[dropcap]I[/dropcap]n an angry editorial on Dec. 5, 1849, an influential Austin newspaper advocated a scorched-earth policy in response to the pending theft of New Mexico from the Lone Star State.
“Rather than surrender to the usurpation of the General Government one inch of our blood bought territory,” fumed The State Gazette, “let every human habitation in Santa Fe be destroyed.”
Texans were too busy battling the mortal enemy on their southern flank in 1846 to pay much attention to the autumn occupation of New Mexico by the Army of the West. Those few that noticed how quickly Gen. Stephen Kearney established a military regime in Santa Fe never thought to question his motives.
The Polk administration had assured Texas prior to admission to the Union that its claim to most of New Mexico and the eastern portion of Colorado would be honored by the United States. However, Gen. Kearney regarded the region as a war-time prize and openly violated the letter as well as the spirit of the annexation accord.
Gov. George T. Wood met this challenge in March 1848 by creating Santa Fe County, which encompassed all of New Mexico east of the Rio Grande. Kearney retaliated eight months later with a kangaroo convention that petitioned the federal government to grant New Mexico territorial status and to ban slavery within its borders.
Calling the general’s bluff, Wood dispatched magistrate Spruce Baird to preside over the new county of Santa Fe. When Baird was turned back by armed soldiers, the infuriated governor threatened to invade New Mexico with Texas troops.
Meanwhile, the 525,000-square-mile price Mexico paid for losing the recent war had rekindled the rancorous debate over human bondage. Northern abolitionists demanded that every square foot of the vast acquisition be “free,” while Southern slaveholders insisted with the same ferocity upon their God-given right to export their “peculiar institution” to the West.
Two prominent Senators saw the crisis as a golden opportunity to cut the 28th state down to size. Thomas Hart Benton of Missouri suggested slicing Texas in two and compensating the inhabitants for their pain and suffering with $15 million. Mississippi’s Henry S. Foote wanted to amputate the area east of the Brazos River and rename it the State of San Jacinto.
Returning to the Senate after a seven-year absence, Henry Clay hoped to head off a national calamity like he had done three decades before with the Missouri Compromise. The Kentuckian submitted an eight-point proposal designed to defuse the political powder keg.
Clay’s carefully crafted package included the Texas Boundary Act, which was sponsored by a Maryland colleague and endorsed by the entire Lone Star delegation. As a reward for relinquishing their right to New Mexico and Colorado, Texans would receive a one-time payment of ten million dollars.
Senators Sam Houston and Thomas Rusk soft-pedaled the significance of their votes in favor of the unpopular bill. Their tongue-in-cheek explanation was that they only wanted to give their constituents the chance to decide the issue for themselves in a statewide referendum.
Leading the charge against the Boundary Act was The State Gazette, which railed, “Gold might buy the votes of the members of Congress, but we rely upon the uncorrupted and incorruptible people of the Lone Star State for a glorious triumph over abolition artifice and the intrigues of speculators.”
Houston and Rusk countered with a question. Where else, they asked, could Texas hope to get the money to pay off the debts of the defunct Republic? Besides, argued the Senators, ten million dollars for all that “worthless” land out in the middle of nowhere was a good deal.
This was, of course, the same short-sighted logic the legislature would use in the 1880’s to justify swapping three million acres in the Panhandle for the construction of a new state capitol. The trusting public unfortunately took the bait on both occasions.
At a special election in September 1850, voters gave the boundary bargain their ballot-box blessing with a resounding two-thirds majority. Two months later, Gov. Hansborough Bell signed the act of acceptance that reduced the State of Texas to its present dimensions.
Clay’s historic compromise provoked a chorus of “we told you so” from those stalwart souls, who had steadfastly opposed sacrificing sovereignty for statehood. Their gloomy prediction that annexation would turn Texas into an expendable pawn in the North-South chess match had come true, and ten million dollars did make the bitter pill any easier to swallow.
Bartee’s three books and “Best of This Week in Texas History” column collections are available for purchase at barteehaile.com.
