The Southwestern Historical Quarterly, Volume 55, July 1951 - April, 1952 Page: 163

THE SOUTHWESTERN HISTORICAL QUARTERLY
VOL. LV OCTOBER, 1951 No. 2
Zhe &volution of Couity govermeft
in the Republic of rexas
SEYMOUR V. CONNOR
I
What the French are in military affairs, the Americans are
in every kind of civil business; let them be left without a
government, every body of Americans is able to improvise
one, and to carry on that or any other public business with
a suficient amount of intelligence, order and decision.
-MILL, On Liberty.
HE experience of Anglo-Americans in Texas vitalizes this
philosophical observation by John Stuart Mill. Through-
out the American frontier several generations had gained
participating experience in creating government, and west of the
Sabine this particular genius of the American people fructified
in the establishment of an independent Republic. The details of
establishing a working government were many, and one of the
most serious, certainly one of the most bothersome, of these was
the problem of local government. Yet that issue was fundamental
in the situation that had resulted in revolution.
The government of the Republic of Texas had its first organ-
ized beginnings as a state government under the defunct Mexican
Constitution of 1824; it was a provisional government, but more
important, it was the creation of the Anglo-American settlers in
Texas, and doubtless many who participated in its organization
in 1835 anticipated an independent status in the near future.
In point of fact it was independent from its inception.
The Provisional Government, and the "Organic Law" under
which it functioned, was an amalgamation of Anglo-American
experience and tradition with the existing Mexican institutions.