mexican-american war (heimler)

background/causes:

• texas declared its independence from mexico but mexico wasn’t happy about it

  • regardless, they were pretty chill with it as long as texas stayed independent

• the problem was that texas actually didn’t wanna stay independent and they actually wanted to join the US

  • mexico wasn’t happy about this and wanted to fight because of it

• when Polk was elected into office, he had promised to annex texas so he did

• Polk sent a diplomat (Slidell) to mexico to ask them to sell more land to the US (new mexico and california)

  • mexico said no

• Slidell was also sent to settle the official southern border of mexico (where did mexico end and the US start?)

  • mexico said no

• Polk sent troops to the Rio Grande to settle this problem, where mexican troops later met them

  • 11 americans died as a result

• this made Polk really mad so he wanted a war and got it approved

• america won the war (yeehaw)

effects:

• US gained a lot of land through the treaty of guadalupe hidalgo

  • this treaty established the Rio Grande as the border between mexico and the US

  • mexico succession: mexico gave new mexico and california to the US for 15 million dollars

• wilmot proviso: said that any land that was gained from the mexican-american war could not be used to expand slavery

  • this was ultimately not put into action but it shows the growing controversy present in the US about slavery

• most people that lived on the land the US had just gained just continued living there

  • these people were granted US citizenship under the treaty, but the native americans living there that were previously mexican citizens were not granted US citizenship (so stupid)

  • lots of voter and education segregation between white US citizens and mexican US citizens + native americans