United States -- Politics and government -- 1845-1849
Mexico is greatly the weaker power, and requires a boundary, which will
give her as much security as is practicable. It is not required, either
for the preservation of peace, or for any other legitimate purpose, that
the United States should occupy a threatening position. It cannot be
rationally supposed, that Mexico will ever make an aggressive war
against them; and even in such case, the desert would protect them
against an invasion. If a war should ever again take place between the
two countries, the overwhelming superiority of the Navy of the United
States will enable them to carry on their operations wherever they
please. They would, within a month, re-occupy the left bank of the Rio
Norte, and within a short time, effect a landing and carry the war to
any quarter they pleased.
Must the war be still prosecuted for an object of no intrinsic value, to
which the United States have no legitimate right, which justice requires
them to yield, and which even expediency does not require?
VI.--RECAPITULATION.
It is an indisputable fact, that the annexation of Texas, then at war
with Mexico, was tantamount to a declaration of war, and that the
comparative weakness of Mexico alone prevented its Government from
considering it as such.
Under these circumstances, it was evidently the duty of the United
States to use every means to soothe and conciliate the Mexicans, and to
wait with patience for an unconditional recognition of the independence
of Texas, till the feelings excited by our aggression had subsided.
It has been shown that after Mexico had resorted, as a substitute for
war, to the harmless suspension of the ordinary diplomatic intercourse,
the attempt to make it retract that measure, before any negotiations for
the restoration of harmony between the two countries should be entered
into, was neither countenanced by the acknowledged law of nations, nor
necessary for any useful purpose, nor consistent with a proper and just
sense of the relative position in which the aggressive measure of the
United States had placed the two countries. But that the refusal of
Mexico to submit to that additional contumely, should have been
considered as an insult to the United States, betrays the pride of
power, rather than a just sense of what is due to the true dignity and
honor of this nation.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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