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Conquest, Patrice, and an Unpopular War: A historical review of the U.S.-Mexican War
For being the second war Congress ever officially declared war, we tend forget the significance the U.S.-Mexican War (1846-1848) had on the history of the United States. Lost between the Texas Revoultion (1835-1836) and the Civil War (1861-1864) the U.S.-Mexican War saw the rapid succession of territorial expansion second only to the Louisiana Purchase, rise of the prominent tacticians and generals who will forge legendary careers with the outbreak of the Civil War, and once President James K. Polk called for war it created a controversy among Congressional members who viewed it as an opportunity to expand slavery westward.
By using primary sources like President James Polk’s dairy written between 1845 and 1849 in which shows his motivations on expanding westward whether it be war with Mexico or Britain. For example, Polk wanted to adjust a permanent boundary between the United States and Mexico and then purchase Upper California and New Mexico for a pecuniary consideration. Not to mention that upon signing a treaty to end the war Polk recognized that he could obtain a boundary from the Rio Grande west to the Pacific by paying a few millions after taking California permanently. With information like this one can seek to answer the question as to why did the U.S. seek to expand its reach from cost to cost? While other sources like the message, Polk sent to Congress on May 11, 1846, which asserted that a state of war existed between the U.S. and Mexico and that the Mexican Government invaded American territory and shed the blood of its citizens. As such, Polk called for a large body of volunteers to serve for not less than six to twelve months unless discharged and recommended that a liberal provision to be made for sustaining the entire military force and furnishing it with munitions of war. Which can be used as a means to answer the question was it necessary to declare war on Mexico.
However, even with Polk asking for war with Mexico some of the congressional members question his motivations behind it. Members of the Wing Party including John Quincy Adams, who refused to support it do to the fact he believed the war was endorsing slavery, John Giddings, who cast the only the only ballot against the resolution of thanks to General Zachary Taylor, and Abraham Lincoln, who demand to know exactly where American blood was shed. In 1847, the party denounced the conduct of the war in an article in the The American Review: a Whig Journal stating that from its inception the war was an act of aggression prompted by the coveting of our neighbor’s possession and gratification of the same lawless cupidity in reference to “the whole of Oregon or none.” By using this primary source, one can seek to answer the question of whether or not the war was fought based on a legitimate reason deemed vital for the security and defense of the nation or perhaps did Polk have other motives behind sending troops across the border.
In the end, these primary sources combined with scholarly secondary works such as Merry Robert W. A Country of Vast Designs: James K. Polk, the Mexican War and the Conquest of the American Continent will attempt to trace the field of study around the U.S.-Mexican War and argue the need to focus on President Polk’s and the decisions he made before, during, and after the war to expand the public understanding the significance of the U.S.-Mexican War.