Page:Confederate Military History - 1899 - Volume 1.djvu/268

232 attached by the two ministers, was accepted by the Mexican senate by a vote of 33 to 5, ratifications were exchanged May 30, 1848, and the treaty was promulgated by proclamation, July 4.

By this treaty the boundary was established at the Rio Grande, and all claims of Mexico to Texas, New Mexico and California were ceded to the United States. In consideration of these cessions, the United States agreed to pay $15,000,000 to Mexico, and to assume debts of Mexico to citizens of the United States, not to exceed $3,250,000. The treaty contained twenty-three articles, all of which were liberal. The area of the ceded territory was 522,568 square miles. (Donaldson’s Public Do main, p. 136.)

A little later the Gadsden Purchase was added to the previously acquired territory. The cession of this territory was a corollary to the cessions of Mexico, and was made for the benefit of American settlers along the rich Mesilla valley and the Gila river, and to afford a better line for the southern boundary. It was signed by James Gadsden, on the part of the United States, and Manuel Diaz de Bonilla, Jose Salazar Ylarregui, and J. Mariana Monterde, on the part of Mexico. It was concluded December 30, 1853, and was ratified and promulgated June 30, 1854. The ceded territory cost $10,000,000, and contains about 45,535 square miles. It is the smallest of the acquisitions. The treaty by which it was acquired was signed in ratification by President Franklin Pierce, of New Hampshire, being the only instance in which the ratification of any treaty for the acquisition of foreign territory was signed by a president residing north of Mason and Dixon’s line. But Franklin Pierce was the representative of the party which had always favored expansion.

Thus the total cost of the Mexican cessions was, square miles of land, not including Texas, which con-