Weekly national intelligencer., 1847-12-18

- Mexico having as yet maze no positive declara-
ton of war, nor committed any oUert act Of hos
hHties said the General, | do not feel at liberty,
under my instructions, to make forward move
ment to the Rio Grande without authority from
the War Department"
About the time that this letter reached Washing
ton, the President was engaged in preparing his first
Message TO Congress, and had already determined
to recommend some measure of hostility against
Mexico on the ostensible ground Of the unpaid in
stalments of indemnity, &c.--when information was
received here of the willingness of Mexico to re-
ceive a Commissioners to treat concerning the
boundary question. We here re-state this point,
because it appears to us very material one in the
history Of the War i'll which the President con-
trived, ouhom consulting Congress, afterwards
to involve the country. This induced change
in the Message and in the intended recommendation
TO Congress to resort to upon Mexico Of
which change, and the reason of it, Congress was
apprized in the Annual Message of December,
ls45, in terms which Mexico perhaps understood,
though we doubt whether Congress did.
"Ifor5ear,' said the President, to recommend
to Congress such ulteror measures of redress for
the wrongs and injuries have so long borne as
IL pould haze been proper TO make had no such
negotiations been instituted"
Instead of a Commissioners as proposed by
Mexico, the President sent Minister Penipoten-
tiary, whose instructions have never been publish
ed. If they ever are, it will be found that he
was ordered not to negotiate a settlement of the
Boundary of Texas Though, as before said, such
negotiation had been directed by Congress) unless
in complication with the cession 10 the United
States of California, by way of indemnity for the old
claims, of which such an exaggerated and distorted
account has been given in the several Messages OF
the President As far as concerns the claims, we
know from the President himself hat Mr.. SLIDELL
was thus instructed. The President could not, he
has informed Congress, for moment entertain the
idea that the claims of our citizens should be post
poned or separated from the boundary question
Nor, we presume, Gin the absence of documentary
proof) was our Commissioner to be allowed to es-
tablish satisfactory boundary between the United
States (Texas included) and Mexico, without secur-
ing at the same time cession Of California.
Had the President met the overture of the Mex
lean Government IN proper spirit, by sending a
Commissioner to treat Of the only imminent ques-
tion-the question of boundary; had he not peril
naciously insisted on cogging that question with
things having no necessary connexion with it, the
boundary might have been amicably settled; the
claims of our citizens examined and adjudicated at
leisure; and the desired territory on the Northwest
: Coast acquired by purchase ind there would
hare been no ,car for there would have been no
pretence for it.
Without waiting for the sanction of Congress to
a measure which was itself an act of war-so OBJ
viously so, that the Commander Of the Army would
not take the responsibility Of it, though invited 10
do so-peremptory orders given while Mr..
SLIDELL was yet in communication with the Co
vernment of Mexico, for the march to the Rio
Grande. What followed is known to every reader.
The war was an inevitable consequence of the march
of our Army into the Mexican territory at the time
and in the manner in which il took place.
4 Mexico had indeed regarded and resented the
annexation of Texas by the United States, without
her consent, hostile act, and had threatened
taliaton. But threats are not hostilities. She
never would have made any approach to our army,
much less have attacked it, whilst it confined itself
TO the known limits of Texas After she knew OF
the advance of our army into the Mexican terri
tory, she did no more than defend that territory
from aggression which she had before exhausted
every art of peace to avert. There would clearly
have been no war with Mexico, had the event de-
: pended upon her striking the first blow.
1t can hardly be necessary to recur to writers on
the Law of Nations to show that, independently ol
the constitutional obligation upon our President to
abstain from war, this war was wholly unjust, be-
cause wholly unnecessary; and that, even if il
were not UNJUST it ought not to have been prosecu-
ted further than required by the supposed necessity
which gave rise to il If all that the President
AYERS to the origin of the war were. irrefragabe
truth it yet could not affect the position that the
war has been pushed to an extent not required by
justice, by national honor, or even by national re-
sentiment II would have ceased long ago, if to
"conquer peace y only had been its object, or il
its real object had not been TO wres from Mexico,
on the poorest of preences, territories which she
will probably never surrender, to the extent requir-
ed, but with her national existence.
That this is the object for which the war is to
be further prosecuted is no longer disguised by the
Executive. The terms upon which alone the Pre-
sident WILL under any circumstances, consent to
peace, are, stated in the Message, the establish
ment of western boundary for the United States
to the Rio Grande, (which includes parts Of -four
Mexican provincesl and the cesson IN tho limited