(no subject)
Allie Berta
Melissa Pace
Period 6
11-28-05
William Walker’s Involvement in Nicaragua;
Was this good foreign policy?
In the mid 1800’s America had many different view points on morality, political issues and social ideologies. America was split into slave states, and non slave states. When new states were entering the union it was hard to decide if it would be a slave state, or a non slave state. The Compromise of 1850 tried to handle the best they could at the time to be fair to both sides. Either way one party was unhappy. At this time there were many adventures from the United States trying to spread their social ideologies, and one of these men was William Walker. Walker tried to take over Nicaragua, and did in fact become Nicaragua’s president, in the hopes of making it a slave state. In 1853 he invaded the Mexican provenance of Lower California on an armed expedition. He then proclaimed himself the president of Sonora an independent republic, but was soon after forced to return to the U.S. He was then put on trial for violating the Neutrality laws. Walker was still determined to take over. In 1855 he was invited by the leader of a revolutionary faction to lead a small armed band into Nicaragua, and did. With the help of Cornelius Vanderbilt and the Accession Transit Co, which at the time was an American concern, he took control of Nicaragua. After recognition from the U.S. in 1856 he had himself made the president of Nicaragua. He planned to make Nicaragua an interoceanic canal and wanted to reintroduce Slavery. He had plans to scam Vanderbilt and take over the Accession Transit Co, but failed. He was driven from his presidency in 1857 after an allied group of neighboring republics formed against him with the help of Vanderbilt. He then returned to the U.S., still in 1857, and later that year attempted an invasion of Nicaragua, again, but was arrested landing by the U.S. Navy and sent back to the U.S.
William Walker was very eager to become a conqueror that he didn’t care that he wasn’t getting the support he needed from the United States. When he didn’t have his country behind him he gained enemies. The people of Nicaragua didn’t want him to be there from the beginning, so he not only made rivals in the U.S., but also in the region surrounding Nicaragua. The only support he had was that of his own troops. He should have gotten consent from the U.S. before entering Nicaragua. Walker claimed however, that he was following the Monroe Doctrine, but he failed to follow the Neutrality Laws. Walker had a bad foreign policy. Seems very similar to the war situation America has gotten itself into today.
Walker had intentions to spread his belief in slavery. He had such strong beliefs in slavery that he was going to go to all lengths to make Nicaragua the way he believed that it should be. He was driven by greed. Nicaragua had one of the main transport links between the Atlantic and Pacific oceans shipping in the 1850’s. Walker was very aware of this and knew that it would be a key transport in the slave trade. Some would say the Iraq war is over oil, which would be a large advantage to the U.S., just like how Walkers slave trade would have helped the South. He wasn’t concerned with what the consequences would be. He had a lot of confidence in his troops, and he felt that would be enough to win over Nicaragua, There are many stories of Walker and his troop’s courage, but that only lasts so long. He was so overly confident that he didn’t think he would need added support, and he didn’t, for a while, but that only led him to failure a few years later.
The U.S. now and then had very many parallels. Walker’s War and the Iraq War were both motivated because they wanted something more. From both wars there was something to be gained of materialistic value. Both wars did not have very much support. America went into this war without the support of the United Nations and Walker went into war without the support of the U.S.A. A lot of Governmental policies have been ignored all throughout history, and it is still true to this day, if people actually followed our policies many bad situations could be avoided and we wouldn’t be left paying the consequences.
America’s foreign policy is very one sided. Most factors having to do with the U.S.’s foreign policy have a much greater advantage to the U.S, but I suppose most foreign policies are the same as well. The Monroe Doctrine is one of the most Unilateral Declarations in the U.S.’s Foreign Policy. It was a symbol of America’s control and power in the whole Western Hemisphere. America had defined its interests in the New World. Walker felt as if he could have a hand on North America and make it a slave state, partly because of the Monroe Doctrine.
“The occasion has been judged proper for asserting, as a principle in which the rights and interests on the United States are involved, that the American continents, by the free and independent condition which they have assumed and maintained, are hence forth not to be considered as subjects for future colonization by any European powers (Monroe Doctrine).”
William Walker felt as if he was not violating the Monroe Doctrine, and he wasn’t, but he was in fact violating the nation's neutrality laws. He invaded foreign countries without government permission. Walker’s story is a lot like the war we are in today.
LimeGreenToeSox: then the 3 different paragraphs giving examplles of how it was good or bad
LimeGreenToeSox: then the last paragrapgh is like a conclusion of it all
“underground railroad” that assisted former slaves to freedom during the US Civil War in the 1860's. The slaves who wanted freedom and those who helped them were willing to face great risks to life and limb to make it across dangerous territory.
Possibly Cox's most daring move with Walker was to draw explicit parallels between America's current foreign policy towards Nicaragua and Walker's invasion of that country. His account of William Walker's bloody invasion of Nicaragua in the 1850s was all too-clearly a comment on America's then involvement in the terrorist war between the Sandinist National Liberation Front (FSLN) and the Nicaraguan people in the 1980s
an American foreign policy opposing interference in the Western hemisphere from outside powers [syn: Monroe Doctrine
Walker can expect punishment more for taking an unpopular position than for violating a law.
Freedom has long included the liberty to ignore governmental policy and to suffer the consequences. Walker has done that.
The Territorial Question.
Speech of Mr. Douglas.
In the Senate, March 13 and 14, 1850.
http://facweb.furman.edu/~benson/docs/Douglas50.htm
[p17]
"Sir, that body of northern and eastern men, who gave those votes at that time, are now seen taking upon themselves, in the nomenclature of politics, the appellation of the northern Democracy. They undertook to wield the destinies of this Empire, if I may call a Republic an Empire, and their policy was, and they persisted in it, to bring into this country all the territory they could. They did under pledges -- absolute pledges to the slave interest in the case of Texas, and afterward they led to their aid in bringing in these new conquests."
[p18]
"Under pledges -- absolute pledges to the slave interest." These are bold assertions. Where are those pledges to be found? Where are the evidences of them? What were the terms, and by whom given?
[p19]
Mr. Webster. When a resolution was brought in here by the Senator from Georgia [Mr. Berrien] against continuing the war for the acquisition of territory, it was negatived by the votes of the northern Democracy.
[p20]
Mr. Douglas. Well, does that vote prove that it was done under pledges to the slave interest? It only proves that the Whigs, who voted for the resolution, were opposed to the acquisition of California and New Mexico, and that the Democrats, who voted against it, were in favor of the acquisition. That is all it proves, and that we are proud to confess. The Democracy claim California and New Mexico as the rich fruits of their labors. We acknowledge with pride, that we stood by our country in a just war against a cruel and perfidious foe, and that the acquisition of those territories are some of the substantial results of our policy. And because we annexed Texas, and thereby provided for the exclusion of slavery from five and a half degrees of latitude, in which it then had legal existence, at the same time a provision for its exclusion hereafter by the action of the people themselves, from a large portion of the residue, and because we supported our country's cause in time of war, and in consequence, acquired five or six hundred square miles of territory, from which slavery is excluded "by the arrangement of things by the Power be above us," the Senator very generously infers, that it must necessarily all have been done "under absolute pledges to the slave interest." What a logical deduction! How irresistible the inference! How can fail to work conviction in the mind of every candid man, after reading the following description of the country, from the Senator's own speech:
[p23]
"I look upon, therefore, as a fixed fact, to use in expression current at this day, that both California and New Mexico are destined to be free, as far as they are settled at all, which I believe, especially in regard to New Mexico, will be very little for a great length of time -- free by the arrangement of things by the Power above us. I have, therefore, to say, in this respect also, that this country is fixed for freedom to as many persons as shall ever live in it, by as irrepealable and more irrepealable a law, than the law that attaches to the right of holding slaves in Texas; and I will say further, that if a resolution or law were now be for me, to provide a territorial government for New Mexico, I would not vote to put any prohibition into it whatever. The use of such a prohibition would be idle, as it respects any effect it would have upon the territory; and I would all not take pains to reaffirm an ordinance of Nature, nor to reenact the will of God. And I would not put in no Wilmot proviso, for the purpose of a taunt or reproach."
[p24]
Well, sir, one would suppose that "the slave interest" must feel itself under eternal obligation to the northern Democracy for having brought such a country into this Union, in opposition to the combined forces of northern and southern Whiggery, as shown by the votes on Mr. Berrien's resolution. The northern Democracy can hardly hope for forgiveness for such a sin against freedom, and such a service to the slave power.
The Territorial Question.
Speech of Mr. Douglas.
In the Senate, March 13 and 14, 1850.
[p1]
The Senate having under consideration the message of the President of the United States transmitting the Constitution of California
[p2]
Mr. Douglas addressed the Senate as follows:
[p3]
Mr. President: before entering into the discussion of the series of questions in the range of this debate, I must be permitted to refer to some points in the able and eloquent speech of the distinguished Senator from Massachusetts. I regret exceedingly that in a speech that so eminently liberal, national, and patriotic, on all the points which unfortunately disturb and distract the country, he should have deemed it necessary to have marred its harmony, and broken its force, by introducing taunts and criminations of a mere partisan character. His attacks upon the northern Democracy, in connection with the annexation of Texas, and the support of the Mexican war, and the acquisition of territory by the treaty of peace, were as gratuitous and unprovoked as they were unfounded and unjust. He charged the northern Democracy with having supported the annexation of Texas under "pledges to the slave interest," for the purpose of sustaining the slave power of this Union. Gladly, sir, would I pass by in silence this act of in justice, and others of equal enormity, could I do so in justice to myself, and those with whom I have ever been associated politically, and the members of the House of Representatives with whom I acted in concert on the annexation question. I must be permitted to tell the Senator from Massachusetts, that neither his present position, nor his past political associations, authorize him to speak for the Democracy of this Union, North or South, or of the motives which influence their action, any further than he finds those motives and reasons recorded in the speeches and political history of the times. It is not his mission to divine our motives, and assigned to us sentiments and opinions which we have never entertained, much less expressed. I claim at least in equal right with him to speak for the Democracy upon all questions, and especially upon the annexation of Texas; and I now tell him, with entire respect, but with a certain knowledge of the truth of what I say, that of the vast multitude of speeches made by northern Democrats want the Texas question, in no one of them can he find a single sentence, sentiment, or word, to justify the sweeping charges he has made against the whole body of Democratic Senators and Representatives from the North, who supported the annexation of Texas. On the contrary, sir, every northern man, who spoke in favor of the annexation of Texas, expressly and indignantly repudiated the doctrine now imputed to them by the Senator from Massachusetts, and assigned entirely different, and in many instances directly opposite, reasons for supporting that measure. I am unable to comprehend that system of courtesy or morals, which authorizes the distinguished Senator to charge a large body of public men, in the performance of high public duties, with having been influenced by motives different from those avowed by themselves at the time. And how is this charge attempted to be maintained? We are reminded that the then Secretary of State, [Mr. Calhoun,] in his correspondence with Mr. Murphy, the chargé d'affairs in the Republic of Texas, and Mr. King, minister to France, boldly and frankly avowed that he was negotiating the treaty of their annexation for the purpose and with the view of giving security to the slave interest in the States bordering upon Texas, and therefore the Senator from Massachusetts boldly assumes that the northern Democrats, one and all, supported the measure upon the grounds and for the reasons stated by Mr. Calhoun. By this process of reasoning, he attempts to fasten the charge, not only upon the Senators and representatives, but upon the great mass of voters -- the whole Democratic organization -- including a vast majority of the people in the free States. This view is ingenious and plausible; but I submit to the candor of the Senator, whether it is fair and just? The Senator keeps out of view -- no, he is incapable of that; he has forgotten -- one important chapter in the history of this question, which changes its whole character, and overturns his position. I will refresh his memory. When President Tyler sent the treaty of annexation to the Senate for ratification, this body by resolution, called for all the correspondence upon the subject. When it was furnished to the Senate, and disclosed to the world, who does not remember -- what friend of Texas can ever forget -- the excitement and universal burst of abhorrence and indignation that a great and favorite national measure should have been butchered and destroyed by those intrusted with its consummation? Dismay, mortification, despondency, bordering on despair, was depicted in the countenance of every friend of Texas, while her enemies exulted with great joy, that the administration of Mr. Tyler, and especially the Secretary of State, had placed the measure upon grounds that all America -- yes, the whole civilized world -- must repudiate, and thereby had surrounded it with an odium and prejudice that might enable them to defeat annexation forever. From that moment the friends of Texas abandoned the idea of annexation through the treaty-making power, under the administration of Mr. Tyler. The treaty was indignantly and contemptuously rejected by the Senate, in order to repudiate the Administration, and all it had done and said in regard to Texas, and especially the correspondence with Messrs. King and Murphy, to which the Senator from Massachusetts has so often referred. The treaty was rejected; the Administration was justly and severely rebuked; the correspondence with Messrs. King and Murphy was repudiated, and here ends the chapter of the correspondence and treaty negotiated by the administration of Mr. Tyler for the annexation of Texas. The Senator from South Carolina may think, as he said in his speech the other day, that he had more to do with the annexation of Texas than any other man in the country. I have no desire to deprive him of this consoling reflection. I would not have referred to it in a matter to deprive him of any of the credit he claims for himself, had he not volunteered his testimony, to a certain extent, in aid of the charges of the Senator from Massachusetts against the northern democracy. But as a conclusion from the chapter of history to which I have referred, I must be permitted to say to him, in all sincerity and kindness, that, my opinion, he did more to embarrass the friends and encourage the enemies of Texas -- more to hazard the success of the measure, to envelop it in clouds of odium and prejudice -- than all other man in America. But further weapons furnished in the correspondence alluded to, the enemies of annexation could not have rallied a majority against the measure in any one State of the Union.
[p4]
Mr. President, I find I am diverging from the thread of my remarks. My object was to show, that the treaty and correspondence, and all the acts of the Tyler administration connected therewith, were rejected and repudiated before the Democratic Party came to the support of the Texas annexation as a party. Having thrown off the aim to bus, and cut loose from all embarrassing alliances, but the Democracy, North and South, came to the rescue, and annexed Texas upon broad national grounds, elevated far above, and totally disconnected from, the question the slavery -- considerations which addressed themselves to the patriotism and pride of every American -- considerations connected with the extension of territory, of commerce, of navigation, of political power, of national security, and glory as one people without especial reference to any particular section. These were the grounds upon which the Democratic Party unfurled the Texas flag to the breeze , in the presidential election of 1844, and received on overwhelming verdict of the popular voice in our favor. The people decreed the annexation of Texas in that election, upon the grounds thus assumed, proclaimed, and defended by the great national Democratic Party. It was the act of the people themselves, leaving to the representatives in Congress the duty of recording the verdict which their constituents had pronounced. Texas was annexed without any distinct reference to the question of slavery. It was supported, not as a measure of hostility nor of protection to that institution. It had no more connection with it and the tariff, the census, the navigation laws, the public lands, or a great number of the questions of public policy which are the subjects of daily legislation. All of them have more or less to do with the question of slavery, because the laws are uniform in their operation, and consequently, in their practical application, relate to the slaveholding as well as the free States. So it was with the annexation of Texas. If I have shown an undue degree of sensitiveness moved to under these attacks upon the northern Democracy, I trust I will be excused, when it is considered that I was one of those northern Democrats who, in the House of Representatives, supported the annexation of Texas, with all of the zeal and energy of my nature.
[p5]
Mr. Webster. With a touch of the northwest -- the northwestern Democracy.
[p6]
Mr. Douglas. Yes, sir; I am glad to hear the Senator say with a touch of the northwest; I thank you for the distinction. We have heard so much talk about the North and the South, as if those two sections were the only ones necessary to be taken into consideration, when gentlemen begin to mature their arrangements for dissolution all the union, and to mark the dividing lines upon the maps, that I'm gratified to find that there are those who appreciate the important truth, but there is a power in this nation greater than either the North or the South -- a growing, increasing, swelling power, that will be able to speak the law to this nation, and to execute the law as spoken. That power is the country known as the great West -- the Valley of the Mississippi, one and invisible from the gulf to the great lakes, and stretching, on the one side and the other, to the extreme sources of the Ohio and Missouri -- from the Alleghenies to the Rocky Mountains. There, sir, is the hope of this nation -- the resting place of the power that is not only to control, but to save, the Union. We furnish the water that makes the Mississippi, and we intend to follow, navigate, and use it until it loses itself in the briny ocean. So with the St. Lawrence. We intend to keep open and enjoy both of these great outlets to the ocean, and all between them we intend to take under our especial protection, and keep and preserve as one free, happy, and united people. This is the mission of the great Mississippi Valley, the heart and soul of the nation and the continent. We know the responsibilities that devolve upon us, and our people will show themselves equal to them. We indulge in no ultraisms -- no sectional strifes -- no crusades against the North or the South. Our aim will be to do justice to all, to all men, to every section. We are prepared to fulfill all our obligations under the Constitution as it is, and determined to maintain into preserve it inviolate in its letter and spirit. Such is the position, the destiny, and the purpose of the great Northwest. Had the Senator from Massachusetts thus clearly discriminated in his printed speech, as he now intimates, that he did not intend to include my own section in his denunciations of the northern Democracy, I should have left my political friends from the North East to have made their own vindication; but, sir, when he told us there were about fifty northern votes in the House of Representatives, and thirteen in the Senate, for the annexation resolutions, and then went onto particularize how many of them were from New England, and the residue from the other free states of the Union, I could not doubt that he intended to include the whole of the free states, my own among the others.
[p7]
In immediate connection with this, there is another portion of the speech of the Senator from Massachusetts, which I deem it my duty to notice. Speaking of the annexation of Texas, he said:
[p8]
"From that time, the whole country from here to the western boundary of Texas, was fixed, pledged, fastened, decided to be slave territory forever, by the solemn guaranties of law."
[p9]
In reply to this, I must be permitted to tell the Senator that I do not so understand the act, nor does it so read. If he had made this statement, without referring to the resolutions of annexation, I should have suppose that his recollection had failed him -- that he had been misinformed, mistaken, deceived in the matter. But, sir, when this statement is made with the resolutions before him, and the particular one, bearing upon this point, being read and incorporated into his speech, I know not what conclusion to draw. I refrain from expressing any opinion upon the subject. I will content myself with reading the resolution itself from the gentleman's own speech:
[p10]
"New States, and of convenient size, not exceeding four in number, in addition to said state of Texas at, and having sufficient population, may hereafter, by the consent South said state, be formed out of the territory thereof, which shall be entitled to admission under the provisions of the Federal Constitution, and such states as may be formed out of that portion of said territory lying south of thirty-six degrees thirty minutes north latitude, commonly known as the Missouri compromise line, shall be admitted into the union with or without slavery, as the people of each State, asking admission may desire; and such state or states as shall be formed out of said territory north of said Missouri compromise line, slavery or involuntary servitude (except for crime) shall be prohibited."
[p11]
In the face of this fundamental law, we are told that "from here to the western boundary of Texas was fixed, pledged, fastened, decided to be slave territory forever, by the solemn guaranties of law!" Was there ever such a torturing of language -- such a perversion of meaning? There is no guarantee -- no pledge -- no intimation even of the kind. The very reverse is the fact. While Texas remained an independent Power, it was all slave territory from the Gulf of Mexico to the forty-second parallel of latitude. By the resolution of annexation, five and a half degrees of the slave territory, to wit, all between thirty-six and a half and the forty-second parallels, were to be, "fixed, pledged, fastened, decided to be "free, and not"slave, territory forever, by the solemn guaranties of law." Here is a territory, stretching across five and a half degrees of latitude, withdrawn from slavery, and devoted to freedom, by the very act which the Senator has chosen to denounce and deride as the work of the northern Democracy. Nor is this all. That part of Texas lying south of 36°30' is not "pledged to slavery," as stated by the Senator from Massachusetts.
[p12]
Mr. Webster. I said that every acre of that territory, which, from its natureand character, is susceptible of slave cultivation, was fixed and pledged, mortgaged and hypothecated to slavery by the resolutions of annexation. I did not of course refer to the mountain country, different in its character, and where slaves cannot exist.
[p13]
Mr. Douglas. Yes, sir, there is a mountainous country, not only north but south of 36°30', where slaves cannot live. That country, which, from its nature and character, is not susceptible of slave cultivation, is large enough to embrace at least three of the five States into which Texas may be subdivided by the resolutions of annexation. And when the northern Democrats are arraigned and condemned for having contributed to the extension of slavery, the five and a half degrees of latitude north of 36°30', for which provision was made to be converted from slave into free territory absolutely, and probably double that amount south of that line by the action of the people themselves, when they come to form a State constitution, ought to have been brought to the notice of the public, and put to our credit in the statement of the account.
[p14]
We have a right to complain, also, of that portion of the Senator's speech which relates to the country south of 36°30'. The resolution does not provide that that portion, or any part of it, shall continue slave territory, or become slave States. Such is not the reading, nor the intention, nor the fair construction, of the resolution. It provides that the States to be formed south of 36°30', "shall be admitted into the Union with or without slavery, as the people of each State asking admission may desire." Before the annexation of Texas, all the territory in the Republic was included in one State, and subject to one uniform system of laws. Of that vast territory, a small portion, say one-fourth, was capable of producing either sugar or cotton, and consequently adapted to slave labor, while the residue consisted of elevated table-lands, and high mountain ridges, with climate and productions totally unsuited to the health and employment of the slave. The population of Texas at that in was confined to the lowlands -- the sugar and cotton regions -- were slave labor was profitably employed. The laws and institutions were adapted to the condition and wishes of the people, by and for whom they were established. So long as Texas should remain one State, with a uniform system of laws -- the preponderance of population and political power residing in the lower country -- the institution of slavery must have been fastened upon the people of the upper country against their will, and without their consent. In view of this probable contingency, the resolution of annexation provides for the division of Texas into any num
Melissa Pace
Period 6
11-28-05
William Walker’s Involvement in Nicaragua;
Was this good foreign policy?
In the mid 1800’s America had many different view points on morality, political issues and social ideologies. America was split into slave states, and non slave states. When new states were entering the union it was hard to decide if it would be a slave state, or a non slave state. The Compromise of 1850 tried to handle the best they could at the time to be fair to both sides. Either way one party was unhappy. At this time there were many adventures from the United States trying to spread their social ideologies, and one of these men was William Walker. Walker tried to take over Nicaragua, and did in fact become Nicaragua’s president, in the hopes of making it a slave state. In 1853 he invaded the Mexican provenance of Lower California on an armed expedition. He then proclaimed himself the president of Sonora an independent republic, but was soon after forced to return to the U.S. He was then put on trial for violating the Neutrality laws. Walker was still determined to take over. In 1855 he was invited by the leader of a revolutionary faction to lead a small armed band into Nicaragua, and did. With the help of Cornelius Vanderbilt and the Accession Transit Co, which at the time was an American concern, he took control of Nicaragua. After recognition from the U.S. in 1856 he had himself made the president of Nicaragua. He planned to make Nicaragua an interoceanic canal and wanted to reintroduce Slavery. He had plans to scam Vanderbilt and take over the Accession Transit Co, but failed. He was driven from his presidency in 1857 after an allied group of neighboring republics formed against him with the help of Vanderbilt. He then returned to the U.S., still in 1857, and later that year attempted an invasion of Nicaragua, again, but was arrested landing by the U.S. Navy and sent back to the U.S.
William Walker was very eager to become a conqueror that he didn’t care that he wasn’t getting the support he needed from the United States. When he didn’t have his country behind him he gained enemies. The people of Nicaragua didn’t want him to be there from the beginning, so he not only made rivals in the U.S., but also in the region surrounding Nicaragua. The only support he had was that of his own troops. He should have gotten consent from the U.S. before entering Nicaragua. Walker claimed however, that he was following the Monroe Doctrine, but he failed to follow the Neutrality Laws. Walker had a bad foreign policy. Seems very similar to the war situation America has gotten itself into today.
Walker had intentions to spread his belief in slavery. He had such strong beliefs in slavery that he was going to go to all lengths to make Nicaragua the way he believed that it should be. He was driven by greed. Nicaragua had one of the main transport links between the Atlantic and Pacific oceans shipping in the 1850’s. Walker was very aware of this and knew that it would be a key transport in the slave trade. Some would say the Iraq war is over oil, which would be a large advantage to the U.S., just like how Walkers slave trade would have helped the South. He wasn’t concerned with what the consequences would be. He had a lot of confidence in his troops, and he felt that would be enough to win over Nicaragua, There are many stories of Walker and his troop’s courage, but that only lasts so long. He was so overly confident that he didn’t think he would need added support, and he didn’t, for a while, but that only led him to failure a few years later.
The U.S. now and then had very many parallels. Walker’s War and the Iraq War were both motivated because they wanted something more. From both wars there was something to be gained of materialistic value. Both wars did not have very much support. America went into this war without the support of the United Nations and Walker went into war without the support of the U.S.A. A lot of Governmental policies have been ignored all throughout history, and it is still true to this day, if people actually followed our policies many bad situations could be avoided and we wouldn’t be left paying the consequences.
America’s foreign policy is very one sided. Most factors having to do with the U.S.’s foreign policy have a much greater advantage to the U.S, but I suppose most foreign policies are the same as well. The Monroe Doctrine is one of the most Unilateral Declarations in the U.S.’s Foreign Policy. It was a symbol of America’s control and power in the whole Western Hemisphere. America had defined its interests in the New World. Walker felt as if he could have a hand on North America and make it a slave state, partly because of the Monroe Doctrine.
“The occasion has been judged proper for asserting, as a principle in which the rights and interests on the United States are involved, that the American continents, by the free and independent condition which they have assumed and maintained, are hence forth not to be considered as subjects for future colonization by any European powers (Monroe Doctrine).”
William Walker felt as if he was not violating the Monroe Doctrine, and he wasn’t, but he was in fact violating the nation's neutrality laws. He invaded foreign countries without government permission. Walker’s story is a lot like the war we are in today.
LimeGreenToeSox: then the 3 different paragraphs giving examplles of how it was good or bad
LimeGreenToeSox: then the last paragrapgh is like a conclusion of it all
“underground railroad” that assisted former slaves to freedom during the US Civil War in the 1860's. The slaves who wanted freedom and those who helped them were willing to face great risks to life and limb to make it across dangerous territory.
Possibly Cox's most daring move with Walker was to draw explicit parallels between America's current foreign policy towards Nicaragua and Walker's invasion of that country. His account of William Walker's bloody invasion of Nicaragua in the 1850s was all too-clearly a comment on America's then involvement in the terrorist war between the Sandinist National Liberation Front (FSLN) and the Nicaraguan people in the 1980s
an American foreign policy opposing interference in the Western hemisphere from outside powers [syn: Monroe Doctrine
Walker can expect punishment more for taking an unpopular position than for violating a law.
Freedom has long included the liberty to ignore governmental policy and to suffer the consequences. Walker has done that.
The Territorial Question.
Speech of Mr. Douglas.
In the Senate, March 13 and 14, 1850.
http://facweb.furman.edu/~benson/docs/Douglas50.htm
[p17]
"Sir, that body of northern and eastern men, who gave those votes at that time, are now seen taking upon themselves, in the nomenclature of politics, the appellation of the northern Democracy. They undertook to wield the destinies of this Empire, if I may call a Republic an Empire, and their policy was, and they persisted in it, to bring into this country all the territory they could. They did under pledges -- absolute pledges to the slave interest in the case of Texas, and afterward they led to their aid in bringing in these new conquests."
[p18]
"Under pledges -- absolute pledges to the slave interest." These are bold assertions. Where are those pledges to be found? Where are the evidences of them? What were the terms, and by whom given?
[p19]
Mr. Webster. When a resolution was brought in here by the Senator from Georgia [Mr. Berrien] against continuing the war for the acquisition of territory, it was negatived by the votes of the northern Democracy.
[p20]
Mr. Douglas. Well, does that vote prove that it was done under pledges to the slave interest? It only proves that the Whigs, who voted for the resolution, were opposed to the acquisition of California and New Mexico, and that the Democrats, who voted against it, were in favor of the acquisition. That is all it proves, and that we are proud to confess. The Democracy claim California and New Mexico as the rich fruits of their labors. We acknowledge with pride, that we stood by our country in a just war against a cruel and perfidious foe, and that the acquisition of those territories are some of the substantial results of our policy. And because we annexed Texas, and thereby provided for the exclusion of slavery from five and a half degrees of latitude, in which it then had legal existence, at the same time a provision for its exclusion hereafter by the action of the people themselves, from a large portion of the residue, and because we supported our country's cause in time of war, and in consequence, acquired five or six hundred square miles of territory, from which slavery is excluded "by the arrangement of things by the Power be above us," the Senator very generously infers, that it must necessarily all have been done "under absolute pledges to the slave interest." What a logical deduction! How irresistible the inference! How can fail to work conviction in the mind of every candid man, after reading the following description of the country, from the Senator's own speech:
[p23]
"I look upon, therefore, as a fixed fact, to use in expression current at this day, that both California and New Mexico are destined to be free, as far as they are settled at all, which I believe, especially in regard to New Mexico, will be very little for a great length of time -- free by the arrangement of things by the Power above us. I have, therefore, to say, in this respect also, that this country is fixed for freedom to as many persons as shall ever live in it, by as irrepealable and more irrepealable a law, than the law that attaches to the right of holding slaves in Texas; and I will say further, that if a resolution or law were now be for me, to provide a territorial government for New Mexico, I would not vote to put any prohibition into it whatever. The use of such a prohibition would be idle, as it respects any effect it would have upon the territory; and I would all not take pains to reaffirm an ordinance of Nature, nor to reenact the will of God. And I would not put in no Wilmot proviso, for the purpose of a taunt or reproach."
[p24]
Well, sir, one would suppose that "the slave interest" must feel itself under eternal obligation to the northern Democracy for having brought such a country into this Union, in opposition to the combined forces of northern and southern Whiggery, as shown by the votes on Mr. Berrien's resolution. The northern Democracy can hardly hope for forgiveness for such a sin against freedom, and such a service to the slave power.
The Territorial Question.
Speech of Mr. Douglas.
In the Senate, March 13 and 14, 1850.
[p1]
The Senate having under consideration the message of the President of the United States transmitting the Constitution of California
[p2]
Mr. Douglas addressed the Senate as follows:
[p3]
Mr. President: before entering into the discussion of the series of questions in the range of this debate, I must be permitted to refer to some points in the able and eloquent speech of the distinguished Senator from Massachusetts. I regret exceedingly that in a speech that so eminently liberal, national, and patriotic, on all the points which unfortunately disturb and distract the country, he should have deemed it necessary to have marred its harmony, and broken its force, by introducing taunts and criminations of a mere partisan character. His attacks upon the northern Democracy, in connection with the annexation of Texas, and the support of the Mexican war, and the acquisition of territory by the treaty of peace, were as gratuitous and unprovoked as they were unfounded and unjust. He charged the northern Democracy with having supported the annexation of Texas under "pledges to the slave interest," for the purpose of sustaining the slave power of this Union. Gladly, sir, would I pass by in silence this act of in justice, and others of equal enormity, could I do so in justice to myself, and those with whom I have ever been associated politically, and the members of the House of Representatives with whom I acted in concert on the annexation question. I must be permitted to tell the Senator from Massachusetts, that neither his present position, nor his past political associations, authorize him to speak for the Democracy of this Union, North or South, or of the motives which influence their action, any further than he finds those motives and reasons recorded in the speeches and political history of the times. It is not his mission to divine our motives, and assigned to us sentiments and opinions which we have never entertained, much less expressed. I claim at least in equal right with him to speak for the Democracy upon all questions, and especially upon the annexation of Texas; and I now tell him, with entire respect, but with a certain knowledge of the truth of what I say, that of the vast multitude of speeches made by northern Democrats want the Texas question, in no one of them can he find a single sentence, sentiment, or word, to justify the sweeping charges he has made against the whole body of Democratic Senators and Representatives from the North, who supported the annexation of Texas. On the contrary, sir, every northern man, who spoke in favor of the annexation of Texas, expressly and indignantly repudiated the doctrine now imputed to them by the Senator from Massachusetts, and assigned entirely different, and in many instances directly opposite, reasons for supporting that measure. I am unable to comprehend that system of courtesy or morals, which authorizes the distinguished Senator to charge a large body of public men, in the performance of high public duties, with having been influenced by motives different from those avowed by themselves at the time. And how is this charge attempted to be maintained? We are reminded that the then Secretary of State, [Mr. Calhoun,] in his correspondence with Mr. Murphy, the chargé d'affairs in the Republic of Texas, and Mr. King, minister to France, boldly and frankly avowed that he was negotiating the treaty of their annexation for the purpose and with the view of giving security to the slave interest in the States bordering upon Texas, and therefore the Senator from Massachusetts boldly assumes that the northern Democrats, one and all, supported the measure upon the grounds and for the reasons stated by Mr. Calhoun. By this process of reasoning, he attempts to fasten the charge, not only upon the Senators and representatives, but upon the great mass of voters -- the whole Democratic organization -- including a vast majority of the people in the free States. This view is ingenious and plausible; but I submit to the candor of the Senator, whether it is fair and just? The Senator keeps out of view -- no, he is incapable of that; he has forgotten -- one important chapter in the history of this question, which changes its whole character, and overturns his position. I will refresh his memory. When President Tyler sent the treaty of annexation to the Senate for ratification, this body by resolution, called for all the correspondence upon the subject. When it was furnished to the Senate, and disclosed to the world, who does not remember -- what friend of Texas can ever forget -- the excitement and universal burst of abhorrence and indignation that a great and favorite national measure should have been butchered and destroyed by those intrusted with its consummation? Dismay, mortification, despondency, bordering on despair, was depicted in the countenance of every friend of Texas, while her enemies exulted with great joy, that the administration of Mr. Tyler, and especially the Secretary of State, had placed the measure upon grounds that all America -- yes, the whole civilized world -- must repudiate, and thereby had surrounded it with an odium and prejudice that might enable them to defeat annexation forever. From that moment the friends of Texas abandoned the idea of annexation through the treaty-making power, under the administration of Mr. Tyler. The treaty was indignantly and contemptuously rejected by the Senate, in order to repudiate the Administration, and all it had done and said in regard to Texas, and especially the correspondence with Messrs. King and Murphy, to which the Senator from Massachusetts has so often referred. The treaty was rejected; the Administration was justly and severely rebuked; the correspondence with Messrs. King and Murphy was repudiated, and here ends the chapter of the correspondence and treaty negotiated by the administration of Mr. Tyler for the annexation of Texas. The Senator from South Carolina may think, as he said in his speech the other day, that he had more to do with the annexation of Texas than any other man in the country. I have no desire to deprive him of this consoling reflection. I would not have referred to it in a matter to deprive him of any of the credit he claims for himself, had he not volunteered his testimony, to a certain extent, in aid of the charges of the Senator from Massachusetts against the northern democracy. But as a conclusion from the chapter of history to which I have referred, I must be permitted to say to him, in all sincerity and kindness, that, my opinion, he did more to embarrass the friends and encourage the enemies of Texas -- more to hazard the success of the measure, to envelop it in clouds of odium and prejudice -- than all other man in America. But further weapons furnished in the correspondence alluded to, the enemies of annexation could not have rallied a majority against the measure in any one State of the Union.
[p4]
Mr. President, I find I am diverging from the thread of my remarks. My object was to show, that the treaty and correspondence, and all the acts of the Tyler administration connected therewith, were rejected and repudiated before the Democratic Party came to the support of the Texas annexation as a party. Having thrown off the aim to bus, and cut loose from all embarrassing alliances, but the Democracy, North and South, came to the rescue, and annexed Texas upon broad national grounds, elevated far above, and totally disconnected from, the question the slavery -- considerations which addressed themselves to the patriotism and pride of every American -- considerations connected with the extension of territory, of commerce, of navigation, of political power, of national security, and glory as one people without especial reference to any particular section. These were the grounds upon which the Democratic Party unfurled the Texas flag to the breeze , in the presidential election of 1844, and received on overwhelming verdict of the popular voice in our favor. The people decreed the annexation of Texas in that election, upon the grounds thus assumed, proclaimed, and defended by the great national Democratic Party. It was the act of the people themselves, leaving to the representatives in Congress the duty of recording the verdict which their constituents had pronounced. Texas was annexed without any distinct reference to the question of slavery. It was supported, not as a measure of hostility nor of protection to that institution. It had no more connection with it and the tariff, the census, the navigation laws, the public lands, or a great number of the questions of public policy which are the subjects of daily legislation. All of them have more or less to do with the question of slavery, because the laws are uniform in their operation, and consequently, in their practical application, relate to the slaveholding as well as the free States. So it was with the annexation of Texas. If I have shown an undue degree of sensitiveness moved to under these attacks upon the northern Democracy, I trust I will be excused, when it is considered that I was one of those northern Democrats who, in the House of Representatives, supported the annexation of Texas, with all of the zeal and energy of my nature.
[p5]
Mr. Webster. With a touch of the northwest -- the northwestern Democracy.
[p6]
Mr. Douglas. Yes, sir; I am glad to hear the Senator say with a touch of the northwest; I thank you for the distinction. We have heard so much talk about the North and the South, as if those two sections were the only ones necessary to be taken into consideration, when gentlemen begin to mature their arrangements for dissolution all the union, and to mark the dividing lines upon the maps, that I'm gratified to find that there are those who appreciate the important truth, but there is a power in this nation greater than either the North or the South -- a growing, increasing, swelling power, that will be able to speak the law to this nation, and to execute the law as spoken. That power is the country known as the great West -- the Valley of the Mississippi, one and invisible from the gulf to the great lakes, and stretching, on the one side and the other, to the extreme sources of the Ohio and Missouri -- from the Alleghenies to the Rocky Mountains. There, sir, is the hope of this nation -- the resting place of the power that is not only to control, but to save, the Union. We furnish the water that makes the Mississippi, and we intend to follow, navigate, and use it until it loses itself in the briny ocean. So with the St. Lawrence. We intend to keep open and enjoy both of these great outlets to the ocean, and all between them we intend to take under our especial protection, and keep and preserve as one free, happy, and united people. This is the mission of the great Mississippi Valley, the heart and soul of the nation and the continent. We know the responsibilities that devolve upon us, and our people will show themselves equal to them. We indulge in no ultraisms -- no sectional strifes -- no crusades against the North or the South. Our aim will be to do justice to all, to all men, to every section. We are prepared to fulfill all our obligations under the Constitution as it is, and determined to maintain into preserve it inviolate in its letter and spirit. Such is the position, the destiny, and the purpose of the great Northwest. Had the Senator from Massachusetts thus clearly discriminated in his printed speech, as he now intimates, that he did not intend to include my own section in his denunciations of the northern Democracy, I should have left my political friends from the North East to have made their own vindication; but, sir, when he told us there were about fifty northern votes in the House of Representatives, and thirteen in the Senate, for the annexation resolutions, and then went onto particularize how many of them were from New England, and the residue from the other free states of the Union, I could not doubt that he intended to include the whole of the free states, my own among the others.
[p7]
In immediate connection with this, there is another portion of the speech of the Senator from Massachusetts, which I deem it my duty to notice. Speaking of the annexation of Texas, he said:
[p8]
"From that time, the whole country from here to the western boundary of Texas, was fixed, pledged, fastened, decided to be slave territory forever, by the solemn guaranties of law."
[p9]
In reply to this, I must be permitted to tell the Senator that I do not so understand the act, nor does it so read. If he had made this statement, without referring to the resolutions of annexation, I should have suppose that his recollection had failed him -- that he had been misinformed, mistaken, deceived in the matter. But, sir, when this statement is made with the resolutions before him, and the particular one, bearing upon this point, being read and incorporated into his speech, I know not what conclusion to draw. I refrain from expressing any opinion upon the subject. I will content myself with reading the resolution itself from the gentleman's own speech:
[p10]
"New States, and of convenient size, not exceeding four in number, in addition to said state of Texas at, and having sufficient population, may hereafter, by the consent South said state, be formed out of the territory thereof, which shall be entitled to admission under the provisions of the Federal Constitution, and such states as may be formed out of that portion of said territory lying south of thirty-six degrees thirty minutes north latitude, commonly known as the Missouri compromise line, shall be admitted into the union with or without slavery, as the people of each State, asking admission may desire; and such state or states as shall be formed out of said territory north of said Missouri compromise line, slavery or involuntary servitude (except for crime) shall be prohibited."
[p11]
In the face of this fundamental law, we are told that "from here to the western boundary of Texas was fixed, pledged, fastened, decided to be slave territory forever, by the solemn guaranties of law!" Was there ever such a torturing of language -- such a perversion of meaning? There is no guarantee -- no pledge -- no intimation even of the kind. The very reverse is the fact. While Texas remained an independent Power, it was all slave territory from the Gulf of Mexico to the forty-second parallel of latitude. By the resolution of annexation, five and a half degrees of the slave territory, to wit, all between thirty-six and a half and the forty-second parallels, were to be, "fixed, pledged, fastened, decided to be "free, and not"slave, territory forever, by the solemn guaranties of law." Here is a territory, stretching across five and a half degrees of latitude, withdrawn from slavery, and devoted to freedom, by the very act which the Senator has chosen to denounce and deride as the work of the northern Democracy. Nor is this all. That part of Texas lying south of 36°30' is not "pledged to slavery," as stated by the Senator from Massachusetts.
[p12]
Mr. Webster. I said that every acre of that territory, which, from its natureand character, is susceptible of slave cultivation, was fixed and pledged, mortgaged and hypothecated to slavery by the resolutions of annexation. I did not of course refer to the mountain country, different in its character, and where slaves cannot exist.
[p13]
Mr. Douglas. Yes, sir, there is a mountainous country, not only north but south of 36°30', where slaves cannot live. That country, which, from its nature and character, is not susceptible of slave cultivation, is large enough to embrace at least three of the five States into which Texas may be subdivided by the resolutions of annexation. And when the northern Democrats are arraigned and condemned for having contributed to the extension of slavery, the five and a half degrees of latitude north of 36°30', for which provision was made to be converted from slave into free territory absolutely, and probably double that amount south of that line by the action of the people themselves, when they come to form a State constitution, ought to have been brought to the notice of the public, and put to our credit in the statement of the account.
[p14]
We have a right to complain, also, of that portion of the Senator's speech which relates to the country south of 36°30'. The resolution does not provide that that portion, or any part of it, shall continue slave territory, or become slave States. Such is not the reading, nor the intention, nor the fair construction, of the resolution. It provides that the States to be formed south of 36°30', "shall be admitted into the Union with or without slavery, as the people of each State asking admission may desire." Before the annexation of Texas, all the territory in the Republic was included in one State, and subject to one uniform system of laws. Of that vast territory, a small portion, say one-fourth, was capable of producing either sugar or cotton, and consequently adapted to slave labor, while the residue consisted of elevated table-lands, and high mountain ridges, with climate and productions totally unsuited to the health and employment of the slave. The population of Texas at that in was confined to the lowlands -- the sugar and cotton regions -- were slave labor was profitably employed. The laws and institutions were adapted to the condition and wishes of the people, by and for whom they were established. So long as Texas should remain one State, with a uniform system of laws -- the preponderance of population and political power residing in the lower country -- the institution of slavery must have been fastened upon the people of the upper country against their will, and without their consent. In view of this probable contingency, the resolution of annexation provides for the division of Texas into any num