Westward Movement
Causes:
 Oregon has fertile land
 Texas is ideal for raising cattle and growing cotton
 Many Americans believe in Manifest Destiny
 Mormons seek a safe home
 Gold is discovered in California
Effects:
 Government initiates Indian removal treaties
 United States annexes Texas
 Britain and the United States divide Oregon
 The United States gains the Mexican Cession after the Mexican War
 United States makes the Gadsden Purchase
 United States stretches from sea to sea
 Cotton kingdom spreads
Manifest Destiny
There were two major views on Manifest Destiny:
 Justification based on economic and racial reasons
 Justification based on a genuine belief that it was Providence
It had its roots in:
 Puritans: “City on a Hill” –John Winthrop’s vision
 Louisiana Purchase
 Monroe Doctrine
U.S. Indian Policy, 1815-1860: Removal to Reservations.
Ideally, relations between two peoples should be an exchange of ideas and a
search for mutually beneficial relationships based upon and promoting
respect for each other’s cultural differences. In an autocratic or aristocratic
government, this ideal can be thwarted by narrow concerns of economic
interest or social prejudice that control government policy. However, in a
democracy, government policy must be supported by commonly held
perceptions, and if that policy is prejudicial toward another people, that
prejudice must be institutionalized so that no significant group of
constituents questions the basic premises from which the policy
emanates. Political discourse then focuses on the choice of the various
policy options that are dictated by the unquestioned premises.
The perceptions that were later to shape the beliefs of the early EuroAmericans and guide their policies toward American Indians were clearly
articulated during the Middle Ages and Renaissance. The feudal system of
Medieval Europe planted the seeds for the belief that property ownership
brought greater freedom. The decline of feudalism led to a rise in social
status of some peasants to that of landowners. This in turn created within the
new propertied class a greater degree of independence. The desire for land
and all of its promises were passed on and became a compelling motive for
future colonizers. The connection between land and freedom had been
firmly established by the end of the Renaissance.
As land was seen as liberating the oppressed, reason was perceived as the
means of understanding the world, freeing the mind from the rule of
passion. Enlightened thought added moral and scientific weight concerning
the superiority of reason over emotion by suggesting that humanity was on a
continuum with the men of logic at the top and those enslaved by their
passions on the bottom. The creators of the concept found themselves on the
highest rung. This perception focused on the benevolence of the
‘superior’ culture bringing progress to the ‘inferior’ culture while at the
same time dismissing its contributions. (To do otherwise would be to
contradict the notions of superiority and suggest equality between the
cultures.) You fell into two groups: the enlightened and the unenlightened.
As European discovery and exploration ultimately led to colonization, the
seeds of enlightened thought were scattered with the settlement of the new
territories. The instruments of exploration and conquest, combined with the
moral imperative of Christianizing and civilizing were seen not only as
evidence of technological superiority but divine mandate as well. By the
time the United States had established its new government, enlightened
thought was firmly imbedded in the institutions of the new democracy. This
provided a justification for the harsh treatment of indigenous peoples
while at the same time silencing almost all criticism of the basic
assumptions inherent in Indian policy, leaving only the methods of
implementation to be disputed. (Please take note that throughout the
removal period, that critics talked mostly about implementation, not about
policy.)
Landowning as a conduit to economic prosperity + Enlightened thought +
the moral imperative of Christianizing = the removal of American Indians.
The education of the citizenry was deemed indispensable to the perpetuation
of American democracy, and public schools became the instruments for
creating an informed population. Along with reading, writing, and
arithmetic, they passed along a version of the world from the Euro-American
perspective. Many textbooks portrayed American Indians as uncivilized,
‘bloodthirsty savages’, or in some cases ‘noble savages’. (Education creates
cultural norms.) The ‘bloodthirsty savage’ appears in James Fennimore
Cooper’s, The Last of the Mohicans, in which Maqua and his followers
commit the famous massacre at Fort William Henry. In contrast, Cooper
depicted Chingachgook as a ‘noble savage.’ Henry Wadsworth Longfellow’s
poem “Hiawatha’ is another example. Indians became stereotyped.
Renowned political and public figures such as John C. Calhoun, President
James Monroe, Lewis Cass and Horace Greeley relied upon these ‘proofs’ as
irrefutable evidence of the inferiority of American Indian cultures. Greeley
wrote in 1859 that Indians were “a slave to appetite and sloth”.
Scientifically, Indians had been described, defined, analyzed and evaluated,
only to be found wanting. Theologically, they were a pagan culture in need
of redemption. Socially, they were enslaved by passion and wandering the
earth. Economically, they were inefficient and squandering their abundant
resources. Viewing American Indians in this manner, those who sought
political remedies could resort to removal, reservations and assimilation as
viable and even benevolent solutions to the “Indian problem”. (Note: this is
the same reasoning that would allow Hitler to exterminate Jews –and the
German people to buy into the program.) (And it is the same attitude that
would allow slavery to flourish in America.) (It is also what many in the
Middle East call the assault of globalization on their culture. -justification of
the twin towers.)
The policies of the United States government and the attitudes expressed by
political leaders were met by eloquent responses from a number of American
Indians who spoke from a different cultural perspective. While European
thought dissected and examined the natural world, Native American
embraced the belief that all things are connected. The ideal was not to
conquer nature, but to live in harmony with it. Land was not property,
but a sacred and nurturing spiritual force. While biblical
interpretations by European theologians suggested man’s domain over
the earth, native belief envisioned harmony among all things. While
scientific thought gave rise to a “Great Chain of Being,” most native
belief placed all things in a circle, with all of creation sharing an equal
status. When the “Great Chain of Being” collided with the “Great
Circle of Life” the conflict over land use became a spiritual struggle for
ideological supremacy.
As the U.S. government adopted Indian Removal as an official policy, those
tribes that were affected responded in various ways according to their
circumstances. From the statements of Elias Boudinout embracing
assimilation to the pleas to be left alone by George Harkins, district chief of
the Choctaw Nation, and Black Hawk’s call to arms, American Indian
leaders sought to preserve their lives and culture despite the encroachments
of Euro-American settlement. Often the choices available to Indian leaders
were limited to opting for physical existence at the cost of cultural heritage.
The government of the United States fashioned Indian policy from the
prevailing ideology of the early 19th century that set the stage for removal.
Espousing rationale ranging from benevolence to cultural superiority,
politicians such as John C. Calhoun, Andrew Jackson, and Lewis Cass
created justifications for the removal of Indians from their land. The
Cherokee’s sought redress through the court system. In Worchester v.
Georgia, the Supreme Court focused on the conflict between states’ rights v.
the federal government and not the central issue; the result was the Trail of
Tears.
Removal alone proved insufficient, so by 1848, Indian Commissioner
William McDill shifted the government’s policy towards reservations.
Most criticism of the policy was based on issues of compassion for an
inferior people or an appeal to honor in fulfilling government treaty
obligations and promises. Bishop Henry Whipple of Minnesota was
perceived by whites as an ardent defender of Indians. Yet, he only
championed their continued life, not the continuation of their culture.
By the mid-nineteenth century, European philosophies of the Enlightenment
were embedded in the Indian policies of the United States government. The
institutions of American democracy were predicated upon Eurocentric
rationale based on enlightened thought. Those institutions in turn translated
that ideology into the context of the American frontier. Public education,
thought to be the cornerstone of democracy, promoted a viewpoint of the
dominant culture that explained and justified interactions with Indian
cultures. Once the benevolent goals of civilization were firmly embedded in
American ideology and policy, almost any actions were permissible if they
furthered that goal. Many American Indians protested, advocating actions
from capitulation to armed resistance, but each action could be interpreted as
evidence of the inferiority of Indian cultures. Some Euro-Americans
sympathetic to the Indian circumstances advanced the notion that culture
must be sacrificed in order to preserve the lives of Indians. As the Civil War
threatened to redefine America, the institutionalization of ideas and attitudes
that would shape the context of American policy for the next century had
been firmly established.
If the Indians were reasonable and accepted U.S. policy, they were
tacitly accepting their own inferiority, confirming the validity of the
policy and condemning themselves to cultural destruction. If the Indians
obeyed the policy, they confirmed their inability to recognize the
superiority of Euro-American culture and its eventual benefits to the
Indians. If the Indians resisted the policy, they provided proof of their
irrational and passionate nature that was the very foundation of EuroAmerican views of Indians.
The Indian Removal period is particularly interesting because it reveals the
irony and inherent contradictions in American Indian policy. The removal of
eastern Indians from the path of the ‘superior society’ appealed to the
benevolent logic of many Americans. Ironically, the largest and most
famous tribes removed were those who already had adopted many white
customs and were even referred to by the U.S. government as the “Five
Civilized Tribes.” The Indians adoption of white farming methods was an
overriding goal of policy makers and yet those Indians were being removed
to an area with a climate unsuitable for agricultural practices of the 1830s.
The Cherokee had made the most impressive strides toward the adoption of
Euro-American political, legal, economic, and social systems as well as
aspects of culture such as religion, housing, dress, written language and
gender roles. Having done everything that had been demanded of them for
assimilation into white culture, they were rejected anyway.
By 1800, most Cherokee spoke English and had converted to Christianity.
Some had plantations and slaves. By 1825, they had written laws, a national
legislature, and a constitutional government. The state of Georgia saw these
developments as an infringement on their own sovereignty guaranteed by the
constitution and grew impatient with decades old federal promises to acquire
title to all Indian land in the state. In 1829, Georgia declared both the
Cherokee tribal council and constitutional government illegal, ruled all
Cherokee laws null and void, and imposed the jurisdiction of Georgia’s
laws, land deeds, and court system over Cherokee territory. They further
denied the Cherokee the right to sue in Georgia courts. They sought redress
through the Supreme Court. However even though in Worchester v.
Georgia, the court ruled in favor of the Cherokee, Georgia and President
Andrew Jackson ignored the ruling and implemented removal. It seems that
the main focus of the court decision focused on issues of federal power
verses states rights and the balance of power between the branches of the
federal government rather than on Cherokee rights and welfare.
In 1835, a small number of leaders signed a treaty which sold all Cherokee
lands and authorized removal of the entire tribe. The question remains
whether or not those leaders had the right to sell. Thus began “The Trail of
Tears.”
The removal of eastern Indians continued to be the official policy until 1851
but it was pursued with much less vigor after the horrors of the “Trail of
Tears.” The concept of a vast Indian territory west of the Mississippi River
became problematic as interest in Oregon and California increased in the
early 1840s and it became totally unfeasible as the volume of migrants to
these newly acquired territories exploded late in the decade. Most of the
remaining eastern Indians were in the upper Midwest and the focus of
government policy shifted to the concentration of the plains Indians in the
northern or southern plains away from the Overland Trail.
The Chippewa Indians living in the area that would eventually become
Wisconsin and Minnesota provide an example of this policy transition from
removal to reservations. The Treaty of Prairie du Chein in 1825 sought to
prevent intertribal warfare by establishing boundaries for the various
Chippewa bands, but it also served as the first step in the government’s
process of acquiring their land. Subsequent treaties in 1837, 1842, and 1854
transferred the enormous timber and mineral resources of northern
Wisconsin and northeastern Minnesota to the United States. Eventual
removal from the ceded territory was assumed but not stated in the 1837
treaty. The 1842 treaty contained three references to removal at the
discretion of the President but the signatories were given verbal assurances
that they could remain in the ceded territory as long as they had peaceful
relations with white settlers. As a result, a removal order by President
Zachary Taylor in 1850 surprised Chippewa leaders but the official change
in government policy the following year caused this decision to be reversed.
The 1854 treaty implemented this new policy with the Chippewa, initiating
the process that would establish their reservations.
FYI: Most textbooks refer to the Treaty of Fort Laramie in 1851 as the first
instance of the concentration policy suggesting that reservations came after
the Civil War. Not so.
Texas
Everyone wanted Texas. JQA had offered $1 million for it; Jackson was
willing to spend $5 million. But the newly independent country of Mexico
wasn’t selling. However, they were willing to have Americans settle there.
In 1821, a Connecticut man named Moses Austin contracted with Mexico to
bring 300 American families to an area near San Antonio. Austin died
shortly thereafter, but his son Stephen took over and led the settlers to the
area in 1823.
By 1834, Austin’s colony had 20,000 white colonists and 2,000 black slaves.
That was four times the number of Mexicans in Texas. Slavery was
abolished in Mexico in 1831, but Austin ignored the law, as well as the one
requiring the settlers to convert to Roman Catholicism. More and more, the
settlers began thinking of themselves less as Mexican subjects and more as a
cross between Mexicans and Texans.
The area began to attract restless and sometimes lawless Americans who
were not as peaceful as the Austin bunch. These included Sam Houston, a
soldier and good friend of Jackson’s; the Bowie brothers, Louisiana slave
smugglers who had designed an impressive long knife that bore their name;
and Davy Crockett, a Tennessee ex-congressman and daredevil
backwoodsman with a flair for self-promotion.
In 1835, Mexican President Antonio Lopez de Santa Anna made himself
dictator and proclaimed a new constitution that eliminated any special
privilege for Texas, and the Texans declared their independence in March
1836 –at that time there were approximately 35,000 Americans living in
Texas. They kicked the Mexican soldiers out of the garrison at San Antonio,
and a force of 187 Texans and American volunteers set up a fort in an old
mission called the Alamo; Jackson remained neutral but many in the South
did not.
On March 6, 1836, after a 13 day siege and a brief pre-dawn battle, Santa
Anna’s army of about 5,000 overran the Alamo, despite heavy Mexican
losses and killed all its defenders. The only Americans to come out of the
Alamo alive were a woman, her baby, and a slave. Santa Anna spared them
so they could warn Sam Houston what awaited him. The victory
accomplished little for Santa Anna, but “Remember the Alamo” became a
rallying cry for Texans. Six weeks after the Alamo fell, an army led by Sam
Houston surprised and defeated Santa Anna at the San Jacinto River, and
Santa Anna was captured.
Texas ratified a constitution, which included slavery, and waited to be
annexed into the Unites States. But Jackson was now in no hurry. He did not
want a war with Mexico over Texas and risk the election of Van Buren.
Jackson formally recognized Texas on his last day in office in March 1841,
after Van Buren had been elected. But it wasn’t until December 1845 that
the Lone Star Republic became the Lone Star State almost nine years after it
has requested admission.
Van Buren (who was blamed for the Panic of 1837 and the recession that
followed) was defeated in the next election by Wm Henry Harrison (a Whig)
who died a month later of pneumonia. John Tyler (a Virginia slave holder
who had become a Whig because he had a falling out with the Democrats
and Jackson over the issue of nullification and state’s rights) became the first
vice president to assume the presidency. People called him “His Accidency”
and many thought he would just serve as caretaker until the next election.
But Tyler became a full-fledged president, setting the example for all the
vice-presidents who would take over the presidency after him. He became
the only sitting president thrown out of his own political party. In 1844, he
started his own party, the Democratic-Republicans, but lost to James K.
Polk, a Democrat from Tennessee who was a follower of Jackson. (still
controlling the party from Van Buren, Tyler, and Polk.) He made several
campaign promises:
 To acquire California
 To settle a dispute with England over the Oregon border
 To lower the tariff
 And not to seek a second term ---He kept all of them.
Mexican leaders were furious at the admission of Texas as a state in
December 1845, even though it had been independent from Mexico for 9
years. So when Polk sent diplomat James Slidell to Mexico City with an
offer to buy California for $25 million, Mexican leaders refused to meet with
him. Polk decided to push us into war –the first war with another country
just to gain land. A young Army lieutenant named Ulysses S. Grant called it
“one of the most unjust wars ever waged by a stronger against a weaker
nation.” Polk sent an “army of observation” under the command of Gen.
Zackary Taylor to the banks of the Rio Grande River, an area that Mexico
considered its territory. The army was gradually built up to about 4,000
troops by 1846. Taylor’s soldiers managed to provoke a small attack and the
war was on.
The United States lost 13,000 men, 11,000 of them from disease, and lost
not a single major battle. The Mexican army was badly led, badly equipped,
and badly trained. The Americans were well equipped and led by Taylor and
Scott. (“Old Rough and Ready” and “Old Fuss and Feathers”) In their ranks
were Captain Robert E. Lee and officer U.S. Grant.
The first battle at Palo Alto set the stage. Taylor led 2,300 Americans to
4,500 Mexicans and routed them. (New Evidence –battle not a draw.)
In Mexico, the troops were now led by Santa Anna -who had been exiled to
Cuba, but had talked Americans into helping him return to Mexico with a
promise of selling Mexico out –he had lied! By Sept. 1847, Taylor’s troops
had captured Mexico City. The Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo gave America
more than 500,000 sq. miles of Mexican territory –CA, NV, UT, AZ, most
of NM, parts of WY and CO. Mexico dropped their claims over Texas. Polk
paid the Mexican government $18.25 million to ease his conscience. Five
years later, we paid Mexico another $10 million for a strip of land in
southern New Mexico and Arizona called the Gadsden Purchase.
 James Gadsden was born in 1788 in Charleston, South Carolina. He
was a soldier, a friend of Jackson, a slave-owning planter, a railroad
executive, and an American Minister to Mexico in 1853. He had been
appointed to this position on the recommendation of Jefferson Davis
who was Secretary of War under Franklin Pierce. At the end of the
Mexican-American War, the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo set the
border at the 32nd parallel of latitude and required the U.S.
government to either control Indian raids south of the new boundary
line or pay compensation for damages they inflicted. Both Gadsden
and Davis wanted to build a railroad from the Atlantic to the Pacific
through the south hoping to spread cotton and slavery. The problem in
Arizona was that the flat buildable land needed for this railroad was
south of the 32nd parallel. In Mexico, Dictator Santa Anna had
indicated that he would be willing to sell more territory to the U.S. At
the same time, the Senate was debating the Kansas-Nebraska Act and
many Northern Senators felt that this would give the South an
advantage. After much debate, the Treaty was ratified on June 29,
1854 and Mexico was paid $7 million; 700,000 which went into Santa
Anna’s pockets. He would later offer to sell more land to the United
States. Gadsden died in 1858 and his southern railroad would not be
completed for another twenty-seven years. Meanwhile, Lincoln would
build a transcontinental railroad through the North.
 The San Patricio Battalion
In Congress, the Wilmot Proviso was introduced beginning in 1846. It stated
that slavery should not be allowed in any territory acquired from Mexico.
While it never passed, the Wilmot Proviso provided a well-defined proposal
that allowed the free-soil forces to attract thousands of followers.
In Congress, a representative from Illinois named Lincoln attacked the war
as unjust aggression –the Spot Resolutions. Henry David Thoreau refused to
pay his taxes and went to jail, but the essay that came out of it “Civil
Disobedience” became a handbook for non-violent protestors and passive
resistance demonstrators around the world well into the next century.
Much of the dissent about the war stemmed not from just being
uncomfortable about picking on Mexico, but because of fears it was
designed to acquire more territory for the spread of slavery.
A big worry was that we might have to go to war with Britain as well over
Oregon. But the two sides agreed to a compromise and set the boundary at
the 49th parallel.
 The Oregon Trail was much more than a pathway to the state of
Oregon; it was the only practical corridor to the entire western United
States. The trail west was exceptionally difficult by today’s standards.
One in ten died; many walked the entire two-thousand miles barefoot.
The common misconception was that Indians were the biggest
problem along the way; they were not. Cholera, poor sanitation and
accidental gunshots killed most travelers on the trail. In 1836, the first
emigrants were Marcus and Narcissa Whitman, missionaries who
were later killed by Indians. By 1843, nearly a thousand had made the
trip and in the next 25 years nearly a half million others would follow.
Many of these would split off and head to California for the gold rush.
It ended in 1869 upon the completion of the transcontinental railroad.
 The Donner Party: Lansford Hastings had written a book claiming that
there was a short cut off the Oregon Trail that would shave 400 miles
from the trip if you were heading to California. The Donner, Reed,
Breen, Murphy, Eddy, Graves, and Keseberg families took it. They
spent the winter of 1846-47 stranded by snow in the Sierra Nevada
range. Ten men, including two Indian guides, and 5 women set out on
foot. They, like those left behind, resorted to cannibalism by eating
the Indian guides. Two men and all five women made it to Sutter’s
Fort. In the spring when they returned to the camp only one man was
left alive.
In January, 1848, gold was discovered in California. More than 90,000
people made their way west; by 1854 there was 300,000. Most miners made
only about $8 a day. In the end, the ones who got rich were the ones selling
the miners supplies. More than $170 million worth of gold came out of CA
and a lot was used to help finance the North during the Civil War.
The United States had realized its “Manifest Destiny.” –a term that had
become popular in the 1840’s as a way of explaining how it was
geographically natural for America to expand its borders to conform to the
continent. A New York journalist named John O’Sullivan first used the term
in 1845, when he wrote the country must fulfill “our manifest destiny to
overspread the continent allotted by Providence for the free development of
our yearly multiplying millions.”
The Mexican War
Arguments for American expansion:
 It lessened the possibility of future collisions with foreign powers.
 It permitted the United States to spread democratic ideals.
 It fulfilled the mission some felt to bring a superior civilization to
superstitious Mexico.
 It permitted the United States to acquire the benefits of harbors on the
Pacific and new trade with the Far East.
Arguments against:
 Americans have no right to force their civilization on Mexicans and
interfere with their rights of self-determination.
 Many believed that the Mexican War was fought in order to spread
the institution of slavery.
 War was unnecessary because Mexico was not bothering the United
States.
 The war resulted from an unconstitutional act on the part of Polk.
 It created a lasting bitterness among Mexicans who came to view the
United States as a greedy and untrustworthy bully.
 The war enlarged the national appetite for expansion and reinforced
racist philosophies.