The land that we took from Mexico was rather distant from Mexico City, you have to cross desert to get to it, and it was essentially unoccupied.
There is a principle in the law, both common law, which the US follows, and civil law, which Mexico follows, called (in civil law) acquisitive prescription, and (in common law) squatter's rights.
Merely saying you own a piece of land isn't sufficient to maintain the title. You have to use it. If someone else comes along and uses it, openly and notoriously, acting like the owner, then after a relatively brief period of years, it belongs to that person. If you use it less openly and notoriously, you can still get title via prescription/squatter's rights, but it takes longer.
AKA "snooze, you lose".
I don't feel like looking up the details but about that same time France and Spain were claiming Mexico for themselves, and I don't notice the Mexicans rushing to honor those claims, so they aren't in any position to get sniffy when we don't honor theirs. |
