The Saint Paul globe. (St. Paul, Minn.) 1896-1905, 1901-12-13
CHAPTER VII.

can War.
In the second quarter of the present
century many considerations favored the
Incorporation of Texas with the Amerl.
can Union. The Sabine river, wh:eh the
treaty of 1919 with Spain had fixed as the
southeastern boundary of the Louisiana
purchase, presented no adequate toro-
graphical barrier to the onward march of
settlement. Regarded from the point OF
view Of climate and of soil, considerations
which determined the advance of a mi
the Sabine and the .Nueces was a pars
and parcel of the Southern empire
The impulse toward occupation was
strengthened by the fact that the terri
tory in question was practically 40
mans land Its fertile acres were in the
nominal possession of a race which was
indisposed and unable to extract from
them 1.-THE of tlieir utility. No OBJ
stacles, in fact, except that of a shadowy
jurisdiction lay in the way of Southern
pioneers, who, moved by the same i'm.
pulse that everywhere along the border
carried our Anglo-Saxon civilization
lo~ llo Tic Ollciit, CIOSSCu INC 'ooctiio
and set their stakes in the rich plains or
the new region. In 1880 colonists to the
number of 10000 had already taken al.
vantage of this opening and in the same
year the Mexican government, forasee-
ing the outcome of this peaceful invasion.
feebly sought to stem the tide with a
decree prohibiting further immigca Hon
from the United States into Texas.
Texas Question Presented.
Left to the operation of these economic
forces, the incorporation of Texas would
have accompanied itself with minimum
eff difficulty and the trans-Sabine terri
tory would have been acquired through
the gradual processes of assimilation
Other factors, however. interviewed and
projected the Texas question into the
great arena of that great sectional strug-
gle which at later period -...ainer OF
national institutions to point OF rupture.
This struggle is to be regarded as the OPP.
position of two phases of development
which characterized the two great Sec
tons of our nation, the North and tie
South. We find them set over against
each other, each struggling for the trl
umph of it's essential idea; the North
with its industrial development based
upon the greater efficiency of free labor;
the South with it's agricultural interests
seemingly dependent upon the institutions
of domestic slavery; the North gathering
unto it yirile elements from all parts
OF the word to swell the impetus OF its
westward movement; the South stimu-
lated with the quick returns Of a staple
Of increasing value, but handicapped
with the burden of an institution discred-
tied by the worlds judgment
Viewed in connection with this I'M
IL 49,,
Texas question Is readily perceived. BY
the Missouri compromise the South was
limited to the extension of it's funda-
mental economic ideas to a smaller share
Of Western territory. In order to pre-
serve that equilibrium of powers which
was conscientiOusly regarded by the sec
tional leaders as the fundamental basis
of union, the South, with its waning ma
terial Importance, was driven to a vigor-
Gus struggle for the creation of new
states within its prescribed limits The
North, conscious of growing strength and
superiority, had passed upon the point of
fnsiStence on sectional equipose and was
prepared to carry the war into the enc
my's country with its propaganda against
the very principles upon which Southern
society was based.
Sought to Repair Error.
The national government, conscious
of these warning motives and of the
necessity of providing an outlet for
Southern expansion, conscious as well
of it's terror in abandoning SO lightly In
1919 a territory geographically belonging
to the South, sought to repair its error
by purchase. In 1927, and again in 1929,
proposals were made looking toward the
peaceable acquisition of the country to the
Nueces river In 1895, when it had be-
come evident that the gradual absorption
of the Pacific slope would eventually
widen the range of our relations with
Mexico, an effort was made to acquire
the whole of the territory east of the Rio
Grande and north of the thirty-seventh
parallel to the Pacific. To these over
lures Mexico turned a deaf ear. With
that pertinacity in the mere political oc-
cupation of territory which is charac-
teristic of the Spanish blood, even in dilu-
tion her government refused to part with
any portion Of its domain and the United
States, baffied in its peaceful effort, had
no choice but to fall back and await the
action Of those forces of which, in a last
analysis, the political activity of nation
is but the result and the ratification
In the case of Texas, however, these
forces were ripe for action. Already the
American colonists, who formed the bulk
of the Texan population, were beginning
to chafe under the arbitrary and incompe-
tent Mexican jurisdiction. In 1885 the
federal system, guaranteed by the con-
stitution of 1924, was overthrown by Santa
Ana and a government by presidential
edict introduced a system quite as eff
fective no doubt, for the general pur-
poses of Mexican progress, but thorough
ly unpalatable TO men of American ante
cedents. They resisted the efforts of Ss&-
ia Ana to ceeree them into obedience with
military force, rose in revolt under the
leadership Of Sam Houston, and formally
declared their independence March 2, 1856
The Battle of San Jacinto. April II of the
same year, resulted in the defeat and
capture of the Mexican leader and the
practical achievement of Texan independ-
dence, a fact whicIi the Mexican govern-
rnent, however persistently refused to
recognize.
Accomplish by Frentiersmen
Thus in a brief contest body of Ameri- |
can frontiersmen had detached from an |
alien and unsympathetic government
land which they had made their own by
occupation and settlement. Their cause
had perhaps no standing in the equity of
nations but it possesses certain juSt1-
fication in the logic of human progress,
which arrays the masterful and the pro-
ductive against the feeble and the unpro-
gressive and is, perhaps, no more repre-
hensible nor less irresistible than other
natural phenomena.
How thoroughly the Texan revolution
lists were Americans, how closely they
were in sympathy with the needs and
aspirations of their section, is shown by
the constitution of 1896, which signalized
their advent to independent statehood
Slavery was legalized beyond the power
of legislative interference: the residence
iii ff,a of free negroes. except |
with special official permission, was pro-
I,;I.itad and the iInnart ton of slaves WAS