Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo: US

The Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo ended the U. S. -Mexican War. Signed on February 2, 1848, it is the oldest treaty still in force between the United States and Mexico. As a result of the treaty, the United States acquired more than 500,000 square miles of valuable territory and emerged as a world power in the late nineteenth century. Beyond territorial gains and losses, the treaty has been important in shaping the international and domestic histories of both Mexico and the United States. During the U.

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S. -Mexican War, U. S. eaders assumed an attitude of moral superiority in their negotiations of the treaty. They viewed the forcible incorporation of almost one-half of Mexico’s national territory as an event foreordained by providence, fulfilling Manifest Destiny to spread the benefits of U. S. democracy to the lesser peoples of the continent.

Because of its military victory the United States virtually dictated the terms of settlement. The treaty established a pattern of political and military inequality between the two countries, and this lopsided relationship has stalked Mexican-U.

S. relations ever since. Signing the treaty was only the beginning of the process; it still had to be approved by the congresses of both the United States and Mexico. No one could foresee how the Polk administration would receive a treaty negotiated by an unofficial agent; nor could they know the twists and turns of the Mexican political scene for the next few months. In both the U. S. and Mexican governments there was opposition to the treaty.

In the United States, the northern abolitionists opposed the annexation of Mexican territory.

In the Mexican congress, a sizable minority was in favor of continuing the fight. Nevertheless both countries ratified the document. The signing of the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo marked the end of a war and the beginning of a lengthy U. S. political debate over slavery in the acquired territories, as well as continued conflict with Mexico over boundaries. In the Article V we can read that Mexico ceded to the United States Upper California and New Mexico, and included present-day Arizona and New Mexico and parts of Utah, Nevada, and Colorado.

Mexico relinquished all claims to Texas and recognized the Rio Grande as the southern boundary with the United States—the border was seen by Mexico to be the Nueces River before the treaty. This is how United States obtained the territories mentioned above. In the Article VIII residents needed to decided to stay in territory that now belongs to United States or leave to Mexico, it is important to mention that this article is applied to was already established in this state, due to this article now Mexicans needed to decided whether they would stay in “United States” or go to the Republic of Mexico.

They could leave and still keep their land or stay and choose on becoming a United States Citizen or keep their Mexican Nationality. The time to decide was a year if the year passed and residences have not taken a decision they will become United States citizens automatically. In the Article IX Mexicans who opted to become citizens will have the rights that were given by the United States to their citizens, they will have the liberty to practice any religion, and they will also be free to have property and total freedom.

On the article X of course this was a legal document before been omitted by the US Senate use to grant lad made by Mexican Government in territories that before belonged to Mexico. This article was to protect Mexicans and provide them with land, we can say that this article was extinguished because it was a way to give Mexicans the right to own land in a territory that was being governed by the United States but was taken from Mexico. Later on Article X was replace by The Protocol of Queretaro.

On 30 May 1848, when the two countries exchanged ratifications of the treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo, they further negotiated a three-article protocol to explain the amendments. The first article stated that the original Article IX of the treaty, although replaced by Article III of the Treaty of Louisiana, would still confer the rights delineated in Article IX. The second article confirmed the legitimacy of land grants pursuant to Mexican law.

The protocol further noted that said explanations had been accepted by the Mexican Minister of Foreign Affairs on behalf of the Mexican Government, and was signed in Santiago de Queretaro by A. H. Sevier, Nathan Clifford and Luis de la Rosa. The U. S. would later go on to ignore the protocol on the grounds that the U. S. representatives had over-reached their authority in agreeing to it. In my opinion The United States used all of these articles to satisfy their guilt for taking Mexican territory by war.