Manifest Destiny and
War with Mexico
History 103
Nov. 16, 1998
Civil War Causation:
Major Schools of Interpretation
Texas
- Mexican independence from Spain (1821)
- Stephen Austin’s colony
- Growth of American population
- Mexican efforts to assert authority
- Texan Revolution (1836)
- Texan independence and request for annexation to U.S. (1836)
- American rejection of annexation (1837-38)
Second Party System after Jackson
- Van Buren’s troubled presidency (1837-41)
- Election of 1840
- William Henry Harrison’s brief presidency (1841)
- John Tyler’s peculiar Whiggery
Politics of Manifest Destiny
- Tyler’s Texas strategy
- Clay-Van Buren agreement re: annexation issue (1844)
- Democrats nominate James K. Polk (1844)
- Polk’s platform
- Oregon and Texas
- Logic of expansionism
- Polk’s victory (1844)
- Annexation of Texas (1845)
- Oregon settlement (1846)
Mexican-American War
- Tensions and provocations
- U.S. Declaration of War (1846)
- "All Mexico!"
- Treaty of Guadelupe Hidalgo (1848)