Chapter 17Manifest Destiny and Its Legacy, 1841–1848

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Introduction to the Presidents

• William Henry Harrison– A Whig, was elected in 1841 and John Tyler

elected Vice-President• Cabinet: Secretary of State—Daniel Webster• Henry Clay spokesman in the Senate, the uncrowned

king of the Whigs.

– Harrison’s election considered first full blown political campaign

– Harrison contacted pneumonia after giving 2 hr long inaugural address and dies only four months in office. By far the shortest administration in American history .

Introduction to the Presidents

• John Tyler:• Vice President, the “Tyler too” party of the Whig

ticket, assumes presidency• His enemies accused him of being a Democrat in

Whig clothing• He was stubbornly attached to principle; forsook the

Democrats for the Whigs because of “King Andrew”• Was at odds with the majority of his adoptive Whigs

Introduction to the Presidents• Tyler, abandoned by Whigs does not run for

reelection • The two major parties nominated their

presidential standard-bearers in May 1844:– Henry Clay chosen by the Whigs at Baltimore– James K. Polk of Tennessee chosen by the

Democrats—America’s first “dark horse”

Introduction to the Presidents • Election results:

• “Dark Horse” Polk nipped Clay 170 to 105 votes in the Electoral College• 1,338,464 to 1,300,097 in the popular vote• Clay would have won if he had not lost New York

State by a scant 5,000 votes:– There the tiny antislavery Liberty Party absorbed nearly

16,000 votes that would have gone to Clay.

Introduction to the Presidents

– The Democrats campaign was an expression of Manifest Destiny:

– Polk… in Jackson’s footsteps as an expansionist Democrat:• Strongly swayed by Manifest Destiny• Platform:

– “All of Oregon or None” (The slogan “Fifty-four forty or fight” was not coined until two years later)

– The Democrats proclaimed they received a mandate from the voters to take Texas.

Map 17-1 p363

Maine

• The Maine boundary dispute:– The St. Lawrence River, main waterway in land,

is icebound several months of the year:• As a defensive precaution the British wanted to build

a road westward from the seaport Halifax to Quebec• The road would go though disputed territory claimed

by Maine• The Aroostook War threatened to widen the dispute

into a full-dress shooting war.

Maine – Britain sent to Washington a nonprofessional

diplomat, Lord Ashburton, who established cordial relations with Secretary Webster• They finally agreed to compromise on the Maine

boundary• A split-the-difference arrangement, the Americans

retained some 7,000 square miles of the 12,000 square miles of the wilderness in dispute

• Britain got less land but won the desired Halifax-Quebec route.

• KEY: BEGINS PROCESS OF LONGEST CONTINOUS UNGUARDED BOARDER IN THE WORLD

Map 17-1 p363

Map 17-2 p368

Oregon

• Oregon Country:– Geography• From the Rockies to the Pacific Ocean, north of

California to the line of 54-40, the present southern tip of Alaska panhandle• This land was claimed at one time or another by:

Spain, Russia, Britain, and the United States• Two claimants dropped out of the scramble:

– Spain through the Florida Treaty of 1819 – Russia retreated to the 54-40 line by treaties of 1824 and

1825.

Oregon

– British claims to Oregon• They were based on:

– Prior discovery and exploration– Treaty rights– Actual occupation– Colonizing agency Hudson’s Bay Company

• Especially the portion north of the Columbia River

Oregon

United States Claim…• The famed Lewis and Clark expedition of 1804-1806• Presence of missionaries and other settlers, some of

whom reached the grassy Willamette River valley– These men and women of God, in saving the soul of the

Indians, were instrumental in saving the soil of Oregon for the United States

– They stimulated interest in a faraway domain that countless Americans had earlier assumed would not be settled for centuries.

• Scattered Americans and British pioneers continued to live peacefully side by side.

Oregon

– The Anglo-American Convention of 1818• The United States sought to divide at the forty-ninth

parallel• The British wanted the Columbia River as the line• A scheme for peaceful “joint occupation” was

adopted, pending future settlement• The handful of Americans in the Willamette Valley

was multiplied in the early 1840s by the “Oregon fever”

Oregon Fever Populates Oregon

• Over the 2,000 mile Oregon Trail (1846) five thousand Americans had settled south of the Columbia River• The British could only muster seven hundred north of

the Columbia River

– Actually only a relatively small segment was in controversy by 1845:

– The Americans offered the forty-ninth parallel– The British repeated offering the line of the Columbia River– The whole issue was now tossed into the presidential

election of 1844, where it became overshadowed by the question of annexing Texas.

Oregon as Part of Polk’s Plan• Polk’s four-point program:

1. To lower the tariff• Secretary of the Treasure, Robert J. Walker, devised a tariff-for-revenue bill that

reduced the average rates of the Tariff of 1842 from 32% to 25%

2. The restoration of the independent treasury:• Pro-bank Whigs in Congress raised a storm of opposition, but victory at last

rewarded the president’s effort in 1846.

3. Settlement of the Oregon dispute4. Acquisition of California

Settling Oregon

• Settlement of the Oregon dispute:• “Reoccupation” of the “whole” had been promised to

northern Democrats in 1844 campaign• 54’ 40 or fight!• Southern Democrats, once Texas was annexed, cooled off• Polk’s feeling bound by the three offers of his predecessor

to London, proposed the compromise line of 49. • Britain in 1846 proposed the line of 49 as anti-

expansionists were now persuaded that the Columbia River was not the St. Lawrence.

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Texas as an Independent Country– Faced threats from Mexico….• refused to recognize Texas’s independence• regarded the “Lone Star Republic” as a province in

revolt to be reconquered in the future• threatened USA with war if it intervened

– Request for annexation into US snubbed – Absence US annexations, it sought alliances with

other foreign powers• In 1839 and 1840, the Texans concluded a treaty with

France, Holland, and Belgium.

Texas as an Independent Country

– Britain was interested in an independent Texas• Texas would serve as a check for Americans moving

South, possibly into British territory • British abolitionists were busily intriguing for a

foothold in Texas • British manufacturers perceived the Texas plains for

great cotton-producing in the future relieving Britain of chronic dependence on American fiber.

VI. The Belated Texas Nuptials

– Texas became a leading issue in the 1844 presidential campaign:• The foes of expansion assailed annexation• Southern hotheads cried, “Texas or Disunion”• The pro-expansion Democrats under James K. Polk

finally triumphed over the Whigs• Lame duck president Tyler interpreted the narrow

Democratic victory as a “mandate” to acquire Texas.• Tyler deserves credit for shepherding Texas into the

fold.

VI. The Belated Texas Nuptials(cont.)

• Tyler despaired of securing the needed 2/3 vote for a treaty in the Senate• He arranged for annexation by a joint resolution• After a spirited debate, the resolution passed in 1845

and Texas was formally invited to become the 28th star on the American flag• Mexico angrily charged that the Americans had

despoiled it of Texas• Mexico left the Texans dangling by denying their right

to dispose of themselves as they chose

VI. The Belated Texas Nuptials(cont.)

– By 1845 the Lone Star Republic had become a danger spot:• Inviting foreign intrigue that menaced the American

people• The continued existence of Texas as an independent

nation threatened to involve the United States in wars• The United States can hardly be accused of haste in

achieving annexation.