Imperial Valley press., 1910-09-17
Records Show That Uncle Sam Was Not Buncoed in the
 GadSden Purchase
Negotiations of Treaties With Mexico
 Had Correct Maps and Did Not Re- fer to the Hardy Chart. Exchange of Territory the Only Remedy For | Complications.

Examination of the records and off cial documents, American and Mex ican, relating to acquisition of Mexi- can territory by the United States under the treaties of 1S4S and 1853, disposes conclusively of the 'supposi- tion that any part of the peninsula of Lower California was lost to the United States through the inad- vertence of the negotiators or error in defining the boundary. There remains only the remote possibility of an error in defining the south line of the Gads- den purchase affecting Arizona and Sonora but not affecting in any degree the delta of the Colorado
 When the treaty of Guadalupe Hid- algo was negotiated after the Mexican war, the United States commissioners proposed that the boundary between California and Mexico be fixed along line south of Ensenada and below the head of the Gulf of California, but Mexico pointed out that such a line would deprive her of any port north of Magdalena bay, and would e}eave the peninsula a detached terri tory without any land connection with Mexico. The 32d parallel was then ! suggested as convenient line. but Mexico contended strenuously for the old jurisdictional line between Alta and Baja California, and thence cast along the Gila, and that was the boundary finally agreed upon. The significant point is that the true po- sition of the Gila was known to the commissioners. A map showing the Gila correctly and showing the bound ary between Upper and Lower Cali fornia where it now runs was used by the commissioners and is made. part of the treaty. The Hardy chart was not referred to in 1S4S, and it is evil dent that it was known to be erro- neous in its location of the main channel of the Colorado and the june tion of the Gila. The Franciscan padres had established the latitude of the mouth of the Gila in the eigh- teenth century and Humboldt had confirmed their observations as ap- Approximately correct. Hardy, the British naval officer, simply made a emistake because of the insufficiency of his knowledge of the geography of the gulf region, but the Mexican gov ernment had better information in its archives and was not misled by the Hardy chart at any time
 The Gadsden purchase did not cover any part of Lower California and was center of the Colorado river. It took in portions of Sonora and Chihuahua, adding to Arizona a large area south of the 'Gila, and it was stipulated in the treaty that the citizens of both nations should have the right of free navigation of the Colorado and the Gila. The only possible discrepancy between Gadsden's understanding of the matter and the line as fixed would be in the course from NogaIes to the river. If Gadsden mistook the MeXi- can league on the maps for the Eng fish mile, he meant to have the line between Sonora and Arizona strike the Colorado at the mouth of the fiardy, but he said twenty miles" befoW the junction of the Gila, and that is where the line was run. It happens that the Hardy mouth is just twenty leagues from the Glla mouth, and that fact is the principal basis for the conjecture that Gadsden made an error and fooled himself.
 But no effort was made by Gadsden on behalf of the United States to move the line between California and Lower California, and it does not appear that cession of any part of the peninsula or the delta by Mexico was discussed. The reasons for Mex ico's desire to retain land connection between the peninsula and the Sono- ran mainland, which was so strong in 1S4s that she was willing to fight again rather than give 1t up, had not changed in five years. The Uni t,sa States. negotiating as conqueror