Manifest Destiny

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Manifest Destiny

• First coined by newspaper editor, John
  OSullivan in 1845.
• ".... the right of our manifest destiny to over
  spread and to possess the whole of the
  continent which Providence has given us for
  the development of the great experiment of
  liberty and federaltive development of
  self-government entrusted to us. It is right
  such as that of the tree to the space of air
  and the earth suitable for the full expansion of
  its principle and destiny of growth."

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Manifest Destiny

• A sense of cultural and racial superiority

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American Progress by John Gast, 1872
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Early

1. 1789- 1792 Boston sea captains trade for furs in
   the Pacific Northwest. Robert Gray names the
   Columbia River
2. 1803- The Louisiana Purchase
3. 1804-1807 explorations of the west by Lewis and
   Clark and Zebulon Pike
4. 1808 The American Fur Trade Company started by
   John Jacob Astor

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1. 1822- 1840s St. Louis the fur trading capital
2. Jedediah Smith, Kit Carson and Jim Bridger mapped
   the West
3. The Trails Santa Fe (1820), Oregon(1840),
   California (1842), Mormon (1847)
4. Missionaries in Oregon

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Opening the West

• Major Stephen H. Long in 1820 described the West
  as "wholly unfit for cultivation,
  and...uninhabitable by a people depending upon
  agriculture for their subsistence.
• Led to the Great Plains being called the Great
  American Desert
• Retarded the growth

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The Oregon Trail

• Pioneers gathered at Independence and St. Joseph,
  Missouri, and Council Bluffs, Iowa, to begin a
  2,000 mile journey westward.
• Between 1841 and 1867, more than 350,000 trekked
  along the overland trails.
• Pioneers buried at least 20,000 emigrants along
  the Oregon Trail.

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The Oregon Trail Albert Bierstadt, 1869
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The Oregon Dispute 54 40º or Fight!

• By the mid-1840s,Oregon Fever wasspurred on
  by thepromise of free land.

• The joint British-U. S.occupation ended in1846.

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Conflict with Britain

• Both Britain and the United States claimed Oregon
  which extended to Russian Alaska.
• The feud was over furs.
• By early 1840s the fur market had dropped and
  the U.S. and Britain settled on a boundary the 42
  parallel

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Boundary Dispute in Maine

• Britain considered the U.S. biggest enemy
• Dispute over the border of Canada and Maine
• A dispute over timber
• The lumberjacks start open warfare
• Settled by the Webster- Ashburton Treaty
• Settles the boundaries of Maine and Minnesota

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Texas

• American settlement in Texas began with the
  encouragement of first the Spanish, and then
  Mexican, governments.
• In the summer of l820 Moses Austin, a bankrupt
  59-year old Missourian, asked Spanish authorities
  for a large Texas land tract which he would
  promote and sell to American pioneers.

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Texas

• American settlement in Texas began with the
  encouragement of first the Spanish, and then
  Mexican, governments.
• In the summer of l820 Moses Austin asked Spanish
  authorities for a large Texas land tract which he
  would promote and sell to American pioneers.

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Texas

• Permission to settle 300 families in Texas.
• Spain welcomed the Americans for two reasons
• to provide a buffer against illegal U.S.
  settlers, who were creating problems in east
  Texas
• to help develop the land, since only 3,500 native
  Mexicans had settled in Texas

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Texas

• 1821Mexicans rebel against Spanish rule, winning
  independence.
• 1823 Stephen Austin establishes the first
  American settlement in Tejas on land originally
  granted to his father along the San Antonio
  River.

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Texas

• 1828The Senate ratifies a treaty setting the
  Sabine River as the border between Mexico and the
  United States.
• 1829Mexico refuses an American offer to buy Tejas
  for 5 million
• 1830Alarmed at the growing number of Americans in
  Tejas, Mexico imposes sharp limits on further
  immigration.

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Manuel Mier y Teran
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Texas

• 1833At the San Felipe Convention, held in San
  Felipe de Austin, American settlers led by
  Stephen Austin vote to make Tejas a Mexican
  state, rather than a dependent territory, and
  draft a state constitution based on that of the
  United States.

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Texas

• 1835 THE TEXAS WAR FOR INDEPENDENCE
  (1835-1836)Mexican President Santa Anna
  proclaims himself dictator
• When the Americans resist at an engagement near
  Gonzales on the Guadalupe River, the Texas War
  for Independence begins.

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Texas

• Nov 1835, Texans declare that they will not
  accept Santa Annas dictatorship
• Dec. 1835 a combined Anglo-Tejano force defeat
  Mexican forces in San Antonio
• Parole the troops on the grounds that they will
  never take arms against Texas again

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Texas

• Feb. 22 March 6, 1836 The siege at the Alamo
• March 2, 1836 -Texas declares their independence
• March 28, 1836 The Goliad Massacre
• April 21, 1836 The Texans defeat Santa Anna at
  the Battle of San Jacinto
• Two Treaties of Velasco

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Texas

• 1836 In the fall, Sam Houston is elected the
  first President of the Republic of Texas,
  outpolling Stephen Austin 4-to-1, and Texans vote
  to seek annexation by the United States
• 1837 Congress refuses to annex Texas, bowing to
  abolitionist opponents who call it a
  "slavocracy." But President Andrew Jackson
  recognizes the Republic of Texas on his last day
  in office.

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Texas

• 1842 Responding to years of harassment along the
  Texas border, Mexican troops strike San Antonio,
  because of a Texan attack on Santa Fe.
• 1845 Outgoing President John Tyler signs a
  congressional joint resolution to annex Texas and
  make it part of the union. Leads to war with
  Mexico

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The Slidell Mission Nov., 1845

• Mexican recognition of the Rio Grande River as
  the TX-US border.
• US would forgive American citizensclaims
  against the Mexican govt.
• US would purchase the New Mexicoarea for
  5,000,000.
• US would buy California at any price.

John Slidell
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The U.S. - Mexican War

• War against Mexico added half a million square
  miles of territory to the United States.
• First American war fought almost entirely outside
  the United States
• First American war to be reported, while it
  happened, by daily newspapers.

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The U.S. - Mexican War

• Cause of the Mexican War - movement of American
  pioneers into lands claimed by Mexico
• 1845 Mexico expelled the American ambassador and
  cut diplomatic relations.
• President offered 5 million if Mexico agreed to
  recognize the Rio Grande River as the
  southwestern boundary of Texas.

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The U.S. - Mexican War

• Also offered up to 5 million for the province of
  New Mexico and 25 million for California. Polk
  was anxious to acquire California
• Polk ordered Brigadier General Zachary Taylor to
  march 3,000 troops southwest from Corpus Christi,
  Texas, to "defend the Rio Grande" River

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The U.S. - Mexican War

• April 25, 1846, a Mexican cavalry force crossed
  the Rio Grande and clashed with a small American
  squadron
• Polk asked Congress to acknowledge that a state
  of war already existed
• Shed American blood upon the American soil."

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Wilmot Proviso, 1846
Provided, territory from that, as an express
and fundamental condition to the acquisition of
any the Republic of Mexico by the United States,
by virtue of any treaty which may be negotiated
between them, and to the use by the Executive of
the moneys herein appropriated, neither slavery
nor involuntary servitude shall ever exist in
any part of said territory, except for crime,
whereof the party shall first be duly convicted.
Congr. David Wilmot(D-PA)
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The U.S. Mexican War

• Opponents denounced the war as an immoral land
  grab by an expansionistic power against a weak
  neighbor that had been independent barely two
  decades.
• Critics also argued that the war was an
  expansionist power play dictated by an aggressive
  Southern slave owners intent on acquiring more
  slave states.

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The Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo

• Mexico ceded to the United States only those
  areas that Polk had originally sought to
  purchase.
• Mexico ceded California, Nevada, Utah, New
  Mexico, and parts of Arizona, Colorado, Kansas,
  and Wyoming to the United States for 15 million
  and the assumption of 3.25 million in debts owed
  to Americans by Mexico.
• The treaty also settled the Texas border dispute
  in favor of the United States, placing the
  Texas-Mexico boundary at the Rio Grande River.

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Results of the Mexican War?

1. The 17-month war cost 100,000,000 and
   13,000American lives (mostly of disease).
2. New territories were brought into the Union which
   forced the explosive issue of SLAVERY to the
   center of national politics. Brought in
   1 million sq. mi. of land (incl. TX)
3. These new territories would upset the balance of
   power between North and South.
4. Created two popular Whig generals who ran for
   President.
5. Manifest Destiny partially realized.

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The Mexican Cession
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Territorial Growth to 1853
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Free Soil Party
Free Soil! Free Speech!
Free Labor! Free Men!

• Barnburners discontented northern Democrats.
• Anti-slave members of the Liberty and Whig
  Parties.
• Opposition to the extension of slavery in the
  newterritories!

WHY?
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The 1848 Presidential Election Results
v
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California Gold Rush

• January 24,1848 James Marshall, a veteran of the
  Bear Flag Revolt, discovers gold on the American
  River while building a lumber mill for John
  Sutter
• 1849Forty-niners heading for California's gold
  fields
• network of trails across the continent,
• Forty-niners come west by ship, sailing around
  Cape Horn or crossing by canoe and donkey train
  through the jungles of Panama

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California Gold Rush

• 1849 year's end, over 80,000 fortune-seekers have
  made their way to California nearly tripling the
  territory's population
• 1850 California enters the Union.
• Anti immigration sentiment Foreign miner laws