See there, no one will argue with that, nor the tone in which it is offered .... it is important to refrain from lying, that has to be half the battle of human progress eh
Grade school textbooks from the US have been taken to México and displayed alongside translations of their pages which deal with this period .... the way in which they are worded, glorifying this invasion of slaveholders as a movement promoting 'freedom' and 'independence', is to those familiar with the facts of the matter quite nauseating ... there is [or was?] a denial all through them of the role slavery played as the central issue, the principal law that this 'Texas Republic' was breaking [though there were others], and for the enforcement of which the army was raised in 1835 and moved north - the empresarios had broken their word, and they were to be encouraged to start keeping it ..... the message that comes through all this, from those negreros right down through the lying textbooks to the wingnuts on these threads, is that estadounidenses lie and cheat and steal, one cannot and must not trust them
But this is not true of all ... it was not true of Daniel Webster, who opposed the conquest and genocide, supported diplomatic and trade ties instead ... his Whig party was the equivalent of the liberales of México as represented by Mora and Gómez Farías ... these people and a great many like them on each side were the forerunners of Juárez, Lincoln, Madero, Samuel Clemens ... but the Polks and O'Sullivans got their way, and the Santa Annas too much on the other side as well [LdeSA had begun as a liberal, in fact it was he who got Guerrero into power, but then progressively turned reptilian and in the end did great damage] .... as always everywhere, you get some steps forward, and some steps back ... it's just important to stop the lying on this stuff though, and especially to stop lying to children
There is actually now available some of the straight goods in the US, tends to be on university sites ... can't find a page i had a few nights ago, but here's one on Daniel Webster, touches on 'Mr Madison's War', which is how he labelled the 1812-14 attempt to conquer Canada, mentions some of his allies, and his opponents like the John L O'Sullivan creature who wanted to take Cuba and much else as slave states [and who probably coined the term 'Manifest Destiny'] - csulb.edu
' In 1845, Webster returned to the Senate while Polk was plotting war with Mexico, which had only been a free republic for a generation. Webster was wary of imperialism for new reasons, not the least of which was that new states would threaten the delicate balance of power in the Senate thereby threatening New England. When Mexico turned down money offers for California and New Mexico territory, and refused the Slidell mission, Polk ordered General Zachary Taylor's army to cross the Nueces River on January 13, 1846 and proceed to the Rio Grande.
Whigs argued that crossing the Nueces was violation of Mexican sovereignty. In the Spring, however, legal technicalities were cast aside when Polk received word that Taylor's troops had come under attack while probing the Rio Grande valley, that some had been captured and seventeen had been killed (Blaine 63). Polk sent an aggressive message to Congress in early May and launched into a justification for the war (Ivie, 1979). On May 13, 1846, Webster was absent from the Senate, when it voted to declare war by a vote of 40 to 2. Many of Webster's Whig compatriots voted for the war fearing that what happened to the Federalists after the War of 1812 would happen to them (Morrison 45). The Whig-dominated Massachusetts legislature, however, passed a resolution proclaiming the war policy unconstitutional and a product of "slave power". '
¡Viva los whigs de Massachusetts, y los de todas partes! |
