or their property, and in fact the region’s residents rose in revolt in January 1847 in an effort to drive the Americans away. Although Price managed to put an end to the rebellion, tensions remained high.

Kearny, meanwhile, arrived in California to find it already in American hands through the joint efforts of California settlers, U.S. naval commander John D. Sloat, and John C. Fremont, a former army captain and son-in-law of Missouri senator Thomas Benton. Sloat, at anchor off the coast of Mazatlan, learned that war had begun and quickly set sail for California. He seized the town of Monterey in July 1846, less than a month after a group of American settlers led by William B. Ide had taken control of Sonoma and declared California a republic. A week after the fall of Monterey, the navy took San Francisco with no resistance. Although some Californios staged a short-lived rebellion in September 1846, many others submitted to the U.S. takeover. Thus Kearny had little to do other than take command of California as its governor.

Leading the Army of the South was General Winfield Scott. Both Taylor and Scott were potential competitors for the presidency, and believing—correctly—that whoever seized Mexico City would become a hero, Polk assigned Scott the campaign to avoid elevating the more popular Taylor, who was affectionately known as “Old Rough and Ready.”

Scott captured Veracruz in March 1847, and moving in a northwesterly direction from there (much as Spanish conquistador Hernán Cortés had done in 1519), he slowly closed in on the capital. Every step of the way was a hard-fought victory, however, and Mexican soldiers and civilians both fought bravely to save their land from the American invaders. Mexico City’s defenders, including young military cadets, fought to the end. According to legend, cadet Juan Escutia’s last act was to save the Mexican flag, and he leapt from the city’s walls with it wrapped around his body. On September 14, 1847, Scott entered Mexico City’s central plaza; the city had fallen ( [link] ). While Polk and other expansionists called for “all Mexico,” the Mexican government and the United States negotiated for peace in 1848, resulting in the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo.

A painting depicts General Winfield Scott on a white horse leading troops into Mexico City’s Plaza de la Constitución as anxious residents of the city look on. One woman peers furtively from behind the curtain of an upstairs window. On the left, a man bends down to pick up a paving stone to throw at the invaders.

The Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo, signed in February 1848, was a triumph for American expansionism under which Mexico ceded nearly half its land to the United States. The Mexican Cession , as the conquest of land west of the Rio Grande was called, included the current states of California, New Mexico, Arizona, Nevada, Utah, and portions of Colorado and Wyoming. Mexico also recognized the Rio Grande as the border with the United States. Mexican citizens in the ceded territory were promised U.S. citizenship in the future when the territories they were living in became states. In exchange, the United States agreed to assume $3.35 million worth of Mexican debts owed to U.S. citizens, paid Mexico $15 million for the loss of its land, and promised to guard the residents of the Mexican Cession from Indian raids.

As extensive as the Mexican Cession was, some argued the United States should not be satisfied until it had taken all of Mexico. Many who were opposed to this idea were southerners who, while desiring the annexation of more slave territory, did not want to make Mexico’s large mestizo (people of mixed Indian and European ancestry) population part of the United States. Others did not want to absorb a large group of Roman Catholics. These expansionists could not accept the idea of new U.S. territory filled with mixed-race, Catholic populations.

Explore the U.S.-Mexican War at PBS to read about life in the Mexican and U.S. armies during the war and to learn more about the various battles.

CALIFORNIA AND THE GOLD RUSH

The United States had no way of knowing that part of the land about to be ceded by Mexico had just become far more valuable than anyone could have imagined. On January 24, 1848, James Marshall discovered gold in the millrace of the sawmill he had built with his partner John Sutter on the south fork of California’s American River . Word quickly spread, and within a few weeks all of Sutter’s employees had left to search for gold. When the news reached San Francisco, most of its inhabitants abandoned the town and headed for the American River. By the end of the year, thousands of California’s residents had gone north to the gold fields with visions of wealth dancing in their heads, and in 1849 thousands of people from around the world followed them ( [link] ). The Gold Rush had begun.

A promotional poster reads “For California!/Direct/Extraordinary Inducements!!/Thirty-Five Days to Gold Regions!/The California Steam Navigation Co./Will dispatch their first vessel from New-York, the NEW and SPLENDID/Steam Ship!/Nicaragua/On Friday, March 23d, 1849/The Quickest, Safest, and Cheapest!!/Price of Passage Through Ninety Dollars!”

The fantasy of instant wealth induced a mass exodus to California. Settlers in Oregon and Utah rushed to the American River. Easterners sailed around the southern tip of South America or to Panama’s Atlantic coast, where they crossed the Isthmus of Panama to the Pacific and booked ship’s passage for San Francisco. As California-bound vessels stopped in South American ports to take on food and fresh water, hundreds of Peruvians and Chileans streamed aboard. Easterners who could not afford to sail to California crossed the continent on foot, on horseback, or in wagons. Others journeyed from as far away as Hawaii and Europe. Chinese people came as well, adding to the polyglot population in the California boomtowns ( [link] ).

A lithograph captioned “The Way They Go to California” shows a dock teeming with men holding picks and shovels. Several reach out or jump from the dock in an attempt to catch a ship that is departing, exclaiming “Hold on there. I’ve paid my passage and I ain’t aboard”; “Bill, I’m afraid we can’t get aboard”; and “I’m bound to go anywhere.” A man on a rocket ship labeled “Rocket Line” flies overhead with his hat blowing off, exclaiming “My hair!! how the wind blows.” Other men fly overhead in an airship, from which one man parachutes holding a pick and shovel.

Once in California, gathered in camps with names like Drunkard’s Bar, Angel’s Camp, Gouge Eye, and Whiskeytown, the “ forty-niners ” did not find wealth so easy to come by as they had first imagined. Although some were able to find gold by panning for it or shoveling soil from river bottoms into sieve-like contraptions called rockers, most did not. The placer gold, the gold that had been washed down the mountains into streams and rivers, was quickly exhausted, and what remained was deep below ground. Independent miners were supplanted by companies that could afford not only to purchase hydraulic mining technology but also to hire laborers to work the hills. The frustration of many a miner was expressed in the words of Sullivan Osborne. In 1857, Osborne wrote that he had arrived in California “full of high hopes and bright anticipations of the future” only to find his dreams “have long since perished.” Although $550 million worth of gold was found in California between 1849 and 1850, very little of it went to individuals.

Observers in the gold fields also reported abuse of Indians by miners. Some miners forced Indians to work their claims for them; others drove Indians off their lands, stole from them, and even murdered them. Foreigners were generally disliked, especially those from South America. The most despised, however, were the thousands of Chinese migrants. Eager to earn money to send to their families in Hong Kong and southern China, they quickly earned a reputation as frugal men and hard workers who routinely took over diggings others had abandoned as worthless and worked them until every scrap of gold had been found. Many American miners, often spendthrifts, resented their presence and discriminated against them, believing the Chinese, who represented about 8 percent of the nearly 300,000 who arrived, were depriving them of the opportunity to make a living.

Visit The Chinese in California to learn more about the experience of Chinese migrants who came to California in the Gold Rush era.

In 1850, California imposed a tax on foreign miners, and in 1858 it prohibited all immigration from China. Those Chinese who remained in the face of the growing hostility were often beaten and killed, and some Westerners made a sport of cutting off Chinese men’s queues, the long braids of hair worn down their backs ( [link] ). In 1882, Congress took up the power to restrict immigration by banning the further immigration of Chinese.

An illustration captioned “Pacific Chivalry. Encouragement to Chinese Immigration” depicts a white man, whose hat is labeled “California,” preparing to whip a Chinese man; he holds the man by his queue as the man attempts to flee, his characteristic hat having fallen beside him. Beside the railroad tracks running past the pair, a sign reads “Courts of Justice Closed to Chinese. Extra Taxes to ‘Yellow Jack.’” The Pacific landscape is visible in the background.

As people flocked to California in 1849, the population of the new territory swelled from a few thousand to about 100,000. The new arrivals quickly organized themselves into communities, and the trappings of “civilized” life—stores, saloons, libraries, stage lines, and fraternal lodges—began to appear. Newspapers were established, and musicians, singers, and acting companies arrived to entertain the gold seekers. The epitome of these Gold Rush boomtowns was San Francisco, which counted only a few hundred residents in 1846 but by 1850 had reached a population of thirty-four thousand ( [link] ). So quickly did the territory grow that by 1850 California was ready to enter the Union as a state. When it sought admission, however, the issue of slavery expansion and sectional tensions emerged once again.

A photograph shows an aerial view of the port of San Francisco. The streets are crowded with houses, and the water teems with ships.

Section Summary

President James K. Polk’s administration was a period of intensive expansion for the United States. After overseeing the final details regarding the annexation of Texas from Mexico, Polk negotiated a peaceful settlement with Great Britain regarding ownership of the Oregon Country, which brought the United States what are now the states of Washington and Oregon. The acquisition of additional lands from Mexico, a country many in the United States perceived as weak and inferior, was not so bloodless. The Mexican Cession added nearly half of Mexico’s territory to the United States, including New Mexico and California, and established the U.S.-Mexico border at the Rio Grande. The California Gold Rush rapidly expanded the population of the new territory, but also prompted concerns over immigration, especially from China.

Review Questions

Which of the following was not a reason the United States was reluctant to annex Texas?

According to treaties signed in 1818 and 1827, with which country did the United States jointly occupy Oregon?

During the war between the United States and Mexico, revolts against U.S. control broke out in ________.

Why did whites in California dislike the Chinese so much?

The Chinese were seemingly more disciplined than the majority of the white miners, gaining a reputation for being extremely hard-working and frugal. White miners resented the mining successes that the Chinese earned. They believed the Chinese were unfairly depriving them of the means to earn a living.

11.4 The Mexican-American War, 1846–1848

Learning objectives.

By the end of this section, you will be able to:

Identify the causes of the Mexican-American War
Describe the outcomes of the war in 1848, especially the Mexican Cession
Describe the effect of the California Gold Rush on westward expansion

JAMES K. POLK AND THE TRIUMPH OF EXPANSION

A fervent belief in expansion gripped the United States in the 1840s. In 1845, a New York newspaper editor, John O’Sullivan, introduced the concept of “manifest destiny” to describe the very popular idea of the special role of the United States in overspreading the continent—the divine right and duty of White Americans to seize and settle the American West, thus spreading Protestant, democratic values. In this climate of opinion, voters in 1844 elected James K. Polk, a slaveholder from Tennessee, because he vowed to annex Texas as a new slave state and take Oregon.

President Polk—whose campaign slogan in 1844 had been “Fifty-four forty or fight!”—asserted the United States’ right to gain full control of what was known as Oregon Country, from its southern border at 42° latitude (the current boundary with California) to its northern border at 54° 40' latitude. According to an 1818 agreement, Great Britain and the United States held joint ownership of this territory, but the 1827 Treaty of Joint Occupation opened the land to settlement by both countries. Realizing that the British were not willing to cede all claims to the territory, Polk proposed the land be divided at 49° latitude (the current border between Washington and Canada). The British, however, denied U.S. claims to land north of the Columbia River (Oregon’s current northern border) ( Figure 11.13 ). Indeed, the British foreign secretary refused even to relay Polk’s proposal to London. However, reports of the difficulty Great Britain would face defending Oregon in the event of a U.S. attack, combined with concerns over affairs at home and elsewhere in its empire, quickly changed the minds of the British, and in June 1846, Queen Victoria’s government agreed to a division at the forty-ninth parallel.

WAR WITH MEXICO, 1846–1848

Expansionistic fervor propelled the United States to war against Mexico in 1846. The United States had long argued that the Rio Grande was the border between Mexico and the United States, and at the end of the Texas war for independence Santa Anna had been pressured to agree. Mexico, however, refused to be bound by Santa Anna’s promises and insisted the border lay farther north, at the Nueces River ( Figure 11.14 ). To set it at the Rio Grande would, in effect, allow the United States to control land it had never occupied. In Mexico’s eyes, therefore, President Polk violated its sovereign territory when he ordered U.S. troops into the disputed lands in 1846. From the Mexican perspective, it appeared the United States had invaded their nation.

General Stephen Watts Kearny, commander of the Army of the West, accepted the surrender of Santa Fe, New Mexico, and moved on to take control of California, leaving Colonel Sterling Price in command. Despite Kearny’s assurances that New Mexicans need not fear for their lives or their property, the region’s residents rose in revolt in January 1847 in an effort to drive the Americans away. Although Price managed to put an end to the rebellion, tensions remained high.

Scott captured Veracruz in March 1847, and moving in a northwesterly direction from there (much as Spanish conquistador Hernán Cortés had done in 1519), he slowly closed in on the capital. Every step of the way was a hard-fought victory, however, and Mexican soldiers and civilians both fought bravely to save their land from the American invaders. Mexico City’s defenders, including young military cadets, fought to the end. According to legend, cadet Juan Escutia’s last act was to save the Mexican flag, and he leapt from the city’s walls with it wrapped around his body. On September 14, 1847, Scott entered Mexico City’s central plaza; the city had fallen ( Figure 11.16 ). While Polk and other expansionists called for “all Mexico,” the Mexican government and the United States negotiated for peace in 1848, resulting in the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo.

The Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo, signed in February 1848, was a triumph for American expansion under which Mexico ceded nearly half its land to the United States. The Mexican Cession , as the conquest of land west of the Rio Grande was called, included the current states of California, New Mexico, Arizona, Nevada, Utah, and portions of Colorado and Wyoming. Mexico also recognized the Rio Grande as the border with the United States. The United States promised to grant Mexican citizens in the ceded territory U.S. citizenship in the future when the territories they were living in became states, and promised to recognize the Spanish land grants to the Pueblos in New Mexico. In exchange, the United States agreed to assume $3.35 million worth of Mexican debts owed to U.S. citizens, paid Mexico $15 million for the loss of its land, and promised to guard the residents of the Mexican Cession from Native American raids.

As extensive as the Mexican Cession was, some argued the United States should not be satisfied until it had taken all of Mexico. Many who were opposed to this idea were southerners who, while desiring the annexation of more slave territory, did not want to make Mexico’s large mestizo (people of mixed Native American and European ancestry) population part of the United States. Others did not want to absorb a large group of Roman Catholics. These expansionists could not accept the idea of new U.S. territory filled with mixed-race, Catholic populations.

Click and Explore

Explore the U.S.-Mexican War at PBS to read about life in the Mexican and U.S. armies during the war and to learn more about the various battles.

CALIFORNIA AND THE GOLD RUSH

Observers in the gold fields also reported abuse of Native Americans by miners. Some miners forced Native Americans to work their claims for them; others drove them off their lands, stole from them, and even murdered them as part of a systemic campaign of extermination. Some scholars view the resulting loss of Native American life as a clear example of genocide in the United States. Foreigners were generally disliked, especially those from South America. The most despised, however, were the thousands of Chinese migrants. Eager to earn money to send to their families in Hong Kong and southern China, they quickly earned a reputation as frugal men and hard workers who routinely took over diggings others had abandoned as worthless and worked them until every scrap of gold had been found. Many American miners, often spendthrifts, resented their presence and discriminated against them, believing the Chinese, who represented about 8 percent of the nearly 300,000 who arrived, were depriving them of the opportunity to make a living.

Visit The Chinese in California to learn more about the experience of Chinese migrants who came to California in the Gold Rush era.

In 1850, California imposed a tax on foreign miners, and in 1858 it prohibited all immigration from China. Those Chinese who remained in the face of the growing hostility were often beaten and killed, and some Westerners made a sport of cutting off Chinese men’s queues, the long braids of hair worn down their backs ( Figure 11.19 ). In 1882, Congress took up the power to restrict immigration by banning the further immigration of Chinese.

As people flocked to California in 1849, the population of the new territory swelled from a few thousand to about 100,000. The new arrivals quickly organized themselves into communities, and the trappings of “civilized” life—stores, saloons, libraries, stage lines, and fraternal lodges—began to appear. Newspapers were established, and musicians, singers, and acting companies arrived to entertain the gold seekers. The epitome of these Gold Rush boomtowns was San Francisco, which counted only a few hundred residents in 1846 but by 1850 had reached a population of thirty-four thousand ( Figure 11.20 ). So quickly did the territory grow that by 1850 California was ready to enter the Union as a state. When it sought admission, however, the issue of slavery expansion and sectional tensions emerged once again.

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Authors: P. Scott Corbett, Volker Janssen, John M. Lund, Todd Pfannestiel, Sylvie Waskiewicz, Paul Vickery
Publisher/website: OpenStax
Book title: U.S. History
Publication date: Dec 30, 2014
Location: Houston, Texas
Book URL: https://openstax.org/books/us-history/pages/1-introduction
Section URL: https://openstax.org/books/us-history/pages/11-4-the-mexican-american-war-1846-1848

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14.2: The Mexican-American War

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Catherine Locks, Sarah Mergel, Pamela Roseman, Tamara Spike & Marie Lasseter

Catherine Locks, Sarah Mergel, Pamela Roseman, Tamara Spike & Marie Lasseter
George State Universities via GALILEO Open Learning Materials

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In the days after the election of 1844 before Polk’s inauguration, at the behest of lame duck President Tyler, Congress passed a resolution to annex Texas. Although Mexico had finally recognized Texas’s independence in 1845, it held that the border between Mexico and Texas was the Nueces River, as it had been from the colonial era. Texas—and now the United States—held the border as the Rio Grande. The area between the two rivers was not the real point of contention for the two countries. The Rio Grande wanders aimlessly for hundreds of miles far into New Mexico and presentday Colorado; in effect, claiming the Rio Grande as the boundary tacitly laid claim to hundreds of thousands more acres. Mexico responded to annexation by cutting off diplomatic relations with the U.S.; both countries prepared for war. As a last-ditch effort to avoid war, Polk sent emissary John Slidell to Mexico City to resolve the border dispute. His secondary mission, however, was to secure California and New Mexico for the United States. Slidell was authorized to pay $5 million for New Mexico and as much as $25 million for Alta (Upper) California. Soon after Slidell’s arrival in Mexico City, the Mexican press learned of his mission to attempt buying so much Mexican territory. Newspapers and journals denounced Slidell and the United States, and leaflets appeared all over the city threatening rebellion if the government negotiated. Slidell was sent away.

Polk seized this opportunity to provoke war with Mexico. He ordered General Zachary Taylor into the disputed territory between the rivers. When a skirmish broke out between Taylor and the Mexican general assigned to patrol the disputed territory, Polk declared war, saying that he had tried every effort at reconciliation. “Mexico,” he stated, “has passed the boundary of United States, invaded our territory, and shed American blood upon the American soil.” Despite opposition from some Whigs, most notably Abraham Lincoln, Congress overwhelmingly approved the declaration of war. The view from Mexico City was very different, however. Mexico contended that the United States had not only taken Texas, but also tried to double Texas’s size. Moreover, when Mexico tried to defend its territory, the United States claimed that Mexico had invaded U.S. land.

The U.S. strategy for the Mexican-American War called for a three-pronged attack on Mexico. The Army of the West was to take and occupy New Mexico; the Army of the Center, to remain in northern Mexico. In anticipation of war with Mexico, the United States assembled a Navy fleet off the coast of California, deploying Marines to the ships. In June of 1846, a small group of mostly American settlers seized the garrison at Sonoma, California. The takeover was peaceable; in fact, no shots were fired. Many of the settlers and californios, or Mexican residents of California, supported the rebellion, as the government of the California territory was ineffectual and notoriously unstable: in the twenty-five year period before the revolt, leadership had changed hands more than forty times. Upon taking the garrison, the rebels proclaimed a new government of the California Republic. This Republic was very short-lived, lasting less than a month; indeed, few Californians knew of its existence. Twenty-six days after the birth of the California Republic, an army corps of engineers under the command of John Frémont marched into Sonoma. The Republic disbanded, and Frémont and the U.S. took over.

Meanwhile, the third prong of the U.S. attack on Mexico, the Army of Occupation, was to take Mexico City. General Winfield Scott led an amphibious assault against the port city of Veracruz and, after taking the city, began his march to the capitol. Scott’s arrival in Mexico coincided with great political turmoil in the nation; in the time since the outbreak of war, the Mexican president had been overthrown by a general. The general then tried to abrogate the constitution, declare martial law, and take power himself; consequently, he was overthrown in a rebellion. The army then invited Santa Anna back from exile to resume the presidency. By the time that Scott took Veracruz, Santa Anna had only just arrived and taken command.

Scott’s army was successful in taking much of the city. On August 20, Scott asked for surrender from Santa Anna; Santa Anna agreed to negotiate. Rather than seriously negotiating surrender, however, Santa Anna used the time to shore up the city defenses. By the time the armistice was at an end, Santa Anna was ready for battle, with his forces concentrated at Chapultepec Castle at the center of the city. The defenders of the Castle, about 1,000 men and the cadets from the military academy, laid land mines all over slopes of the steep hill upon which the Castle was located. The land mines failed to explode. After a fierce battle, Scott’s forces prevailed. Mexican sources attest that by the time Scott’s forces reached the Castle, only a handful of cadets remained to defend it. After the death of his comrades, the last remaining cadet wrapped himself in the Mexican flag and jumped from the palace terrace, plummeting to his death on the steep rocks below.

Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo and the Aftermath of the War

The Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo, which ended Mexican-American War, was signed in February of 1848. The treaty confirmed the U.S. title to Texas and ceded the Alta California and New Mexico territories to the United States, some 525,000 square miles. Mexico was allowed to keep everything south of the Rio Grande. The United States agreed to pay $15 million and to assume the claims of Americans against the Mexican government, about $3,250,000. In short, Mexico lost more than half of its territorial landmass in the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo. The land ceded to the United States eventually became the states, or part of the states, of California, Arizona, New Mexico, Texas, Utah, Nevada, Colorado, Wyoming, and Kansas, tremendously increasing the U.S. holdings and stoking the fires of Manifest Destiny. The most radical adherents of Manifest Destiny had gone so far as to demand the annexation of not only “all of Texas,” but all of Mexico as well. Why, given the expansionist climate of the era, did the United States not lay claim to all of Mexico? Perhaps the best answer to this question lies in an examination of the problems that arose from the Mexican Cession itself.

Through the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo, the United States acquired about 55% of Mexico. Of course these lands were not “empty” but (sparsely) populated with indigenous peoples and Mexican citizens who suddenly, and through no choice of their own, found themselves residents of the United States. It is estimated that there were 80,000 Mexican citizens in California in the late 1840s. Many of the families had been residents of the California or New Mexico territories for generations, since the Spanish colonial period. Mexico was keenly interested in ensuring that these Mexicans would be provided for under the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo, which stated that all Mexican citizens who remained in the ceded lands for more than one year could become naturalized U.S. citizens. Moreover, the original version of the treaty guaranteed that Mexican and Spanish land deeds and grants would be recognized by the United States, allowing resident Mexicans to retain ownership of their lands. Later amendments and interpretations of the treaty weakened this provision.

However, racial tensions emerged as the conquest of the territories of the Cession set a pattern for violence and racial antagonism that still resonates today. Over the next decades, Mexicans and Mexican-Americans alike (some having become citizens, some having declined the offer and remaining Mexican citizens) lost their lands as Texas, California, New Mexico, and the United States government itself declared the Mexican and Spanish land deeds “imperfect,” questioned their veracity, and ultimately took the lands of tejanos, californios, and others. Before the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo, Mexicans owned all lands valued over $10,000 in California; by the 1870s, they owned only one-quarter of these lands; by the 1880s, californios were relatively landless. Thousands went from being landowners to laborers, sometimes on the very land they had once owned. Much of the work was migratory in nature, and Mexican laborers were paid as much as two-thirds less than white laborers. California, Texas, and other soon-to-be states also passed laws that targeted and politically unempowered Mexican-Americans. A good example of this type of legislation was California’s Greaser Act, enacted in 1885. Technically, the Greaser Act was an antivagrancy law. However, “vagrants” were defined in the law as “all persons who are commonly known as ‘Greasers,’ or the issue of Spanish and Indian blood…and who go armed and are not peaceable and quiet persons.” In general, Hispanics became more and more alienated from the dominant society in the decades after Guadalupe Hidalgo.

So why didn’t the United States acquire “all of Mexico” after conquering Mexico City? Some historians argue that racism played a large role. It was one thing to take the thinly-populated portions of Mexico that could be populated with many more Caucasian Americans and another thing entirely to take over a country, or “uncontrolled dominion,” with a turbulent history, populated with people of mixed ancestry, whom many Americans considered to be “mongrels.” Ultimately, Mexico would have been an expensive, complicated problem for the United States. In taking the California and New Mexico territories, the U.S. increased its land mass by some 20% and gained the important ports of San Diego and San Francisco, thus allowing for trade with Asia, a much more pragmatic and manageable arrangement.

Because the Mexican Cession delineated by the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo represented a tremendous increase to the land mass of the United States, it did much to further manifest destiny. The last major territorial acquisition of the continental United States followed on the heels of the Mexican Cession of 1848. In 1854, the United States and the Mexican government, once again under the control of the corrupt Santa Anna, signed the Mesilla Treaty, confirming the Gadsden Purchase. The United States paid $10 million for Arizona’s Mesilla Valley, approximately 30,000 acres. The purchase also clarified and finalized the border between the United States and Mexico. The U.S. desired this land for two additional reasons. First, the Mesilla Valley offered the best terrain for building a transcontinental railroad along a deep southern route. Second, by securing the land south of the Gila River, the United States finalized the border between California and Baja California (now the U.S. and Mexico) as south of the San Diego Bay, offering an excellent harbor. Plans were made for building the trans-continental railroad from Texas to San Diego, but nothing ever materialized.

The war was a tremendous military victory for the United States. The American military gained much experience. West Point and the Naval Academy claimed that their training were the key to success and justified their existence with the war’s success. The Marines won prestige as well and still sing of the conquest of “the halls of Montezuma.” The British and foreign skeptics also reevaluated their opinion on American military strength in the war’s aftermath. However, the war was also costly. Some 13,000 Americans died, most from disease. The war’s monetary cost was about $100,000,000. The war also influenced foreign relations in Latin America, especially with Mexico, in lasting ways. Mexico, and much of Latin America, considered that the United States had deliberately provoked the war and that American greed was its primary underlying cause. The war intensified what has been referred to as “Yankeephobia” in Latin America, leading to distrust and suspicion. The United States, many contended, was untrustworthy, considered itself superior to others, and was a bully. It was called the “Colossus of the North.” Perhaps most significantly, the war upset the carefully-maintained domestic political truce over slavery. Some felt that the war would lead to a severe sectional crisis; poet Ralph Waldo Emerson observed, “Mexico will poison us!” Many Whigs opposed the war on principle, believing that the U.S. had no legal right to the land south of the Nueces River, the original boundary dispute between Texas and Mexico; many abolitionists believed that the war was provoked by the South in order to expand slavery. The sheer amount of possible slaveholding territory coming into the Union upset the balance established by the Missouri Compromise, reignited the slavery debate, and threatened stability. In response to this, Congressman David Wilmot introduced a bill, called the Wilmot Proviso, which would have banned slavery in any territory acquired from Mexico in the war. The measure was eventually defeated and never became law. However, it was strongly supported by representatives of Congress from the free states. Ultimately, the Mexican War represented the looming question of slavery’s future.

Technological Development and Manifest Destiny

As the United States expanded geographically, it also underwent a period of growth and development in technology. Many advocates of manifest destiny saw a clear link between territorial growth and technological development; internal development, the mechanism that would spread American influence, followed on the heels of expansion. Two technologies were particularly important in facilitating communication and travel across the great distances from coast to coast: the telegraph and the railroad.

The development of a railroad infrastructure had begun in the 1830s in a limited area and proved to be viable and profitable. Rail travel transformed the American economy in the 1840s and 1850s, linking port cities to the interior. Before the advent of rail, the main route of commerce was along canal lines, which remained rail’s biggest competitor for quite some time. Although the steam locomotive was faster, shipping costs were cheaper by canal. By the 1850s, however, the railroad network had grown into the dominant means of transport by far. The growth of the telegraph and railroads also provided stability to the growing nation. The United States had become so big that critics doubted its ability to effectively govern so much land and so many people. Railroads and the telegraph provided one solution. Moreover, they facilitated the emergence of a national market system.

The expansion of railroads and the telegraph was not just an effect of manifest destiny. It was a continuation of an ongoing discussion in the American government: the debate over internal improvements. The issue was first raised under Jefferson and focused on the building of canals to better connect the trans-Appalachian frontier to the United States. The debate changed with evolving technology and was raised again and again, most notably during the Madison and Jackson presidencies. A constant in the debate was the discussion of whether or not it was appropriate to use federal money to fund these internal improvements. Manifest destiny and its accompanying technological advances was simply the latest incarnation of this debate.

The significance of these technological advances to the concept of Manifest Destiny appears in various cultural artifacts. In John Gast’s “American Progress” (1872), for example, the floating figure above the landscape resembles an angel and symbolizes the American belief that Manifest Destiny was divinely ordained. How does the angel express the concept of Manifest Destiny as espoused by John O’Sullivan? The paragraph below is from a nineteenth century description of the painting by George Crofutt, who widely distributed his engraving of it.

In “American Progress,” a diaphanously and precariously-clad America floats westward through the air with the “Star of Empire” on her forehead. She has left the cities of the east behind, and the wide Mississippi, and still her course is westward. In her right hand she carries a school book— testimonial of the national enlightenment, while with her left she trails the slender wires of the telegraph that will bind the nation. Fleeing her approach are Indians, buffalo, wild horses, bears, and other game, disappearing into the storm and waves of the Pacific coast. They flee the ponderous vision— the star “is too much for them.”

Technology enabled American expansionism throughout the North American continent by facilitating travel and communication. Americans were not the only ones to harness this technological power towards an expansionist goal; during the 1800s, these technologies further enabled European powers such as France, Britain, and Germany to establish a new kind of colonialism: imperialism. The telegraph and railroad, along with other new technologies such as the steamboat and the Maxim gun, one of the first machine guns, allowed a small number of Europeans to dominate large areas and great numbers of people and fuel their own Industrial Revolutions. In this way, Manifest Destiny became a part of a greater nineteenth century movement in expansionism.

In 1845, the United States annexed Texas and admitted it to the Union. Tensions arose between the U.S. and Mexico over the boundary; the U.S. claimed the Rio Grande as the border, with Mexico claiming the long-established boundary at the Nueces River. The real reason for this border dispute was deeply linked to the expansionist desires of the United States; establishing the Rio Grande as the border would lay claim to a substantial portion of Mexico outside of the confines of Texas. John Slidell’s mission to Mexico exemplifies this intent; although his formal mission was diplomatic, he was secretly charged with buying a substantial portion of the Mexican northwest for the United States. When Mexicans responded to this offer with outrage, Polk took advantage by provoking war. The Mexican-American War, fought from 1846 to 1848, culminated with General Winfield Scott’s invasion of Mexico City.

The Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo ended the Mexican-American War. The treaty confirmed the U.S. title to Texas and ceded the Alta California and New Mexico territories to the United States, some 525,000 square miles. Mexico lost more than half of its territorial land mass. This ceded land eventually became all of, or part of, the U.S. states of California, Arizona, New Mexico, Texas, Utah, Nevada, Colorado, Wyoming, and Kansas, tremendously increasing U.S. holdings and stoking the fires of Manifest Destiny. In 1848, the Gadsden Purchase finalized the present border between the United States and Mexico with the purchase of Arizona’s Mesilla Valley.

The incorporation of so much Mexican territory and so many Mexican citizens into the United States led to great problems. The conquest of the territories of the Mexican Cession set a pattern for violence and racial antagonism that still resonates today. Over the next decades, Mexicans and Mexican-Americans alike lost their lands in Texas, California, and New Mexico; the United States government declared the Mexican and Spanish land deeds “imperfect,” questioning their veracity and ultimately taking the lands of tejanos, californios, and others.

The Mexican-American War adversely and lastingly influenced foreign relations in Latin America. Mexico, and much of Latin America, believed that the United States deliberately provoked the war, with American greed being its primary underlying cause. The war intensified Latin American “Yankeephobia,” leading to distrust and suspicion. The war also upset the carefully-maintained domestic political truce over slavery. Some felt that the war would lead to a severe sectional crisis. The sheer amount of potential slaveholding territory coming into the Union upset the balance established by the Missouri Compromise, reignited the slavery debate, and threatened stability.

Finally, the growth of technologies such as the telegraph and the railroad accompanied and enhanced the growth of Manifest Destiny, connecting the burgeoning country in communication and ease of travel. Rail linked the ports and the interior, facilitating trade and propelling the emergence of a national market system.

Exercise $\PageIndex{1}$

The “Greaser Act” is an example of

a law that targeted and politically unempowered Mexican-Americans.
“Yankeephobia” in Mexico.
an attempt to maintain the balance between free and slaveholding states in the aftermath of the Mexican-American War.
an attempt to settle territorial disputes between the United States and Mexico.

Exercise $\PageIndex{2}$

The Wilmot Proviso is an example of

Exercise $\PageIndex{3}$

As a result of the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo, Mexico lost more than half of its territorial land mass.

Exercise $\PageIndex{4}$

The growth of rail and telegraph was hailed by expansionists as a means to

spread American influence.
enhance internal development.
facilitate trade.
all of the above.

Stanford University

SPICE is a program of the Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies.

Mexican Perspectives on the Mexican–U.S. War, 1846–1848

This fall, Stanford’s Center for Latin American Studies and SPICE released a new video lecture by Professor Will Fowler , a renowned expert on Mexican history who teaches at the University of St. Andrews, Scotland. In the lecture, Fowler presents Mexican perspectives on the Mexican–U.S. War of 1846–1848 and the resulting Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo, which most Mexicans regard as the most tragic chapter in their history. Professor Fowler also reflects on the consequences of the war for Mexico and how the country remembers the war.

In Mexico, this war is usually referred to as “ la intervención estadounidense en México ” or “ la guerra mexicano-estadounidense ,” which translates into English as the “U.S. Intervention in Mexico” or “the Mexican–U.S. War.”

The video is an excerpt from a longer lecture that Professor Fowler gave on the Mexican–U.S. War of 1846–1848 for the Center for Latin American Studies on July 27, 2021. A free classroom-friendly discussion guide for this video was developed by SPICE Curriculum Consultant Greg Francis and is available for download here . The objectives of the video lecture and curriculum guide are for students to:

gain an understanding of Mexico’s experience of the Mexican–U.S. War and the 1848 Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo;
examine what led to Mexico’s defeat in the war;
discuss the consequences and legacy of the war from a Mexican perspective; and
learn the importance of thinking critically about perspectives in their textbooks and classes.

Among the topics of Fowler’s lecture is the legend of the six boy heroes, or the Niños Héroes , that has become the main symbol and memory of the war in Mexico. The two most well-known depictions of the event are a mural on the ceiling of Chapultepec Castle and the Altar a la Patria (Altar to the Homeland) monument, more commonly called the Monumento a los Niños Héroes , both in Mexico City. The guide presents an activity that engages students in an examination of the Niños Héroes .

In addition, the guide engages students in a review of how their history textbooks treat the U.S.–Mexico War. After reading the textbook excerpt, students respond to these questions.

According to the textbook passage, how did U.S. leaders and the general public react to the U.S. victory in the war?
What was most surprising or novel to you about the textbook passage?
Which actors does the U.S. textbook emphasize? How do these differ from the actors that Professor Fowler emphasized?
Which perspectives does the textbook cover that Professor Fowler did not, and vice versa?

The video lecture and guide were made possible through the support of U.S. Department of Education National Resource Center funding under the auspices of Title VI, Section 602(a) of the Higher Education Act of 1965.

Video Lecture: Mexican Perspectives on the Mexican–U.S. War, 1846–1848

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Speech on the Mexican-American War

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The day is dark and gloomy, unsettled and uncertain, like the condition of our country, in regard to the unnatural war with Mexico. The public mind is agitated and anxious, and is filled with serious apprehensions as to its indefinite continuance, and especially as to the consequences which its termination may bring forth, menacing the harmony, if not the existence, of our Union.

It is under these circumstances, I present myself before you. No ordinary occasion would have drawn me from the retirement in which I live; but, whilst a single pulsation of the human heart remains, it should, if necessary, be dedicated to the service of one’s country. And I have hope that, although I am a private and humble citizen, an expression of the views and opinions I entertain, might form some little addition to the general stock of information, and afford a small assistance in delivering our country from the perils and dangers which surround it.

I have come here with no purpose to attempt to make a fine speech, or any ambitious oratorical display. I have brought with me no rhetorical bouquets to throw into this assemblage. In the circle of the year, autumn has come, and the season of flowers has passed away. In the progress of years, my spring time has gone by, and I too am in the autumn of life, and feel the frost of age. My desire and aim are to address you, earnestly, calmly, seriously and plainly, upon the grave and momentous subjects which have brought us together. And I am most solicitous that not a solitary word may fall from me, offensive to any party or person in the whole extent of the union.

War, pestilence, and famine, by the common consent of mankind, are the three greatest calamities which can befal our species; and war, as the most direful, justly stands foremost and in front. Pestilence and famine, no doubt for wise although inscrutable purposes, are inflictions of Providence, to which it is our duty, therefore, to bow with obedience, humble submission and resignation. Their duration is not long, and their ravages are limited. They bring, indeed, great affliction whilst they last, but society soon recovers from their effects. War is the voluntary work of our own hands, and whatever reproaches it may deserve should be directed to ourselves. When it breaks out, its duration is indefinite and unknown—its vicissitudes are hidden from our view. In the sacrifice of human life, and in the waste of human treasure, in its losses and in its burthens, it affects both belligerent nations; and its sad effects of mangled bodies, of death, and of desolation, endure long after its thunders are hushed in peace. War unhinges society, disturbs its peaceful and regular industry, and scatters poisonous seeds of disease and immorality, which continue to germinate and diffuse theirbaneful influence long after it has ceased. Dazzling by its glitter, pomp and pageantry, it begets a spirit of wild adventure and romantic enterprise, and often disqualifies those who embark in it, after their return fromthe bloody fields of battle, from engaging in the industrious and peaceful vocations of life.

We are informed by a statement which is apparently correct, that the number of our countrymen slain in this lamentable Mexican war, although it has yet been of only 18 months existence, is equal to one half of the whole of the American loss during the seven years war of the Revolution! And I venture to assert that the expenditure of treasure which it has occasioned, when it shall come to be fairly ascertained and footed up, will be found to be more than half of the pecuniary cost of the war of our independence. And this is the condition of the party whose arms have been every where and constantly victorious!

How did we unhappily get involved in this war? It was predicted as the consequence of the annexation of Texas to the United States. If we had not Texas, we should have no war. The people were told that if that event happened, war would ensue. They were told that the war between Texas and Mexico had not been terminated by a treaty of peace; that Mexico still claimed Texas as a revolted province: and that, if we received Texas in our Union, we took along with her, the war existing between her and Mexico. And the Minister of Mexico [Juan N. Almonte] formally announced to the Government at Washington, that his nation would consider the annexation of Texas to the United States as producing a state of war. But all this was denied by the partisans of annexation. They insisted we should have no war, and even imputed to those who foretold it, sinister motives for their groundless prediction.

But, notwithstanding a state of virtual war necessarily resulted from the fact of annexation of one of the belligerents to the United States, actual hostilities might have been probably averted by prudence, moderation and wise statesmanship. If General Taylor had been permitted to remain, where his own good sense prompted him to believe he ought to remain, at the point of Corpus Christi; and, if a negotiation had been opened with Mexico, in a true spirit of amity and conciliation, war possibly might have been prevented. But, instead of this pacific and moderate course, whilst Mr. Slidell was bending his way to Mexico with his diplomatic credentials, General Taylor was ordered to transport his cannon, and to plant them, in a warlike attitude, opposite to Matamoras, on the east bank of the Rio Bravo; within the very disputed territory, the adjustment of which was to be the object of Mr. Slidell’s mission. What else could have transpired but a conflict of arms?

Thus the war commenced, and the President after having produced it, appealed to Congress. A bill was proposed to raise 50,000 volunteers, and in order to commit all who should vote for it, a preamble was inserted falsely attributing the commencement of the war to the act of Mexico. I have no doubt of the patriotic motives of those who, after struggling to divest the bill of that flagrant error, found themselves constrained to vote for it. But I must say that no earthly consideration would have ever tempted or provoked me to vote for a bill, with a palpable falsehood stamped on its face. Almost idolizing truth, as I do, I never, never, could have voted for that bill.

The exceptionable conduct of the Federal party, during that last British War, has excited an influence in the prosecution of the present war, and prevented a just discrimination between the two wars. That was a war of National defence, required for the vindication of the National rights and honor, and demanded by the indignant voice of the People. President Madison himself, I know, at first, reluctantly and with great doubt and hesitation, brought himself to the conviction that it ought to be declared. A leading, and perhaps the most influential member of his Cabinet, (Mr. Gallatin,) was, up to the time of its declaration, opposed to it. But nothing could withstand the irresistible force of public sentiment. It was a just war, and its great object, as announced at the time, was “Free Trade and Sailors Rights,” against the intolerable and oppressive acts of British power on the ocean. The justice of the war, far from being denied or controverted, was admitted by the Federal party, which only questioned it on considerations of policy. Being deliberately and constitutionally declared, it was, I think, their duty to have given to it their hearty co-operation. But the mass of them did not. They continued to oppose and thwart it, to discourage loans and enlistments, to deny the power of the General Government to march the militia beyond our limits, and to hold a Hartford Convention, which, whatever were its real objects, bore the aspect of seeking a dissolution of the Union itself. They lost and justly lost the public confidence.—But has not an apprehension of a similar fate, in a state of case widely different, repressed a fearless expression of their real sentiments in some of our public men?

How totally variant is the present war! This is no war of defence, but one unnecessary and of offensive aggression. It is Mexico that is defending her fire-sides, her castles and her altars, not we. And how different also is the conduct of the whig party of the present day from that of the major part of the federal party during the war of 1812! Far from interposing any obstacles to the prosecution of the war, if the Whigs in office are reproachable at all, it is for having lent too ready a facility to it, without careful examination into the objects of the war. And, out of office, who have rushed to the prosecution of the war with more ardor and alacrity than the Whigs? Whose hearts have bled more freely than those of the Whigs?—Who have more occasion to mourn the loss of sons, husbands, brothers, fathers, than whig parents, whig wives and whig brothers, in this deadly and unprofitable strife?

But the havoc of war is in progress, and the no less deplorable havoc of an inhospitable and pestilential climate. Without indulging in an unnecessary retrospect and useless reproaches on the past, all hearts and heads should unite in the patriotic endeavor to bring it to a satisfactory close. Is there no way that this can be done? Must we blindly continue the conflict, without any visible object, or any prospect of a definite termination?—This is the important subject upon which I desire to consult and to commune with you. Who, in this free government is, to decide upon the objects of a War, at its commencement, or at any time during its existence? Does the power belong to the Nation, to the collective wisdom of the Nation in Congress assembled, or is it vested solely in a single functionary of the government?

A declaration of war is the highest and most awful exercise of sovereignty. The Convention, which framed our federal constitution, had learned from the pages of history that it had been often and greatly abused. It had seen that war had often been commenced upon the most trifling pretexts; that it had been frequently waged to establish or exclude a dynasty; to snatch a crown from the head of one potentate and place it upon the head of another; that it had been often prosecuted to promote alien and other interests than those of the nation whose chief had proclaimed it, as in the case of English wars for Hanoverian interest; and, in short, that such a vast and tremendous power ought not to be confided to the perilous exercise of one single man. The Convention, therefore, resolved to guard the war-making power against those great abuses, of which in the hands of a monarch it was so susceptible. And the security, against those abuses which its wisdom devised, was to vest the war-making power in the Congress of the United States, being the immediate representatives of the people and the States. So apprehensive and jealous was the Convention of its abuse in any other hands, that it interdicted the exercise of the power to any State in the Union, without the consent of Congress. Congress, then, in our system of government, is the sole depository of that tremendous power.—The Constitution provides that Congress shall have power to declare war, and grant letters of marque and reprisal, to make rules concerning captures on land and water, to raise and support armies, to provide and maintain a navy, and to make rules for the government of the land and naval forces. Thus we perceive that the principal power, in regard to war, with all its ancillary attendants, is granted to Congress. Whenever called upon to determine upon the solemn question of peace or war, Congress must consider and deliberate and decide upon the motives, objects and causes of the war. And, if a war be commenced without any previous declaration of its objects, as in the case of the existing war with Mexico, Congress must necessarily possess the authority, at any time, to declare for what purposes it shall be further prosecuted. If we suppose Congress does not possess the controlling authority attributed to it; if it be conended that a war having been once commenced, the President of the United States may direct it to the accomplishment of any objects he pleases, without consulting and without any regard to the will of Congress, the Convention will have utterly failed in guarding the nation against the abuses and ambition of a single individual. Either Congress, or the President, must have the right of determining upon the objects for which a war shall be prosecuted. There is no other alternative. If the President possess it and may prosecute it for objects against the will of Congress, where is the difference between our free government and that of any other nation which may be governed by an absolute Czar, Emperor, or King?

Congress may omit, as it has omitted in the present war, to proclaim the objects for which it was commenced or has been since prosecuted, and in cases of such omission the President, being charged with the employment and direction of the national force is, necessarily, left to his own judgment to decide upon the objects, to the attainment of which that force shall be applied. But, whenever Congress shall think proper to declare, by some authentic act, for what purposes a war shall be commenced or continued it is the duty of the President to apply the national force to the attainment of those purposes. In the instance of the last war with Great Britain, the act of Congress by which it was declared was preceded by a message of President Madison enumerating the wrongs and injuries of which we complained against Great Britain. That message therefore, and without it the well known objects of the war, which was a war purely of defence, rendered it unnecessary that Congress should particularize, in the act, the specific objects for which it was proclaimed. The whole world knew that it was a war waged for Free Trade and Sailors’ Rights.

It may be urged that the President and Senate possess the treaty making power, without any express limitation as to its exercise; that the natural and ordinary termination of a war is by a treaty of peace; and therefore, that the President and Senate must possess the power to decide what stipulations and conditions shall enter into such a treaty. But it is not more true that the President and Senate possess the treaty making power, without limitation, than that Congress possesses the war making power, without restriction. These two powers then ought to be so interpreted as to reconcile the one with the other; and, in expounding the constitution, we ought to keep constantly in view the nature and structure of our free government, and especially the great object of the Convention in taking the war-making power out of the hands of a single man and placing it in the safer custody of the representatives of the whole nation. The desirable reconciliation between the two powers is effected by attributing to Congress the right to declare what shall be the objects of war, and to the President the duty of endeavoring to obtain those objects by the direction of the national force and by diplomacy.

I am broaching no new and speculative theory. The Statute book of the United States is full of examples of prior declarations by Congress of the objects to be attained by negotiations with Foreign Powers, and the archives of the Executive Department furnish abundant evidence of the accomplishment of those objects, or the attempt to accomplish them, by subsequent negotiation. Prior to the declaration of the last war against Great Britain, in all the restrictive measures which Congress adopted, against the two great belligerent Powers of Europe, clauses were inserted in the several acts establishing them, tendering to both or either of the belligerents the abolition of those restrictions if they would repeal their hostile Berlin and Milan decrees and Orders in Council, operating against our commerce and navigation. And these acts of Congress were invariably communicated, through the Executive, by diplomatic notes, to France and Great Britain, as the basis upon which it was proposed to restore friendly intercourse with them. So, after the termination of the war, various acts of Congress were passed, from time to time, offering to Foreign Powers the principle of reciprocity in the commerce and navigation of the United States with them. Out of these acts have sprung a class, and a large class, of treaties (four or five of which were negotiated, whilst I was in the department of State,) commonly called reciprocity treaties concluded under all the Presidents, from Mr. Madison to Mr. Van Buren, inclusive. And, with regard to commercial treaties, negotiated without the sanction of prior acts of Congress, where they contained either appropriations or were in conflict with unrepealed statutes, it has been ever held as the republican doctrine from Mr. Jay’s treaty down to the present time, that the passage of acts of Congress was necessary to secure the execution of those treaties. If in the matter of Foreign Commerce, in respect to which the power vested in Congress to regulate it and the treaty making power may be regarded as concurrent, Congress can previously decide the objects to which negotiation shall be applied, how much stronger is the case of war, the power to declare which is confided exclusively to Congress?

I conclude, therefore, Mr. President and Fellow-Citizens, with entire confidence, that Congress has the right either at the beginning or during the prosecution of any war, to decide the objects and purposes for which it was proclaimed, or for which it ought to be continued. And, I think, it is the duty of Congress, by some deliberate and authentic act, to declare for what objects the present war shall be longer prosecuted. I suppose that the President would not hesitate to regulate his conduct by the pronounced will of Congress, and to employ the force and the diplomatic power of the nation to execute that will. But, if the President should decline or refuse to do so, and, in contempt of the supreme authority of Congress, should persevere in waging the war, for other objects than those proclaimed by Congress, then it would be the imperative duty of that body to vindicate its authority, by the most stringent, and effectual, and appropriate measures. And, if, on the contrary, the enemy should refuse to conclude a treaty, containing stipulations securing the objects, designated by Congress, it would become the duty of the whole government to prosecute the war, with all the national energy, until those objects were obtained by a treaty of peace. There can be no insuperable difficulty in Congress making such an authoritative declaration. Let it resolve, simply, that the war shall, or shall not, be a war of conquest; and, if a war of conquest, what is to be conquered. Should a resolution pass, disclaiming the design of conquest, peace would follow, in less than sixty days, if the President would conform to his constitutional duty.

Here, fellow Citizens, I might pause, having indicated a mode by which the nation, through its accredited and legitimate representatives in Congress, can announce for what purposes and objects this war shall be longer prosecuted, and can thus let the whole people of the United States know for what end their blood is to be further shed and their treasure further expended, instead of the knowledge of it being locked up and concealed in the bosom of one man. We should no longer perceive the objects of the war, varying, from time to time, according to the changing opinions of the Chief Magistrate, charged with its prosecution. But I do not think it right to stop here. It is the privilege of the people, in their primitive assemblies, and of every private man, however humble, to express an opinion in regard to the purposes for which the war should be continued; and such an expression will receive just so much consideration and consequence as it is entitled to, and no more. Shall this war be prosecuted for the purpose of conquering and annexing Mexico, in all its boundless extent, to the United States?

I will not attribute to the President of the United States any such design; but I confess that I have been shocked and alarmed by manifestations of it in various quarters. Of all the dangers and misfortunes which could befall this nation, I should regard that of its becoming a warlike and conquering power the most direful and fatal. History tells the mournful tale of conquering nations and conquerors. The three most celebrated conquerors, in the civilized world, were Alexander, Caesar and Napoleon. The first, after overrunning a large portion of Asia, and sighing and lamenting that there were no more worlds to subdue, met a premature and ignoble death. His Lieutenants quarrelled and warred with each other, as to the spoils of his victories, and finally lost them all. Caesar, after conquering Gaul, returned, with his triumphant legions to Rome, passed the Rubicon, won the battle of Pharsalia, trampled upon the liberties of his country, and expired by the patriot hand of Brutus. But Rome ceased to be free. War and conquest had enervated and corrupted the masses. The spirit of true liberty was extinguished, and a long line of Emperors succeeded, some of whom were the most execrable monsters that ever existed in human form. And that most extraordinary man [Napoleon], perhaps, in all history, after subjugating all continental Europe, occupying almost all its Capitals, seriously threatening, according to Mr. Thiers, proud Albion itself, and decking the brow of various members of his family, with crowns torn from the heads of other monarchs, lived to behold his own dear France itself in the possession of his enemies, and was made himself a wretched captive, and far removed from country, family, and friends, breathed his last on the distant and inhospitable rock of St. Helena. The Alps and the Rhine had been claimed as the natural boundaries of France, but even these could not be secured in the treaties to which she was reduced to submit. Do you believe that the people of Macedon or Greece, or Rome, or France, were benefitted, individually or collectively, by the triumphs of their great Captains? Their sad lot was immense sacrifice of life, heavy and intolerable burdens, and the ultimate loss of liberty itself.

That the power of the United States is competent to the conquest of Mexico, is quite probable. But it could not be achieved without frightful carnage, dreadful sacrifices of human life, and the creation of an onerous national debt; nor could it be completely effected, in all probability, until after the lapse of many years. It would be necessary to occupy all its strongholds, to disarm its inhabitants, and to keep them in constant fear and subjection. To consummate the work, I presume that standing armies, not less than a hundred thousand men, would be necessary, to be kept perhaps always in the bosom of their country. These standing armies, revelling in a foreign land, and accustomed to trample upon the liberties of a foreign people, at some distant day, might be fit and ready instruments, under the lead of some daring and unprincipled chieftain, to return to their country and prostrate the public liberty.

Supposing the conquest to be once made, what is to be done with it? Is it to be governed, like Roman Provinces, by Proconsuls? Would it be compatible with the genius, character, and safety of our free institutions, to keep such a great country as Mexico, with a population of not less that nine millions, in a state of constant military subjection?

Shall it be annexed to the United States: Does any considerate man believe it possible that two such immense countries, with territories of nearly equal extent, with populations so incongruous, so different in race, in language, in religion and in laws, could be blended together in one harmonious mass, and happily governed by one common authority? Murmurs, discontent, insurrections, rebellion, would inevitably ensue, until the incompatible parts would be broken asunder, and possibly, in the frightful struggle, our present glorious Union itself would be dissevered or dissolved. We ought not to forget the warning voice of all history, which teaches the difficulty of combining and consolidating together, conquering and conquered nations. After the lapse of eight hundred years, during which the Moors held their conquest of Spain, the indomitable courage, perseverance and obstinacy of the Spanish race finally triumphed, and expelled the Africa invaders from the Peninsula. And, even within our own time, the colossal power of Napoleon, when at its loftiest height, was incompetent to subdue and subjugate the proud Castilian. And here in our own neighborhood, Lower Canada, which near one hundred years ago, after the conclusion of the seven years war, was ceded by France to Great Britain, remains a foreign land in the midst of the British provinces, foreign in feelings and attachment, and foreign in laws and language. And what has been the fact with poor, gallant, generous and oppressed Ireland? Centuries have passed away, since the overbearing Saxon overrun and subjugated the Emerald Isle. Rivers of Irish blood have flowed, during the long and arduous contest. Insurrection and rebellion have been the order of the day; and yet, up to this time, Ireland remains alien in feeling, affection and sympathy, towards the power which has so long borne her down. Every Irishman hates, with a mortal hatred, his Saxon oppressor. Although there are great territorial differences between the condition of England and Ireland, as compared to that of the United States and Mexico, there are some points of striking resemblance between them. Both the Irish and the Mexicans are probably of the same Celtic race. Both the English and the Americans are of the same Saxon origin. The Catholic religion predominates in both the former, the Protestant among both the latter. Religion has been the fruitful cause of dissatisfaction and discontent between the Irish and the English nations. Is there not reason to apprehend that it would become so between the people of the United States and those of Mexico, if they were united together? Why should we seek to interfere with them, in their mode of worship of a common Saviour? We believe that they are wrong, especially in the exclusive character of their faith, and that we are right. They think that they are right and we wrong. What other rule can there be than to leave the followers of each religion to their own solemn convictions of conscientious duty towards God? Who, but the great Arbiter of the Universe, can judge in such a question? For my own part, I sincerely believe and hope, that those, who belong to all the departments of the great church of Christ, if, in truth and purity, they conform to the doctrines which they profess, will ultimately secure an abode in those regions of bliss, which all aim finally to reach. I think that there is no potentate in Europe, whatever his religion may be, more enlightened or at this moment so interesting as the liberal head of the Papal See.

But I suppose it to be impossible that those who favor, if there be any who favor the annexation of Mexico to the United States, can think that it ought to be perpetually governed by military sway. Certainly no votary of human liberty could deem it right that a violation should be perpetrated of the great principles of our own revolution, according to which, laws ought not to be enacted and taxes ought not to be levied, without representation on the part of those who are to obey the one, and pay the other. Then, Mexico is to participate in our councils and equally share in our legislation and government. But, suppose she would not voluntarily choose representatives to the national Congress, is our soldiery to follow the electors to the ballot-box, and by force to compel them, at the point of the bayonet, to deposit their ballots? And how are the nine millions of Mexican people to be represented in the Congress of the United States of America and the Congress of the United States of the Republic of Mexico combined? Is every Mexican, without regard to color or caste, per capitum, to exercise the elective franchise? How is the quota of representation between the two Republics, to be fixed? Where is their Seat of Common Government to be established? And who can foresee or foretell, if Mexico, voluntarily or by force, were to share in the common government what would be the consequences to her or to us? Unprepared, as I fear her population yet is, for the practical enjoyment of self government, and of habits, customs, languages, laws and religion, so totally different from our own, we should present the revolting spectacle of a confused, distracted, and motley government. We should have a Mexican Party, a Pacific Ocean Party, an Atlantic Party in addition to the other Parties, which exist, or with which we are threatened, each striving to execute its own particular views and purposes, and reproaching the others with thwarting and disappointing them. The Mexican representation, in Congress would probably form a separate and impenetrable corps, always ready to throw itself into the scale of any other party, to advance and promote Mexican interests. Such a state of things could not long endure. Those, whom God and Geography have pronounced should live asunder, could never be permanently and harmoniously united together.

Do we want for our own happiness or greatness the addition of Mexico to the existing Union of our States? If our population was too dense for our territory, and there was a difficulty in obtaining honorably the means of subsistence, there might be some excuse for an attempt to enlarge our dominions. But we have no such apology. We have already, in our glorious country, a vast and almost boundless territory. Beginning at the North, in the frozen regions of the British Provinces, it stretches thousands of miles along the coasts of the Atlantic Ocean and the Mexican Gulf, until it almost reaches the Tropics. It extends to the Pacific Ocean, borders on those great inland seas, the Lakes, which separate us from the possession of Great Britain, and it embraces the great father of rivers, from its uppermost source to the Belize, and the still longer Missouri, from its mouth to the gorges of the Rocky Mountains. It comprehends the greatest variety of the richest soils, capable of almost all the productions of the earth, except tea and coffee and the spices, and it includes every variety of climate, which the heart could wish or desire. We have more than ten thousand millions of acres of waste and unsettled lands, enough for the subsistence of ten or twenty times our present population. Ought we not to be satisfied with such a country? Ought we not to be profoundly thankful to the Giver of all good things for such a vast and bountiful land? Is it not the height of ingratitude to Him to seek, by war and conquest, indulging in a spirit of rapacity, to acquire other lands, the homes and habitations of a large portion of his common children? If we pursue the object of such a conquest, besides mortgaging the revenue and resources of this country for ages to come, in the form of an onerous national debt, we should have greatly to augment that debt, by an assumption of the sixty or seventy millions of the national debt of Mexico. For I take it that nothing is more certain than that, if we obtain, voluntarily or by conquest, a foreign nation we acquire it with all the incumbrances attached to it. In my humble opinion, we are now bound, in honor and morality, to pay the just debt of Texas. And we should be equally bound, by the same obligations, to pay the debt of Mexico, if it were annexed to the United States.

Of all the possessions which appertain to man, in his collective or individual condition, none should be preserved and cherished, with more sedulous and unremitting care, than that of an unsullied character. It is impossible to estimate it too highly, in society, when attached to an individual, nor can it be exaggerated or too greatly magnified in a nation. Those who lose or are indifferent to it become just objects of scorn an contempt. Of all the abominable transactions, which sully the pages of history none exceed in enormity that of the dismemberment and partition of Poland, by the three great Continental Powers of Russia, Austria, and Prussia.—Ages may pass away, and centuries roll around, but as long as human records endure all mankind will unite in execrating the rapacious and detestable deed. That was accomplished by overwhelming force, and the unfortunate existence of fatal dissensions and divisions in the bosom of Poland.—Let us avoid affixing to our name and national character a similar, if not worse, stigma. I am afraid that we do not now stand well in the opinion of other parts of christendom. Repudiation has brought upon us much reproach. All the nations, I apprehend, look upon us, in the prosecution of the present war, as being actuated by a spirit of rapacity, and an inordinate desire for territorial aggrandizement. Let us not forfeit altogether their good opinions. Let us command their applause by a noble exercise of forbearance and justice. In the elevated station which we hold, we can safely afford to practice the Godlike virtues of moderation and magnanimity. The long series of glorious triumphs, achieved by our gallant commanders and their brave armies, unattended by a single reverse, justify us, without the least danger of tarnishing the national honor, in disinterestedly holding out the olive branch of peace. We do not want the mines, the mountains, the morasses, and the sterile lands of Mexico. To her the loss of them would be humiliating, and be a perpetual source of regret and mortification. To us they might prove a fatal acquisition, producing distraction, dissension, division, possibly disunion. Let, therefore, the integrity of the national existence and national territory of Mexico remain undisturbed. For one, I desire to see no part of her territory torn from her by war. Some of our people have placed their hearts upon the acquisition of the Bay of San Francisco in Upper California. To us, as a great maritime Power, it might prove to be of advantage hereafter in respect to our commercial and navigating interests. To Mexico, which can never be a great maritime Power, it can never be of much advantage. If we can obtain it by fair purchase with a just equivalent, I should be happy to see it so acquired. As, whenever the war ceases, Mexico ought to be required to pay the debt due our citizens, perhaps an equivalent for that Bay may be found in that debt, our Government assuming to pay to our citizens whatever portion of it may be applied to that object. But it should form no motive in the prosecution of the war, which I would not continue a solitary hour for the sake of that harbor.

But what, it will be asked, shall we make peace without any indemnity for the expences of the war? If the published documents in relation to the late negotiations between Mr. Trist and the Mexican Commissioners be true, and I have not seen them any where contradicted, the Executive properly waived any demand of indemnity for the expences of the war. And the rupture of that negotiation was produced, by our Government insisting upon a cessation from Mexico, of the strip of mostly barren land between the Nueces and the Rio Bravo and New Mexico, which Mexico refused to make. So that we are now fighting, if not for the conquest of all Mexico, as intimated in some quarters, for that narrow strip and for the barren Province of New Mexico, with its few miserable mines. We bought all the Province of Louisiana for fifteen millions of dollars, and it is, in my opinion, worth more than all Mexico together. We bought Florida for five millions of dollars, and a hard bargain it was, since, besides that sum, we gave up the boundary of the Rio Bravo, to which I think we were entitled, as the Western limit of the Province of Louisiana, and were restricted to that of the Sabine. And we are now, if not seeking the conquest of all Mexico, to continue this war indefinitely for the inconsiderable objects to which I have just referred.

But, it will be repeated, are we to have no indemnity for the expenses of this war? Mexico is utterly unable to make us any pecuniary indemnity, if the justice of the war on our part entitled us to demand it. Her country has been laid waste, her cities burned or occupied by our troops, her means so exhausted that she is unable to pay even her own armies. And every day’s prosecution of the war, whilst it would augment the amount of our indemnity, would lessen the ability of Mexico to pay it. We have seen, however, that there is another form in which we are to demand indemnity. It is to be territorial indemnity! I hope, for reasons already stated that that fire-brand will not be brought into our country.

Among the resolutions, which it is my intention to present for your consideration, at the conclusion of this address, one proposes, in your behalf and mine, to disavow, in the most positive manner, any desire, on our part, to acquire any foreign territory whatever, for the purpose of introducing slavery into it. I do not know that any citizen of the United States entertains such a wish. But such a motive has been often imputed to the slave States, and I therefore think it necessary to notice it on this occasion. My opinions on the subject of slavery are well known. They have the merit, if it be one, of consistency, uniformity, and long duration. I have ever regarded slavery as a great evil, a wrong, for the present, I fear, an irremediable wrong to its unfortunate victims. I should rejoice if not a single slave breathed the air or was within the limits of our country. But here they are, to be dealt with as well as we can, with a due consideration of all circumstances affecting the security, safety and happiness of both races. Every State has the supreme, uncontrolled and exclusive power to decide for itself whether slavery shall cease or continue within its limits, without any exterior intervention from any quarter. In States, where the slaves outnumber the whites, as is the case with several, the blacks could not be emancipated and invested with all the rights of freemen, without becoming the governing race in those States. Collisions and conflicts, between the two races, would be inevitable, and, after shocking scenes of rapine and carnage, the extinction or expulsion of the blacks would certainly take place. In the State of Kentucky, near fifty years ago, I thought the proportion of slaves, in comparison with the whites, was so inconsiderable that we might safely adopt a system of gradual emancipation that would ultimately eradicate this evil in our State. That system was totally different from the immediate abolition of slavery for which the party of the Abolitionists of the present day contend. Whether they have intended it or not, it is my calm and deliberate belief, that they have done incalculable mischief even to the very cause which they have espoused, to say nothing of the discord which has been produced between different parts of the Union. According to the system, we attempted, near the close of the last century, all slaves in being were to remain such, but, all who might be born subsequent to a specified day, were to become free at the age of twenty-eight, and, during their service, were to be taught to read, write, and cypher. Thus, instead of being thrown upon the community, ignorant and unprepared, as would be the case by immediate emancipation, they would have entered upon the possession of their freedom, capable, in some degree, of enjoying it. After a hard struggle, the system was defeated, and I regret it extremely, as, if it had been then adopted, our State would be now nearly rid of that reproach.

Since the epoch, a scheme of unmixed benevolence has sprung up, which, if it had existed at that time, would have obviated one of the greatest objections which was made to gradual emancipation, which was the continuance of the emancipated slaves to abide among us. That scheme is the American Colonization Society. About twenty-eight years ago, a few individuals, myself among them, met together in the city of Washington, and laid the foundations of that society. It has gone on, amidst extraordinary difficulties and trials, sustaining its elf almost entirely, by spontaneous and voluntary contributions, from individual benevolence, without scarcely any aid from Government. The Colonies, planted under its auspices, are now well established communities, with churches, schools and other institutions appertaining to the civilized state. They have made successful war in repelling attacks and invasions by their barbarous and savage neighbors. They have made treaties, annexed territories to their dominion, and are blessed with a free representative Government. I recently read a message, from one of their Governors to their Legislature, which, in point of composition, and in careful attention to the public affairs of their Republic, would compare advantageously to the messages of the Governors of our own States. I am not very superstitious, but I do solemnly believe that these Colonies are blest with the smiles of Providence; and, if we may dare attempt penetrating the veil, by which He conceals his allwise dispensations from mortal eyes, that he designs that Africa shall be the refuge and the home of the descendants of its sons and daughters, torn and dragged from their native land, by lawless violence.

It is a philanthropic and consoling reflection that the moral and physical condition of the African race in the United States, even in a State of slavery, is far better than it would have been if their ancestors had never been brought from their native land. And if it should be the decree of the Great Ruler of the Universe that their descendants shall be made instruments in His hands in the establishment of Civilization and the Christian Religion throughout Africa, our regrets on account of the original wrong, will be greatly mitigated.

It may be argued, that, in admitting the injustice of slavery, I admit the necessity of an instantaneous reparation of that injustice. Unfortunately, however, it is not always safe, practicable or possible, in the great movements of States and public affairs of nations, to remedy or repair the infliction of previous injustice. In the inception of it, we may oppose and denounce it, by our most strenuous exertions, but, after its consummation, there is often no other alternative left us but to deplore its perpetration, and to acquiesce as the only alternative, in its existence, as a less evil that the frightful consequences which might ensue from the vain endeavor to repair it. Slavery is one of those unfortunate instances. The evil of it was inflicted upon us, by the parent country of Great Britain, against all the entreaties and remonstrances of the colonies. And here it is among us, and we must dispose of it, as best we can under all the circumstances which surround us. It continued, by the importation of slaves from Africa, in spite of Colonial resistance, for a period of more than a century and a half, and it may require an equal or longer lapse of time before our country is entirely rid of the evil. And, in the meantime, moderation, prudence and discretion among ourselves, and the blessings of Providence may be all necessary to accomplish our ultimate deliverance from it. Example of similar infliction of irreparable national evil and injustice might be multiplied to an indefinite extent. The case of the annexation of Texas to the United States is a recent and obvious one where, if it were wrong, it cannot now be repaired. Texas is now an integral part of our Union, with its own voluntary consent. Many of us opposed the annexation with honest zeal and most earnest exertions. But who would now think of perpetrating the folly of casting Texas out of the confederacy and throwing her backupon her own independence, or into the armsof Mexico? Who would now seek to divorce her from this Union? The Creeks and the Cherokee Indians were, by the most exceptionable means, driven from their country, and transported beyond the Mississippi river. Their lands have been fairly purchased and occupied by inhabitants of Georgia, Alabama, Mississippi and Tennessee. Who would now conceive of the flagrant injustice of expelling those inhabitants and restoring the Indian country to the Cherokees and the Creeks, under color of repairing original injustice? During the war of our revolution, millions of paper money were issued by our ancestors, as the only currency with which they could achieve our liberties and independence. Thousands and hundreds of thousands of families were stripped of their homes and their all and brought to ruin, by giving credit and confidence to that spurious currency. Stern necessity has prevented the reparation of that great national injustice.

But I forbear, I will no longer trespass upon your patience or further tax my own voice, impaired by a speech of more than three hours duration, which professional duty required me to make only a few days ago. If I have been at all successful in the exposition of the views and opinions which I entertain I have shown—

1st. That the present war was brought about by the annexation of Texas and the subsequent order of the President, without the previous consent and authority of Congress.

2d. That the President, being unenlightened and uninstructed, by any public declaration of Congress, as to objects for which it ought to be prosecuted, in the conduct of it is, necessarily, left to his own sense of what the national interests and honor may require.

3d. That the whole war making power of the nation, as to motives, causes and objects, is confided by the constitution to the discretion and judgment of Congress.

4th. That it is, therefore, the right of Congress, at the commencement or during the progress of any war, to declare for what objects and purposes the war ought to be waged and prosecuted.

5th. That it is the right and duty of Congress to announce to the nation for what objects the present war shall be longer continued; that it is the duty of the President, in the exercise of all his official functions, to conform to and carry out this declared will of Congress, by the exercise, if necessary, of all the high powers with which he is clothed; and that, if he fail or refuse to do so, it becomes the imperative duty of Congress to arrest the further progress of the war by the most effectual means in its power.

Let Congress announce to the nation the objects for which this war shall be further protracted and public suspense and public inquietude will no longer remain. If it is to be a war of conquest of all, or any part of Mexico, let the people know it, and they will be no longer agitated by a dark and uncertain future. But, although I might have foreborne to express any opinion whatever as to purposes and objects for which the war should be continued, I have not thought proper to conceal my opinions, whether worth any thing or not, from the public examination. Accordingly I have stated.

6th. That it seems to me that it is the duty of our country, as well on the score of moderation and magnanimity, as with the view of avoiding discord and discontent at home, to abstain from seeking to conquer and annex to the United States Mexico or any part of it; and, especially, to disabuse the public mind in any quarter of the Union of the impression, if it any where exists, that a desire for such a conquest, is cherished for the purpose of propagating or extending slavery.

I have embodied, Mr. President and fellow-citizens, the sentiments and opinions which I have endeavored to explain and enforce in a series of resolutions which I beg now to submit to your consideration and judgment. They are the following:

1. Resolved, as the opinion of this meeting, that the primary cause of the present unhappy war, existing between the United States of America, and the United States of the Republic of Mexico, was the annexation of Texas to the former; and that the immediate occasion of hostilities between the two republics arose out of the order of the President of the United States for the removal of the army under the command of General Taylor, from its position at Corpus Christi to a point opposite to Matamoras, on the East bank of the Rio Bravo, within territory claimed by both Republics, but then under the jurisdiction of that of Mexico, and inhabited by its citizens; and that the order of the President for the removal of the army to that point, was improvident and unconstitutional, it being without the concurrence of Congress, or even any consultation with it, although it was in session: but that Congress having, by subsequent acts, recognized the war thus brought into existence without its previous authority or consent, the prosecution of it became thereby National.

2. Resolved, That, in the absence of any formal and public declaration by Congress, of the objects for which the war ought to be prosecuted, the President of the United States, as Chief Magistrate, and as Commander in Chief of the Army and Navy of the United States, is left to the guidance of his own judgment to prosecute it for such purposes and objects as he may deem the honor and interest of the nation to require.

3. Resolved, That, by the Constitution of the United States, Congress, being invested with the power to declare war, and grant letters of marque and reprizal, to make rules concerning captures on land and water, to raise and support armies, to provide and maintain a navy, and to make rules for the government of the land and naval forces, has the full and complete war making power of the United States; and, so possessing it, has a right to determine upon the motives, causes and objects of any war, when it commences, or at any time during the progress of its existence.

4. Resolved, as the further opinion of this meeting, that it is the right and duty of Congress to declare, by some authentic act, for what purposes and objects the existing war ought to be further prosecuted; that it is the duty of the President, in his official conduct, to conform to such a declaration of Congress; and that, if, after such declaration, the President should decline or refuse to endeavor, by all the means, civil, diplomatic, and military, in his power, to execute the announced will of Congress, and, in defiance of its authority, should continue to prosecute the war for purposes and objects other than those declared by that body, it would become the right and duty of Congress to adopt the most efficacious measures to arrest the further progress of the war, taking care to make ample provision for the honor, the safety and security of our armies in Mexico, in every contingency. And, if Mexico should decline or refuse to conclude a treaty with us, stipulating for the purposes and objects so declared by Congress, it would be the duty of the Government to prosecute the war with the utmost vigor, until they were attained by a treaty of peace.

5. Resolved, That we view with serious alarm, and are utterly opposed to any purpose of annexing Mexico to the United States, in any mode, and especially by conquest; that we believe the two nations could not be happily governed by one common authority, owing to their great difference of race, law, language and religion, and the vast extent of their respective territories, and large amount of their respective populations; that such a union, against the consent of the exasperated Mexican people, could only be effected and preserved by large standing armies, and the constant application of military force—in other words, by despotic sway exercised over the Mexican people, in the first instance, but which, there would be just cause to apprehend, might, in process of time, be extended over the people of the United States. That we deprecate, therefore, such a union, as wholly incompatible with the genius of our Government, and with the character of free and liberal institutions; and we anxiously hope that each nation may be left in the undisturbed possession of its own laws, language, cherished religion and territory, to pursue its own happiness, according to what it may deem best for itself.

6. Resolved, That, considering the series of splendid and brilliant victories achieved by our brave armies and their gallant commanders, during the war with Mexico, unattended by a single reverse, The United States, without any danger of their honor suffering the slightest tarnish, can practice the virtues of moderation and magnanimity towards their discomfited foe. We have no desire for the dismemberment of the United States of the Republic of Mexico, but wish only a just and proper fixation of the limits of Texas.

7. Resolved, That we do, positively and emphatically, disclaim and disavow any wish or desire, on our part, to acquire any foreign territory whatever,for the purpose of propagating slavery, or of introducing slaves from the United States, into such foreign territory.

8. Resolved, That we invite our fellow citizens of the United States, who are anxious for the restoration of the blessings of peace, or, if the existing war shall continue to be prosecuted, are desirous that its purpose and objects shall be defined and known; who are anxious to avert present and future perils and dangers, with which it may be fraught; and who are also anxious to produce contentment and satisfaction at home, and to elevate the national character abroad, to assemble together in their respective communities, and to express their views, feelings, and opinions.

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Struggle for Mexican Independence

By: History.com Editors

Updated: September 15, 2021 | Original: September 14, 2010

On September 16, 1810, a progressive priest named Miguel Hidalgo y Costilla became the father of Mexican independence with a historic proclamation urging his fellow Mexicans to take up arms against the Spanish government. Known as the “Grito de Dolores,” Hidalgo’s declaration launched a decade-long struggle that ended 300 years of colonial rule, established an independent Mexico and helped cultivate a unique Mexican identity. Its anniversary is now celebrated as the country’s birthday.

Background to Mexican Independence

The land that is now Mexico fell into Spanish hands in August 1521 when Hernán Cortés and his army of conquistadors toppled the Aztec empire, ushering in three centuries of colonial rule and importing new diseases that decimated once-flourishing native populations. Under orders from the Spanish king, Charles V, Cortés founded a capital city—Ciudad de Mexico—on the ruins of Tenochtitlan, and a series of viceroys took command of the territory, which was dubbed New Spain.

Did you know? Despite his traditional education for the priesthood, Miguel Hidalgo y Costilla rejected or questioned many of Catholicism’s most fundamental tenets, including the Virgin birth, clerical celibacy and the existence of hell.

The earliest revolt against the Spanish colonial government was led by Martín Cortés, the illegitimate son of Hernán Cortés and his translator, a Mayan-born woman known as La Malinche. In the years leading up to the Mexican War of Independence, most plots to end Spanish rule were devised by Mexican-born Spaniards, or criollos , who ranked below native Europeans within Mexico’s highly stratified caste system. The criollos’ approach largely excluded Indigenous Mexicans and mestizos —people of mixed ancestry like Martín Cortés—who were often deprived of the most basic political and civil rights.

Mexican War of Independence

Napoleon’s invasion and occupation of Spain from 1808 to 1813 heightened the revolutionary fervor in Mexico and other Spanish colonies. On September 16, 1810, Miguel Hidalgo y Costilla, a respected Catholic priest (and an unconventional one, given his rejection of celibacy and love of gambling) issued a passionate rallying cry known as the “Grito de Dolores” (“Cry of Dolores”) that amounted to a declaration of war against the colonial government. So named because it was publicly read in the town of Dolores, the Grito called for the end of Spanish rule in Mexico, the redistribution of land and a concept that the criollos ’ earlier plans had deliberately omitted: racial equality. Though a criollo himself, Hidalgo extended his call to arms to mestizos and people of Indigenous descent; their significant contribution of manpower changed the tenor of the revolt.

Hidalgo led his growing militia from village to village en route to Mexico City, leaving in their wake a bloodbath that he later came to deeply regret. Defeated at Calderón in January 1811, Hidalgo fled north but was captured and executed by firing squad in Chihuahua . Others took the helm of the rebellion, including José María Morelos y Pavón, Mariano Matamoros and Vicente Guerrero, who all led armies of Indigenous and racially mixed revolutionaries against the Spanish royalists. Known as the Mexican War Of Independence, the conflict dragged on until 1821, when the Treaty of Córdoba established Mexico as an independent constitutional monarchy under Agustín de Iturbide. Just 18 months later, the republican insurgents Antonio López de Santa Anna and Guadalupe Victoria ousted the emperor and established the first Mexican Republic.

Celebrating Mexican Independence

Although September 16, 1810, marked the beginning of Mexico’s struggle for independence rather than its ultimate achievement, the anniversary of the Grito de Dolores has been a day of celebration across Mexico since the late 19th century. The holiday begins on the evening of September 15 with a symbolic reenactment of Hidalgo’s historic proclamation by the president of the republic and the governor of each state. The next day, typical activities include parades, bullfights, rodeos and traditional dancing. In 2010, the festivities included a special—if somewhat macabre—feature: In honor of the country’s bicentennial, the remains of 12 men who fought for Mexican independence—including Hidalgo, Morelos, Matamoros and Guerrero—were exhumed in a military ceremony led by President Felipe Calderón.

Many non-Mexicans, particularly in the United States, often mistake the Cinco de Mayo holiday for a celebration of Mexican independence; instead, it commemorates the Mexican army’s 1862 victory over France at the Battle of Puebla during the French-Mexican War.

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The Mexican-American War: An Annotated Bibliography

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Gene Brack; The Mexican-American War: An Annotated Bibliography. Hispanic American Historical Review 1 May 1982; 62 (2): 318–319. doi: https://doi.org/10.1215/00182168-62.2.318a

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Norman E. Tutorow’s annotated bibliography of the Mexican-American War will be useful, if not indispensable, to future writers on the subject, and those who have worked in the area previously will be envious that the bibliography was unavailable to them.

The bibliography contains 4,537 items arranged under eight headings: Reference Works; Manuscript Collections; Government Documents; United States National Archives; Periodical Literature; Books; Theses and Dissertations; and Cartography and Graphics.

There are eight appendixes, some of which contain important information (like appendix six, which includes nine tables on military strength and casualties).

While future work on the Mexican War must of necessity rely heavily upon Tutorow’s bibliography, it is nevertheless somewhat limited in its usefulness for perfectly valid, but regrettable, reasons of space, an apparently insurmountable problem that the compiler acknowledges and explains in his introduction. First, the bibliography contains only material relating specifically to the period of the war itself, from May 1846 to February 1848. Many items treat earlier and later events, but the vast majority do pertain only to this narrowly prescribed chronological period. Second, and perhaps more important, the compiler acknowledges that he “does not deal in any great detail with Mexican sources” (p. xxv). How unfortunate this is, since most work in English on the Mexican War has suffered from ignoring Mexican sources, and the bibliography under review might have stimulated future writers to be more balanced in their treatment of the war and related issues.

The annotations are well done; those treating periodical literature are more complete, for some reason, than those treating books.

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New Mexico filmmaker tells the stories of war-torn Ukraine

NEW MEXICO (KRQE) – New Mexico has been at the cutting edge of filmmaking since the silent movie days of Tom Mix. Now one New Mexico filmmaker’s inspiration has led her to war-torn Ukraine.

On February 24, 2022, Russia invaded the neighboring country of Ukraine. The unprovoked and largest humanitarian crisis in Europe since World War II. It’s also not the first time the super-power has waged war on the former Soviet Republic.

As the Soviet Union crumbled, Ukraine passed its declaration of independence in August of 1991. As the years progressed, so did Ukraine’s alliances with western nations and members of NATO.

President Vladimir Putin saw this as an act of aggression toward Russia, threatening western countries with retaliation if they encroached too much in Ukraine.

In 2014, Russia covertly invaded and annexed Crimea, a move they justified as a “rescue operation” for Russian Nationals living in the southeastern parts of Ukraine. Less than 10 years later, Putin launched his full-scale attack that continues to this day.

“When the full-scale invasion happened, I felt compelled to help. And so I used basically all of my background experience, to help in what I’m doing now,” said Genevieve Trainor.

Half a world away, filmmaker and media strategist Genevieve Trainor watched with millions of other Americans as the brutal invasion took place. Images were fed back to American news outlets of bombed-out buildings and military campaigns. Trainor couldn’t help but think of the innocent, anonymous voices of Ukrainians living in the war zone. “We see we see the bombed out buildings in the news, but we don’t hear the people’s stories,” said Trainor.

Trainor, who received her undergrad in Communications and Journalism from the University of New Mexico, felt she might be able to give a voice to those living through the conflict.

So in the fall of 2022, she sold her car, stepped away from her career in film and public relations, and planned her first trip to Eastern Europe. Landing in Warsaw, Poland in 2022, she convened with filmmakers based in Poland, Ukraine, and colleagues working state-side.

“It felt a little bit extreme for my first trip to Ukraine, to go to the eastern part of the country, where that’s where most of the action is,” said Trainor.

Compelled by her Polish colleague, Trainor crossed over the border to Ukraine making her way east to the occupied Donbas region and the city of Kharkiv. “And so we spent time in there, in that region and, in Kharkiv and the way that people, they don’t take their days for granted, they wake up, you know, not everybody, of course, but generally speaking, they wake up appreciative of waking up for another day,” said Trainor.

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As you head further east into the country, the roads deteriorate, destroyed by Russian tanks and bombings. In some parts, you can see reflections of a time when the country wasn’t at war. It’s within these confines that thousands of Ukrainians make their best effort to live a normal life and at the same time, voluntarily take up arms against their invaders. “It’s a civilian war, you know, most I believe most of the military members. Right now fighting were civilians before the full-scale invasion. The people helping on the ground are every day, everyday Ukrainians,” said Trainor.

Since December of 2022, Trainor has taken six trips to the country with a seventh planned for the summer. There she meets, listens, and relays the daily struggles triumphs, and tragedies of the nation’s population. Among them are people like Yevegeny, a Ukrainian-born basketball enthusiast who is working to provide free camps for kids displaced by the war. Then there is Fuminori Tsuchiko, a 76-year-old transplant to the country, arriving just weeks before Russia attacked. He has helped with humanitarian efforts, distributing food, developing a mobile children’s library and establishing a cafe.

Trainor herself has sacrificed much to help bring the untold stories outside the borders of Ukraine. But one sacrifice in particular made her decision difficult but necessary. ” I have two girls, and, that said, it’s certainly not something that everybody understands in terms of why I’m spending time in Ukraine, particularly as a mother and with kids. And I know that it’s okay for me that people don’t understand. but it had I’ve sacrificed time with my girls. That I won’t get back. So, that’s that’s probably the hardest thing,” said Trainor. ” I think that time with my girls that I won’t get back has been hard, but I hope…. I hope that my my work there shows them that they can they can pivot their lives if they feel compelled to do something in their life that they’re not currently doing. That they don’t have to stay in something that you know doesn’t make them happy or know that they can also chase what they want in their life.”

The Domino effect on global stability cannot be understated and while thousands of miles separate the US from Ukraine, Trainor stresses no one is immune from the conflict.

Trainor has also been working ith Ukranian media overseas as well as in the United States, combatting with what she calls Russian propaganda. Her producers are currently in post-production on their first episodes of the docuseries.

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New Mexico filmmaker tells the stories of war-torn Ukraine

Group shot of a family in the garden of their house. One woman in the foreground is cutting another's hair, while a girl pushes a baby in a pram and another woman looks on

The families risking everything to keep Ukraine’s trains running – photo essay

Dutch photographer Jelle Krings has been documenting the workers of the Ukrainian railway since the war began. Here, he revisits the families that have kept a war-torn country moving, often to great personal sacrifice

Words and pictures by Jelle Krings

I n the early hours of 24 February 2022, when Russian bombs and rockets struck Ukrainian cities and infrastructure throughout the country, railway workers boarded trains heading east. Determined to get as many people as possible to safety , they would end up evacuating millions to Ukraine’s borders in the west.

Ukraine’s new railway chief Yevhen Liashchenko was in the team that guided the network through the first stages of the war. He says his people acted not because they were instructed to but because “they didn’t know any other way”. There was no time for bureaucracy, “decisions were made by the people on the ground, and they love the railway, not as a business but as a family”.

It takes more than 230,000 people to keep the trains running in Ukraine.

The train station in Lyman, Donbas, in ruins after being destroyed by shelling.

The railway station in Lyman, Donbas, destroyed by shelling

Yevhen Liashchenko, chief executive of Ukrainian Railways, standing in a rail shed with a man working on a wagon behind him.

Yevhen Liashchenko, chief executive of Ukrainian railways, has been leading Ukraine’s 230,000 railway workers through the war

Together they run a vast railway network of more than 15,000 miles (24,000km) of track, one that has been invaluable for Ukraine’s ability to withstand the invasion. Despite continual bombing, the network has largely remained operational. Damage to the tracks is swiftly repaired, and shell-hit critical infrastructure is promptly restored.

Over two years, we followed families and workers living by the tracks near the frontlines to find out how the war and the struggle to keep the trains running is shaping their lives.

The Neschcheryakovas

Nadiya Neschcheryakova works as an attendant at a railway crossing in Bucha, about 10 miles from Kyiv. She works in shifts, sharing her post with her mother and two other women. On the morning of the invasion, the sound of explosions pierced the sky above the thick pine forests surrounding her home. She went to work anyway. A few days later, her post at the railway crossing was occupied by Russian troops. Her home in the next village along the track was now at the frontline of the war.

Nadiya Neschcheryakova at her post at a railway crossing in Bucha, near Kyiv. A freight train approaches under an overcast winter sky.

Nadiya Neschcheryakova operates her railway crossing in Bucha, near Kyiv . A freight train passes transporting materials such as wood for possible use in Ukraine’s defensive efforts along the frontline

Remnants of a house, destroyed by shelling, lie in a yard

Remnants of the Neschcheryakovas’ family house, destroyed by shelling, lie in the yard at Spartak, Kyiv oblast

Nadiya Neschcheryakova, right, with her husband, Yuriy, left, on either side of their daughter Kateryna and grandson Andriy.

Nadiya Neschcheryakova with her husband, Yuriy, their daughter Kateryna and grandson Andriy. Yuriy built a new house after their home was destroyed by shelling early in the war

With her husband, daughter and grandson, Nadiya managed to flee to the west where they stayed for a month waiting for the Russian withdrawal from Kyiv. When they returned home, they found their home had been reduced to rubble.

The Petrovs

When the city of Kherson was liberated after nine months of Russian occupation in November 2022, Oleksandr Petrov was sent on a mission to repair the tracks leading to the city. When he set out in a van with a team of repairmen in the morning, he knew the risks: the fields along the tracks were heavily mined in an attempt to slow the Ukrainian advance.

Railway workers wash their wounds after driving over a mine in the Kherson region, November 2022.

Railway workers wash their wounds after driving over a mine in the Kherson region, 13 November 2022. They were carrying out repair works just days after Kherson was liberated. Oleksandr Petrov lost a leg in the incident

Oleksandr shows his prosthetic leg to workers in a railway repair team, Voznesensk, Mykolaiv oblast, Ukraine.

Oleksandr shows his prosthetic leg to workers in a railway repair team in Voznesensk, Mykolaiv oblast. Since his injury, Oleksandr has been given a desk job

Oleksandr Petrov at his parent’s place in Voznesensk. His prosthetic leg is on the floor beside him and there is a wheelchair nearby.

Oleksandr Petrov at his parents’ house in Voznesensk. Family members spend a day at the cemetery to maintain their relatives’ graves and pay their respects

Russian troops were expected to start shelling the city once they’d had a chance to regroup on the other side of the Dnipro River. The civilians left in the city would have to be evacuated by train, so Oleksandr went anyway. Later that day, Oleksandr lost his leg after they drove over a Russian anti-vehicle mine.

The Lyman community

When Ukrainian troops recaptured the railway hub of Lyman from Russian troops in November 2022, it had been under Russian occupation for six months. Since then, it has been on the frontline of the war in Ukraine’s Donbas region. Yet, a small community of railway families continues to live in the basements of their battered apartment buildings on the outskirts of the city.

The Rosokhas family mourn the death of Nina Rosokha who was killed by a Russian artillery strike on Lyman

The Rosokha family mourn the death of Nina Rosokha, who was killed by a Russian artillery strike on Lyman. Nina had worked in a railway service department, her husband was a train driver for 36 years. During the funeral, sounds of fighting could be heard in the nearby Kreminna forest

A forest on the outskirts of Lyman burns after shelling

A forest on the outskirts of Lyman smoulders after shelling. Firefighters do not go into the forests for fear of mines

Fedya, 13, plays his accordion outside the apartment building where he lives with his mother and grandmother, both of whom work for the railway. Evelyna, 12, with one of her cats

The families in the community stay underground most of the time. The frontline is too close for the air raid alert system to be effective, and artillery and missiles can strike at any moment. The community have paid a heavy price in the war . Railway worker Nina Rosokha was killed on her way to the post office in a Russian artillery strike on a market. During another attack, Lyubov Surzhan’s top-floor apartment was obliterated. A piece of shrapnel skimmed Fedya’s head during a strike on a nearby railway depot. Yet the railway is their home and, despite the danger, they don’t want to leave.

The Mykolaychuks

The Mykolaychuk brothers live in an apartment building in the centre of Podilsk. Both are fifth generation locomotive drivers. Before the invasion, their jobs were mostly local, transporting grain from the region to the port of Odesa. Now, they go farther east towards the frontlines of the war, driving evacuation trains and weapons transports.

A woman in an apartment looks after two toddler girls who have just started walking

Alla Valeriyivna Mykolaychuk in Podilsk with her daughter and niece, both aged one

They don’t get paid if they don’t work, and jobs have become less frequent since the war. With money hard to come by, they have had to sell their family car to make ends meet.

The Tereshchenkos

Olha Tereshchenko survived a Russian attack on a convoy of civilians fleeing the then occupied city of Kupiansk. Her husband and five-year-old son were killed. Consumed with grief, she now works at a railway office in Kharkiv and gets support from her fellow workers there. Urns containing the ashes of her husband and son still sit on a shelf in a nearby crematorium. She hopes to bury them near their home in Kupiansk one day, when the frontline is further away.

Woman walking in a grey, desolate street with a blossom tree in flower

Olha Tereshchenko in Saltivka, the area of Kharkiv where she now lives

A photo of Olha’s dead husband and child on a floral bedspread

Olha’s husband and son, photographed as a baby, were killed in a Russian attack on a civilian convoy. Olha is overcome when she visits their remains in a nearby crematorium: she hopes one day to bury her husband and son near their home in Kupiansk

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A.T. Ariyaratne, a Hero in Sri Lanka for Helping the Poor, Dies at 92

He built Sarvodaya, an organization that battled dismal living conditions in his country’s villages and championed peace and mediation during a vicious civil war.

A man with white hair wearing a crisp white button down shirt looks at the camera with a booklet open in his hands.

By Adam Nossiter

A.T. Ariyaratne, a Sri Lankan who fought to alleviate the terrible living conditions of his country’s rural poor, creating a Buddhism-inspired social services organization that operates in thousands of villages, died on April 16 in Colombo, Sri Lanka’s capital. He was 92.

His death, at a hospital, was confirmed by his son Dr. Vinya Ariyaratne, in an interview.

Sometimes styled in the country’s media as a Sri Lankan Mahatma Gandhi, Mr. Ariyaratne preached brotherhood across ethnic divides and, with the help of volunteer labor and outside donations, brought aid to Sri Lankan villagers struggling with poor sanitation, insufficient food, broken roads and inadequate shelters and schools.

Hailed as a national hero and modeling himself on Ghandi’s ideals, he grew his Sarvodaya, or “Awakening of All,” movement from a presence in a handful of villages to operations in more than 5,000 of them a half-century later, digging wells, building schools, fixing roads, providing credit and more.

“Sarvodaya,” a term first used by Gandhi in India and inspired by the writings of the English critic and essayist John Ruskin, meant “the well-being of all,” especially the least fortunate, in Mr. Ariyaratne’s interpretation, as he explained in an essay in the anthology “The Sri Lanka Reader.” Ruskin’s essay “Unto This Last,” with its egalitarian, anticapitalist underpinnings, was a particular inspiration.

But Mr. Ariyaratne worked primarily in a time and a place largely unreceptive to his peace message: during Sri Lanka’s vicious civil war from 1983 to 2009, in which mass murders, civilian executions and torture were the norm. The war limited his impact, according to some scholars and observers, as the country reeled from repeated bouts of violent conflict between the majority Sinhalese Buddhists, like Mr. Ariyaratne, and the minority Tamils, mostly Hindu.

In the midst of the war, in 2001, Barbara Crossette , a former foreign correspondent for The New York Times, wrote in the Buddhist magazine Tricycle, “Sarvodaya’s success has been small, and the carnage continues.”

Much of the Sarvodaya Shramadana Movement was dismissed as “naïve and unrealistic” by the Oxford and Princeton scholars Richard Gombrich and Gananath Obeyesekere in their 1988 book, “Buddhism Transformed.”

But others, pointing to Sarvodaya’s village-level projects, insist that Mr. Ariyaratne’s movement had positively affected thousands of Sri Lankans and that his Buddhist precept of respecting all lives had helped his country through a relatively peaceful period since the end of the war.

“The legacy was to provide practical ways people could address the problem of suffering,” John Clifford Holt, a veteran Sri Lanka scholar and emeritus professor at Bowdoin College, said in an interview. “He provided a progressive, this-worldly orientation to Buddhism. He took these ideas and inspired the volunteers. They built roads and dug wells, they provided microfinance for women.”

In Sri Lanka, observers and analysts acknowledged that Mr. Ariyaratne’s efforts to lessen the country’s strife had uneven results.

“He tried to ensure that if there was conflict, it was transformed into coexistence,” Paikiasothy Saravanamuttu, executive director of the Centre for Policy Alternatives in Colombo, said in an interview. “Ariyaratne’s work has not been able to prevent that. But where he’s seen it happening, he’s intervened, at the local level.”

Sarvodaya had “an impact on bringing Tamils and Sinhalese together in various parts of the country, but it was not large enough to really make a big dent,” said Radhika Coomaraswamy, a Sri Lankan and former U.N. special representative for children and armed conflict.

Still, Mr. Ariyaratne’s efforts to foster peace were nothing if not dogged. Soon after the first deadly anti-Tamil riots in Colombo in 1983, “Sarvodaya began to organize camps for the refugees and aid for the victims,” George D. Bond wrote in “Buddhism at Work,” his 2003 study of the movement.

Mr. Ariyaratne, he added, used his “village network to provide food for the refugees, construct medical clinics, construct shelters and rebuild houses and schools.” He also established preschools and credit facilities for villagers as well as nutrition centers for children and the elderly.

As the violence continued, he organized a peace march in the south of the island that was stopped after only a few miles on the order of the president at the time, J. R. Jayewardene . Mr. Ariyaratne organized other peace marches in the following years, often to the irritation of the country’s leaders, who resented his popularity.

In 1994, traveling to the country’s north as a mediator, he met with leaders of the Tamil rebel movement, the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam. “It was not successful,” Jehan Perera, executive director of Sri Lanka’s National Peace Council, who was part of the mission, recalled in an interview.

Sarvodaya organized a mass meditation for peace in 2002 that was similarly ineffectual, though it remarkably attracted 650,000 people across ethnic divides, according to Mr. Bond. It wasn’t until 2009 that the government brutally stamped out the remnants of the rebel movement, engaging in more civilian massacres.

Mr. Ariyaratne had early on shed any illusions about the Buddhist underpinnings of the Sri Lankan state. “Even though, historically and culturally, Sri Lanka may claim to be Buddhist,” he wrote in 1987, “in my opinion, certainly the way political and economic structures are instituted and managed today, they can hardly be called Buddhist either in precept or practice.”

Ahangamage Tudor Ariyaratne was born on Nov. 5, 1931, in the town of Unawatuna, British Ceylon, as the country was known before it gained independence. He was the son of Ahangamage Hendrick Jinadasa, a wholesale trader, and Rosalina Gajadheera Arachchi, who managed the household. He attended Mahinda College in nearby Galle and received a degree in economics, education and Sinhala from Vidyodaya University in 1968.

Years before, Mr. Ariyaratne had embarked on a trip that transformed him and became the foundation of his movement. In December 1958, while teaching science at Nalanda College, a leading secondary school in Colombo, he took 40 of his students and 12 teachers to a nearby low-caste village, Kanatoluwa, where they spent days helping its residents in various ways, including digging wells, building latrines and repairing its school. Thus was born Mr. Ariyaratne’s concept of “Shramadana,” or “Gift of Labor,” a project that grew throughout the 1960s to encompass hundreds of voluntary labor camps, as Mr. Bond characterized them.

Mr. Ariyaratne saw Shramadana as transformative for both the movement’s thousands of volunteers and the villages themselves. His goal, he wrote, was “a dynamic nonviolent revolution which is not a transfer of political economic or social power from one party or class to another but the transfer of all such power to the people.”

By the early 1970s, he was attracting funding from the Netherlands, Germany, and Switzerland. Sarvodaya became the country’s largest nongovernmental organization, according to Mr. Bond. Though clashes with the government over the movement’s nonviolent stance led some outside donors to withdraw funding for periods, Mr. Ariyaratne always managed to bounce back.

In addition to his son, he is survived by his wife, Neetha Ariyaratne; three daughters, Charika Marasinghe, Sadeeva de Silva and Nimna Ganegama; two other sons, Jeevan and Diyath; 12 grandchildren; and sister, Amara Peeris.

After his death, Mr. Ariyaratne was given a state funeral attended by the country’s president, Ranil Wickremesinghe, and prime minister, Dinesh Gunawardena.

“We see him as a model human being who attempted, amid great challenges, to bring people together,” Colombo’s Anglican bishop, Dushantha Rodrigo, said in an interview. “The war was orchestrated on very political lines. People were not given much of a chance, well-meaning people like him, who made attempts to bring about a peaceful settlement.”

Skandha Gunasekara contributed reporting.

Adam Nossiter has been bureau chief in Kabul, Paris, West Africa and New Orleans, and is now a Domestic Correspondent on the Obituaries desk. More about Adam Nossiter

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The Impact of the Mexican American War on American Society and Politics

Hispanic-Americans in the Civil War

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Tejano Heroes of the Texas Revolution

The Mexican-American War, 1846–1848

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JAMES K. POLK AND THE TRIUMPH OF EXPANSION

WAR WITH MEXICO, 1846–1848

CALIFORNIA AND THE GOLD RUSH

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11.4 The Mexican-American War, 1846–1848

JAMES K. POLK AND THE TRIUMPH OF EXPANSION

WAR WITH MEXICO, 1846–1848

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CALIFORNIA AND THE GOLD RUSH

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14.2: The Mexican-American War

Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo and the Aftermath of the War

Technological Development and Manifest Destiny

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Mexican Perspectives on the Mexican–U.S. War, 1846–1848

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