Santa Anna was thus once more in the capital and effectually at the head of power; but he remained only a short time to attend to political matters, and dreading, doubtless, to assume openly the management of the government or to trust himself away from the protection of the military, he hastened to surround his person with the army;—as commander-in-chief, he effectually controlled all the departments of the government.
In order to perceive distinctly the perilous position of Santa Anna, we must understand the state of parties in Mexico. The revolution which placed him in power was brought about by a union of the federalists with his partizans. Santa Anna, of course, retained an influence over his adherents after arriving in Mexico; but the federalists were divided into two parties—the Puros and Moderados, or, democrats and conservatives. The dissensions in these sections enabled Santa Anna, in a degree, to hold the balance between them. Salas, the acting executive, was a conservative, and Gomez Farias, president of the council of government, was a democrat. Intrigue after intrigue occurred in the cabinet and elsewhere among the ultras to supplant Salas, and several resignations gave evidence of the ill feeling and dissensions betwixt the ministers—Cortina and Pacheco, both conservatives, resigned—and so did Rejon and Farias. The National Guard intimated its discontent with the condition of things very manifestly, and the new cabinet was filled with old enemies of Santa Anna. Meanwhile Almonte, the ablest man in the country, retained the ministry of war.
About this time the state of San Luis Potosi pronounced against the presidency of General Salas, demanding that General Santa Anna should assume the executive functions, or that some one should be named by him. As a precaution against the apprehended attempts upon his life, Salas retired on the 25th of October from the capital to Tacubaya. The greater part of the permanent garrison of the capital took up its quarters in the same place. Santa Anna was probably determined that General Salas should not obtain too absolute an ascendancy. Report said that Salas was honest enough to attempt to carry into effect all the guaranties of the revolution of Jalisco and the citadel, and that his policy did not suit the chief; but Santa Anna professed to act in the utmost harmony with him.
This outbreak against the provisional government of General Salas was soon suppressed, and Santa Anna remained in command of the army at San Luis Potosi, but without making any attack upon our forces on the Rio Grande after the defeat of Ampudia at Monterey, or endeavoring to prevent our subsequent capture of Victoria and Tampico.
On the 23d of December congress voted, by states, for provisional president and vice president. Each state had one vote in this election, determined by the majority of its deputies. Twenty-two states voted, including the federal district of Mexico, and two territories. Santa Anna's opponent, Francisco Elorriega, was the choice of nine states, and Gomez Farias was elected vice president. The day before the election the members of the cabinet threw up their portfolios; and, in the midst of his evident political unpopularity with the politicians Santa Anna seems to have been left by the authorities at San Luis Potosi with an army destitute of efficient arms, of military knowledge, and of the means of support. Santa Anna accepted the provisional presidency.
Meanwhile our army had been advancing steadily since the battles of Resaca de la Palma and Palo Alto on the 8th and 9th of May, 1846. California had fallen into our hands, and New Mexico had been subjugated. Tampico was, also, ours, and Taylor had pushed his victorious army to Saltillo. Santa Anna stood, at bay, in San Luis Potosi; for he was not yet prepared to fight, and popular opinion would not permit him to negotiate. In this forlorn condition he resorted to the usual occupation of the Mexican government when in distress, and issued, despatch after despatch to stimulate congress, the cabinet and the people in the lingering war.
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Nor was the government of the United States, meanwhile, inattentive to this position of affairs in Mexico, or indisposed to afford the government an opportunity to reconcile our difficulties by negotiation. Two distinct efforts were made by Mr. Buchanan, our secretary of state in the summer of 1846, and in January, 1847; but both proved abortive, and we were therefore obliged to continue hostilities.
At length, when Santa Anna perceived the enfeebled condition of General Taylor, and believed that Scott would be for a long time hindered from effecting his attack upon Vera Cruz, he marched to Buena Vista and experienced the sad reverse which we have already recounted. As soon as the battle was over the wily and discomfited chief immediately began to repair the losses of his arms by the eloquence and adroitness of his pen. In a long account of the battle he treats the affair as almost a victory, and leaves the public mind of Mexico in doubt as to whether he had been beaten or victorious. The few trophies, taken in the saddest moments of the action, were sent in triumph to the interior and paraded as the spolia opima in San Luis and the city of Mexico. The public men of the country knew that Angostura had in reality been lost, and Miñón who was seriously assailed in the press by Santa Anna for not co-operating at the critical moment, published a reply in which he treated Santa Anna in the plainest terms and denounced, as false, the general's statement that his troops were famishing for food on the 24th of February, and that his failure to destroy Taylor's army was only owing to this important fact! This system of mutual denunciation and recrimination was quite common in Mexico, whenever a defeat was to be accounted for or thrown on the shoulders of an individual who was not in reality answerable for it.
When Santa Anna returned to San Luis Potosi, he entered that city with not one half the army that accompanied him on his departure to the north. It was moreover worn out and disorganized by the long and painful march over the bleak desert, and had entirely lost its habit of discipline. Such was the condition of things at San Luis in the month of March, when Santa Anna found himself compelled to organize another force to resist the enemy on the east; but whilst his attention was diligently directed to this subject the sad news reached him, that Mexico was not only assailed from without, but that her capital was torn by internal dissensions.