2004-7-21
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VOICE ONE:
THE MAKING OF A NATION -- a program in Special English.
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Once more, in the year
eighteen-forty-three, Texas had become a major issue in American
politics. President John Tyler wanted to make it a state in the
Union. But his secretary of state, Daniel Webster, was cool toward
the idea. Webster was a northerner and was opposed to having another
slave state in the Union.
Tyler needed Webster's political support and therefore did not
push the issue. Then, Webster resigned. And the president appointed
a southern supporter, Abel Upshur, as secretary of state. Four
months after taking the job, Upshur began negotiations to bring
Texas into the union. A few weeks before these negotiations were
completed, Upshur was killed in an accident.
Tyler was a Whig. But he made a Democrat -- John C. Calhoun --
his secretary of state. He did so for two reasons. Calhoun also
wanted Texas in the Union. And Tyler, although he was a Whig, hoped
that Calhoun might be able to get him nominated in
eighteen-forty-four as the presidential candidate of the Democratic
Party.
VOICE TWO:
Calhoun completed the talks that Upshur had begun. And the treaty
with Texas was signed April twelfth, eighteen-forty-four. A few days
later, a letter from Calhoun to the British minister in Washington
was made public. The letter was Calhoun's answer to a British note
saying that Britain wished to end slavery wherever it existed.
Calhoun defended slavery in the
American south. He said that what was called slavery was really a
political institution necessary for the peace, safety, and economic
strength of those states where it existed. Calhoun said that
statehood for Texas was necessary to the peace and security of the
United States. He said that ending slavery in Texas would be a
danger to the American south and to the Union itself.
VOICE ONE:
Calhoun made it seem that the United States wanted Texas -- not
because of some great national interest -- but only to protect
slavery in the south. The letter created great opposition to Texas
statehood in the north. People called on their senators to vote
against the acceptance of Texas. President Tyler sent the treaty
with Texas to the Senate on April twenty-second,
eighteen-forty-four.
This was just nine days before the Whig party opened its national
convention in Baltimore. Everybody was sure that the Whigs would
choose Senator Henry Clay as their presidential candidate. Clay had
been working hard for the nomination for more than two years. The
Democrats were to hold their convention a month later. Former
President Martin Van Buren was the choice of most Democrats.
VOICE TWO:
Both Clay and Van Buren opposed
statehood for Texas. Clay said it would lead to war with Mexico. Van
Buren agreed. As expected, Clay was chosen as the Whig Party's
candidate for president. But Van Buren was given a surprise. The
Democrats adopted a rule that their candidate must receive at least
two-thirds of the votes...one-hundred and seventy-seven of the
two-hundred and sixty-six delegates to the convention. Van Buren won
a majority of the votes...one-hundred and forty-six. But that was
not enough.
The convention voted again. But Van Buren still fell short of the
necessary two-thirds. The delegates voted again and again without
giving Van Buren the number he needed. After a time, Van Buren began
to lose votes. None of the names nominated seemed able to win the
necessary two-thirds. At last, another name was proposed: James K.
Polk. Polk was at one time governor of Tennessee and Speaker of the
House of Representatives. He was a supporter of statehood for Texas.
VOICE ONE:
The convention delegates voted for the eighth time. Polk got only
forty-four votes. Then they voted again. This time, polk received
all two-hundred sixty-six votes. Senator Silas Wright of New York
was chosen as candidate for the vice-presidency. But he refused to
accept, because he did not support making Texas a state. The
Democrats then chose Senator George Dallas of Pennsylvania. Two
other parties offered candidates in the eighteen-forty-four
elections. President Tyler formed a party of his supporters and
government workers. They met and nominated him for president. A
fourth group, the Liberty Party, was organized by northeastern
Abolitionists after the Democratic and Whig parties refused to
oppose slavery. Representatives from six states met at Albany, New
York. They chose James Birney for president.
VOICE TWO:
Texas was the chief issue of the eighteen-forty-four campaign.
President Tyler had sent the treaty with Texas to the Senate for
approval. The Senate received it just one week after the democratic
convention. Those senators who had supported Martin Van Buren were
still bitter over the party's failure to nominate him as its
candidate. They joined with the Whigs to defeat the treaty:
thirty-five to sixteen.
Tyler still hoped to get statehood for Texas. James K. Polk, the
Democratic candidate, also campaigned on promises to get Texas for
the United States. The Whig candidate, Henry Clay, at first opposed
statehood for Texas. But this position began to cost him support in
the south. Then he said statehood might be possible if most of the
people wanted it. This satisfied the slave owners of the south who
wanted Texas in the Union as a slave state.
Clay angered many people in the
north because he softened his opposition to Texas. Some of these
began supporting the Liberty Party candidate, James Birney. The
Democrats were able to get President Tyler to withdraw as a
candidate. They told him that he would take votes from the Democrats
and might make Clay president.
Wild campaign charges were made against both Polk and Clay. Clay
was called a gambler, a duelist, a man of dishonest deals. Stories
were told about Clay's use of strong language and his love of card
games. Whig newspapers reported that a traveler saw a group of
slaves being sold in Tennessee. Burned into the skin of each of the
slaves, the papers said, were the letters j-k-p. The initials of
James K. Polk.
The election was very close.
Two-million seven-hundred-thousand people voted. Polk received only
thirty-eight-thousand votes more than Clay. But Polk got
one-hundred-seventy electoral votes. Clay got only one-hundred-five.
VOICE ONE:
The election was really decided in New York state. Clay lost the
state's thirty-six electoral votes. But he did so by just
fifty-one-hundred votes. He might have won the state had not James
Birney received more than fifteen-thousand votes in New York.
President Tyler believed Polk's victory showed that the American
people wanted statehood for Texas. But he knew that he could never
get the Senate's approval of a Texas statehood treaty. It would take
two-thirds of the Senate vote to do so. So Tyler proposed other
action to make Texas a state. When Congress met in December, he
proposed that Texas be given statehood through a joint resolution by
both the House and Senate. Such a resolution needed only a simple
majority for approval.
A resolution calling for the annexation of Texas was passed by
the house in January, eighteen-forty-five, and by the Senate on
February twenty-seventh. Tyler signed the bill on March first...just
three days before he stepped down as president.
VOICE TWO:
The resolution invited Texas to join the Union as a state. It
gave Texas the right to split itself into as many as four more
states when its population was large enough. Texas could keep its
public lands. But it had to pay its own debts. And Texas could enter
the Union as a slave state.
The Mexican minister to Washington protested the resolution. He
called it an act of aggression against his country. He demanded his
passport and returned to Mexico. Britain and France tried to prevent
Texas from becoming a state. They got Mexico to agree to recognize
Texas independence, but only if Texas would not join the United
States.
VOICE ONE:
Texas thus had two choices. It could become a state in the United
States. Or it could continue as a republic with its independence
recognized by Mexico. The Texas Congress chose statehood. President
Polk looked even farther to the west for more new territory.
That will be our story in the next program of THE MAKING OF A
NATION.
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VOICE TWO:
You have been listening to the Special English program, THE
MAKING OF A NATION. Your narrators were Stuart Spencer and Maurice
Joyce. Our program was written by Frank Beardsley.