MORE TERRITORY ACQUIRED
TYLER AND THE WHIGS QUARREL.--When Congress (in May, 1841) first met in
Tyler's term, Clay led the Whigs in proposing measures to carry out their
party principles. But Tyler vetoed their bill establishing a new national
bank. The Whigs then made some changes to suit, as they supposed, his
objections, and sent him a bill to charter a Fiscal Corporation; but this
also came back with a veto; whereupon his Cabinet officers (all save
Daniel Webster, Secretary of State) resigned, and the Whig members of
Congress, in an address to the people, read him out of the party. Later in
his term Tyler vetoed two tariff bills, but finally approved a third,
known as the Tariff of 1842. For these uses of the veto power the Whigs
thought of impeaching him; but did not.
[Illustration: THE DISPUTED MAINE BOUNDARY.]
WEBSTER-ASHBURTON TREATY.--When Tyler's cabinet officers resigned, Webster
remained in order to conclude a new treaty with Great Britain, [1] by
which our present northeastern boundary was fixed from the St. Croix to
the St. Lawrence. Neither power obtained all the territory it claimed
under the treaty of 1783, but the disputed region was divided about
equally between them. [2]
Soon after the treaty was concluded Webster resigned the secretaryship of
state, and the rupture between Tyler and the Whigs was complete.
THE REPUBLIC OF TEXAS.--The great event of Tyler's time was the decision
to annex the republic of Texas.
[Illustration: THE ALAMO.]
In 1821 Mexico secured her independence of Spain, and about three years
afterward adopted the policy of granting a great tract of land in Texas to
anybody who, under certain conditions, and within a certain time, would
settle a specified number of families on the grant. To colonize in this
way at once became popular in the South, and in a few years thousands of
American citizens were settled in Texas.
For a while all went well; but in 1833 serious trouble began between the
Mexican government and the Texans, who in 1836 declared their
independence, founded the republic of Texas, [3] and sought admission into
our Union as a state. Neither Jackson nor Van Buren favored annexation, so
the question dragged on till 1844, when Tyler made with Texas a treaty of
annexation and sent it to the Senate. That body refused assent.
[Illustration: THE WAR WITH MEXICO.]
THE DEMOCRATS AND TEXAS.--The issue was thus forced. The Democratic
national convention of 1844 claimed that Texas had once been ours, [4] and
declared for its "reannexation." To please the Northern Democrats it also
declared for the "reoccupation" of Oregon up to 54° 40'. This meant that
we should compel Great Britain to abandon all claim to that country, and
make it all American soil.
The Democrats went into the campaign with the popular cries, "The
reannexation of Texas;" "The whole of Oregon or none;" "Texas or
disunion"--and elected Polk [5] after a close contest.
TEXAS ANNEXED; OREGON DIVIDED.--Tyler, regarding the triumph of the
Democrats as an instruction from the people to annex Texas, urged Congress
to do so at once, and in March, 1845, a resolution for the admission of
Texas passed both houses, and was signed by the President. [6] The
resolution provided also that out of her territory four additional states
might be made if Texas should consent. The boundaries were in dispute, but
in the end Texas was held to have included all the territory from the
boundary of the United States to the Rio Grande and a line extending due
north from its source.
After Texas was annexed, notice was served on Great Britain that joint
occupation of Oregon must end in one year. The British minister then
proposed a boundary treaty which was concluded in a few weeks (1846). The
line agreed on was the 49th parallel from the Rocky Mountains to the
Strait of Juan de Fuca (hoo-ahn' da foo'ca), and by it to the Pacific
Ocean (compare maps, pp. 278 and 330).
WAR WITH MEXICO.--Mexico claimed that the real boundary of Texas was the
Nueces (nwâ'sess) River. When, therefore, Polk (in 1846) sent General
Zachary Taylor with an army to the Rio Grande, the Mexicans attacked him;
but he beat them at Palo Alto (pah'lo ahl'to) and again near by at Resaca
de la Palma (ra-sah'ca da lah pahl'ma), and drove them across the Rio
Grande. When President Polk heard of the first attack, he declared that
"Mexico has shed American blood upon American soil.... War exists,... and
exists by the act of Mexico herself." Congress promptly voted men and
money for the war.
MONTEREY.--Taylor, having crossed the Rio Grande, marched to Monterey and
(September, 1846) attacked the city. It was fortified with strong stone
walls in the fashion of Old World cities; the flat-roofed houses bristled
with guns; and across every street was a barricade. In three days of
desperate fighting our troops forced their way into the city, entered the
buildings, made their way from house to house by breaking through the
walls or ascending to the roofs, and reached the center of the city before
the Mexicans surrendered the town.
NEW MEXICO AND CALIFORNIA.--Immediately after the declaration of war,
Colonel Stephen W. Kearny with a force of men set off (June, 1846) by the
old Santa Fe trail and (August 18) captured Santa Fe without a struggle,
established a civil government, declared New Mexico annexed to the United
States, and then started to take possession of California. But California
had already been conquered by the Americans. In June, 1846, some three
hundred American settlers, believing that war was imminent and fearing
they would be attacked, revolted, adopted a flag on which was a grizzly
bear, and declared California an independent republic. Fremont, who had
been exploring in California, came to their aid (July 5), and two days
later Commodore Sloat with a naval force entered Monterey and raised the
flag there. In 1847 (January 8, 9) battles were fought with the Mexicans
of California; but the Americans held the country.
BUENA VISTA.--Toward the close of 1846 General Winfield Scott was put in
command of the army in Mexico, and ordered Taylor to send a large part of
the army to meet him at Vera Cruz (vâ'ra kroos). Santa Anna, hearing of
this, gathered 18,000 men and at Buena Vista, in a narrow valley at the
foot of the mountains, attacked Taylor (February 23, 1847). The battle
raged from morning to night. Again and again the little American army of
5000 seemed certain to be overcome by the 18,000 Mexicans. But they fought
on desperately, and when night came, both armies left the field. [7]
[Illustration: GENERAL TAYLOR AT BUENA VISTA. From an old print.]
THE MARCH TO MEXICO.--Scott landed at Vera Cruz in March, 1847, took the
castle and city after a siege of fifteen days, and about a week later set
off for the city of Mexico, winning victory after victory on the way. The
heights of Cerro Gordo were taken by storm, and the army of Santa Anna was
beaten again at Jalapa (ha-lah'pa). Puebla (pwâ'bla) surrendered at
Scott's approach, and there he waited three months. But on August 7 Scott
again started westward with 10,000 men, and three days later looked down
on the distant city of Mexico surrounded by broad plains and snow-capped
mountains.
[Illustration: CATHEDRAL, MEXICO.]
Then followed in quick succession the victory at Contreras (kôn-trâ'ras),
the storming of the heights of Churubusco, the victory at Molino del Rey
(mô-lee'no del râ') the storming of the castle of Chapultepec' perched on
a lofty rock, and the triumphal entry into Mexico (September 14). [8]
THE TERMS OF PEACE (1848).--The republic of Mexico was now a conquered
nation and might have been added to our domain; but the victors were
content to retain Upper California and New Mexico--the region from the Rio
Grande to the Pacific, and from the Gila River to Oregon (compare maps,
pp. 318, 330). For this great territory we paid Mexico $15,000,000, and in
addition paid some $3,500,000 of claims our citizens had against her for
injury to their persons or property. [9]
[Illustration: MONUMENT ON MEXICAN BOUNDARY.]
SHALL THE NEWLY ACQUIRED TERRITORY BE SLAVE SOIL OR FREE?--The treaty with
Mexico having been ratified and the territory acquired, it became the duty
of Congress to provide the people with some American form of government.
There needed to be American governors, courts, legislatures, customhouses,
revenue laws, in short a complete change from the Mexican way of
governing. To do this would have been easy if it had not been for the fact
that (in 1827) Mexico had abolished slavery. All the territory acquired
was therefore free soil; but the South wished to make it slave soil. The
question of the hour thus became, Shall New Mexico and California be slave
soil or free soil? [10]
THE PRESIDENTIAL CAMPAIGN OF 1848.--So troublesome was the issue that the
two great parties tried to keep it out of politics. The Democrats in their
platform in 1848 said nothing about slavery in the new territory, and the
Whigs made no platform. This action of the two parties so displeased the
antislavery Whigs and Wilmot Proviso Democrats that they held a
convention, formed the Free-soil party, [11] nominated Martin Van Buren
for President, and drew away so many New York Democrats from their party
that the Whigs carried the state and won the presidential election. [12]
On March 5, 1849 (March 4 was Sunday), Taylor [13] and Fillmore [14] were
inaugurated.
[Illustration: DEMOCRATIC CARTOON IN CAMPAIGN OF 1848]
GOLD IN CALIFORNIA.--By this time the question of slavery in the new
territory was still more complicated by the discovery of gold in
California. Many years before this time a Swiss settler named J. A. Sutter
had obtained a grant of land in California, where the city of Sacramento
now stands. In 1848 James W. Marshall, while building a sawmill for Sutter
at Coloma, some fifty miles away from Sutter's Fort, discovered gold in
the mill race. Both Sutter and Marshall attempted to keep the fact secret,
but their strange actions attracted the attention of a laborer, who also
found gold. Then the news spread fast, and people came by hundreds and by
thousands to the gold fields. [15] Later in the year the news reached the
East, and when Polk in his annual message confirmed the rumors, the rush
for California began. Some went by vessel around Cape Horn. Others took
ships to the Isthmus of Panama, crossed it on foot, and sailed to San
Francisco. Still others hurried to the Missouri to make the overland
journey across the plains. [16] By August, 1849, some eighty thousand gold
hunters, "forty-niners," as they came to be called, had reached the mines.
[17]
[Illustration: A ROCKER.]
THE STATE OF CALIFORNIA.--As Congress had provided no government, and as
scarcely any could be said to exist, the people held a convention, made a
free-state constitution, and applied for admission into the Union as a
state.
ISSUES BETWEEN THE NORTH AND THE SOUTH.--The election of Taylor, and
California's application for statehood, brought on a crisis between the
North and the South.
Most of the people in the North desired no more slave states and no more
slave territories, abolition of slavery and the slave trade in the
District of Columbia, and the admission of California as a free state.
The South opposed these things; complained of the difficulty of capturing
slaves that escaped to the free states, and of the constant agitation of
the slavery question by the abolitionists; and demanded that the Mexican
cession be left open to slavery.
Since 1840 two slave-holding states, Florida and Texas (1845), and two
free states, Iowa (1846) and Wisconsin (1848), had been admitted to the
Union, making fifteen free and fifteen slave states in all; and the South
now opposed the admission of California, partly because it would give the
free states a majority in the Senate.
THE COMPROMISE OF 1850.--At this stage Henry Clay was again sent to the
Senate. He had powerfully supported two great compromise measures--the
Missouri Compromise of 1820, and the Compromise Tariff of 1833. He
believed that the Union was in danger of destruction; but that if the two
parties would again compromise, it could be saved.
To please the North he now proposed (1) that California should be admitted
as a free state, and (2) that the slave trade (buying and selling slaves),
but not the right to own slaves, should be abolished in the District of
Columbia. To please the South he proposed (1) that Congress should pass a
more stringent law for the capture of fugitive slaves, and (2) that two
territories, New Mexico and Utah, should be formed from part of the
Mexican purchase, with the understanding that the people in them should
decide whether they should be slave soil or free. This principle was
called "squatter sovereignty," or "popular sovereignty."
[Illustration: CLAY ADDRESSING THE SENATE IN 1850. From an old engraving.]
Texas claimed the Rio Grande as part of her west boundary. But the United
States claimed the part of New Mexico east of the Rio Grande, and both
sides seemed ready to appeal to arms. Clay proposed that Texas should give
up her claim and be paid for so doing.
During three months this plan was hotly debated, [18] and threats of
secession and violence were made openly. But in the end the plan was
accepted: (1) California was admitted, (2) New Mexico and Utah were
organized as territories open to slavery, (3) Texas took her present
bounds (see maps, pp. 318, 330) and received $10,000,000, (4) a new
fugitive slave law [19] was passed, and (5) the slave _trade_ was
prohibited in the District of Columbia. These measures together were
called the Compromise of 1850.
DEATH OF TAYLOR.--While the debate on the compromise was under way, Taylor
died (July 9, 1850) and Fillmore was sworn into office as President for
the remainder of the term.
SUMMARY
1. Congress in 1841 passed two bills for chartering a new national bank,
but President Tyler vetoed both. The Whig leaders then declared that Tyler
was not a Whig.
2. The next year the Webster-Ashburton treaty settled a long-standing
dispute over the northeastern boundary.
3. In 1844 the Democrats declared for the annexation of Texas and Oregon,
and elected Polk President. Congress then quickly decided to admit Texas
to the Union.
4. War with Mexico followed a dispute over the Texas boundary. In the
course of it Taylor won victories at Monterey and Buena Vista; Scott made
a famous march to the city of Mexico; and Kearny marched to Santa Fe and
on to California.
5. Peace added to the United States a great tract of country acquired from
Mexico. Meanwhile, the Oregon country had been divided by treaty with
Great Britain.
6. The acquisition of Mexican territory brought up the question of the
admission of slavery, for the territory was free soil under Mexican rule.
7. The opponents of extension of the slave area formed the Free-soil party
in 1848, and drew off enough Democratic votes so that the Whigs elected
Taylor and Fillmore.
8. Meanwhile gold had been discovered in California, and a wild rush for
the "diggings" began.
9. The people in California formed a free-state constitution and applied
for admission to the Union.
10. The chief political issues now centered around slavery, and as they
had to be settled, lest the Union be broken, the Whigs and Democrats
arranged the Compromise of 1850.
11. This made California a free state, but left the new territories of
Utah and New Mexico open to slavery.
[Illustration: OLD ADOBE RANCH HOUSE IN SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA.]
FOOTNOTES
[1] Besides the long-standing dispute over the Maine boundary, two other
matters were possible causes of war with Great Britain. (1) Her cruisers
had been searching our vessels off the African coast to see if they were
slavers. (2) In the attack on the _Caroline_ (p. 297) one American was
killed, and in 1840 a Canadian, Alexander McLeod, was arrested in New
York and charged with the murder. Great Britain now avowed responsibility
for the burning of the _Caroline_, and demanded that the man should
be released. McLeod, however, was tried and acquitted.
[2] Two other provisions of the treaty were of especial importance. (1) In
order to stop the slave trade each nation was to keep a squadron (carrying
at least eighty guns) cruising off the coast of Africa. (2) It was agreed
that any person who, charged with the crime of murder, piracy, arson,
robbery, or forgery, committed in either country, shall escape to the
other, shall if possible be seized and given up to the authorities of the
country which he fled.
[3] A war between Mexico and Texas followed, and was carried on with great
cruelty by the Mexicans. Santa Anna, the president of Mexico, having
driven some Texans into a building called the Alamo (ah'la-mo), in San
Antonio, carried it by storm and ordered all of its defenders shot. A band
of Texans who surrendered at Goliad met the same fate. In 1836, however,
General Samuel Houston (hu'stun) beat the Mexicans in the decisive battle
of San Jacinto. The struggle of the Texans for independence aroused
sympathy in our country; hundreds of volunteers joined their army, and
money, arms, and ammunition were sent them. Read A. E. Barr's novel
_Remember the Alamo_.
[4] Referring to our claim between 1803 and 1819 (p. 276) that the
Louisiana Purchase extended west to the Rio Grande.
[5] James K. Polk was born in North Carolina in 1795, but went with his
parents to Tennessee in 1806, where in 1823 he became a member of the
legislature. From 1824 to 1839 he was a member of Congress, and in 1839
was elected governor of Tennessee. Polk was the first presidential "dark
horse"; that is, the first candidate whose nomination was unexpected and a
surprise. In the Democratic national convention at Baltimore the contest
was at first between Van Buren and Cass. Polk's name did not appear till
the eighth ballot; on the ninth the convention "stampeded" and Polk
received every vote. When the news was spread over the country by means of
railroads and stagecoaches, many people would not believe it till
confirmed by the newspapers. The Whigs nominated Henry Clay; and the
Liberty party, James G. Birney. Tyler also was renominated by his friends,
but withdrew.
[6] Read Whittier's _Texas_.
[7] In the course of the fight a son of Henry Clay was killed, and
Jefferson Davis, afterward President of the Confederate States of America,
was wounded. At one stage of the battle Lieutenant Crittenden was sent to
demand the surrender of a Mexican force that had been cut off; but the
Mexican officer in command sent him blindfolded to Santa Anna. Crittenden
thereupon demanded the surrender of the entire Mexican army, and when told
that Taylor must surrender in an hour or have his army destroyed, replied,
"General Taylor never surrenders." Read Whittier's _Angels of Buena
Vista_.
[8] The war was bitterly opposed by the antislavery people of the North as
an attempt to gain more slave territory. Numbers of pamphlets were written
against it. Lincoln, then a member of Congress, introduced resolutions
asking the President to state on what spot on American soil blood had been
shed by Mexican troops, and James Russell Lowell wrote his famous
_Biglow Papers_.
[9] Five years later (1853), by another treaty with Mexico, negotiated by
James Gadsden, we acquired a comparatively small tract south of the Gila,
called the Gadsden Purchase (compare maps, pp. 330, 352). The price was
$10,000,000. The purchase was made largely because Congress was then
considering the building of a railroad to the Pacific, and because the
route likely to be chosen went south of the Gila.
[10] As early as 1846 the North attempted to decide the question in favor
of freedom. Polk had asked for $2,000,000 with which to settle the
boundary dispute with Mexico, and when the bill to appropriate the money
was before the House, David Wilmot moved to add the proviso that all
territory bought with it should be free soil. The House passed the Wilmot
Proviso, but the Senate did not; so the bill failed. The following year
(1847) a bill to give Polk $3,000,000 was introduced, and again the
proviso was added by the House and rejected by the Senate. Then the House
gave way, and passed the bill; but the acquisition of California and New
Mexico by treaty left the question still unsettled.
[11] Their platform declared: (1) that Congress has no more power to make
a slave than to make a king; (2) that there must be "free soil for a free
people"; (3) that there must be "no more slave states, no more slave
territories"; (4) that "we inscribe on our banner, 'Free soil, free
speech, free labor, and freemen.'"
[12] The Liberty party nominated John P. Hale of New Hampshire, but he
withdrew in favor of Van Buren. The Liberty party was thus merged in the
Free-soil party, and so disappeared from politics. The Democratic
candidates for President and Vice-President were Lewis Cass and William O.
Butler.
[13] Zachary Taylor was born in Virginia in 1784, was taken to Louisville,
Kentucky, while still a child, and grew up there. In 1808 he entered the
United States army as a lieutenant, and by 1810 had risen to be a captain.
For a valiant defense of Fort Harrison on the Wabash, he was made a major.
He further distinguished himself in the Black Hawk and Seminole wars. In
the Mexican War General Taylor was a great favorite with his men, who
called him in admiration "Old Rough and Ready." Before 1848 he had taken
very little interest in politics. He was nominated because of his record
as a military hero.
[14] Millard Fillmore was born in central New York in 1800, and at
fourteen was apprenticed to a trade, but studied law at odd times, and
practiced law at Buffalo. He served three terms in the state assembly, was
four times elected to Congress, and was once the Whig candidate for
governor. In 1848 he was nominated for the vice presidency as a strong
Whig likely to carry New York.
[15] Laborers left the fields, tradesmen the shops, and seamen deserted
their ships as soon as they entered port. One California newspaper
suspended its issue because editor, typesetters, and printer's devil had
gone to the gold fields. In June the Star stopped for a like reason, and
California was without a newspaper. Some men made $5000, $10,000, and
$15,000 in a few days. California life in the early times is described in
Kirk Munroe's _Golden Days of '49_, and in Bret Harte's _Luck of Roaring
Camp_ and _Tales of the Argonauts_.
[16] Those who crossed the plains suffered terribly, and for many years
the wrecks of their wagons, the bones of their oxen and horses, and the
graves of many of the men were to be seen along the route. This route was
from Independence in Missouri, up the Platte River, over the South Pass,
past Great Salt Lake, and so to "the diggings."
[17] Some miners obtained gold by digging the earth, putting it into a tin
pan, pouring on water, and then shaking the pan so as to throw out the
muddy water and leave the particles of gold. Others used a box mounted on
rockers and called a "cradle" or "rocker."
[18] Read the speeches of Calhoun and Webster in _Johnston's American
Orations_, Vol. II. Webster's speech gave great offense in the North.
Read McMaster's _Daniel Webster_, pp. 314-324, and Whittier's poem
_Ichabod_. The debate and its attendant scenes are well described in
Rhodes's _History of the U. S._, Vol. I, pp. 104-189.
[19] The fugitive slave law gave great offense to the North. It provided
that a runaway slave might be seized wherever found, and brought before a
United States judge or commissioner. The negro could not give testimony to
prove he was not a fugitive but had been kidnapped, if such were the case.
All citizens were "commanded," when summoned, to aid in the capture of a
fugitive, and, if necessary, in his delivery to his owner. Fine and
imprisonment were provided for any one who harbored a fugitive or aided in
his escape. The law was put in execution at once, and "slave catchers,"
"man hunters," as they were called, "invaded the North." This so excited
the people that many slaves when seized were rescued. Such rescues
occurred during 1851 at New York, Boston, Syracuse, and at Ottawa in
Illinois. Read Wilson's _Rise and Fall of the Slave Power in America_,
Chap. 26.
In the midst of this excitement Mrs. Harriet Beecher Stowe published her
story of _Uncle Tom's Cabin_. Mrs. Stowe's purpose was "to show the
institution of slavery truly just as it existed." The book is rather a
picture of what slavery might have been than of what slavery really was;
but it was so powerfully written that everybody read it, and thousands of
people in the North who hitherto cared little about the slavery issue were
converted to abolitionism.
[Illustration: THE UNITED STATES IN 1850.]