Page:The American Cyclopædia (1879) Volume III.djvu/597

 CALHOUN 591 the special facts alleged, or any secret plot for the abolition of slavery in Texas, or any dispo- sition to resort to any measures which would tend to disturb the peace and tranquillity of the slaveholding states, or the prosperity of the Union, admitted however at the same time, as a thing well known both to the United States and everywhere else, that Great Britain desired and was constantly exerting herself to procure the abolition of slavery throughout the world. Shortly after the treaty was concluded, Mr. Calhoun, in replying to this despatch, took the latter admission as an admission also that the British government was laboring to pro- cure the abolition of slavery in Texas, and as having justified on the part of the United States, as a necessary act of self-defence, the treaty of annexation just concluded. The Mexican minister at Washington had given re- peated notices that the signature of a treaty of annexation would be regarded by Mexico as an act of war. The American minister at Mexico was directed to disavow any disrespect to that country, or indifference to its honor or dignity, and to represent that the efforts of Great Britain to abolish slavery in Texas had compelled the United States to sign the treaty of annexation without stopping" to obtain the previous consent of Mexico. The disposition, however, was expressed to settle all questions which might grow out of this treaty, including that of boundary, on the most liberal terms ; and the minister was privately authorized to tender $10,000,000 to Mexico by way of in- demnity. The treaty was sent to the senate April 19, where it was rejected by a vote of 35 to 16. But the treaty had already had the effect to defeat the nomination of Van Buren. He as well as Clay, who was the whig candi- date, were opposed to the immediate annexa- tion of Texas, on the ground that it would be equivalent to a war with Mexico. Mr. Polk was nominated by the democrats, and went into the canvass as the advocate of immediate annexation ; and having been elected, he was anxious to have the matter acted upon by con- gress before his accession to office. At the en- suing session joint resolutions were introduced for receiving Texas into the Union. These resolutions could be carried through the senate only by annexing an alternative provision for a negotiation to be opened on the subject with Texas and Mexico (the president to act under either provision as he might deem best), and by means of a promise from Mr. Polk that he would act under the latter provision. In this, however, he was anticipated by Calhoun. Within three days after the passage of the res- olutions, and on the last day of President Ty- ler's term of office, he despatched a messen- ger to Texas to bring her in under the first provision. Calhoun expected to retain his po- sition as secretary of state ; but he was offered instead the place of minister to England, which he declined to accept. He did not, however, retire to private life. One of the South Caro- 141 VOL. in. 38 lina senators resigned his seat to make room for him, and at the next session (December, 1845) he reappeared at Washington as a sen- ator. In the violent debate at that session on the Oregon question, which threatened to involve a war with Great Britain, he announced himself the decided advocate of compromise and peace, which finally prevailed. The con- troversy pending with Mexico ended in war. Without waiting for the Mexican people to be- come reconciled to the treaty, the president or- dered the American troops in Texas to take possession of the disputed territory on the north bank of the Rio Grande. When the Mex- icans opposed by force this occupation, the president informed congress that our territory had been invaded and that war had been commenced by the Mexicans, and requested that body to recognize its existence and pro- vide for its prosecution. Calhoun spoke against the bill introduced for this purpose, but as the case was hopeless he did not record his name against it. He was, however, utterly opposed to the war thus commenced, both as unnecessary and unjust. At the next session, the American forces having already occupied the northern provinces of Mexico, Calhoun, in his speech on the three-million bill, advocated the policy of- abstaining from further invasion. He proposed to hold the country already in possession as a means of forcing the Mexicans to treat, the line of occupation which he rec- ommended being nearly coincident with the boundary afterward obtained, except that it included the peninsula of Lower California. In this speech he declared himself very strongly against any attempt upon the independence of Mexico or the absorption of her inhabited terri- tory. In reply to Mr. Benton's charge that it was he who had plunged the nation into the Mexican war, he accepted the imputation of being the author of the annexation of Texas, but he insisted that the responsibility for the war belonged to the president, who had violated the constitution by marching troops on his own authority into the disputed territory, and by the collision thus brought on had forced con- gress to recognize as a fact a war which that body could never have been induced to declare or to commence. The Wilmot proviso (that in any territory acquired from Mexico slavery should be prohibited) having been brought for- ward in the house as an amendment to the three-million bill, and this proviso having been warmly urged by resolutions adopted by the united vote of both political parties in the legis- latures of many of the free states, Calhonn again stepped forward as the leader and cham- pion of the slaveholding interest. He intro- duced a series of resolutions, in which, starting from the principle that the United States are but the states united, and that the territories are the joint property of those states, ho denied that congress had power to make any law which should directly or indirectly deprive any state of its full and equal right in this common