The Mexican War and Polk
Tuesday May 13, 2008
On May 13, 1846, the United States declared war on Mexico. The declaration came as a result of Mexican troops crossing the Rio Grande onto American soil. President James Knox Polk stated that, "Mexico's aggression had shed American blood on American soil." Polk intended to take Mexican territory in California by force. Polk was considered the best wartime president up to his time.
Comments
American Soil?
He had his dates wrong. Texas became American Soil after the war, nor before. Making Texas American was the purpose of the war.
Lucas
Actually, Lucas, Texas became a state in 1845. You must be thinking of Texas’s war for independence which involved the famous siege of the Alamo. The Mexican-American War was an entirely seperate conflict.
Sorry guys. First of all, America stretches from the artic to Terra del Fuego–so this whole continent is american!
That’s beside the point–Lucas is right. The point of the Mexican American War was to assure that Texas plus every piece of land to the Pacific Ocean would become part of the US. Remember Seth–Mexico stretched to what is now Nevada over to half of Utah and all the states we claim now, such as Arizona and New Mexico. Of course California.
james Polk was no great president; he was a greedy warmonger, part of the thinking that said we who conquer have a ‘manifest destiny’ to keep on conquering. gh
I like your comments on the war. With Texas being a state, the dispute was over which river was going to be the southern border of the state. Mexico claimed the northern one and U.S. claimed the southern one. I completely agree with your comment about Polk being the best war president up to that time, since the last war president was Madison and we know how he did in a war.
The real question about Polk is: was he the maker of policy or a follower of the mob.
Mexico started the war by crossing into the United States. The USA beat them and the spoils of war became ours. The fact that they couldn’t control their troops then or the hordes of their illegal immigrants now proves as a country they are incompetent.
Yes Georgia, I know that Mexico stretched across those lands. I also know that the war was over the border dispute mainly and that the Mexicans believed they were in their country still. The point I was making is that Texas was already a state and the war was not to acquire the state of Texas. I chose my words wrong, and I didn’t mean to be derogatory toward Lucas, but the war was fought over the border between Texas and Mexico, not to make Texas a part of the United States. Texas was admitted to the Union in December 1845 and the war did not start until several months after that.
As to Manifest Destiny, nearly all countries have practiced that policy. Especially the Mexican government with their grabbing the lands, and the later enslavement for the Silver Mines, of the native Indians; Almost a dozen tribes fought the hated Mexican government in the West and Mexico before the Mexican/American War; A few smaller armed revolutions continue today. During and after the Mexican American War, especially , the Apaches and Commanches fought the Americans for their lands. However even the Indian tribes practised Manifest Destiny with their warring and taking lands from each other.
Also, all of the continent of Americas are not for “Amercians”, just as all of Europe is not for Europeans; it depends on the culture and peoples that have settled (or taken it) which boundries describe a nation.
Has anyone taken a peek at the Mexican view of the M-A war, before and after? Might make interesting reading.
This all is very interesting however, can not the referee jump in at interludes and “Chart” the entire argument and present the facts as they are inherient to history? I am a -novice- history buff, myself, for all this (the Sport of Boxing is my expertise) from: WilkinsonJBoxing@Hotmail.com, John Wilkinson (-grandson of the late John E. Wilkinson the outboard motorboat racer and ham radio pioneer-)
hi people. you are all aliens./ i am 300 and the world will be destroyed in 2012 by planet x….. yours fartfully, jeeba