I
103D CONGRESS
1ST SESSION
H. R. 2160
To amend the National Trails System Act to provide for a study of El
Camino Real Para Los Texas (The Royal Road for the Texas), and
for other purposes.
IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
MAY 19, 1993
Mr. WILSON introduced the following bill; which was referred to the
Committee on Natural Resources
A BILL
To amend the National Trails System Act to provide for
a study of El Camino Real Para Los Texas (The Royal
Road for the Texas), and for other purposes.
Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representa-
tives of the United States of America in Congress assembled,
SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE.
This Act may be cited as the ‘‘El Camino Real Para
Los Texas Study Act of 1993’’.
SEC. 2. FINDINGS.
The Congress finds that—
(1) El Camino Real Para Los Texas was the
Spanish road established to connect a series of mis-
sions and posts extending from Monclova, Mexico, to
the mission and later Presidio Nuestra de Pilar de
los Adaes which served as the Spanish capital of the
province of Texas from 1722 to 1772;
(2) El Camino Real, over time, comprised an
approximately 1,000 mile corridor of changing
routes from Saltillo through Monclova and Guerrero,
Mexico; San Antonio and Nacogdoches, Texas, and
then easterly to the vicinity of Los Adaes in present
day Louisiana; and constituted the only major over-
land route from the Rio Grande to the Red River
Valley during the Spanish Colonial Period;
(3) the 17th, 18th, and early 19th century ri-
valries among the European colonial powers of
Spain, France, and England, and after their inde-
pendence, Mexico and the United States, for domin-
ion over lands fronting the Gulf of Mexico were
played out along the evolving travel routes across
this immense area, and, as well, the future of several
American Indian nations were tied to these larger
forces and events;
(4) El Camino Real and the subsequent San
Antonio Road witnessed a competition that helped
determine the United States’ southern and western
boundaries; and
(5) the San Antonio Road, like El Camino Real,
was a series of routes established over the same
broad corridor but was not necessarily the same as
El Camino Real, and from the 1830s, waves of
American immigrants, many using the Natches
Trace, travelled west to Texas and its cheap and ac-
cessible lands via the San Antonio Road.
SEC. 3. DESIGNATION OF TRAIL.
Section 5(c) of the National Trails System Act (16
U.S.C. 1244(c)) is amended by adding the following new
paragraph at the end thereof:
‘‘(
) El Camino Real Para Los Texas, the ap-
proximate series of routes coursing northeasterly
from Saltillo, Monclova, and Guerrero, Mexico,
across 
Texas 
through 
San 
Antonio 
and
Nacogdoches, to the vicinity of Los Adaes, Louisi-
ana, together with the evolving routes later known
as the San Antonio Road. The study shall (A) exam-
ine the changing roads within the general corridor,
(B) examine major connecting branch routes, and
(C) determine individual or combined suitability and
feasibility of routes for national historic trail des-
ignation. The study shall be done in cooperation
with the Government of Mexico and shall provide
for, as necessary, technical assistance to Mexico with
the possible objective of establishing an international
historic trail. The study shall give due consideration
to alternative name designations.’’.
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