MANIFEST DESTINY AND THE CONQUEST OF THE TRANS-MISSISSIPPI WEST

*Bent's Fort

*Manifest Destiny(1845)

• John Louis O'Sullivan

Texas

• cotton
• the Alamo(San Antonio)
• Republic of Texas(1836-1845)
• John Tyler(1841-45)

*James Knox Polk(1845-49)

• Tennessee Democrat
• strong Jackson supporter and champion of westward expansion

-Mexican War(1846-48)

• relevant boundaries
  • Rio Nueces/Nueces River
  • Rio Grande
• opposition to the war on moral and sectional grounds
  • *David Wilmot
  • *Henry Thoreau
    • "Resistance to Civil Government"
      • later more widely known as Civil Disobedience
      • influence on
        • Mahatma Gandhi
        • Martin Luther King, Jr.
• support for the conquest of all of Mexico
• *Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo
  • You can find the text of the treaty at http://www.yale.edu/lawweb/avalon/diplomacy/mexico/guadhida.htm
  • terms
    • Mexican cession of 529,017 square miles to the U.S.
    • U.S. payment of $15 million to Mexico

*Oregon Country(1846)

• *"54 40' or fight"
• Great Britain
• 49th parallel

ROUTES TO THE PACIFIC COAST

• clipper ships
  • Boston to San Francisco in less than 100 days
• overland trails
  • *Mormon migration
    • Salt Lake City, Utah(1847)
  • *Donner party(1846-47)
    • Sierra Nevada Mountains