The Mexican-American War April 25, 1846–Feb. 2, 1848 (25 abr 1846 año – 2 feb 1848 año)

Descripción:

-Polk tried to buy the Southwest from Mexico to no prevail
-Polk then challenged Mexican authorities on the border of Texas
-provoked a Mexican attack on American troops (Mexico was already agitated over the annexation of Texas)
-Polk used the border attack as grounds to argue for a declaration of war, even though some congressmen questioned Polk's claim that the Mexicans had fired first
-The war didn't have universal supports from the American public, b/c Northerners feared that the new states in the West would become slave states, thus tipping the balance in congress in favor of proslavery forces
-Americans believed that Polk provoked the Mexicans into war at the request of powerful slave owners
-The idea that slave owners had control over the gov't. became popular and known as Slave Power
-the gag rule in 1836, and the defeat of the Wilmot Proviso (a bill prohibiting the extension of slavery into any territory gained from Mexico) strengthened concerns of Slave Power
-Wilmot Proviso: voting fell along the lines of sectional divisions instead of political parties, almost all northerners were in favor, while almost all southerners were opposed
-Whigs split between the North (Conscience Whigs) and the South (cotton Whigs) (followed the Federalists into extinction)
-Free-Soil Party emerged who were a single-issue party devoted to the goals of the Wilmot Proviso (largely exposed to the expansion of slavery not b/c they were abolitionists, but b/c they didn't want white settlers to have to compete with slave labor in new territories
-War ended through the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo (more about this in its own event box)

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