Overview of Manifest Destiny Lecture Part 1 (Monday)

Feeling too tired in class? Didn't bother taking notes except verbatim on the powerpoint Mr. Stewart showed to us?  Well have no fear, ODong is here!  I will be giving a brief overview of that lecture had you missed any information.

Manifest Destiny
The lecture started out with the widely recognized painting American Progress by John Gast.  We were asked to make observations on what we saw and most of all the observations that were said were given an "ahh..provocative" response from Mr. Stewart.  Not much to be said here.

The term Manifest Destiny is the belief that Americans should expand across the entire continent.  This short phrase was coined by Jeff L. O'Sullivan.  Fun fact: Jeff L. O'Sullivan was originally named just Jeff L. Sullivan, but there were too many people with the name Jeff L. Sullivan.  However great this may sound like, it also brings up several pondering issues.  Just how far should the US be able to expand? Can we do it peaceably?  Will there be war?

Texas
Texas was a small independent republic after gaining its independence from Mexico in 1836.  It encouraged people settling in.  However only Americans wanted to move into Texas.  Texas allowed this as they felt that the Americans settling in would eventually assimilate with the Texans.  This was not the case as more and more people settled in.  It eventually became populous enough to address the question of whether it should be a state.  Along with this brought up the Annexation Question: issues with slavery and balance and being expansionist or less expansionist.  During their terms, President Jackson and Van Buren completely ignored the issue with Texas as they didn't want to deal with issues that are hard to solve, as in this case.  Eventually Texas becomes a state in December 1846 under the presidency of James K. Polk, a pro-expansionist.

Oregon
Meanwhile, up in the northwest, there was a debate with the British over the Oregon territory.  The Americans claimed the 54-40 line while the British claimed the 42nd Parallel.  How to solve this? Of course with a compromise!  The compromise was 49th parallel, as you can see in the image below.  This also helped shape the Canadian-American border was we know it today.  The compromise came after threats of war and invocation of the Monroe Doctrine.  Remember the Monroe Doctrine stated that any European power trying to colonize in North or South America would be viewed as acts of aggression.

Election of 1844
The Whigs chose Henry Clay (yes THE Henry Clay, now in his 70s and looking like a skeleton) as their candidate for president.  Clay was noncommittal on expansion mostly because he feared that it would increase and aggravate sectionalism.  The Democrats chose James K. Polk as their candidate.  As mentioned above, Polk was extremely pro-expansionist.  The Democrats brought together the Texas and Oregon issues and said that America should "re-occupy" and "re-annex" them.  In other words, they used a tricky play of words to appeal to try to the people.  For example, it's like using the phrase "you're relieved" instead of "you're fired".  In the end, Polk wins.  It was 170 to 105 electoral votes for Polk's side.  Because he won, Polk and the democrats believed that the majority of America must be for pro-expansionism.  And this led him to decision to annex Texas.  However, his way of thinking was flawed as he only won only by 40000 in the popular vote.

The Mexican War
The Mexican War was started mostly over the dispute over the Texas border.  After Texas had been annexed, the US believed the border of Texas was the Rio Grande River.  However Mexico believed that Texas's border was only until the Nueces River (seen below).

Polk decides to move land and naval forces toward the southwest, past the Nueces River.  Mexico thinks of this as an invasion as it crosses their "believed" border: the Nueces River.  And thus the Texas border dispute flames into the Mexican War.

 At first opponents believed that President Polk had deliberately fostered the conditions for war and purposely tried to provoke Mexico into war.  This is why the war is sometimes known as "Mr. Polk's War".  The Mexican war also hurt negotiations up northwest over Oregon.  In case the Oregon dispute also flared into a war, the US would be at a greater disadvantage because it would have to fight in two places.  However, the opposition to the war was largely stifled by the success of the war.  It was over before any actual protests could take place.  This was largely due to the US's advantage in mobility-able to move armies quickly for a quick war.  Additionally, this also led to the increase in the desire to be patriotic, especially among the Whigs.

During this time, it was also supposedly rumored that the US was already designing on and planning for California.  Hint Hint

The Treaty of Guadalupe-Hidalgo (Feb. 1848)
The war ended on the terms of this treaty.  Mexico recognized the border of Texas to be at the Rio Grande and also ceded much of its territory, including California to the US.  However, the US agreed to assume the debts of its citizens to Mexico and also paid Mexico 15 million dollars.  Why do this even though they won?  It's because the US didn't want to have more disputes with Mexico and basically wanted Mexico to be a "good neighbor"



Well that's all for the first part! I hope this helped, at least somewhat.  Part 2 will be up shortly