Page:The War with Mexico, Vol 1.djvu/184

Rh the Bold River no more produced the war than Pitcairn's march to Lexington produced the American revolution. It was an effect and an occasion, but not a cause.

Finally, as a matter of fact, the hostilities were deliberately precipitated by the will and act of Mexico. The circumstances proved this and testimony illuminates them. In October, 1847, a pamphlet written by Mariano Otero, editor of El Siglo XIX and Senator from the state of Jalisco, appeared. His object was by no means to defend the United States, but he said: "The American forces did not advance to the Rio Grande until after the war became inevitable, and then only as an army of observation. . . . The military rebellion of San Luis [Potosí] gave rise to a government [that of Paredes] pledged to resist all accommodation [with the United States] . . . which government. . . began hostilities." Arista declared in December, 1847, "I had the pleasure of being the first to begin the war'" In short, Polk told only the truth when he said the conflict was forced upon us. Mexico wanted it; Mexico threatened it; Mexico issued orders to wage it; and on April 18 her President, no doubt in view of his political difficulties, insisted upon those orders. "it is indispensable," he wrote urgently to Arista, "that hostilities begin, yourself taking the initiative."

"If in a litigious affair," declared Vattel, "our adversary refuses the means of bringing the right to proof, or artfully eludes it; if he does not, with good faith, apply to pacific measures for terminating the difference, and above all, if he is the first who begins acts of hostility, he renders just [even] the cause which was before doubtful." Every condition of this judgment fitted the course of Mexico.