and a dissatisfaction resulting from energies that found no adequate
outlet. In all parts of the country this was the case. As a people "we
are restless, fidgety, discontented, anxious for excitement," confessed
the New York _Herald_. In Illinois times were hard. Every attempt at
commercial or industrial enterprise had failed; farmers could not sell
their crops at paying rates; with boundless force in heart and brain
the young man could find nothing worth while to do. The state of mind
in other parts of that section appears to have been similar. Indiana
gave up all attempts to pay interest on her debt as early as 1840. All
over the western border, said the _American Review_, "are great numbers
of bold and restless spirits, men gathered out of all the orderly and
civilized portions of society as its most turbulent members, and ready
for any enterprise that can minister to their reckless manner of life
and love of danger and of change;" and the West was already powerful in
our national affairs. "Our people," wrote Calhoun, "are like a young
man of 18, full of health and vigour, and disposed for adventure of any
description."[6.14]
[THE POPULAR EYE FIXED ON MEXICO]
Such an intoxication of animal vitality demanded a fight, of course.
"The multitude cry aloud for war," admitted the New York _Herald_ in
August, 1845. "Nine-tenths of our people, ceteris paribus, would rather
have a little fighting than not," was the opinion of its neighbor, the
_Morning News_. "LET US GO TO WAR," began a leader in the New
York _Journal of Commerce_; "The world has become stale and insipid,
the ships ought to be all captured, and the cities battered down, and
the world burned up, so that we can start again. There would be fun
in that. Some interest,--something to talk about." If such was the
feeling in a high latitude, it must have burned hot at the south; and
the young men of the Mississippi valley had special reasons for their
ardor. The region of western Tennessee had been settled by revolutionary
soldiers, and they had left a rich inheritance of military traditions.
Jackson towered above all other figures at the southwest, and his chief
distinction was that of the sword. Everybody talked still of the war of
1812 and his brilliant exploit at New Orleans. Indeed, when the mind
wearied of the continual hunting, there was little else to fasten its
eye upon. Military glory became the young man's dream. All aspired to
be soldiers, and to win renown by fighting for their country. This was
their inborn and incessantly cultivated ambition; and it need not be
added that all the young ladies felt that only a military hero, or at
least the makings of such a hero, deserved their attention.[6.15]
Reasons enough why this feeling concentrated upon Mexico have already
been given, but certain others are in order here. That "is indeed the
garden spot of the Americas and presents allurements more tempting than
did the sunny plains and vineyards of Italy, when the northern hordes
swept down and drifted like a snowstorm over the south of Europe"--such
was the picture of "that magnificent region" held up by the _Commercial
Bulletin_ of New Orleans before thousands of young sparks bored nearly
to death by the commonplace. Besides, greatly exaggerated notions of
Mexico's wealth got abroad. Young fellows overstocked with energy were
not willing to hoe corn at five shillings a day, or dig potatoes for
every tenth bushel when the mountains of a near and hostile country were
understood to be packed with silver, and her churches to be radiant
with diamonds and gold. Stronger than all else, perhaps, the vague but
romantic idea of "revelling in the halls of the Montezumas" exercised
a perfect fascination. A letter from New York published in August,
1845, declared that fully twenty thousand volunteers could be raised in
that city alone "without fee or reward, who would jump at the chance
of marching to Mexico" simply to enjoy this diversion. In short, said
the New York _Morning News_, all the "young and ardent spirits that
throng the cities and are spread over the face of the Union want but a
direction to their restless energies, and their attention is already
fixed on Mexico."[6.16]
What made this outlook peculiarly inviting was the belief that only one
bold, swift dash would be needed--no dull, plodding, grimy campaigning
year after year. Six sevenths of the people in Mexico were said to
be Indians, half-breeds and negroes--"mere slaves," and the rest of
them degenerate Spaniards; and the keepers of that paradise, the
guardians of those treasures, were represented as "a feeble and degraded
soldiery, who would be scattered like chaff by the first volley from
the Anglo-Saxon rifle, the first charge of the Anglo-Saxon bayonet."
"An adventure full of fun and frolic and holding forth the rewards of
opulence and glory," was therefore the _Commercial Bulletin's_ golden
picture of a war with Mexico, and such became the common idea.[6.17]
In the summer of 1845 this magnificent dream of sport, glory and
opulence appeared to be on the point of realization, and the war spirit
flamed high. Even journals that had stood firmly against annexing Texas
took fire. "What more inspiring strain can strike the ears of freemen,"
demanded the Richmond _Enquirer_, "than the trumpet note which summons
our people to the punishment of tyrants?... We utterly mistake the
spirit of republicanism in America, if there be not one voice for a full
and thorough chastisement of Mexican arrogance and folly." The prospect
of "coercing" out of Mexico her "spirit of depredation, perfidy and
aggression" and thus inaugurating the sweet and commercially profitable
reign of peace excited hot zeal. West of the Alleghanies the feeling was
peculiarly strong. At Nashville the _Union_ promised that "any number"
of volunteers the government might call for would be forthcoming. At St.
Louis, in the opinion of the _Reveille_, only a prospect of service in
the field was needed to induce "the most active volunteering" among the
"enthusiastic population." "Go where you will," recorded the _Picayune_,
"'tis war and nothing but war;" and Buchanan wrote, "You can have no
adequate conception of the military ardor which exists" in the west and
southwest; "It will be easy to bring 100,000 volunteers into the field
from those States."[6.18]
When Mexico seemed to be slow about striking, the New York _Morning
News_ declared that "a feeling of disappointment" began to be shown
by the public, though still, it added, "At every spring of the whelp,
at every mail from the Gulf, the national pulse moves quicker." When
the prospect of immediate hostilities appeared to be over, the Mobile
_Herald and Tribune_ announced, "After all the visions of glory and
honor which have been dancing through the popular brain for the last
six months" nothing has been done. But in reality something had been
done. Such a state of passion could not simply go out of existence,
especially since the causes of it still remained. The people had become
yet more thoroughly inoculated with the idea of fighting Mexico, and
the country had not advanced far into the new year 1846 before all were
again talking about it, said a Mississippi journal. "Sunday editors" in
particular, it added, "shriek out 'War! War! War!'" Will Polk be able to
withstand the clamor? asked the Memphis _Enquirer_; "We fear not." The
final rejection of Slidell naturally intensified the martial feeling.
"The almost unanimous voice of the American people," wrote even Governor
Hammond of South Carolina, insisted upon war. So much for the attitude
of the public.[6.19]
[THE CHARGE THAT POLK WISHED FOR WAR]
Turning now to the attitude of the government, we are told at once that
Polk deliberately intended to attack Mexico, and are offered various
reasons for so believing. One accuser says that he was ambitious for
personal glory; another, that he desired to perpetuate the power of
his party; a third, that he felt anxious to cover up the humiliating
result of the Oregon negotiation; still another, that he wished to be
reëlected; and more than one allege that he was determined to obtain
California. For this last view there is just evidence enough to create
a suspicion. For example, Bancroft remarked more than forty years after
the event that Polk said the acquisition of that province would be one
of his aims, and this remark has been cited as if it proved the charge.
But there was not the slightest impropriety in his desiring an immensely
valuable territory that Webster had endeavored a few years before to
acquire, and in 1845 Bancroft himself represented the President's
feeling toward Mexico as "most conciliatory." Indeed, after the conflict
had begun, Bancroft wrote privately to Samuel Hooper, "We were driven
reluctantly to war."[6.20]
Again, certain facts are cited and aligned: Polk wanted California, a
war occurred, and he promptly took advantage of the war to occupy the
desired territory. But the existence of several points in line does not
prove the existence of a path connecting them, and there is weighty
evidence against the suspicion which these facts naturally excite.
While directing Slidell to obtain the cession of northern California,
if he could, Buchanan intimated, as we have seen, that he should
not press this matter, if so doing would prevent the restoration of
amicable relations with Mexico. In other words, instead of desiring to
precipitate a war for the sake of obtaining California, Polk was ready
to let California go--or at least wait--for the sake of maintaining
peace. Besides, as we shall find when we come to the operations on the
western coast, Polk had a policy for the acquisition of that region, and
this policy did not contemplate war. With nothing solid to stand upon,
then, and much to stand against, this theory must be given up.[6.20]
The other explanations of Polk's alleged intention to fight Mexico are
evidently mere conjectures, and prove nothing. The idea that contracts
and offices could strengthen the administration and build up the party
is mainly, or perhaps entirely, fallacious. There were not enough to
satisfy more than a small percentage of the hungry patriots, and the
rest were likely to take offence. Moreover, if given to Democrats, these
favors could make no converts; while if given to Whigs, the Democrats
were sure to complain, and few of the recipients could change their
party for such a reason. Many of Polk's chief troubles, as his diary
shows, came from dissatisfied applicants for commissions, and any
person well versed in public affairs could have foreseen that it would
be so.[6.21] And yet, after all, the charge that he purposely brought
on the war has been so commonly believed, or at least so frequently
repeated, that it can fairly demand a more extended examination.[6.22]
[POLK'S PERSONALITY]
First of all, then, we must form an estimate of Polk. For this purpose
his diary is extremely useful. No doubt, like other documents of the
sort, it colors some things and omits others; but so extremely busy a
man could not have practised systematic misrepresentation in his daily
record without hopelessly enmeshing and entangling himself and incurring
the risk of detection at many points, while--occupying, as he did, a
position where his every word and act were noted by others--he would
have exposed himself often to documentary refutation. Besides, the
marks of good faith are without number. The diary should therefore be
accepted, and has been accepted, as essentially truthful; and the man
it shows us--revealed also by a large amount of other evidence--is a
cold, narrow, methodical, dogged, plodding, obstinate partisan, deeply
convinced of his importance and responsibility, very wanting in humor,
very wanting in ideality, very wanting in soulfulness, inclined to be
sly, and quite incapable of seeing great things in a great way. All know
the type. It is the leading citizen and schemer of the small town, who
marches up the centre aisle on public occasions with creaking shoes
and a wooden smile, and takes his seat with a backward, all-embracing
glance.[6.23]
Such a person--lean, stiff, angular, with sharp gray eyes in a sad face,
and long, grizzled hair brushed straight back behind his ears--makes
no appeal to our sympathies, and for that reason is almost sure to be
judged unfairly. For example, Polk has been called the "Mendacious"; but
that is unjust. Many things are done in good society which, if thrown
upon a screen before two thousand people, would be recognized instantly
as mean; and the same is true in the world of affairs. As a lawyer and
politician of Nashville, Polk no doubt resorted to devices of this kind,
and he was not the man to realize the difference between a provincial
town and a nation, and adapt himself to his new position. Compelled to
act, he acted as he could; used the tactics with which he was familiar.
In this manner he deceived men or permitted men to deceive themselves,
and those accustomed to broader and larger and nobler methods thought
he lied. In reality he was not Polk the Mendacious, but simply Polk the
Mediocre.[6.23]
Yet he was mediocre only as compared with great standards. He could by
no means be called insignificant. George Bancroft, secretary of the
navy, has testified that he surpassed every member of his Cabinet in
ability--not as high a distinction, perhaps, as might have been wished,
but still high. His will-power was ample, and his output of mental
energy large. In seriousness, industry and fidelity he left nothing to
be desired. Though strongly inclined to be positive, he would listen
patiently to others, discuss weighty matters at length, and if convinced
would yield. He reflected long, and yet when the time for decision came,
he did not shrink from taking a stand. He intended to do his duty as he,
Polk, was able to see it, and spent himself liberally in that cause. He
certainly was religious, and no doubt--though blind to the beauty of
uprightness and unresponsive to the delicacy of honor--he fully believed
that he was conscientious.[6.23]
To regard such a man, uninspired and uninspiring, as capable of playing
the brilliant villain's rôle in a grand international tragedy, of
dreaming the conqueror's dream and sacrificing his fellow-citizens
on the altar of gory but gorgeous ambition, of smelling the battle
from afar like the war-horse and crying, "Ha, ha!"--this is out of
the question. It was not in him. Neither intellect, conscience nor
imagination permitted it. The Cabinet, which he selected with care,
hampered by no preëlection agreements, was much like him; and as Benton
said, it is "impossible to conceive of an administration less warlike,
or more intriguing." "Mr. Polk never dreamed of any other war than a war
upon the Whigs," admitted Robert Toombs, then a Whig member of Congress,
in February, 1846.[6.23]
A number of circumstances almost committed him to a peaceable course
toward Mexico. During the discussions of the annexation project one of
the strongest objections had been that it would involve the country
in war, and its advocates had strenuously denied this allegation. The
President belonged to that group, and Webster said: "That Mr. Polk
and his Cabinet will desire to keep the peace, there is no doubt. The
responsibility of having provoked war by their scheme of annexation is
what they would greatly dread." Though many plain citizens desired a
fight, an influential body of merchants, financiers and conservatives
did not; and in the view of a still greater number a vital discrepancy
between the predictions of the annexationists and their later conduct
would surely have been damaging. The Oregon question threatened to prove
serious; and it is hardly credible that Polk, even if quite willing to
meet an attack from Mexico, would have desired to attack her before
settling this controversy with England. The secretaries of state, war
and the navy did not hail from fire-eating communities. The head of
the army, General Scott, was a Whig and a recognized candidate for the
Presidency; and the chiefs of the Democratic party had fully sense
enough to understand that a war might enable him to succeed Polk. In
fact the President's diary exhibits painful writhings due to such a
possibility. Finally war, no matter how successful, would mean taxes,
and even those who demanded a fight might not be willing to pay for it.
Certainly Polk was not self-sacrificing enough to desire the odium of
laying war taxes for the sake of bringing Scott into the White House.
Besides, it looked as if war expenses could not fail to strengthen
the tariff system, and that was obnoxious to a great number of the
Democrats.[6.24]
[POLK'S COURSE PACIFIC]
Polk's professions were every way most pacific. The assurances conveyed
to Almonte after he made his protest have already been mentioned. In
August, 1845, Polk wrote confidentially to a Senator, "We will not
be the aggressors upon Mexico." A month later Buchanan declared in a
"Private and Personal" letter to our minister at London: "The President
does not intend to proceed beyond a just and righteous self-defence, and
he is ready to present the olive branch to Mexico the moment he knows it
will be accepted." It is hardly supposable that our secretary of state
intended to deceive our most important representative abroad, or that he
was deceived himself by Polk in so vital a matter.[6.25]
The confidential orders of the government were emphatically unwarlike
in tone. To Conner, commanding in the Gulf, the secretary of the navy
wrote in March, 1845, "The disposition of the President is to maintain
the most friendly relations with the Mexican Republic," and in substance
this declaration was repeated in the following July and August. "Take
special care," the department said to Stockton, who had a few vessels
on the Texas coast, "to avoid every act that can admit of being
construed as inconsistent with our friendly relations" with Mexico.
Commodore Sloat, in the Pacific, was told in "Secret and Confidential"
instructions dated June 24, 1845, "The President hopes, most earnestly,
that the peace of the two countries may not be disturbed ... do
everything consistent with the national honor" to avoid a rupture; and
these instructions to Sloat were most noteworthy, for the commander on
the Pacific station was liable to be out of touch with the government
for a year at a time, and he needed to be sure as to its general
policy.[6.26]
For the guidance of our chargé in Texas, where many feared a Mexican
invasion and called for American troops, a clear statement of our
intentions was equally necessary, and Buchanan wrote to Donelson at
about the same time, "The Government will studiously refrain from all
acts of hostility towards that republic [Mexico], unless these should
become absolutely necessary in self-defence." Quite in line with all
this was the order cancelling Frémont's second exploring trip to the far
west, because he had equipped his party in a military style--an order
that was decidedly over-strict, since precautions against the Indians
could not be neglected. In his Message to the Senate, March 24, 1846,
the President declared it his "settled purpose" to maintain peace with
Mexico, and it is believed that no expression of his indicating a desire
to provoke a conflict can be found.[6.26]
The measures of the administration corresponded with its professions.
In the first place this was true negatively. It would not be easy to
deny that Mexico's refusal to pay the instalments of our awards could
have been handled by our government in a way to enrage this nation,
already so eager for the fray, and probably her severance of diplomatic
relations might have been used to precipitate an issue; but no advantage
was taken of either opportunity. Another instance is even more signal.
One can hardly doubt that Polk might have brought on a war in the
summer of 1845, had he so desired. Not only had Mexico grossly insulted
us, refused to pay those awards, and severed relations with us both
at her capital and at our own, but she had solemnly announced that
our annexing Texas would be regarded as equivalent to a declaration
of war, notified her agents privately and the world at large publicly
that she was going to fight, and begun preparations for immediate
hostilities. Had Polk summoned Congress and laid all the facts before
it, a declaration of war, or at least an ultimatum that Mexico would
in all probability have rejected, must certainly, or almost certainly,
have been the response; and if one may judge from the state of mind
existing in the United States at the time, our people would in the main
have supported such a course. "The current of public opinion," said the
St. Louis _Republican_, "seems now strongly inclined in favor of a war
with Mexico." "All the better portions of the press of the country,"
was the summary of the New Orleans _Picayune_, "are urgent for the
adoption of the most energetic measures" against that country. Almost
every Democratic journal and a vast majority of the Whig journals,
declared the Washington _Globe_, were for crushing Mexico at once. "The
people will approve" of vigorous action, admitted even the Charleston
_Courier_.[6.27]
[POLK DID NOT DESIRE THE WAR]
But Polk did not adopt a course of that sort. He took no such steps
to settle matters with England as a President of ordinary common
sense would have taken, if anxious to fight Mexico; and no serious
measures were adopted to increase our nominal army or our insufficient
fleet. In September, he requested the members of the Cabinet to make
their estimates for the coming year on "the most economical scale,"
and in fact only twenty-six hundred additional men were asked for the
army--none for the navy. A note from the secretary of the navy to
Captain Perry--"We are jogging on quietly this winter, not anticipating
war"--well represents our military and naval programme; and a letter to
Conner explains it: "We all hope Mexico will agree to a peace." Knowing,
as Polk must have known, the deep and widespread fear of Mexican
privateers, he would have been prevented by a merely selfish regard for
the good opinion of the public from planning war without making some
dispositions to protect, or at least warn, our millions of floating
property. And apparently even the ardor of our young men for combat did
not seriously move him.[6.28]
In the second place, Polk's action pointed the same way as his
non-action. No one could think of any rational method to conciliate
Mexico that he did not put into operation. The chief object of Parrott's
mission, which was private and therefore could not have been intended
for effect upon the world, was understood by Parrott himself to be,
"preventing a declaration of war, by Mexico, against the United
States." In appointing Slidell, as even the _American Review_ admitted,
the President was evidently sincere. At the end of March, 1846, Polk
received advices from Slidell which made it seem quite possible that he
would finally be given a hearing, and immediately he set on foot a plan
to furnish Paredes with funds, enable him to keep the army faithful,
and thus encourage him to settle matters amicably. Indeed, all that is
known of this mission from beginning to end, including Slidell's private
letters to Buchanan and numerous details that it would be wearisome
to hear specified, show that Polk strongly desired--as the Mexicans
accused him of desiring--a restoration of friendly intercourse; and when
the purpose had evidently failed, Slidell gave final evidence of that
disposition by writing: "I am greatly mortified at the total failure
of a mission commenced under auspices apparently the most flattering,
but that mortification is much mitigated by the consciousness, that no
fault of omission or commission, can justly be attributed either to the
Government or to the Legation."[6.29]
In short, then, we find that Polk had the gravest reasons for desiring
friendly intercourse with Mexico, and probably felt none for plotting
war; that a variety of personal and political circumstances naturally
inclined him toward peace; that his declarations, both public and
private, pointed consistently in that direction as long as any hope of
an amicable settlement remained; and that what he did in repeated and
most significant ways, as well as what he refrained from doing, had the
same meaning. We must therefore give up the idea that he desired, and
from the first intended, to have a war with Mexico.
[A CRISIS]