THE TREATY OF GUADALUPE HIDALGO February 2, 1848 With all due respect to Martin Luther King Jr, Cesar Chavez and Reis Lopez Tijerina, who recently passed away, the civil rights movement did not begin in 1967. For our ancestors here in Texas they struggled just for the right to exist ever since the treaty was signed. With newly arrived Anglos from the United States wishing to steal land belonging to Tejanos many court houses would mysteriously burn destroying any documents pertaining to land ownership. Most of those documents of ownership however were never recorded and would remain in the hands of land grant owners. Being unfamiliar with the new US laws it became easier for the land to be stolen. Often lawless men would arrive at a Tejano ranch and order the owner to sign it over and get out and if not his widow would sign it in the morning. Some Historians argue that the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo did not apply to Texas since it was already a part of the Union. But there are always two sides to every story. Mexico did not recognize the independence of Texas until after the US Mexican War of 1846-1848; up until then Texas was considered a rogue state and still part of Mexico. Reis Lopez Tijerina would argue that a treaty was the Supreme law of the Land and that the document called for equal protection under the law for any Mexican that wished to remain on this side of the border. However that was far from reality and that equal protection sounded good in theory but not in reality. Our ancestors would literally fight to maintain human and property rights even using the unfamiliar new government court. Under the new government the people had the right to petition the government for the redress of grievances; however our ancestors would realize that this right would not apply to them and their struggle within the system would be to no avail. Armando B. Rendon J.D. argues that the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo is a living document and it provides guarantees which are protected not only on a domestic level but internationally as well. His arguments are sound and valid and I recommend his “Proposed Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo to International Courts” be read by serious students of Texas history. Nicolas Trist, Chief Clerk of the US State Department would be sent to Mexico City to negotiate a peace treaty with the Mexican Government. His orders were to remain firm and demand Mexico forfeit half of its territory to the United States. After months of negotiations the Mexican delegates had agreed and arrived to sign the peace treaty and one of the Mexican delegates approached Trist and said “This must be a very proud moment for you.” Later, in a letter to his wife Trist would write “that if the Mexican delegate had at that moment seen into my heart he would have discovered how ashamed I was of being an American.” In other words he knew what he and his government had done was wrong. Ulysses S. Grant would also write that “if there had ever been a most unjust unprovoked war it was the War with Mexico. President Dwight D. Eisenhower in this countries first visit to Mexico by a president since the US Mexican War would also say that never again would a nation of greater power be allowed to attack a weaker nation in this hemisphere. I leave it to the reader to form his own conclusions. Dan Arellano
Posted on: Wed, 21 Jan 2015 22:04:35 +0000
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