Annexation – U.S. to 1877

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The reading for this week was for the most part focused on the idea of Manifest Destiny and how the United States began to annex other lands into their country. Starting with the death of President Harrison (which is the most absurd thing I have ever heard of) the United States mission to move in on other lands became what seemed like the most important thing to the presidents. After Texas expressed their want to become a part of the United States, along with the fact that the British stood a chance to take control of the Republic, new President John Tyler jumped on the chance to annex, which he just barely got done before Polk was sworn into the Presidency.

With another new president the United States was told that there were four major goals to be completed: “the settlement of the Oregon question, the reduction of the protectionist tariff of 1842, reestablishment of the independent treasury, and the acquisition of California.” (306) It only makes sense that half of our countries goals were to gain more land since it was our destiny to expand. Polk sent in men to go to the Mexican border, basically in an attempt to start war and take over California. Although it may not have been constitutional, Polk started the war and then got approval from the congress. His rival, Calhoun, did not take kindly to this abuse of power as he was an opponent of the war and said the Polk “had unconstitutionally engineered the country into war.” (310)

As any other story of pre-civil war America, slavery had to find its way into this situation. The idea of whether the newly admitted lands would be slave or free territories started dividing the Whig party as sectionalism became more important that ideology. I think this is similar to what my classmate SpEdwards was saying in the beginning of his post as he spoke on how Polk thought the new lands would unify the country, but instead it gave the North and South more reason to divide. As we bring up often in class, I feel that the Wilmot Proviso was one of the early precursors of the Civil war that we had coming. The parties split and Calhoun “saw the proviso as a golden opportunity to unite southerners across party lines” (319) and it didn’t take the north long to align the same way. Hence the divide that we later see fighting against one another in the civil war over the same issue, abolition.

In Wilentz’s reading of chapters 17-20 expansion was very prominent and consumed politics throughout these years opening many doors. Polk’s presidency was plagued with the issue over the annexation of Texas. This issue may have been one of Polk’s most notable throughout his presidency. Polk was finishing up what Martin Van Buren had started; Van Buren’s party platform stood behind two things in particular and those were, the annexation of Texas as well as securing Oregon territory’s borders (Taylor 300). Therefore, this issue over Texas was an ongoing debate lasting throughout two presidencies leaving enough time for multiple perspectives and various new forms of political parties to arise. Yet, there is a deeper meaning behind all of this and it was not just the annexation of Texas and the new issues that arose with that, such as, how to deal with slavery. The deeper issue and the root of all of this was the idea of expansionism and various forms of manifest destiny that paved the way for new democratic possibilities.

This goes along with what SPEDWARDS mentions in his blog post, when stating that, “expansion and slavery are always paired together.” This is something that makes sense in the grand scheme of things, as new land is found and old lands are being over-worked it makes sense to expand and bring your slaves with you to till the new territory. Yet this sparks controversy because there are many abolitionists and parties such as the antislavery Whigs, Barnburners, or groups like the Liberty Free Soil Party. These groups had views that were multi-faceted and conflicted with various other parties and views. All of this controversy and contradiction came about because of expansion and because of expansion there were new policies that needed to be set in stone. This is where the various political views and parties were introduced on the political scene. Many parties want to express their views and the way things should be incorporated or “run” on these states added to the frontier. The clash of various political organizations over matters of expansion pioneers the way to new democratic opportunities. One movement in particular that came about because of the consequences of expansion was the women’s rights movement led by Lucretia Mott and Elizabeth Stanton.

Although, these clashes at first glance can be seen as dangerous to the Union, they are in fact healthy. These clashes and various parties that arise from expansion progress the United States in a positive light. By expressing the various views on certain matters, it is possible to come to a conclusion that satisfies the preferences of the majority.

Tag: Annexation

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