Examples Of Primary Source Analysis For Annexing Texas

Tetiana Zabornyk

Professor Schultz

History 109

2 October 2017

Primary Source Analysis

Joint Resolution for annexing Texas to the United States

The Joint Resolution for annexing Texas to the United States was accepted by the Senate of the 28th Congress of the United States on February 27, 1845, and signed by President Tyler on March 1, 1845. The Resolution was constructed on the basis of the previous Tyler- Calhoun treaty for the annexation of Texas which had not been accepted by the same Congress earlier in 1844. The Tyler- Calhoun treaty was modified by two amendments. One of them was composed by the Southern Whigs Representative Milton Brown, Senator Ephraim Foster, both from Tennessee, and Representative from Georgia Alexander Stephen. The

The combination of the two amendments formed the Joint Resolution for annexing Texas to the United States.

The Resolution was composed in order to address the situation of the annexation of Texas. From the moment of the proclamation of its independence from Mexico, the majority of the population in Texas favored the idea of joining the Union. Due to the slave status and vast territories of Texas, a number of resolutions of Texas government were rejected by the American Congress as the United States wanted to keep the balance between the northern free and southern slave states, and therefore, did not want to add another large slave territory to the Union. In 1841, John Tyler became the tenth President of the United States. Driven by the idea of securing the second term in the White House and territorial expansion of the country, he decided to annex Texas into the Union. His first attempt to have the annexation treaty accepted by the Senate secretly had failed due to the leak of Calhoun’s letter to the British minister Packenham, in which the former denounced the British interference in Texas slavery, and called it a social blessing. This information created the idea that President Tyler wanted to annex Texas only to keep and spread slavery.

The first one, called Brown’s amendment, offered inclusion of Texas as a slavery state, responsibility for the disputed Texas- Mexico boundary had to be delegated to the U.S. government, Texas also was given a right to form five separate states within the Texas territory with the slavery permitted. This amendment created by the Southern Whigs was intended to give higher gains for the slave owners than the previous Tyler- Calhoun treaty bill supported by Democrats. The author of the second amendment, Thomas Hart Benton instead of partitioning the Texas territory into slave and free proposed that Texas be given right to form five states within its boundaries without any reference to their slavery