Mexico - U.S. Relations 1819-1900

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Mexico - U.S. Relations 1819-1900

• Adam-Onis Treaty 1819
• Texas Revolt 1836
• U.S.-Mexico War 1846-48
• U.S. Mexicans 1849-1900

SOC 335 The Latino Experience in the United
States
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Stages of U.S. Encroachment of Mexican Lands

• Early U.S.-"New Spain" relations culminate in the
  1819 Adams-Onis Treaty Florida for Tejas
  agreement on a "final" transcontinental border
• The U.S. North/South dual scramble west gt Texas
  outcome 1823 - 1836
• The Mexican American War (1846-48) gt U.S.
  annexation of northern 1/2 of Mexico (today's
  U.S. Southwest)

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Early U.S. - New Spain relations 1776 - 1819

• Early U.S. explorations of the trans-Mississippi
  west gt trickle of Anglo fur trappers, trade
  routes, intelligence
• Spanish late colonization beyond Rio Grande via
  missions a defensive weak strategy of
  containment vs U.S., British, French, Russian
• Louisiana Purchase on 1803 geopolitical coup!
• The Adams-Onis Treaty of 1819 Florida ceded to
  U.S. in exchange for permanent transcontinental
  border between the U.S. New Spain - honored by
  Mexico in 1824

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Early U.S. - Mexican relations 1822-1836

• Both North/South sought expansion westward for
  different competing reasons
• The Santa Fe - Trail U.S. land penetration into
  New Mexico via trade with St. Louis
• Pacific whaling China trade U.S. maritime
  penetration of Spanish California its early
  projection to Asia

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Early U.S. - Mexican relations 1822-1836

• U.S. repeated attempts to "purchase Texas" from
  Mexico after the Louisiana Purchase fail.
• Mexico adopts generous immigrant laws for
  Catholic Anglos in Tejas to avoid war and to
  settle its northern province
• (1) open immigration to homesteaders ( their
  slaves) gt about 30,000 settled by 1836, mostly
  Southerners
• (2) Mexican 1824 abolition of slavery gt Tejas
  after intense lobbying by Stephen Austin, gets a
  10-year waiver that satisfies no one.

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The 1836 Texas Revolt An alternative experiment

• Republic of Texas a 10-year alliance of
  Southern planters, U.S. President Andrew Jackson,
  Anglo Southern homesteaders in Texas
• Texas independence immediately recognized by
  Great Britain the U.S., but not by Mexico ten
  years of 3-way diplomacy ensue.
• Texas early expansionism encouraged by Great
  Britain to contain the U.S. westward expansion
  gt Failed 1841 military expedition to New Mexico
  (Alta California saved from getting annexed to
  the R.o.T.!)

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The Mexican American War 1846 - 1848

• 1845-46 Oregon question settled with Great
  Britain and U.S. annexes Texas gt Newly elected
  U.S. President Polk orders U.S. troop to cross
  disputed border zone between the Nueces Rio
  Grande rivers, provoking bloodshed.
• White House propaganda American blood spilled
  in American soil gt U.S. Congress declares war
  expecting a quick war, which drags on to 1848
• U.S. troops take possession of U.S. Southwest
  have to march into Mexico City to finally
  negotiate the Guadalupe Hidalgo Treaty of 1848.

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Dilemmas of Mexican occupation, 1846 - 1848

• Anglo-Saxon Manifest Destiny vs. the westward
  extension of the Mason-Dixie Line (accepting the
  expansion of Southern slavery?) gt Wilmot Proviso
  said no! (except for Texas) and was imposed by
  the North on the South in Congress
• Monoracial (White only) vs. multiracial nation
  (Mexicans too) gt U.S. withdrawal from Mexico in
  1848 the abandoned the strategy of territorial
  expansion altogether.

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Polk's Covert War Objectives

• 1. Possess San Francisco Bay as a strategic
  gateway to Asia
• 2. Control of Rio Grande Basin gt control of
  Mexicos northern economy and develop a potential
  new Mississippi!
• 3. Annex only northern Mexico into U.S as free
  U.S. territory except for Texas (annexed as a
  slave state already)

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1848 Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo

• U.S. forces occupied Mexico City for months but
  no one would negotiate an end to the war. Treaty
  finally arrived at
• 15 Million for U.S. annexation of the Southwest
• Full property, civil social rights extended to
  Mexican Americans, later amended down by the U.S.
  Senate

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U.S. Firsts in the Mexican American War

• First U.S. Presidential War, basically
  pre-empting Congressional war powers
• First U.S. Media War full-throttled
  newspapers' hysteria gt the racial demonization
  of the Mexican people
• First U.S. talk of Civil War Southern
  response for being denied spoils of war
• U.S. finally becomes a continental power

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Stages of Mexican Ethnic Subordination in the U.S.

• 1830s -1880s De-population, land dispossession,
  racialization ethnic subordination of 75,000
  Mexicans in the U.S. Southwest
• Texas Independent Decade (1836-1846) gt massive
  violent explusion (ethnic cleansing) of Mexicans
  to Rio Nueces-Rio Grande area(contested area)

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The depopulation/dispossession of Mexicans 1830s
- 1880s

• CA Gold Rush gt Californios Native Americans
  quickly marginalized in a sea of European and
  Chinese immigrants, and increasingly U.S.-born
  Anglo American Midwestern transplants
• New Mexico gt Elite Hispano-Anglo alliance formed
  land dispossession of the pobres in the
  highlands Hispano communities

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Mexican Americans 1880-1900

• 1880s-1900s With the advent of the railroads and
  massive irrigation works, and the exclusion of
  Chinese after 1883, theres a slow demographic
  resurgence of Mexican Americans concentrated in
  segregated marginalized rural communities
• gt Mexican Americans become socially
  reconstructed as mere temporary and "foreign"
  agricultural railroad laborers -- and racially
  inferior on top!

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The End

• The End