Page:The War with Mexico, Vol 1.djvu/163

134 that no fault of omission or commission, can justly be attributed either to the Government or to the Legation."

In short, then, we find that Polk had the gravest reasons for desiring friendly intercourse with Mexico, and probably felt none for plotting war; that a variety of personal and political circumstances naturally inclined him toward peace; that his declarations, both public and private, pointed consistently in that direction as long as any hope of an amicable settlement remained; and that what he did in repeated and most significant ways, as well as what he refrained from doing, had the same meaning. We must therefore give up the idea that he desired, and from the first intended, to have a war with Mexico.

All prospects of negotiation came to an end, however, and ,the administration found itself confronted by a crisis. The dignity of the United States had certainly been outraged in a defiant and contemptuous manner. By the acts of Mexico, diplomatic relations had been completely severed, and she would not renew them on any terms which the United States could think of accepting. Commercial intercourse was practically at an end, and the interests of our citizens were so graver prejudiced, that from this point of view even a London paper, the Examiner, admitted reluctantly that the situation was becoming "intolerable to the United States." Our claims and our awards were still facts. "The honor of this government is pledged to our own people for the diligent and proper prosecution of these claims," our secretary of state had said in 1843, and it was perfectly true. To let them go unpaid, in addition to being internationally immoral, would have wronged our aggrieved citizens; and to pay them from our own revenues, besides being immoral, pusillanimous and ridiculous, would have been unfair to all of our tax — payers, We had observed no more willingness, although the Mexican government had nearly always been sufficiently strong, to do us justice before annexation became an issue than afterwards; and in fact Ashburnham, a British representative at Mexico, did not exaggerate when he wrote, "They will not pay but on compulsion." There was therefore no way to collect our due except by force.

If our long forbearance appeared to American editors a mistake, much more reason had the administration to entertain that opinion, for our ministers and consuls in Mexico had