Transcript CH 17 PPT

Chapter 17
Manifest Destiny and
Its Legacy, 1841–1848
I. The Accession of “Tyler Too”
• Whig party:
– Wm. H. Harrison, a Whig, was elected in 1840
and John Tyler elected Vice-President
• Cabinet: Secretary of State—Daniel Webster
• Henry Clay spokesman in the Senate, the uncrowned
king of the Whigs.
– Harrison contacted pneumonia and died after
only one month in office
• By far the shortest administration in American history
but longest inaugural address.
I. The Accession of “Tyler Too”
(cont.)
• John Tyler:
• The “Tyler too” party of the Whig ticket, now claimed
the spotlight
• He was stubbornly attached to principle
• Resigned early from the Senate, rather than accept
distasteful instructions from the Virginia legislature
• Forsook the Jacksonian Democrats for the Whigs
• His enemies accused him of being a Democrat in
Whig clothing
• Was at odds with the majority of his adoptive Whigs
I. The Accession of “Tyler Too”
(cont.)
• John Tyler:
• Had been frustrated by Jackson's spoils system
– Described it as an "electioneering weapon“
• Had voted against many of the Jackson’s nominations
– He thought they were based on patronage
– Was offended by Jackson's use of recess appointments
• Had attempted to remain on good terms with Jackson
– Only opposed him on principle rather than partisanship
– Defended some of Jackson vetoes of “unconstitutional”
programs
– Voted to confirm several of the President's appointments
I. The Accession of “Tyler Too”
(cont.)
• John Tyler:
• Joined Jackson in opposition to rechartering the
Second Bank of the United States
– Voted to sustain Jackson’s veto of the recharter bill
• Break with the Democrats
– Tyler's disagreements with his party came to a head during
the Nullification Crisis of 1832–33
– Tyler had sympathized with South Carolina's reasons for
nullification, and voted against the Force Bill
– Tyler had supported Clay's Compromise Tariff
– Jackson’s destruction of the Bank by “executive fiat” had
been the last straw, causing Tyler to join with Henry Clay
and the Whigs in the Senate
What has caused this great commotion, motion,
Our country through?
It is the ball a-rolling on,
For Tippecanoe and Tyler too, Tippecanoe and Tyler too.
And with them, we'll beat the little Van, Van, Van
Van is a used-up man.
~ Campaign song from the 1840 election
I. The Accession of “Tyler Too”
(cont.)
• Whig party platform:
– Pro-bank, pro-protective tariff, and pro-internal
improvements.
– “Tyler too” rhymed with “Tippecanoe,” but there
the harmony ended.
• President Harrison, the Whig, served for only 4
weeks, whereas Tyler, the ex-Democrat who was still
largely a Democrat at heart, served for 204 weeks.
– Outlined a strongly nationalist program
II. John Tyler: A President Without a
Party
• Whig platform:
– Financial reform came first:
• The Whig Congress passed a law ending the
independent treasury system
• President Tyler, disarmingly agreeable, signed it
• Clay drove though Congress a bill for a “Fiscal Bank”
which would create a new Bank of the United States
– Clay—the “Great Compromiser”—would have done well to
conciliate Tyler
– Tyler vetoed the bill on both practical and constitutional
grounds
II. John Tyler: A President Without
a Party (cont.)
• The Whig leaders tried again, passing another bill
providing for a “Fiscal Corporation”
– Tyler again vetoed the offensive substitute
– The Democrats were jubilant
• Whig extremists condemned Tyler as “His Accidency”
and “Executive Ass”
– He was formally expelled from his party
– His entire cabinet resigned in a body, except Secretary of
State Webster, who was then in the midst of delicate
negotiations with England.
II. John Tyler: A President Without
a Party (cont.)
• Proposed Whig tariff bill:
– Tyler vetoed the bill
– Because he saw the Whig scheme for a distribution among
the states of revenue from the sale of public lands in the
West
– He could see no point of squandering federal money.
• Chastened Clayites redrafted their tariff bill:
– They chopped out the offensive dollar-distribution scheme
– Pushed down the rates to about the moderately protective
level of 1832—roughly 32% on dutiable goods
– Tyler reluctantly signed the Tariff of 1842
III. A War of Words with Britain
• Anti-British passions:
• At the bottom lay the bitter, red-coated memories of
the two Anglo-American wars
• The pro-British Federalists had died out
• British travelers wrote negatively about American
customs in their travel books
• These writings touched off the “Third War with
England”
• Fortunately this British-American war was fought on
paper broadsides, and only ink was spilled.
p362
III. A War of Words with Britain
(cont.)
– America a borrowing nation:
• Expensive canals to dig and railroads to build
• Britain, with overflowing coffers, was a lending nation
• The panic of 1837 and several states defaulted on
their bonds or repudiated them altogether
– 1837—a short-lived insurrection erupted in
Canada
• Hot-blooded Americans furnished military supplies or
volunteered for armed service
• The U.S. government under Van Buren tried to hold
its neutrality
III. A War of Words with Britain
(cont.)
• Again it could not enforce unpopular laws in the face
of popular opposition.
• A provocative incident on the Canadian frontier
brought passions to a boil in 1837:
– An American steamer, Caroline, was carrying supplies to the
insurgents across the Niagara River
– It was attacked on the New York shore by the British and set
on fire
– The craft sank short of the Falls; one American was killed.
• This unlawful invasion of American soil had alarming
aftermaths.
III. A War of Words with Britain
(cont.)
– In 1840 a man, McLeod, who confessed to being involved in
the Carolina raid, was arrested and indicted for murder
– The London Foreign Office made clear that his execution
would mean war
– Fortunately, McLeod was freed after establishing an alibi
– Tensions were renewed in 1841 when British officials in the
Bahamas offered asylum to 130 Virginian slaves who had
rebelled and captured the American ship Creole.
– Britain had abolished slavery within the empire in 1833,
raising southern fears that its Caribbean possessions would
become Canada-like havens for escaped slaves.
IV. Manipulating the Maine Maps
• The Maine boundary dispute:
– The St. Lawrence River is icebound several
months of the year:
• As a defensive precaution the British wanted to build
a road westward from the seaport Halifax to Quebec
• The road would go though disputed territory claimed
by Maine
• The Aroostook War threatened to widen the dispute
into a full-dress shooting war.
IV. Manipulating the Maine Maps
(cont.)
– Britain sent to Washington a nonprofessional
diplomat, Lord Ashburton, who established
cordial relations with Secretary Webster
• They finally agreed to compromise on the Maine
boundary (see Map 17.1)
• A split-the-difference arrangement, the Americans
retained some 7,000 square miles of the 12,000
square miles of the wilderness in dispute
• Britain got less land but won the desired HalifaxQuebec route.
IV. Manipulating the Maine Maps
(cont.)
• The Caroline affair was patched up by an exchange of
diplomatic notes
• Bonus sneaked in small print:
– The British, in adjusting the U.S.-Canadian boundary farther
West, surrendered 6,500 square miles
– The area was later found to contain the priceless Mesabi
iron ore of Minnesota.
Map 17-1 p363
V. The Lone Star of Texas Shines Alone
• Texas’s precarious existence:
– Mexico:
• refused to recognize Texas’s independence
• regarded the Lone Star Republic as a province in
revolt to be reconquered in the future
• Mexican officials threatened war if the American
eagle ever gathered the fledgling republic under its
protective wings.
V. The Lone Star of Texas Shines
Alone (cont.)
– Texas was forced to maintain a costly military
establishment:
• Threatened by Mexico, Texas was driven into open
negotiations with Britain and France to secure a
defensive shield of a protectorate
• In 1839 and 1840, the Texans concluded a treaty with
France, Holland, and Belgium.
– Britain was interested in an independent Texas
• Texas would serve as a check for Americans moving
South, possibly into British territory
V. The Lone Star of Texas Shines
Alone (cont.)
• Dangers threatened from other foreigners:
– British abolitionists were busily intriguing for a
foothold in Texas
– British merchants regarded Texas as a potentially
important free-trade area—an offset to the
tariff-walled United States
– British manufacturers perceived the Texas plains
for great cotton-producing in the future relieving
Britain of chronic dependence on American fiber.
p364
VI. The Belated Texas Nuptials
– Texas became a leading issue in the 1844
presidential campaign:
• The foes of expansion assailed annexation
• Southern hotheads cried, “Texas or Disunion”
• The pro-expansion Democrats under James K. Polk
finally triumphed over the Whigs
• Lame duck president Tyler interpreted the narrow
Democratic victory as a “mandate” to acquire Texas.
• Tyler deserves credit for shepherding Texas into the
fold.
VI. The Belated Texas Nuptials
(cont.)
• Tyler despaired of securing the needed 2/3 vote for a
treaty in the Senate
• He arranged for annexation by a joint resolution
• After a spirited debate, the resolution passed in 1845
and Texas was formally invited to become the 28th
star on the American flag
• Mexico angrily charged that the Americans had
despoiled it of Texas
– True in 1836, but not in 1845
• Mexico could never recover Texas
– But left the Texans dangling by denying their right to
dispose of themselves as they chose
VI. The Belated Texas Nuptials
(cont.)
– By 1845 the Lone Star Republic had become a
danger spot:
• Inviting foreign intrigue that menaced the American
people
• The continued existence of Texas as an independent
nation threatened to involve the United States in
wars
• The United States can hardly be accused of haste in
achieving annexation.
VII. Oregon Fever Populates Oregon
• Oregon Country:
– Geography
• From the Rockies to the Pacific Ocean, north of
California to the line of 54-40, the present southern
tip of Alaska panhandle
• This land was claimed at one time or another by:
Spain, Russia, Britain, and the United States
• Two claimants dropped out of the scramble:
– Spain through the Florida Treaty of 1819
– Russia retreated to the 54-40 line by treaties of 1824 and
1825.
VII. Oregon Fever Populates
Oregon (cont.)
– British claims to Oregon were strong:
• Especially the portion north of the Columbia River
• They were based on:
–
–
–
–
Prior discovery and exploration
Treaty rights
Actual occupation
Colonizing agency Hudson’s Bay Company
– American claims to Oregon:
• To exploration and occupation
• Captain Robert Gray (1792) had stumbled on the
Columbia River, which he named after his ship
III. Oregon Fever Populates
Oregon (cont.)
• The famed Lewis and Clark expedition of 1804-1806
• Presence of missionaries and other settlers, some of
whom reached the grassy Willamette River valley
– These men and women of God, in saving the soul of the
Indians, were instrumental in saving the soil of Oregon for
the United States
– They stimulated interest in a faraway domain that countless
Americans had earlier assumed would not be settled for
centuries.
• Scattered Americans and British pioneers continued
to live peacefully side by side.
III. Oregon Fever Populates
Oregon (cont.)
– The Anglo-American Convention of 1818 (see pp.
239-240):
• The United States sought to divide at the forty-ninth
parallel
• The British wanted the Columbia River as the line
• A scheme for peaceful “joint occupation” was
adopted, pending future settlement
• The handful of Americans in the Willamette Valley
was multiplied in the early 1840s by the “Oregon
fever”
III. Oregon Fever Populates
Oregon (cont.)
• Over the 2,000 mile Oregon Trail (1846) five thousand
Americans had settled south of the Columbia River
• The British could only muster seven hundred north of
the Columbia River
– Actually only a relatively small segment was in
controversy by 1845:
– The Americans offered the forty-ninth parallel
– The British repeated offering the line of the Columbia River
– The whole issue was now tossed into the presidential
election of 1844, where it became overshadowed by the
question of annexing Texas.
p365
VIII. A Mandate (?) for Manifest
Destiny
• The two major parties nominated their
presidential standard-bearers in May 1844:
– Henry Clay chosen by the Whigs at Baltimore
– James K. Polk of Tennessee chosen by the
Democrats—America’s first “dark horse”
– The campaign was an expression of Manifest
Destiny:
– A sense of mission, believing that Almighty God had
“manifestly” destined the American people for a
hemisphere career…(see page 366).
VIII. A Mandate (?) for Manifest
Destiny (cont.)
– Expansionist Democrats:
• Strongly swayed by Manifest Destiny
• Their platform: “Reannexation of Texas” and
“Reoccupation of Oregon”-all the way to 54-40
• “All of Oregon or None” (The slogan “Fifty-four forty
or fight” was not coined until two years later)
• They condemned Clay as a “corrupt bargainer,” a
dissolute character, and a slaveowner.
VIII. A Mandate (?) for Manifest
Destiny (cont.)
– The Whigs:
• They countered with their own slogans
• They spread the lie:
– that a gang of Tennessee slaves had been on their way to a
southern market branded with the initials J.K.P. (James K.
Polk)
• Clay “straddled” the crucial issue of Texas:
– He personally favored annexing slaveholding Texas (an
appeal to the South); he also favored postponement (an
appeal to the North).
VIII. A Mandate (?) for Manifest
Destiny (cont.)
• Election results:
• “Dark Horse” Polk nipped Clay 170 to 105 votes in the
Electoral College
• 1,338,464 to 1,300,097 in the popular vote
• Clay would have won if he had not lost New York
State by a scant 5,000 votes:
– There the tiny antislavery Liberty Party absorbed nearly
16,000 votes that would have gone to Clay.
• The Democrats proclaimed they received a mandate
from the voters to take Texas.
p366
p367
IX. Polk the Purposeful
• President James K. Polk:
• Was not an impressive figure
• His burden increased by his unwillingness to delegate
authority
• Methodical and hard-working but not brilliant
• He was shrewd, narrow-minded, conscientious, and
persistent
• He developed a four-point program and with
remarkable success achieved it completely in less
than four years.
IX. Polk the Purposeful
(cont.)
• Polk’s four-point program:
– To lower the tariff
• Secretary of the Treasure, Robert J. Walker, devised a
tariff-for-revenue bill that reduced the average rates
of the Tariff of 1842 from 32% to 25%
• With strong support of low-tariff southerners, the
Walker Tariff bill made it through Congress
• Complaints came from the middle states and New
England (see Table 17.1)
• The Bill proved to be an excellent revenue producer.
Table 17-1 p368
IX. Polk the Purposeful
(cont.)
– The restoration of the independent treasury:
• Unceremoniously dropped by the Whigs in 1841
• Pro-bank Whigs in Congress raised a storm of
opposition, but victory at last rewarded the
president’s effort in 1846.
– The third and fourth points on Polk’s “must list”
were the acquisition of California and the
settlement of the Oregon dispute (see Map 17.2)
IX. Polk the Purposeful
(cont.)
• Settlement of the Oregon dispute:
• “Reoccupation” of the “whole” had been promised to
northern Democrats in 1844 campaign
• Southern Democrats, once Texas was annexed, cooled
off
• Polk’s feeling bound by the three offers of his
predecessor to London, proposed the compromise
line of 49.
• British anti-expansionists were now persuaded that
the Columbia River was not the St. Lawrence.
• Britain in 1846 proposed the line of 49.
IX. Polk the Purposeful
(cont.)
• Polk threw the decision to the Senate
• They speedily accepted the offer and approved the
subsequent treaty
• Satisfaction with the Oregon settlement among
Americans was not unanimous.
• So, Polk, despite all the campaign bluster, got neither
“fifty-four forty” nor a fight.
• But he did get something that in the long run was
better: a reasonable compromise without a rifle being
raised.
Map 17-2 p368
X. Misunderstandings with Mexico
– Faraway California was another worry for Polk:
• Diverse population: Spanish Mexicans, Indians, “some
foreigners” and Americans
• Given time these transplant Americans might bring
California into the Union
• Polk was eager to buy from Mexico
• But the United States had some $3 million claim to
American citizens and their property
• A more serious contention was Texas
• Deadlock with Mexico over Texas’s boundaries.
X. Misunderstandings with Mexico
(cont.)
• Texas wanted the Rio Grande River boundary but
Mexico only wanted the Nueces River boundary
• Polk was careful to keep American troops out of the
no-man’s-land
– California continued to cause Polk anxiety:
• Rumors—British wanted to buy or seize California
• A grab the Americans could not tolerate under the
Monroe Doctrine
• Polk dispatched John Slidell to Mexico City (1845):
– To offer $25 million for California and territory to the east
– Mexico would not even permit Slidell to present his case
p369
XI. American Blood on American (?)
Soil
• Polk was ready to take action:
– January 13, 1846 he ordered 4000 men:
• Under General Zachary Taylor to march from Nueces
River to the Rio Grande hoping for a clash
• When nothing happened he informed his cabinet
(May 9, 1846) that he proposed to declare war
– Unpaid claims
– Slidell’s rejection
• New of bloodshed arrived on the same night
• Mexican troops crossed the Rio Grande and met
Taylor.
XI. American Blood on American
(?) Soil (cont.)
– Polk sent a vigorous war message to Congress:
• Congress overwhelmingly voted for war
• In his message to Congress, Polk was making
history—not writing it
• Spot resolutions—by brand-new U.S. Rep. Abraham
Lincoln demanding information as to the precise
“spot” on American soil where American blood had
been shed.
– Did Polk provoke war?
• California was imperative in his program
• Mexico would not sell it at any price
The first authenticated image of
Abraham Lincoln is this
daguerreotype of him as U.S.
Congressman-elect in 1846
XI. American Blood on American
(?) Soil (cont.)
• Polk wanted California by any means, so he pushed
the quarrel to a bloody showdown
• Both sides were spoiling for a fight
• Both sides were fired by moral indignation
• The Mexican people could fight with the flaming
sword of righteousness
• Many earnest Americans sincerely believed that
Mexico was the aggressor.
XII. The Mastering of Mexico
• Polk wanted Mexico—not war:
– When war came:
• he wanted to fight on a limited scale and then pull
out when he captured the prize
• Santa Anna convinced Polk that he would sell out his
country, then drove his countrymen to a desperate
defense of their soil
XIII. The Mastering of Mexico
(cont.)
• American operation in the Southwest and
California were completely successful (see
Map 17.3):
– Both General Stephen W. Kearny and Captain
John C. Frémont had success in the West
– Frémont collated with American naval officers
and local Americans who hoisted the banner of
short-lived California Bear Flag Republic.
XIII. The Mastering of Mexico
(cont.)
– General Zachery Taylor fought the Mexicans in
several successful battles and then reached
Buena Vista:
•
•
•
•
Here he defeated 20,000 troops under Santa Anna
The Mexicans were finally conquered
Zachery Taylor became the “Hero of Buena Vista.”
Now he called for a crushing blow at the enemy’s
vitals—Mexico City
• Taylor, however, could not win decisively in the
semideserts of northern Mexico.
XIII. The Mastering of Mexico
(cont.)
• General Winfield Scott’s success
– Landed at Veracruz in Mar 1847
• Won major victory at Cerro Gordo in Apr 1847
• Battled his way up to Mexico City by Sep 1847
– One of the most brilliant campaigns in American
annals:
• He proved to be the most distinguished American
general between the American Revolution and the
Civil War.
Map 17-3 p371
p372
XIII. Fighting Mexico for Peace
• Scott and chief clerk of the State Department
Nicholas P. Trist arranged:
– For an armistice with Santa Anna
• At a cost of $10,000
– Polk called Trist home, but he wrote a 65 page
letter explaining why he could not come home
– Trist signed the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo on
February 2, 1848, forwarded it to Washington.
XIII. Fighting Mexico for Peace
(cont.)
• The Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo:
•
•
•
•
Confirmed the American title to Texas
Yielded the enormous area stretching to Oregon,
the ocean, embracing California
The total expanse was about ½ of Mexico
The United States agreed to pay $15 million for the
land and to assume the claims of its citizen against
Mexico in the amount of $3,250,000
– (see “Makers of America: the Californios” pp.
374-375.)
XIII. Fighting Mexico for Peace
(cont.)
• Polk submitted the treaty to the Senate:
– The antislavery Whigs in Congress—dubbed
“Mexican Whigs” or “Conscience Whigs”—
denounced the “damnable war”.
– Another peril impended:
• A swelling group of expansionists were clamoring for
all of Mexico
• If America had seized it, she would have been saddled
with an expensive and vexatious policing problem.
XIII. Fighting Mexico for Peace
(cont.)
• Victors rarely pay an indemnity:
– Polk arranged to pay $18,250,000 after winning
– Critics say Americans were pricked by guilty
consciences
– Apologists pointed proudly to the “Anglo-Saxon
spirit of fair play”
XIV. Profit and Loss in Mexico
• As wars go, the Mexican War was a small
one:
– It cost 13,000 American lives, most taken by
disease
– The fruits of the fighting were enormous:
• America’s total expanse was increased by 1/3
• It proved to be the blood-spattered schoolroom of
the Civil War
• The campaigns provided priceless experience
• The work of the navy was valuable in placing a
blockade around Mexican ports.
XIV. Profit and Loss in Mexico
(cont.)
• The Marine Corps won new laurels and to this day
sings in its stirring hymn about the “Halls of
Montezuma.”
• The army waged war without defeat and without a
major blunder
• Opposing armies emerged with increased respect for
each other
• Mexicans never forgot that their northern neighbors
tore away about ½ of their country
• Marked an ugly turning point in relations between
the United States and Latin America.
XIV. Profit and Loss in Mexico
(cont.)
• The war aroused the slavery issue that would not stop
until the Civil War
• David Wilmot of Pennsylvania introduced a fateful
amendment that stipulated that slavery should never
exist in any of the territories to be wrested from
Mexico.
• The Wilmot Proviso never became federal law:
– It was endorsed by the legislatures of all but one of the free
states
– It came to symbolize the burning issue of slavery in the
territories
The Mexican War
In A Wicked War: Polk, Clay, Lincoln, and the 1846 U.S.
Invasion of Mexico, historian Amy S. Greenberg called it
“the fatal and destructive war for empire that tore the
nation apart.”
The Doughface
•Northern Democrat who favored the Southern position
in political disputes
•In 1847, 27 doughfaces voted against the Wilmot Proviso.
p374
p375
Map 17-4 p375
p376
p377