Directions: Please answer the following question by writing 5-6 sentences and using 2-3 direct examples from the bubble map and primary sources in the previous steps. Please make sure that your responses are written in your own words
Question: Do you feel the United Staes was justified in going to war with Mexico? Why or why not.
Bubble map:
1: The annexation of Texas made
Mexicans mad. They didn't like the independence of Texas
2: Mexicans were worried about the fact that Americans would encourage rebellions in California and New Mexico like they did to Texas.
3: Americans were annoyed at the fact that Mexico rejected President Polk's offer of $30 million to buy California and New Mexico.
4: A lot of Americans felt that Mexico was standing in the way of President Polk's offer of $30 million to buy California and New Mexico.
Primary Sources:
Primary Source - Document A:
President Polk's War Message to Congress
"To the Senate and
House of Representatives:
(In an earlier message) I informed you that ... I had ordered an efticient military force to take a position "between the Nueces and the Del Norte (Rio Grande).** This had become necessary, to meet a threatened invasion of Texas by the Mexican forces... The invasion was threatened solely because Texas had deter-mined... to annex herself to our Union; and, under these circumstances, it was plainly our duty to extend our protection over her citizens and soil.
... The Congress of Texas, by its act of December 19, 1836, had declared the Rio del Norte to be the boundary of that repub-lic... The country between that river and the Del Norte... is now included within one of our congressional districts.... It became, therefore, of urgent necessity to provide for the defense of that portion of our country....
(On the 24th of April) a party... of sixty-three men and officers, were ... dispatched from the American camp up the Rio del Norte, on its (North) bank, to ascertain whether the Mexican troops had crossed, or were preparing to cross, the river... (They) became engaged with a large body of these (Mexican) troops, and, after a short affair, in which some sixteen (Americans) were killed and wounded, appear to have been surrounded and compelled to surrender....
We have tried every effort at reconcili-ation. The cup of forbearance had been exhausted even before the recent information from the frontier of the Del Norte.
But now, ... Mexico has passed the boundary of the United States, has invaded our territory and shed American blood upon the American soil.
Note: War Vote, May 13, 1846:
US Senate: 40 Yes, 2 No House of Flep: 174 Yes, 14 No
Primary Source - Document B :
Speech by Congressman Abraham Lincoln
That soil was not ours; and Congress did not annex or attempt to annex it.
But to return to your position: Allow the President to invade a neighboring nation, whenever he shall deem it necessary to repel an invasion, and you allow him to do so, whenever he may choose to say he deems it necessary for such purpose — and you allow him to make war at pleasure. Study to see if you can fix any limit to his power in this respect....
The provision of the Constitution giving the war-making power to Congress was dictated, as I understand it, by the following reasons. Kings had always been involving and impoverishing their people in wars, pretending generally, if not always, that the good of the people was the object. This, our convention understood to be the most oppressive of all Kingly oppressions; and they resolved to so frame the Constitution that no one man should hold the power of bringing this oppression upon us. But your view destroys the whole matter, and places our President where Kings have always stood.*
Primary Source - Document C:
Mexican General Francisco Mejias Proclamation
"The annexation (adding) of Texas to the United States, projected and consummated (completed) by the tortuous policy of the cabinet of the Union, does not yet satisfy the ambitious desires of the degenerate (corrupt) sons of Washington.
The civilized world has already recognized in that act all the marks of injustice, iniquity (unfair), and the most scandalous violation of the rights of nations.
Indelible (permanent) is the stain which will darken the character for virtue falsely attributed to the people of the United States.. The right of conquest has always been a crime against humanity...
In the midst of peace, of the territory of a friendly nation, which generously relied upon the faith of promises and the solemnity (seriousness) of treaties."