The Southwestern Historical Quarterly, Volume 18, July 1914 - April, 1915 Page: 82
438 p. : ill. ; 23 cm.View a full description of this periodical.
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The Southwestern Historical Quarterly
the best interests of the American Union would be conserved, be-
cause the admission of Texas would hasten the inevitable disinte-
gration; the best interest of the Southern states would be con-
served, because a strong western power with similar interests and
institutions would thus be ready to combine with them when they
should be forced into secession.
It is interesting to note, in connection with the third argu-
ment an extract from a letter written by Ram6n Musquiz, the
political chief of Texas, on March 11, 1833.9 Musquiz, after
speaking of the desire of the United States to acquire Texas, adds:
It is also well known that the southern States of our neighboring
republic have a tendency to secede from their northern sisters and
organize themselves into a separate nation; in which direction
one effort has already been made this year by South Carolina.
To such new national organization the acquisition of Texas would
be a boon of transcendent value, adding, as it would, so ex-
tensively to its territorial area and multiplying so largely its
sources of wealth.
A letter of Memucan Hunt, minister of Texas to the United
States, written on April 15, 1837, to the Texan department of
state,10 is also of interest in this connection, because of its sug-
gestion that the possibility of the confederation of seceded South-
ern states and an independent Texas as the alternative of an-
nexation be held as a whip over the heads of anti-annexationists,
in view of the great danger to the North and the great advantage
to the South of a disruption of the Union.
The lack of influence of these arguments and speculations upon
the ultimate outcome of the matter, the fact that their promul-
gators in several instances became later the warmest advocates
of annexation, do not lessen their interest in view of the insight
which they give into the working of men's minds at a momentous
period of our history; moreover, in the fact that they were ad-
vanced by extreme nullification and pro-slavery men lies a con-
temporary refutation of the contemporary and later view of the
entire course of Texan colonization and revolution as a pro-
slavery conspiracy.
"Translation in Brown, History of Texas, I, 225-226, and by Dr. Ethel
Zivley Rather in TiE QUARTERLY, VIII, 138-139.
"Garrison, Dip. Cor. Texas, I, 208.
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Texas State Historical Association. The Southwestern Historical Quarterly, Volume 18, July 1914 - April, 1915, periodical, 1915; Austin, Texas. (https://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metapth101064/m1/88/?rotate=270: accessed April 26, 2024), University of North Texas Libraries, The Portal to Texas History, https://texashistory.unt.edu; crediting Texas State Historical Association.