History of the United States Volume Iii Part 13

[Ill.u.s.tration: Portrait.]

Wendell Phillip.

The destruction of colored people's houses became for a time an every-day occurrence in many northern cities. For some years the condition of the free blacks and their friends was hardly better north than south. Schools for colored children were violently opposed even in New England. One kept by Miss Prudence Crandall, at Canterbury, Conn., was, after its opponents had for months sought in every manner to close it, destroyed by fire. The lady herself was imprisoned, and such schools were by law forbidden in the State. A colored school at Canaan, N. H., was voted a nuisance by a meeting of the town; the building was then dragged from its foundations and ruined. Many who aided in these deeds belonged to what were regarded the most respectable cla.s.ses of society.

[1839-1840]

Owing to the vagaries and unpatriotism of the Garrisonians, there was from 1840 schism in the abolition ranks. Garrison and his closest sympathizers were very radical on other questions besides that concerning the sin of slavery. They declared the Const.i.tution "a league with death and a covenant with h.e.l.l" because it recognized slavery. They would neither vote nor hold office under it. They upbraided the churches as full of the devil's allies. They also advocated community of property, women's rights, and some of them free love. Others, as Birney, Whittier, and Gerrit Smith, refused to believe so ill of the Const.i.tution or of the churches, and wished to rush the slavery question right into the political arena. The division, far from hindering, greatly set forward the abolitionist cause. Perhaps neither abolition society, as such, had, after the schism of 1840, quite the influence which the old exerted at first, but by this time a very general public opinion maintained anti-slavery propagandism, pushing it henceforth more powerfully than ever, as well as, through broader modes of utterance and action, more successfully. Whittier, Lowell, Longfellow, each enlisted his muse in the crusade. Wendell Phillips's tongue was a flaming sword.

Clergymen, politicians, and other people entirely conservative in most things, felt free to join the new society of political Abolitionists.

In 1839 the Governor of Virginia made a requisition on Governor Seward of New York, to send to Virginia three sailors charged with having aided a slave out of bondage. Seward declined, on the ground that by New York law the sailors were guilty of no crime, as that law knew nothing of property in man. He accompanied his refusal with a discussion of slavery and slave law quite in the abolitionist vein. To a like call from Georgia, Seward responded in the same way, and his example was followed by other northern governors. The Liberty Party took the field in 1840, Birney and Earle for candidates, who polled nearly 7,000 votes. Four years later Birney and Morris received 62,300.

It would be a mistake, let us remember, to regard the anti-abolitionist temper at the North wholly as apathy, friendliness to slavery, or the result of truckling to the South. Besides sharing the general fanaticism which mixed itself with the movement, the Abolitionists ignored the South's dilemma--the ultras totally, the moderates too much. "What would you do, brethren, were you in our place?" asked Dr. Richard Fuller, of Baltimore, in a national religious meeting where slavery was under debate; "how would you go to work to realize your views?" Dr.

Spencer H. Cone, of New York, roared in reply, "I would proclaim liberty throughout all the land, to all the inhabitants thereof." But the thing was far from being so simple as that. Denouncing the Const.i.tution as Garrison did could not but affront patriotic hearts. It was impolitic, to say the least, to import English co-agitators, who could not understand the intricacies of the subject as presented here.

[Ill.u.s.tration: facsimile of Heading of the "Liberator."]

The fact that, defying slave-masters and sycophants alike, the cause of abolition still went on conquering and to conquer, was due much less to the strength of its arguments and the energy of its agitation than to the South's wild outcry and preposterous effrontery of demand.

Conservative northerners began to see that, bad as abolitionism might be, the means proposed for its suppression were worse still, being absolutely subversive of personal liberty, free speech, and a free press. More serious was the conviction, which the South's att.i.tude nursed, that such mortal horror at Abolitionists and their propaganda could only be explained by some sort of a conviction on the part of the South itself that the Abolitionists were right, and that slavery was precisely the heinous and d.a.m.nable evil they declared it to be. It was mostly in considering this aspect of the case that the Church and clergy more and more developed conscience and voice on freedom's side, as practical allies of abolitionism. In each great denomination the South had to break off from the North on account of the latter's love to the black as a human being. Men felt that an inst.i.tution unable to stand discussion ought to fall. By 1850 there were few places at the North where an Abolitionist might not safely speak his mind.

It were as unjust as it would be painful to view this long, courageous, desperate defence of slavery as the pure product of depravity. The South had a cause, in logic, law, and, to an extent, even in justice. Both sides could rightly appeal to the Const.i.tution, the deep, irrepressible antagonism of freedom against bondage having there its seat. The very existence of the Const.i.tution presupposed that each section should respect the inst.i.tutions of the other. What right, then, had the North to allow publications confessedly intended to destroy a legal southern inst.i.tution, deeply rooted and cherished? From a merely const.i.tutional point of view this question was no less proper than the other: What right had the South, among much else, to enact laws putting in prison northern citizens of color absolutely without indictment, when, as sailors, they touched at southern ports, and keeping them there till their ships sailed? This outrage had occurred repeatedly. What was worse, when Messrs. h.o.a.r and Hubbard visited Charleston and New Orleans, respectively, to bring amicable suits that should go to the Supreme Court and there decide the legality of such detention, they were obliged to withdraw to escape personal violence.

It was said that the North must bear these incidents of slavery, so obnoxious to it, in deference to our complex political system. Yes, but it was equally the South's duty to bear the, to it, obnoxious incidents of freedom. Southern men seem never to have thought of this. Doubtless, as emanc.i.p.ation in any style would have afflicted it, the South could not but account all incitements thereto as hardships; but the North must have suffered hardships, if less gross and tangible, yet more real and galling, had it acceded to southern wishes touching liberty of person, speech, and the press. That at the North which offended the South was of the very soul and essence of free government; that at the South which aggrieved the North was, however important, certainly somewhat less essential. Manifestly, considerations other than legal or const.i.tutional needed to be invoked in order to a decision of the case upon its merits, and these, had they been judicially weighed, must, it would seem, all have told powerfully against slavery. Not to raise the question whether the black was a man, with the inalienable rights mentioned in the Declaration of Independence, the South's own economic and moral weal, and further--what one would suppose should alone have determined the question--its social peace and political stability loudly demanded every possible effort and device for the extirpation of slavery. That this would have been difficult all must admit; that it was intrinsically possible the examples of Cuba and Brazil since sufficiently prove.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Map of the United Staes and Territories.]

CHAPTER III.

THE MEXICAN WAR

[1836]

Attracted by fertility of soil and advantages for cattle-raising, large numbers of Americans had long been emigrating to Texas. By 1830 they probably comprised a majority of its inhabitants. March 2, 1836, Texas declared its independence of Mexico, and on April 10th of that year fought in defence of the same the decisive battle of San Jacinto. Here Houston gained a complete victory over Santa Anna, the Mexican President, captured him, and extorted his signature to a treaty acknowledging Texan independence. This, however, as having been forced, the Mexican Government would not ratify.

[1845]

Not only did the Texans almost to a man wish annexation to our Union, but, as we have seen, the dominant wing of the democratic party in the Union itself was bent upon the same, forcing a demand for this into their national platform in 1840. Van Buren did not favor it, which was the sole reason why he forfeited to Polk the democratic nomination in 1844. Polk was elected by free-soil votes cast for Birney, which, had Clay received them, would have carried New York and Michigan for him and thus elected him; but the result was hailed as indorsing annexation.

Calhoun, Tyler's Secretary of State, more influential than any other one man in bringing it about, therefore now advocated it more zealously than ever. Calhoun's purpose in this was to balance the immense growth of the North by adding to southern territory Texas, which would of course become a slave State, and perhaps in time make several States. As the war progressed he grew moderate, out of fear that the South's show of territorial greed would give the North just excuse for sectional measures.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Portrait.]

General Sam. Houston.

Henry Clay, with nearly the entire Whig Party, from the first opposed the Tyler-Calhoun programme. Clay's own reason for this, as his memorable Lexington speech in 1847 disclosed, was that the United States would be looked upon "as actuated by a spirit of rapacity and an inordinate desire for territorial aggrandizement." His party as a whole dreaded more the increment which would come to the slave power. After much discussion in Congress, Texas was annexed to the Union on January 25, 1845, just previous to Polk's accession. June 18th, the Texan Congress unanimously a.s.sented, its act being ratified July 4th by a popular convention. Thus were added to the United States 376,133 square miles of territory.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Portrait.]

General Santa Anna.

The all-absorbing question now was where Texas ended: at the Nueces, as Mexico declared, or at the Rio Grande, as Texas itself had maintained, insisting upon that stream as of old the bourne between Spanish America and the French Louisiana. Mexico, proud, had recognized neither the independence of Texas nor its annexation by the United States, yet would probably have agreed to both as preferable to war, had the alternative been allowed. To be sure, she was dilatory in settling admitted claims for certain depredations upon our commerce, threatened to take the annexation as a casus belli, withdrew her envoy and declined to accept Slidell as ours, and precipitated the first actual bloodshed. Yet war might have been averted, and our Government, not Mexico's, was to blame for the contrary result. Slidell played the bully, the navy threatened the coast, our wholly deficient t.i.tle, through Texas, to the Nueces-Rio-Grande tract was a.s.sumed without the slightest ado to be good, and when General Arista, having crossed the river in Taylor's vicinity, repelled the latter's attack upon him, the President, followed by Congress, falsely alleged war to exist "by act of the Republic of Mexico."

[1846]

During most of 1845, General Zachary Taylor was at Corpus Christi on the west bank of the Nueces, in command of 3,600 men. The first aggressive movement occurred in March of the following year, when Taylor, invading the disputed territory by command from Washington, advanced to the Rio Grande, opposite Matamoras. April 26th, a Mexican force crossed the river and captured a party of American dragoons which attacked them.

Taylor drew back to establish communication with Point Isabel, and on advancing again toward the Rio Grande, May 8th, found before him a Mexican force of nearly twice his numbers, commanded by Arista. The battle of Palo Alto ensued, and next day that of Resaca de la Palma, Taylor completely victorious in both. May 13th, before knowledge of these actions had reached Washington, warranted merely by news of the cavalry skirmish on April 26th, Congress declared war, and the President immediately called for 50,000 volunteers. In July Taylor was re-enforced by Worth, and proceeded to organize a campaign against Monterey, a strongly fortified town some ninety miles toward the City of Mexico.

This place was reached September 19th, and captured on the 22d, after hard fighting and severe losses on both sides. An armistice of eight weeks followed.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Portrait.]

James K. Polk, after a photograph by Brady.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Map.]

PLAN OF THE BATTLE OF BUENA VISTA MORNING 23 OF FEB 1847.

[1847]

Meantime a revolution had occurred in Mexico. The banished Santa Anna was recalled, and as President of the Republic a.s.sumed command of the Mexican armies. On February 23, 1847, occurred one of the most sanguinary but brilliant battles of the war, that of Buena Vista.

Taylor, learning that a Mexican force was advancing under Santa Anna, at least double the 5,200 left him after the requisition upon him which General Scott had just made, drew back to the strong position of Buena Vista, south of Saltillo. Here Santa Anna, having through an intercepted despatch learned of Taylor's weakness, ferociously fell upon him with a force 12,000 strong. On right and centre, by dint of good tactics and bull-dog fighting, Taylor held his own and more, but the foe succeeded at first in partly turning and pushing back his left. The Mexican commander bade Taylor surrender, but was refused, whence the saying that "Old Rough and Ready," as they called Taylor, "was whipped but didn't know it."

To check the flanking movement he sent forward two regiments of infantry, well supported by dragoons and artillery, who charged the advancing ma.s.s, broke the Mexicans' column, and sent them fleeing in confusion. This saved the day. The American loss was 746, including several officers, among them Lieutenant-Colonel Clay, son of the Kentucky statesman. Colonel Jefferson Davis, one day to be President of the Southern Confederacy, caused during this conflict great havoc in the enemy's ranks with his Mississippi riflemen. Santa Anna's loss was 2,000.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Portrait.]

General Winfield Scott.

General Winfield Scott had meantime been ordered to Mexico as chief in command. Taylor was a Whig, and the Whigs whispered that his martial deeds were making the democratic cabinet dread him as a presidential candidate. But Scott was a Whig, too, and if there was anything in the surmise, his victorious march must have given Polk's political household additional food for reflection. Scott's plan was to reduce Vera Cruz, and thence march to the Mexican capital, two hundred miles away, by the quickest route. Vera Cruz capitulated March 27, 1847.

Scott straightway struck out for the interior. He was bloodily opposed at Cerro Gordo, April 18th, and at Jalapa, but he made quick work of the enemy at both these places. In the latter city, after his victory, he awaited promised re-enforcements. When the last of these had arrived, August 6th, under General Franklin Pierce, so that he could muster about 14,000 men, he advanced again. August 10th the Americans were in sight of the City of Mexico. This was a natural stronghold, and art had added to its strength in every possible way. Except on the south and west it was nearly inaccessible if defended with any spirit. Scott of course directed his attack toward the west and south sides of the city. The first battle in the environs of the capital was fiercely fought near the village of Contreras, and proved an overwhelming defeat for the Mexicans. Two thousand were killed or wounded, while nearly 1,000, including four generals, were captured, together with a large quant.i.ty of stores and ammunition. The American loss was only 60 killed and wounded.

The survivors fled to Churubusco, farther toward the city, where, with every advantage of position, Santa Anna had united his forces for a final stand. An old stone convent, which our artillery could not reach till late in the action, was utilized as a barricade, and from this the Mexicans poured a most deadly fire upon their a.s.sailants. The Americans were victorious, as usual, but their loss was fearful, 1,000 being killed or wounded, including 76 officers. A truce to last a fortnight was now agreed upon, but Scott, seeing that the Mexicans were taking advantage of it to strengthen their fortifications, did not wait so long. He now had about 8,500 men fit for duty, and sixty-eight guns.

Hostilities were renewed September 7th, by the storm and capture, costing nearly 800 men, of Molino del Rey, or "King's Mill," a mile and a half from the city.

Possession of the Molino opened the way to Chapultepec, the Gibraltar of Mexico, 1,100 yards nearer the goal. As it was built upon a rock 150 feet high, impregnable on the north and well-nigh so on the eastern and most of the southern face, only the western and part of the southern sides could be scaled. But the stronghold was the key to the city, and after surveying the situation, a council of war decided that it must be taken. Two picked American detachments, one from the west, one from the south, pushed up the rugged steeps in face of a withering fire. The rock-walls to the base of the castle had to be mounted by ladders. This was successfully accomplished; the enemy were driven from the building back into the city, and the castle and grounds occupied by our troops. A large number of fugitives were cut off by a force sent around to the north.

[Ill.u.s.tration: The Plaza of the City of Mexico.]

[1848]