The Mexican War of 1846 Responses

Responding to Classmate 1

Hello, Classmate 1,

Thank you for sharing your post. The Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo was signed On February 2, 1848. This treaty officially brought the Mexican-American War to an end. However, after the war was over and the soldiers returned home, a new war began, which has continued to shape America’s course to the present day. Although Ulysses S. Grant argued that God, through the Civil War, was punishing Americans for the Mexican-American War and asserted that the latter was a “wicked war” whose basis was slavery expansion and imperialism; still a majority of the Americans supported the said war because they saw the war as a way to fulfill the country’s manifest destiny (American Battlefield Trust, n.d).

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The Louisiana Purchase also resulted in a significant crisis regarding how the new states would be organized. This crisis was later resolved by the compromise that would end all compromises, the Missouri Compromise. Under Wilmot Proviso, any territory gained during the Mexican war was to remain free and for the exclusive reservation of the whites. The provision brought together the Southern Americans against the Northern counterparts regarding slavery. Following the vote, the political landscape in America was changed permanently (American Battlefield Trust, n.d.).

Responding to Classmate 2

Hello, Classmate 2,

Thank you for sharing your post. I agree that the Lewis and Clark Expedition was the most impactful in fulfilling Manifest Destiny. The expedition group came to embody the manifest destiny values and prodded other adventurers on discovery expeditions to explore unknown territories. The expedition also opened new territory for trade in lumber and fur. It also pointed out prime land suitable for settlements in the future and for agriculture as well. The expedition also allowed America to grow into a great nation because the more land it acquired, the more resources it attained and hence, the acquisition of more power (Encyclopaedia Britannica, n.d).

Other Related Post: The Principle of Scarcity

Reference

American Battlefield Trust. The Impact of the Mexican-American War on American Society and Politics. https://www.battlefields.org/learn/articles/impact-mexican-american-war-american-society-and-politics

Encyclopedia Britannica. Louisiana Purchase. http://www.britannica.com/eb/article-9049100/Louisiana-Purchase

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Question

Week 3 Discussion: Manifest Destiny and the Mexican War of 1846

Follow-Up Posts

The Mexican War of 1846 Responses

Compare your selections and analysis of selections with those of your peers. If they chose different events, examine how yours are similarandr different. If they chose the same events, build on their posts by providing additional information about the events that you have not already noted in your post.

Classmate 1’s Post

Among the several events that contributed to westward expansion during 1800-1,8re outlined in the text, the independence of Texas and the Mexican War of 1846-1848 stand out as the most impactful. Not only did these events cleara significantt geopolitical obstacle to the ideology’s fulfillment, that of Mexico’s territorial claim to the southwestern part of the continent, but they also appear as the two most straightforwardly motivated by the ideology itself. These events proved to be the most impactful because through them,t the ideology which motivated westward expansion found its most explicitt expression.

For instance, the Louis and Clark expedition was an event that certainly contributed to westward expansion and was also motivated by something like what came to be called “manifest destiny.” The two explores set out to lay the groundwork for Thomas Jefferson’s vision of a nation of yeoman farmers by surveying, mapping, collecting samples, and gifting objects to indigenous groups forlaterr identification by white setters as being “non-hostile to whites” (Corbett et al. 2017, p. 304). These actions represented the beginning of the spread of United States power over the recently acquired Louisiana territory and were motivated, on Jefferson’s part, by that very end. But it seems essential to make a distinction between the unnamed, proto-manifest ideologies which motivated Jefferson, rooted as they were in his late-eighteenth century worldview, and the later ideology that gripped the nation, rooted as it was in the dramatic social and economic changes which took place during the early nineteenth century (Watson 11).

Manifest destiny was not just the idea that the United States was morally destined to stretch from the Atlantic to the Pacific but that this destiny would come about because of the imagined economic and technological superiority of the United States (Watson 13). In contrast to the Louis and Clark expedition, the independence of Texas was directly motivated by manifest destiny as a defined ideology (even if it still lacked a name for a few more years), and the event had sevevitaltant impacts on westward expansion, including the War with Mexico. The white Americans who settled in Texas during the 1820s were directly motivated by the belief that they should be allowed to enslave people and to benefit directly from an economic system built on slavery. This right was based on their ideas of superiority. (Corbett et al. 2017, p. 312) When the Mexican government abolished slavery in 1829, many white residents of Texas responded by pushing back on the new laws and were soon driven, because of the ideologies they held, to agitate for independence. After attaining independence from Mexico, the ideology of supremacy also motivated whites in Texas to marginalize the Tejanos and indigenous groups in the area (Corbett et al. 2017, p. 315).

The War with Mexico was similarly influenced by manifest destiny, whien had received its name from newspaper editor John O’Sullivan by thenvan. (Corbett et al. 2017, p. 316) President James K. Polk was directly motivated by the ideology when he ordered troops to the Rio Grande, knowing that it was not recognized as the border by the Mexicans, and then declaring war after the troops got into a firefight with the Mexican Calvary (Corbett et al. 2017, p. 318). Although a vocal group of politicians was critical of Polk’s actions, demanding information as to the exact location of the event, the war was broadlygely popular because of widely held negative views of Mexican sociey and the belief in American superiority (Corbett et al. 2017, p. 318). In the aftermath of the war, the United States receivasthuge swathes of territory from Mexico, which came to be known as the Mexican Cession (Corbett et al. 2017, p. 319). Unlike the Louisiana Purchase, which came about as a result of several disparate global political changes, the United States acquired these new territoriess directly because of the ideology of manifest destiny. Thus, while the acquisition of the former territories had inspired manifest destiny, the acquisition of the latterwase its by-product.

References

“Chapter 11: A Nation on the Move: Westward Expansion, 1800-1860.” U.S. History, by P. Scott Corbett et al., OpenStax, Rice University, 2017.

“Introduction.” Liberty and Power: Thee Politics of Jacksonian America, by Harry L. Watson, Hill and Wang, 2006.

Classmate 2’s Post

Professor and Class,

The Lewis and Clark Expedition is best described as a two-year, 8,000-mile exploration of the territory West of the Mississippi River. Theendeavourr was proposed to discover new property and trade routes—namely to Asian markets. This expedition occurred between 18and to 1806 and was led by Meriwether Lewis and William Clark, chosen by President Jefferslf (Openstax, 2019).

The California Gold Rush occurred after James Marshall and John Sutter found gold in his sawmill, with word catching on to the employees of Marshall and Sutter and San Francisco after that. People began abandoning their homes, families, and occupations to discover gold by the hundreds and thousands, “rushing” to California`s American River (Openstax, 2019).

Out of the two chosen above, I believe the Lewis and Clark Expedition greatly impacted Westward Expansion during 1800-1848. The expedition discovered rivers, mountains, land, plants, animals and Native American tribes that had yet to be imagined, let alone seen—including 178 pants and 122 animals. Discovering Delaware, Maryland, Virginia, Pennsylvania, Ohio, West Virginia, Kentucky, Indiana, Illinois, and Missouri. Theydiscoveredmore accessibleer travel routes, edible and poisonous plants, dangerous and beneficial animals, and ways to speak and co-exist with Native American tribes (National Park Service, 2017). The exploration of these states allowed research to be collected that would further benefit and result in prosperity for the colonies.

Manifest Destiny was an idealization in which it was believed that white Americans possessed the right to further expand, control and take the West in efforts to spread personal beliefs, such as Protestant religions and democratic preference. The effects of this train of thought motivated Thomas Jefferson to enlist two men to research land further never before assessed—with no mind to the risks, as the desire to possess land and profit outweighed the potential for risks (National Geographic 2019). This train of thought also persuaded individuals to leave their homes and rush to a river with the frame of mind to remove gold that was not yet “owned” by another individual’s∝party.Thegreedforthelapartyerty.The thegreedforthelands gifts greatly surmised the rationality which was eluded when they impulsively left their homes and, essentially, lives.
-Cassidy Ginter