Santa Fe new Mexican. [volume] (Santa Fe, N.M.) 1898-1951, 1904-03-17
THE NAME OF
NEW MEXICO
To Change Its Name to Arizona
Would Be Nothing Short Of
SacriIege.
A GLORIOUS HISTORY
The Traditions, Romance and Associa.
tons Of Three Centuries Cluster
About It.

Ex-Governor l.. B. Prince, presiden
OF the New Mexico Historical Societ
and we'll known and oft quoted au
thority upon the history of New Mexic,
has addressed the following letter tt
the Chairman of the committee of ter
litories of the House:
Santa Fe, N. NJ, March 12, 1904.
To the Chairman of the Committee OF
Territories.
Sir-The proposed change of the
name OF New Mexico to Arizona, is sc
contrary to precedent and involves
such an overturn of history, that
think it must have been suggested
without consideration, and I therefore
take The liberty of drawing your at
tenticn TO the historic facts involved.
Never before, in the naming of a
state mas an old name, sanctioned by
centuries of use and interviewer with
the whole history Of a country, been
ignored or changed. Apart from sen
timental considerations, the confusion
necessarily caused by blotting from
the map name which would be con.
stantly found in all books on the
southwest would be not only annoy
ing but misleading.
Suppose that the name of New
York should suddenly be changed to
Montauk. what confusion would arise
hereafter in reading the history of
the Empire State, when it's old name
was only a reminiscence and it's iden-
tity had constantly to be explained.
Yet New York is comparatively new
name, dating only from the English
occupation in 1866, while the name of
New Mexico is almost a century older
To turn to the exact history involv-
ed, New Mexico has the oldest name
of any civil division in the United
States except one-Florida. 1t was SO
named by Antonio de Espejo in the re-
por! If his expedition in 1928, and
has never been varied since. | have
before me g copy of the account of
Espejo's discoveries, printed in Paris
in 1883, which narrates that they
found fifteen provinces full of cities
and villages where the people lived in
houses four or five stories in height,
and called it New Mexico, because in
many things it was similar to the
other Mexico already discovered"
In the prose occount of the conquest
and colonization of the country by
Onate in 1898, it is called "the, king
doms and provinces of New Mexico;"
and the long epic poem of 33 cantos,
by Captain Villagra, which narrates
the story of the conquest in heroic
verse, is called History of New
Mexico The official title of Onate,
after the conquest, was Governor and
Captain General of the Kingdoms and
Provinces of New Mexico;" and for
many years the dignity of kingdom
was always accorded to New Mexico
in an official documents. In this re-
spect it's position was very different
from that of any other parts of the
Spanish domain afterward embraced
in the Republic @of Mexico. They
were provinces of the vice-royalty of
Spain, but never aspired to the dig
nifty of being separate kingdoms.
The Importance of New Mexico as
to territorial extent is well illustrated
by the maps of different epochs. In
those of the seventeenth century, it
divides the width of the continent
with Florida, extending from the Pa
cific Ocean to the western boundary
of what are now Arkansas and Mis-
souri,; everything else to the Atlantic
was embraced in Florida except the
English settlements along the coast.
This division appears on all the maps
of that century, including Sanson's
map published in Paris in 1857, and
Sauerman's, published at Bremen in
1893; and continued as late as that of
N. de Fer, geographer of the Dauphin,
in 1705. In those of the eighteenth
century, Louisiana takes it's place be-
tween Florida and New Mexico, occu-
pying the Mississippi Valley; but
New Mexico still extended from the
Pacific to the present Indian Territory,
until late in the century, when the
strip along the western coast began to
be marked California. It is thus ap-.
parent how important a place the
name played in the history of the con-
tinent in earlier times.
After the Mexican war, the compro-
mise measure of 1850 established the
Territory of New Mexico, including all
of what is now New Mexico and Ari-
zona. with southern Nevada, and
southern Colorado to the thirty-eighth
parallel. Subsequently all north OF
the thirty-seventh parallel was made
part of Colorado, in 1861; and in 1863
the territory of Arizona was formed
with the 1O9th meridian as its boun-
Diary. Thus even under the United
States government, New Mexico orig
inally embraced nearly all Of the
southwest, and it would seem strange
to give to 1t now the name of one Of
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