President Polk and Santa Anna: Subterfuge and Possible Treason?

James K. Polk entered the White House in 1845 as an ardent expansionist, wedded to the ideal of Manifest Destiny as an American directive characterized by historian Frederick Merk as, “…immediate, realistic, aggressive.” In efforts to disassemble Mexico’s territories north of the Rio Grande, Polk engaged every option. This included Polk’s cunning scheme to assist the exiled Mexican leader Antonio Lopez de Santa Anna by returning him to power and paying him a stipend for championing American annexation goals.

 

Santa Anna Returns to Mexico

 

Polk was in contact with Santa Anna through secret envoys as early as February 1845. Exiled to Cuba, Santa Anna was remembered as the butcher of the Alamo defenders, a man hated in the new Texas republic which had been formally joined to the United States in the waning hours of John Tyler’s presidency. The disgraced general, eager to return to Mexico and reassume power, promised Polk recognition of the Rio Grande boundary and the sale of Mexico’s continental territories for thirty million dollars.

 

The Rio Grande border between Mexico and Texas was a relatively new development and had seldom been used before 1845 as an official boundary. Santa Anna recognized the river as the border at the end of Texas’ war for independence, but the treaty had been signed under duress and was repudiated by the Mexican government.

 

Santa Anna had no intention of fulfilling his agreements. Polk, unaware of the general’s plans, allowed him to slip back into Mexico through the U.S. naval blockade. In August 1846, before Santa Anna resumed power in Mexico, Polk attempted to obtain a $2 million appropriation, ostensibly as a down payment for the Mexican territories. A handful of Senators politically aligned to Polk knew that the appropriation included a stipend for Santa Anna.

 

The bill was defeated in the U.S. Senate shortly before Congress adjourned, chiefly due to an anti-slavery amendment known as the Wilmot Proviso. The debate over slavery’s expansion into the territories joined to the U.S. as a result of the war was about to grow heated and divisive.

 

Santa Anna Continues the War

 

Santa Anna resumed his leadership of Mexico and the war continued through 1847. At the February 1847 battle of Buena Vista, Santa Anna vastly outnumbered American forces under the command of Zachary Taylor. Taylor was acting against orders but managed a spectacular victory due in large part to his West Point-trained artillery units.

 

By October 1847, General Winfield Scott occupied Mexico City and Santa Anna relinquished control, joining the Mexican guerrilla campaign being waged against U.S. troops. Polk, despite his machinations with Congress from the first weeks of his presidency, fulfilled his campaign promises. The 1848 Treaty of Guadalupe-Hidalgo ceded vast territories to the United States and ended Mexican claims against Texas. Aggressive expansionism prevailed.

 

References:

 

Robert W. Johannsen, To The Halls of the Montezumas (Oxford University Press, 1985)

Frederick Merk, History of the Westward Movement (Alfred A. Knopf, 1978)

Federick Merk, Manifest Destiny in American History (Vintage/Random House, 1966)

Published March 14, 2012 in Suite101 by M.Streich. copyright