So the matter presented itself to many when studied as an exclusively Mexican affair. But could it be regarded as exclusively Mexican? In Central and South America there were countries that naturally entertained a racial prejudice against the “Anglo-Saxon.” They were fully capable of discovering the claim to monopoly suggested by the name United States of “America,” by our considering none except ourselves “Americans,” and by our “Monroe Doctrine”; and moreover our press clamored for the entire continent. Mexico had her eye upon them, and she counted on drawing support from that quarter.[18]
As early as 1836 Cuevas, then minister at Paris, after pointing out to his government how strongly the country was protected by nature against the United States, remarked: “Add to this the interest of the republics of the South to defend Mexico against an always threatening enemy, which with its ever monstrous greed seems a volcano ready to burst upon them.” The next year a Mexican agent at Lima reported that the alleged unlawful interference of this country in Texas was the subject of general conversation and of just alarm in the Spanish-American states. In 1842 Dorsey, bearer of despatches from our legation at Mexico, stated at Savannah that Santa Anna had sent envoys to all the South American republics with this message: “Unless you enable us to resist such aggression as will be perpetrated by the United States, she will proceed to embrace in her mighty grasp the whole of the southern continent;” and Dorsey added that Colombia had already promised financial aid and two thousand men. At the close of that year, as a letter from Caracas mentioned, steps were said to have been taken toward forming a league to support Mexico against American encroachments. In 1843 Almonte made up a pamphlet of extracts from John Quincy Adams’s brilliant though unfounded speech at Braintree, in which he accused our government of greed and unrighteousness in the Texas business; and this telling document was distributed in the principal cities of South America. During the following years the menace of our ambition to all of the Spanish race in this hemisphere continued to be discussed in the Mexican press. “Republics of South America,” cried La Aurora de la Libertad, for example, “your existence also is in danger; prepare for the combat;” and it was easy to believe that official appeals for assistance, in the event of actual invasion, would not fall upon deaf ears.[18]
EUROPEAN AID EXPECTED
And there were still better grounds, it was reckoned, for expecting aid from abroad. In the first place, holding more or less honestly that we had trampled on the law of nations, the Mexicans persuaded themselves that every civilized country would feel an interest in their cause. The justice of our case against the United States, declared the official Diario, will be recognized at once by all governments to which “public faith and honor are not an empty name.” This view was encouraged in Europe. The cause of Mexico, said the Liverpool Mail, is that of all just and honest governments. The Mexicans have good ground to complain, proclaimed the sympathetic Journal des Débats, for “they have been tricked and robbed.”[19]
Covered with so noble a sentiment as devotion to the cause of justice, more practical considerations could be expected to exert their full influence. In Mexico as well as in the United States, the monarchies of Europe were believed to view with jealousy the success of our republican institutions. Our policy of “America for the Americans,” which the British minister, Ward, had turned against Poinsett at Mexico, was contrary to the interest of every commercial nation beyond the Atlantic. The United States, exclaimed Le Correspondant of Paris, assumes to exclude Europe from the affairs of that continent—as if Europe had not had rights and possessions there before the United States began to be! as if the United States did not owe its existence to Europe! as if the ocean could change the law of nations; and leading journals in London expressed similar indignation.[20]
As the whole world understood, great Britain had not yet forgiven us for becoming independent, and viewed with great repugnance our extensions of territory, our commercial development and our control over raw cotton; and it was obvious that she would be glad to stop our growth. Sooner or later, warned the British press, the course of this monster will have to be checked. Guizot, the premier of France, regarded the United States as a “young Colossus,” and earnestly desired to apply in this hemisphere the principle of the balance of power. Polk was by no means popular at the Tuilleries, and the Journal des Débats, commonly regarded as the mouthpiece of the government, courteously described his Message of December, 1845, as bellicose, passionate, full of vain and ludicrous bravado, arrogant, detestably hypocritical, brutally selfish and brutally dishonest.[21]
The plan to annex Texas had greatly disturbed these two governments, and they had not only exerted to the utmost against it their diplomatic strength, both separately and in concert, but, as Mexico knew, had been disposed to take up arms in that cause. Aided by circumstances, the courage and skill of the United States had completely foiled them, but they could not be supposed to view the result with satisfaction; and there was good reason to believe that they contemplated a possible further extension of this country, not only with alarm, but with a strong desire to prevent it. Said the London Morning Herald in March, 1845: Mexico will turn to good account the support of her powerful protectors and their intense repugnance to the annexation of Texas; and the London Times predicted that our greed in the Texas affair would be punished.[22]
Gifted at vaticination, the Times predicted also that our next aim would be the mines of Mexico, and asked the nations of Europe how they would like to find their monetary circulation “dependent on the caprice of the President of the United States.” In September, 1845, it printed the assertion of its Mexican correspondent, that England must interfere or be prepared to see not only those mines but also California in American hands. There is a general feeling, announced the London Standard, that only the interposition of England and France can check the United States. The United States will absorb Mexico unless foreign powers avert this, preached the London Journal of Commerce. “The conquest of Mexico would create perils for the political balance of the world,” said the Journal des Débats; and hence “the immense aggrandizements” contemplated by the United States “could not take place without giving umbrage to several nations.” Europe would certainly forbid a conquest of Mexico, threatened Le Constitutionnel. The Mexicans were fully capable of seeing all this for themselves. The Monitor Constitutional, for example, gave currency to the idea that certain powers would prevent the invasion of their country. Indeed they could see even more. “Enlightened nations of Europe,” exclaimed La Aurora de la Libertad, “a people consumed with ambition and covetousness is already taking up arms to conquer the American continent, lay down the law to your interests and possessions, and some day disturb your peace at home.”[23]
Another source of possible trouble for the United States abroad was the idea that any territory obtained from Mexico would be given up to slavery. This point came out strongly in the Journal des Débats, for example. Considerably more serious was the danger that in coping with Mexican privateers we should offend other nations. In this way, so the British minister warned our secretary of state, the Americans were likely to become involved in “complications of the gravest character”; and it was believed by the Mexicans that a blockade of their coast, in addition to being extremely difficult, was almost or quite certain to have that effect.[24]
To these points they added characteristically that fear of their power, as well as antipathy to us, might lead foreign nations to espouse their side; and all the supporters of the monarchical plans now entertained by the government and the upper classes, felt that if carried out these would pave the way for European assistance. In fact the British minister himself believed that such a change of regime would guarantee Mexico against the United States, and it is reasonable to suppose that in talking with her public men he disclosed this conviction. Being a jealous nation, thoroughly given up to politics, and not industrial or commercial, Mexico could not fail to exaggerate the probable effect of all these influences upon England and France, and to underestimate the factors that were tending to keep them at peace with us.[25]