The Montgomery advertiser., 1901-08-28
HOW THE UNITED STATES
 HAVE EXPANDED.
(By Dana c. Munro, A. M., and
 William Fairiey, Ph. D.)
CHAPTER VII. Annexation of Texas and the Mexi- can War

ChAfTEh VII.
 Annexation of Texas and the Mexi- can War.
 In the second quarter of the present century many consioe. ations favored | the incorporation or Texas With the American Union. The Sabine Rive, | which the treaty of 1Sls with Spain had | fixed as the southeastern poundary of the Lou siana Purchase, presented no | adequate typographical barrier to the | onward march of settlement. Regard ed from the point of view of climate and of soil, considerations which deter mined the advance of a migi a ting pop | ulation, the country between the Sa- l bine and the Nueces was u part and parcel of the Southern Empire.
 This impulse toward occupation was | strengthened by the fact that the t. er- ritory in question was practically mo mans land" Its fertile acres were in | the nominal possession of race which | was indisposed and unable to extract | from them a tithe of their utility. No obstacles, in fact, except that of a shadowy Jurisdiction lay in the ~vay of Southern pioneers. who. moved by | the same impulse that everywhere along the border carried our Anglo Saxon civilization toward the Orient, crossed the Sabine and set their stakes
 in the rich plains of the new region. In l 1880 colonists to the number of 20,00O
 had already taken advantage Of this opening and in the same year the Mexi- can Government. foreseeing the out come of this peaceful invasion. feeoly sought to stem the tide with decree prohibiting further immigration from rhe United States into Texas.
 Texas Question Presented.
 r.x. .o .hn ooarat,ov of thasa ecou- omic forces, the incorporation of Texas would have accomplished itself with a minimum of difficulty and the trans Sabine territory would have been &C., qulred tn.ough the gradual processes | of assimilation. Other factors, now ever intervened and projected the rex as question into the great arena Of that 1 great sectional struggle. which at 1 later period strained our national in stitutions to a point of rupture ms struggle is to be regarded as the oppo- sition of two phases ot development which charactei ized the two great sec | lions If our nation, the North and the ! South. We find them set over aBamSt each other, each struggling for the tri- umph of it's essential idea; the No tn
 with its industrial development based upon the greater efficiency or free la
 hor: the South with it's agricultural in- terests seemingly dependent upon the institutions of domestic slavery tpe
 North gathering unto its verile ele- ments from all parts or the "oriu to
 swell the impetus of its westwa.S va. U
 movement: the South stimulated with
 tbe ouick returns of staple Of increaa
 inc value. but handicapped with N burden of institution discredited ny 'he
 worlds judgment. ~ . ,,,
 Viewed in connection with this ini- | nard,np struggle, the importance or
 tha Taxas question is readily perceiv- cd Nv tha Missouri Compromise the | coutb was limited to the extension or | its funda1ncrtal economic ideas 10 smaller sh2re of Western territory. Tn
 order to preserve that equilibrium ol | powers which was conscientiously re- | garded by sectional leaders as the run-
 damentsi basis of union. the South, with | its waning ina terial importance, was
 driven :o a vigorous struggle for me
 creation of new States within its oresr
 crihed limits The North, 1s1tohs
 of growing strength and superiority, | had passed beyond the point of in-
 sistence on sectional equipoise and
 was prepared to carry the war into
 the enemy's country with its propa-
 ganda against the very princiules upon
 which Southern A>ciety was based.
 Sought to Repair Error.
 The National Government, conscious | of these warning motives and of the
 necessity of providing an outlet Tor Southern expansion, conscious Us well | of its terror in abandoning so lightly in 1919 a territory geographically be- longing to the South, sought to repair
 it's error by purchase. In 1927. and
 again in 1929 proposals were made looking toward the peaceful acquisition
 of the country to -he Nueces River. In
 1885, when it had become cviden: that the gradual absorption of the PGcift'' slope would eventually widen the
 range of our relations with Mexico, an effort was made to acquire the whole of the territory eas tof the Rio Grande and north of the thirty seventh parai-
 Tel to the Pacific. To these overtures
 Mexico turned deaf ear. With that
 pertinacity in the mere political occu- patton of territory which Is a charac-
 teristic of the Spanish blood. even in
 dilution. her government refused to
 part with any portion of it's domain, and the United States. batfled in It's 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 a nation is but the
 result and the rattf1cntlOn.
 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 be-
 ginning to chafe under the 9r oitrdry
 and incompetent Mexican Jurisdiction.
 Tn 1885 the Federal system. guaranteed
 by the Constitution of 1924. was cvcr-
 thrown by Santa Anna and a govern
 ment by presidential edict introduced a
 system quite as effective. no doubt. for
 the general purposes of Mexican pro-
 greSs, but throughly unpalatable 10
 men of American antecedentS. They
 resisted the efforts of Santa Anna to coerce them into obedience with militia
 ry force rose in revolt under the lea fer ship of Sam Houston, and formally de- clared their independence March ?, ls3s
 The battle of San Jacinto. Apr 21 of the same year. resulted in the defeat and capture of the Mexican leader and the practical achievement of Texan inde- pendence, a fact which the Mexican Government. however, persist ently re- fused to recognize.
 Accomplished by Frontiersmen.
 Thus in a brief contest a body of American frontiersmen had detached from an alien and unsympathetic gov ernment a land which they had made their own by occupation and settle ment. Their cause had perhaps no eta in he nf hut