The Mexican War

Background Information:

Although frequently simplified by students of the conflict, the causes of the Mexican War of 1846-1848 were complex. Relations between the two countries had been strained almost from the moment Mexico won its independence from Spain in 1821. Although a republican form of government was established in 1824, Mexico proved to be a republic in name more than in fact. Wracked by frequent revolutions, the nation remained weak and unstable and was often dominated by dictators.

As a result of the disorder, the United States, France, and Great Britain lodged claims against the government for damages inflicted upon their nationals and property. The American claims were submitted to a commission for arbitration, which settled on a figure of about $2 million. When the Mexican government defaulted, sentiment among Americans for collecting the claims by force increased, and some urged that war be declared.

Mexico's grievance against the United States focused on the issue of Texas. Already angered by America's aid to the Texas Revolution, the Mexican government became further alarmed when the movement to annex Texas to the United States gained momentum. Mexico had never recognized Texas's independence and made plans to recapture the area. As Congress debated the issue, Mexico made it clear that the permanent loss of Texas would be sufficient cause for war.

Events moved swiftly following the passage of an annexation resolution on March 3, 1845, the day before James K. Polk assumed the presidency. Fears for the safety of Texas and rumors that Mexico would transfer California to Great Britain in lieu of its debt payment, combined with a new sense of national identity and destiny, heightened American sensitivity to Mexico's threats and moved Americans closer to a war spirit. Mexico recalled its minister in Washington and broke off diplomatic relations. In response, U.S. troops commanded by Gen. Zachary Taylor entered Texas to protect the region until annexation was completed. Mexico countered by dispatching an army to the south bank of the Rio Grande. Hoping to avoid war with Mexico (conflict with Great Britain over the Oregon country loomed), President Polk sent an emissary, John Slidell, to the Mexican capital with instructions not only to negotiate a settlement of the claims and Texas issues but also to offer to buy New Mexico and California. Slidell arrived in early December amid a wave of anti-American feeling, and the government refused to receive him. The Mexican president, who it was said favored conciliation with the United States, was overthrown in a military coup. He was replaced by an officer who announced his intention to restore Texas to Mexico while he made overtures to European nations for the establishment of a monarchy in Mexico in return for aid against the United States.

Following the admission of Texas to the Union in December 1845, Taylor's army was ordered to the Rio Grande, the traditional boundary of the American claim to Texas dating back to the early years of the century. The opposing Mexican force received orders to attack the Americans, and in late April, the commanding general informed Taylor that hostilities had begun. An American patrol was ambushed north of the Rio Grande, followed quickly by a movement of the Mexican force across the river. The two armies clashed in the Battles of Palo Alto and Resaca de la Palma in early May 1846. Although outnumbered, Taylor's army was victorious in both engagements. Slidell's rebuff by the Mexican government and news of the first American losses along the Rio Grande persuaded President Polk and his cabinet to ask that Congress recognize a state of war with Mexico. The war resolution passed on May 13, with only token opposition.

The United States speedily mobilized its manpower and matériel. Congress authorized the enlistment of fifty thousand volunteers, assigning quotas to the states closest to the fighting. The government increased the size of the regular military forces, appropriated money for the production of equipment, and requisitioned ships to carry the troops to Mexico.

There were three areas of military operation. Taylor's army penetrated northern Mexico, occupied the important city of Monterrey, and defeated a larger Mexican army commanded by General Santa Anna at the Battle of Buena Vista on February 22-23, 1847. In the meantime, an army under the command of Stephen W. Kearny followed the Santa Fe Trail to New Mexico, occupied Santa Fe, and moved westward to the Pacific where it joined naval units in the occupation of California. Impatient to end the war, Polk opened a third operation against Mexico City itself. Commanded by Winfield Scott, an army made up largely of volunteers landed at Veracruz in March 1847 and marched inland, defeating the opposing forces in hard-fought battles at Cerro Gordo and in the Valley of Mexico. The capital was occupied in mid-September 1847.

The Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo, which ended the war, was signed early in February 1848. Mexico ceded New Mexico and California to the United States and, in recognition of the loss of Texas, agreed to the Rio Grande boundary. In return, the United States assumed the claims of its citizens against Mexico and paid Mexico an additional $15 million to help the country achieve long-needed fiscal stability.

The Mexican War was costly for the United States. Its military forces suffered almost thirteen thousand deaths, although only seventeen hundred were battle-related, the rest resulting from disease that swept through the army camps. Nevertheless, the war was popular. It was the first war covered by large numbers of correspondents, as the nation's press competed for war news. Some members of the Whig party and the abolitionists opposed the war, the former because they felt it was unconstitutional, the latter believing erroneously that it was part of a slaveholders' conspiracy to extend slavery. For many Americans, the war was a romantic venture in a distant and exotic land. The campaigns were often compared with the Spanish conquest of Mexico in the sixteenth century, which had recently been popularized by the historian William Hickling Prescott.

The reliance on volunteers gave the conflict a democratic cast, stimulating notions of an American mission to restore republican government to a people oppressed by military rulers. America's triumph seemed to confirm the superiority of democratic institutions, and literary figures like Walt Whitman and James Fenimore Cooper saw it as part of a worldwide mission to extend democratic ideals. Like most wars, however, this one left serious questions in its wake. The issue of whether slavery should be allowed in the lands taken from Mexico, first debated in 1846, set in motion a constitutional debate between the North and South that would dominate future political discourse, eventually dividing the Union itself.

K. Jack Bauer, The Mexican War, 1846-1848 (1974); Robert W. Johannsen, To the Halls of the Montezumas: The Mexican War in the American Imagination (1985); David M. Pletcher, The Diplomacy of Annexation: Texas, Oregon, and the Mexican War (1973).

Robert W. Johannsen

(from: http://www.historychannel.com/)

Computer with internet access.

Content organizers to handout.

Overhead computer projecter.

Today we will analyze the issues and events that led to the war between the U.S. and Mexico. These relate to the issues surrounding the independence of Texas which we talked about yesterday.

After this lesson you will also be able to identify the territories the U.S. gained as a result of the war.

We’re also going to talk about the impact of the war on former Mexican citizens.

What issues led to the war between the United States and Mexico?

What territories did the United States gain as a result of the war?

What was the impact of the war on former Mexican citizens?

How would you characterize the relationship between Mexico and U.S. today?

(Encourage students to focus on economic ties, issues surrounding Mexican immigration to U.S., Mexican-American cultural influences, etc.)

List the responses students generate on an overhead projector or chalkboard. These can be listed in a graphic organizer type of format.

Explain that the relationship between Mexico and the United States is deeply interconnected and many of the modern day issues related to that relationship can be directly linked to the outcome of the U.S.-Mexican War.

(Students will have already read this section in their textbook, although they should be allowed to use their textbook to fill in the content organizer, if necessary).

Assign students to work in groups of two or three for 20 minutes to list the reasons (economic and political) for war from the viewpoints of the American and Mexican governments. One question on the organizer will ask them to address whether or not each nation’s stance made war inevitable.

I will provide a content organizer for this purpose. Students are to fill in the worksheets as a group and be prepared to discuss their findings as a group.

Use website and overhead computer projector to discuss with students the varying views, Mexican and American, on the war.

Discuss major figures from the period, with particular attention to Santa Anna.

Discuss the major events of the war and the outcomes for both the United States and Mexico.

As a group, we will discuss the content organizers that students filled in earlier regarding the causes for the war. Students will discuss their answer to whether or not war with Mexico was inevitable.

Then in groups of three or four, students will imagine they are Mexican landowners living at the time of the Mexican cession. I will ask them to write a letter to a relative in Mexico describing their life before and after the Mexican War.

Volunteers will read letters aloud to class and we will develop a list on the chalkboard of ways that they war changed the lives of former Mexican citizens.

Ask students to briefly refer back to their content organizers to discuss the causes of the war, the outcomes and whether or not each country’s stance made war inevitable.

As Homework: Students are to write a brief essay (no longer than one page, no shorter than one paragraph) addressing one of the following topics:

• Do you think the United States was right to go to war with Mexico? Explain your answer.
• Do you think the war between the United States and Mexico could have been prevented? Explain your answer.
• What are some problems that exist in the United States today regarding the annexation of the Southwest? What are some benefits of that annexation?
• Do you think Spanish should become the official second language of the United States? Why or why not?