September 4, 2026 • 20 mins
On this episode of Our American Stories, after winning its independence from Mexico in 1836, Texas faced a new challenge: surviving as its own country. The young republic struggled with debt, threats from Mexico, conflicts on the frontier, and political divisions over whether its future lay as an independent nation or as part of the United States. Meanwhile, the question of annexing Texas became tangled in the national debate over slavery and America's growing belief in Manifest Destiny.
Texas State Historian Monte Monroe tells the story of the Republic of Texas, from the presidencies of Sam Houston and Mirabeau B. Lamar to the political battle that finally brought Texas into the Union in 1845.
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Speaker 1 (00:10):
And we return to our American stories. Up next, a
history story. In 1845, Texas joined the Union as a country,
the only state in our nation to do so. It
was a long road to get to that point. Texas
first had to fight a war for independence, which they
managed to gain against all odds after the Battle of
(00:32):
San Jacinto. Here to tell the rest of the story
is Monty Monroe, the Texas state historian. Take it away, Monty.
Speaker 2 (00:40):
The first national Texas election was a contest of personalities
rather than politics. And Sam Houston was elected president over
Stephen F. Austin and Henry Smith by an 80% vote.
That was quite a bit. Houston would dominate Texas in
this era in the same way that Lyndon Baines Johnson
did in the 20th century. He was an imposing figure.
(01:04):
He was a close friend of Andrew Jackson. He had
been a congressman, governor of Tennessee. He ran on a
platform of annexation. Like George Washington after the American Revolution,
Houston would draw his cabinet from members of both revolutionary factions.
He appointed Stephen F. Austin as the first Secretary of State,
(01:26):
but Austin, unfortunately, the so-called father of Texas, died in
December of 1836. cutting short his valuable career. There was
actually a 30-day period of mourning for him. Henry Smith
became the Secretary of the Treasury. Thomas J. Rusk, another
(01:47):
important Texas revolutionary name, would become Secretary of War. And
Maribor B. Lamar, who would become the second president of Texas,
was elected as vice president. He was the chief political
opponent of Sam Houston during all of this. There were
many issues that were problematic during the first Houston administration.
(02:08):
The frontier was one of those. There was always fear
of future Mexican invasion. Indeed, that happened. Houston viewed a
standing army as a problem. He was afraid that they
would be agitating to invade Mexico. He didn't want that
to happen because the Republic of Texas was a fragile
state at that time. So he offered land to those
(02:31):
who would agree to a discharge or he was going
to disband the volunteers and ship them back to New Orleans. Ultimately,
there would be Texas Ranger companies that would be organized
to deal with the various Indian threats, particularly the Comanche
and the Kiowas. Houston's inclinations to Indian relations tended to
(02:54):
run contrary to the will of the general population in
Texas and He signed a treaty with them, guaranteeing them
land in exchange for their neutrality with Mexico, but the
Texas Senate refused to ratify that treaty. The Republic of
Texas always had monetary problems, and this would be a
problem even for the state of Texas. During Houston's first term,
(03:15):
the public debt surpassed $ 2 million, which was a lot
of money back in those days. I don't know what
the equivalent would be now, but it would be in
the billions. Tariffs, custom duties at the ports and land fees,
business taxes, all of these were imposed, but they were
generally low. And the problem was most people didn't have
hard currency or specie, so they paid in kind. Many
(03:39):
times I've said they paid with chickens or whatnot, but
they paid with their crops. And so Houston literally had
to depend on his own personal credit to fund army
supplies and some government operations. Paper money was used, but
it ultimately, the Constitution, the Texas Constitution, barred him from
(04:02):
running for a second term, so he became the Republic's
principal ambassador to the United States. Maribel B. Lamar became
the second president. He was opposed to annexation, unlike his predecessor,
and he tried to make peace with Mexico, but he
wasn't successful. Lamar drove The Indians from Texas resettled them
(04:24):
to parts of Texas, and he was able to open
up rich lands, particularly in East Texas, for sale and settlement,
and it gave pioneers a bit of security, but it
was costly. It took another two and a half million
dollar toll on the treasury, and so he issued what
(04:45):
they called redbacks, and they ultimately plummeted to 12 cents
on the dollar, and so When the next president, Sam Houston,
who returned for a second term, comes into office, he
is faced or confronted by crippling debt. And he drastically
cut offices. He has a very frugal second term, spending
(05:09):
little money. He had a very generous land policy. He
gave 4,000, over 4,600 acres of land to families. And
then single individuals could gain up to $ 1, 400. acres of land.
And all of this led to a flood of immigration
into Texas. The Republic gave away, during its time, 41
(05:34):
million acres between 1836 and 1845. By 1846, the western
edge of the Texas frontier reached Dallas and Waco and
Corpus Christi, almost along what is today Interstate 35. The
population climbed from 40,000 in 1836 to 142,000 in 1847.
(06:03):
So by that time, because most of the immigrants came
from the American South, by 1845, Texas resembled the southern
states of the United States for all purposes. Most settlers
coming from the South grew cotton, corn, Sugarcane and many
brought slaves. As the last act of his presidency in 1837,
(06:30):
Andrew Jackson grants diplomatic recognition of the independence of Texans.
Texans immediately sought annexation, but they were rebuffed because of
this interest in maintaining good relations with Mexico and because
of anti-slavery opposition in Congress. consequently talk about annexation would languish.
(06:52):
By 1843, however, things are starting to change in the
United States. President John Tyler revives the annexation issue because
he starts to fear a growing British interest in Texas,
which is a whole different story. In 1844, Texas emissaries
and the U.S. Secretary of State, then John C. Calhoun,
(07:16):
hammer out a treaty of annexation that would have established
Texas as a territory. The treaty was defeated in the U.S.
Senate because, again, of anti-slavery opposition during an election year.
Despite that fact, Texas did become a major election issue
in 1844 because the Democratic candidate at that time, James K. Polk,
(07:41):
openly favored annexation. and ran on a strong expansionist platform.
He claimed that he would bring in Oregon, Texas, and
California into the Union in response to these mounting sentiments
in the United States of so-called manifest destiny. This notion
(08:02):
that Americans were God's chosen people and that they were
to spread their culture and religion across the North American
continent from the Atlantic to the Pacific. These notions were
fanned in the American press at the time, and Polk
capitalized on that sentiment. He was elected by an overwhelming majority,
(08:26):
and Polk's election and that mandate allows President Tyler, or
encouraged him, to prompt Congress to pass a joint resolution
on February 28, 1845, a simple majority resolution to annex Texas.
And that happened. Anson Jones becomes the last president of
(08:48):
the Republic of Texas.
Speaker 1 (08:49):
And you're listening to Texas state historian Monty Monroe tell
one heck of a story about how Texas became a state.
And my goodness, what a land grab between 1836 and 1845.
41 million acres. Of course, Southerners came, mostly Southerners, with
their slaves, many of them. And it was cotton and
(09:11):
it was sugar. that they would be forming. The story
of how Texas became a state continues here on Our
American Story. Our American Story And we return to Our
(09:40):
American Stories and the story of how the Republic of
Texas became a state. When we last left off Monte Monroe,
the Texas state historian was telling us about the challenges
the Republic of Texas faced. With crippling debt and constant
threats of invasion, most Texans supported annexation into the United States.
but it was a long road to get there. Nevertheless,
(10:03):
in 1845, President Polk saw Texas welcomed into the Union,
and it would be up to his minister to Mexico,
John Slidell, to iron out the details. Let's get back
to the story. Here again is Monty Monroe.
Speaker 2 (10:19):
The provisions of the annexation resolutions allowed that Texas would
enter the Union as a state, because it had been
an independent nation, and keep her public lands. And that
would be important, particularly in the 20th century, when the
United States is trying to carve out national park lands.
(10:41):
Texas was unique in that it possessed all of its
public lands. And so It made it a little bit
easier to create national parks in Texas. The U.S., on
the other hand, would decide all boundary questions, and that's
going to be critical. Texas was to surrender all of
(11:02):
her forts and military equipment to the U.S., but Texas
could retain its Navy, and to this day, the governor
can appoint admirals of the Texas Navy, which is an
honorary position. With the agreement, of Texas citizens, Texas could
be split into four additional states aside from the state
(11:23):
of Texas. Any new state that would be established from
Texas could permit slavery, and this is always going to
be a problem. The state constitution of 1845 provided for
a bicameral legislature of two-year terms for House members and
four-year terms for senators that still exists today. The legislature
(11:46):
was to meet every two years. There are reasons for that.
And the reasons were that there was this concern to
impose restrictions on the legislature because there was a fear
of government, of big government. They had just gone through
this whole period of Mexican centralist government. And so this
was very cognizant in their minds. The meeting time of
(12:08):
the legislature is limited. There were low pay for legislators.
They didn't want people sitting in the legislature spending tax
money all the time. The governor would be the chief executive.
There was a lieutenant governor, which in today's terms is
probably even more politically powerful because he controls or he
is the head of the Senate than the governor. The
(12:31):
Texas Constitution of 1845, and there have been subsequent constitutions,
was influenced by Jacksonian thought. There were strict prohibitions against
state banks because many Jacksonians believed, as did these Texans
of the time, that bankers were thieves. There were also
(12:52):
prohibitions against establishing big business corporations, especially monopolies. There were
strict prohibitions against any minister of the gospel holding public office.
Nobody who had been in a duel could hold public office.
And most importantly for women today, women... could own property
in their own name. And this didn't happen throughout the
(13:14):
United States at that time. In their own name, especially
married women. And this notion was unique to Texas and
was probably part of our Texas Spanish legacy. J. Pinckney
Henderson was elected the first governor of the state. Sam
Houston and Thomas Jefferson Rusk, two of the great revolutionaries
(13:34):
of the republic era, became the first U.S. senators from Texas. So,
Texas becomes a state. But what was one of the
problems that that might bring about? Mexico was against annexation.
(13:55):
Mexico was certainly against Texas becoming a state of the
United States. Mexico had said that the annexation of Texas
would lead to war, and this was the most important cause. Also,
there was another reason that led to the so-called U.S.-Mexican War.
(14:16):
Mexico refused to pay debt claims to Americans for losses
and debts of property and various things of that nature.
France and Britain used their influence to collect their debts,
but the United States could not. And There was much
political instability in Mexico at this time. This was the
(14:37):
period of the Caudillos where military strongmen were constantly coming in,
building an army, overthrowing the central government. In the United States,
you have this sense of manifest destiny. There's a fear
by the Mexican governments of land hunger of the Americans
because of manifest destiny and this desire to acquire California.
(14:57):
The U.S. wanted California for its natural harbors. They believed
it would make the United States a strong Pacific power
and open Asian markets to the United States. There were
some attempts at diplomacy. There's no need to go into
all of that at this time with John Slidell. President
Polk knew that Mexico had severe financial problems, so he
(15:17):
sent Slidell to try and purchase California, which only had
about 3,000 Mexican citizens living there at the time. He
met with the current Mexican president at that time, Jose Herrera,
who stated that Texas was the key issue. If the U.S.
would return Texas to Mexico, Mexico might consider selling California
to the U.S. That didn't happen, and it couldn't happen.
(15:41):
Slidell returns to the U.S., convinced that military versus diplomatic
means was the only way for the U.S. to achieve
its goals, particularly in relation to the Mexican-owned and controlled
what would become the American West. When Polk learned of
Slidell's failure, he immediately sends General Zachary Taylor all rough
(16:03):
and ready to move to the Rio Grande. So he
goes down and he starts building fortifications on the Texas
side of the Rio Grande. Mexico claimed that Taylor's move
was an invasion of Mexican territory. And ultimately they positioned
Mexican troops across the river from Taylor and on October
(16:27):
the 24th, President Paredes declares a defensive war against the
US and Mexican troops skirmish with Taylor's troops and Taylor
wires poke that war exists and ultimately would end in
the Treaty of Velasco after the United States is victorious
(16:52):
in the war with Mexico. And the Treaty of Hidalgo
says more or less the following, that Texas is recognized
as a state of the United States with the boundary
at the Rio Grande River. California and the New Mexico Territory,
(17:12):
which encompassed at that time Arizona and what would become Nevada,
the Mexican Cession, was ceded. to the United States in
return for $ 15 million. The U.S. also assumes $ 3. 25 million
in debt claims against Mexico by American citizens. And of
(17:37):
critical importance to Texas, the boundary description allowed Texas to
retain control over its tidelands 10 miles out into the
Gulf and after World War II That would become a
major issue, or during World War II, it would become
a major issue, particularly because of oil development in the
post-war era in the Gulf of Mexico. This would be
(18:00):
a great windfall when offshore oil production takes place in
the Gulf of Mexico. Following the war, and as a
consequence of the border now being secure, settlement increases dramatically
in Texas. And of course, that will cause a problem
with the issue of slavery and ultimately leading to the
(18:25):
Civil War, which Texas, of course, will join the Confederacy.
And that is beyond the purview of our discussions today.
And I hope in this little brief talk that you
have gotten a thumbnail sketch of the 500-year history of Texas.
(18:47):
Texas brings that legacy to the United States. It is today,
because of many things that have happened since Texas became
a state and after the Civil War and returning to
the Union during Reconstruction, is now, if it was an
(19:08):
independent nation today, it would be the fourth largest economy
in the world. but Texas contributes mightily to the nation.
During World War II, it sent over 750,000 Texans to
the war effort. The oil production during the war fueled
(19:33):
the arsenal of democracy and led to our ultimate victory
in World War II. So Texas has an interesting history
and it continues to contribute mightily to the United States.
Speaker 1 (19:51):
And a terrific job on the storytelling and production by
our own Monty Montgomery, and a special thanks to Monty Monroe,
the Texas State Historian. And my goodness, how the Mexican-American
War started when we learned a lot more about a
subject that was, at best, really boring when we learned
about it in high school. The story of how Texas
became a state here on Our American Stories.
And we return to our American stories. Up next, a
history story. In 1845, Texas joined the Union as a country,
the only state in our nation to do so. It
was a long road to get to that point. Texas
first had to fight a war for independence, which they
managed to gain against all odds after the Battle of
(00:32):
San Jacinto. Here to tell the rest of the story
is Monty Monroe, the Texas state historian. Take it away, Monty.
Speaker 2 (00:40):
The first national Texas election was a contest of personalities
rather than politics. And Sam Houston was elected president over
Stephen F. Austin and Henry Smith by an 80% vote.
That was quite a bit. Houston would dominate Texas in
this era in the same way that Lyndon Baines Johnson
did in the 20th century. He was an imposing figure.
(01:04):
He was a close friend of Andrew Jackson. He had
been a congressman, governor of Tennessee. He ran on a
platform of annexation. Like George Washington after the American Revolution,
Houston would draw his cabinet from members of both revolutionary factions.
He appointed Stephen F. Austin as the first Secretary of State,
(01:26):
but Austin, unfortunately, the so-called father of Texas, died in
December of 1836. cutting short his valuable career. There was
actually a 30-day period of mourning for him. Henry Smith
became the Secretary of the Treasury. Thomas J. Rusk, another
(01:47):
important Texas revolutionary name, would become Secretary of War. And
Maribor B. Lamar, who would become the second president of Texas,
was elected as vice president. He was the chief political
opponent of Sam Houston during all of this. There were
many issues that were problematic during the first Houston administration.
(02:08):
The frontier was one of those. There was always fear
of future Mexican invasion. Indeed, that happened. Houston viewed a
standing army as a problem. He was afraid that they
would be agitating to invade Mexico. He didn't want that
to happen because the Republic of Texas was a fragile
state at that time. So he offered land to those
(02:31):
who would agree to a discharge or he was going
to disband the volunteers and ship them back to New Orleans. Ultimately,
there would be Texas Ranger companies that would be organized
to deal with the various Indian threats, particularly the Comanche
and the Kiowas. Houston's inclinations to Indian relations tended to
(02:54):
run contrary to the will of the general population in
Texas and He signed a treaty with them, guaranteeing them
land in exchange for their neutrality with Mexico, but the
Texas Senate refused to ratify that treaty. The Republic of
Texas always had monetary problems, and this would be a
problem even for the state of Texas. During Houston's first term,
(03:15):
the public debt surpassed $ 2 million, which was a lot
of money back in those days. I don't know what
the equivalent would be now, but it would be in
the billions. Tariffs, custom duties at the ports and land fees,
business taxes, all of these were imposed, but they were
generally low. And the problem was most people didn't have
hard currency or specie, so they paid in kind. Many
(03:39):
times I've said they paid with chickens or whatnot, but
they paid with their crops. And so Houston literally had
to depend on his own personal credit to fund army
supplies and some government operations. Paper money was used, but
it ultimately, the Constitution, the Texas Constitution, barred him from
(04:02):
running for a second term, so he became the Republic's
principal ambassador to the United States. Maribel B. Lamar became
the second president. He was opposed to annexation, unlike his predecessor,
and he tried to make peace with Mexico, but he
wasn't successful. Lamar drove The Indians from Texas resettled them
(04:24):
to parts of Texas, and he was able to open
up rich lands, particularly in East Texas, for sale and settlement,
and it gave pioneers a bit of security, but it
was costly. It took another two and a half million
dollar toll on the treasury, and so he issued what
(04:45):
they called redbacks, and they ultimately plummeted to 12 cents
on the dollar, and so When the next president, Sam Houston,
who returned for a second term, comes into office, he
is faced or confronted by crippling debt. And he drastically
cut offices. He has a very frugal second term, spending
(05:09):
little money. He had a very generous land policy. He
gave 4,000, over 4,600 acres of land to families. And
then single individuals could gain up to $ 1, 400. acres of land.
And all of this led to a flood of immigration
into Texas. The Republic gave away, during its time, 41
(05:34):
million acres between 1836 and 1845. By 1846, the western
edge of the Texas frontier reached Dallas and Waco and
Corpus Christi, almost along what is today Interstate 35. The
population climbed from 40,000 in 1836 to 142,000 in 1847.
(06:03):
So by that time, because most of the immigrants came
from the American South, by 1845, Texas resembled the southern
states of the United States for all purposes. Most settlers
coming from the South grew cotton, corn, Sugarcane and many
brought slaves. As the last act of his presidency in 1837,
(06:30):
Andrew Jackson grants diplomatic recognition of the independence of Texans.
Texans immediately sought annexation, but they were rebuffed because of
this interest in maintaining good relations with Mexico and because
of anti-slavery opposition in Congress. consequently talk about annexation would languish.
(06:52):
By 1843, however, things are starting to change in the
United States. President John Tyler revives the annexation issue because
he starts to fear a growing British interest in Texas,
which is a whole different story. In 1844, Texas emissaries
and the U.S. Secretary of State, then John C. Calhoun,
(07:16):
hammer out a treaty of annexation that would have established
Texas as a territory. The treaty was defeated in the U.S.
Senate because, again, of anti-slavery opposition during an election year.
Despite that fact, Texas did become a major election issue
in 1844 because the Democratic candidate at that time, James K. Polk,
(07:41):
openly favored annexation. and ran on a strong expansionist platform.
He claimed that he would bring in Oregon, Texas, and
California into the Union in response to these mounting sentiments
in the United States of so-called manifest destiny. This notion
(08:02):
that Americans were God's chosen people and that they were
to spread their culture and religion across the North American
continent from the Atlantic to the Pacific. These notions were
fanned in the American press at the time, and Polk
capitalized on that sentiment. He was elected by an overwhelming majority,
(08:26):
and Polk's election and that mandate allows President Tyler, or
encouraged him, to prompt Congress to pass a joint resolution
on February 28, 1845, a simple majority resolution to annex Texas.
And that happened. Anson Jones becomes the last president of
(08:48):
the Republic of Texas.
Speaker 1 (08:49):
And you're listening to Texas state historian Monty Monroe tell
one heck of a story about how Texas became a state.
And my goodness, what a land grab between 1836 and 1845.
41 million acres. Of course, Southerners came, mostly Southerners, with
their slaves, many of them. And it was cotton and
(09:11):
it was sugar. that they would be forming. The story
of how Texas became a state continues here on Our
American Story. Our American Story And we return to Our
(09:40):
American Stories and the story of how the Republic of
Texas became a state. When we last left off Monte Monroe,
the Texas state historian was telling us about the challenges
the Republic of Texas faced. With crippling debt and constant
threats of invasion, most Texans supported annexation into the United States.
but it was a long road to get there. Nevertheless,
(10:03):
in 1845, President Polk saw Texas welcomed into the Union,
and it would be up to his minister to Mexico,
John Slidell, to iron out the details. Let's get back
to the story. Here again is Monty Monroe.
Speaker 2 (10:19):
The provisions of the annexation resolutions allowed that Texas would
enter the Union as a state, because it had been
an independent nation, and keep her public lands. And that
would be important, particularly in the 20th century, when the
United States is trying to carve out national park lands.
(10:41):
Texas was unique in that it possessed all of its
public lands. And so It made it a little bit
easier to create national parks in Texas. The U.S., on
the other hand, would decide all boundary questions, and that's
going to be critical. Texas was to surrender all of
(11:02):
her forts and military equipment to the U.S., but Texas
could retain its Navy, and to this day, the governor
can appoint admirals of the Texas Navy, which is an
honorary position. With the agreement, of Texas citizens, Texas could
be split into four additional states aside from the state
(11:23):
of Texas. Any new state that would be established from
Texas could permit slavery, and this is always going to
be a problem. The state constitution of 1845 provided for
a bicameral legislature of two-year terms for House members and
four-year terms for senators that still exists today. The legislature
(11:46):
was to meet every two years. There are reasons for that.
And the reasons were that there was this concern to
impose restrictions on the legislature because there was a fear
of government, of big government. They had just gone through
this whole period of Mexican centralist government. And so this
was very cognizant in their minds. The meeting time of
(12:08):
the legislature is limited. There were low pay for legislators.
They didn't want people sitting in the legislature spending tax
money all the time. The governor would be the chief executive.
There was a lieutenant governor, which in today's terms is
probably even more politically powerful because he controls or he
is the head of the Senate than the governor. The
(12:31):
Texas Constitution of 1845, and there have been subsequent constitutions,
was influenced by Jacksonian thought. There were strict prohibitions against
state banks because many Jacksonians believed, as did these Texans
of the time, that bankers were thieves. There were also
(12:52):
prohibitions against establishing big business corporations, especially monopolies. There were
strict prohibitions against any minister of the gospel holding public office.
Nobody who had been in a duel could hold public office.
And most importantly for women today, women... could own property
in their own name. And this didn't happen throughout the
(13:14):
United States at that time. In their own name, especially
married women. And this notion was unique to Texas and
was probably part of our Texas Spanish legacy. J. Pinckney
Henderson was elected the first governor of the state. Sam
Houston and Thomas Jefferson Rusk, two of the great revolutionaries
(13:34):
of the republic era, became the first U.S. senators from Texas. So,
Texas becomes a state. But what was one of the
problems that that might bring about? Mexico was against annexation.
(13:55):
Mexico was certainly against Texas becoming a state of the
United States. Mexico had said that the annexation of Texas
would lead to war, and this was the most important cause. Also,
there was another reason that led to the so-called U.S.-Mexican War.
(14:16):
Mexico refused to pay debt claims to Americans for losses
and debts of property and various things of that nature.
France and Britain used their influence to collect their debts,
but the United States could not. And There was much
political instability in Mexico at this time. This was the
(14:37):
period of the Caudillos where military strongmen were constantly coming in,
building an army, overthrowing the central government. In the United States,
you have this sense of manifest destiny. There's a fear
by the Mexican governments of land hunger of the Americans
because of manifest destiny and this desire to acquire California.
(14:57):
The U.S. wanted California for its natural harbors. They believed
it would make the United States a strong Pacific power
and open Asian markets to the United States. There were
some attempts at diplomacy. There's no need to go into
all of that at this time with John Slidell. President
Polk knew that Mexico had severe financial problems, so he
(15:17):
sent Slidell to try and purchase California, which only had
about 3,000 Mexican citizens living there at the time. He
met with the current Mexican president at that time, Jose Herrera,
who stated that Texas was the key issue. If the U.S.
would return Texas to Mexico, Mexico might consider selling California
to the U.S. That didn't happen, and it couldn't happen.
(15:41):
Slidell returns to the U.S., convinced that military versus diplomatic
means was the only way for the U.S. to achieve
its goals, particularly in relation to the Mexican-owned and controlled
what would become the American West. When Polk learned of
Slidell's failure, he immediately sends General Zachary Taylor all rough
(16:03):
and ready to move to the Rio Grande. So he
goes down and he starts building fortifications on the Texas
side of the Rio Grande. Mexico claimed that Taylor's move
was an invasion of Mexican territory. And ultimately they positioned
Mexican troops across the river from Taylor and on October
(16:27):
the 24th, President Paredes declares a defensive war against the
US and Mexican troops skirmish with Taylor's troops and Taylor
wires poke that war exists and ultimately would end in
the Treaty of Velasco after the United States is victorious
(16:52):
in the war with Mexico. And the Treaty of Hidalgo
says more or less the following, that Texas is recognized
as a state of the United States with the boundary
at the Rio Grande River. California and the New Mexico Territory,
(17:12):
which encompassed at that time Arizona and what would become Nevada,
the Mexican Cession, was ceded. to the United States in
return for $ 15 million. The U.S. also assumes $ 3. 25 million
in debt claims against Mexico by American citizens. And of
(17:37):
critical importance to Texas, the boundary description allowed Texas to
retain control over its tidelands 10 miles out into the
Gulf and after World War II That would become a
major issue, or during World War II, it would become
a major issue, particularly because of oil development in the
post-war era in the Gulf of Mexico. This would be
(18:00):
a great windfall when offshore oil production takes place in
the Gulf of Mexico. Following the war, and as a
consequence of the border now being secure, settlement increases dramatically
in Texas. And of course, that will cause a problem
with the issue of slavery and ultimately leading to the
(18:25):
Civil War, which Texas, of course, will join the Confederacy.
And that is beyond the purview of our discussions today.
And I hope in this little brief talk that you
have gotten a thumbnail sketch of the 500-year history of Texas.
(18:47):
Texas brings that legacy to the United States. It is today,
because of many things that have happened since Texas became
a state and after the Civil War and returning to
the Union during Reconstruction, is now, if it was an
(19:08):
independent nation today, it would be the fourth largest economy
in the world. but Texas contributes mightily to the nation.
During World War II, it sent over 750,000 Texans to
the war effort. The oil production during the war fueled
(19:33):
the arsenal of democracy and led to our ultimate victory
in World War II. So Texas has an interesting history
and it continues to contribute mightily to the United States.
Speaker 1 (19:51):
And a terrific job on the storytelling and production by
our own Monty Montgomery, and a special thanks to Monty Monroe,
the Texas State Historian. And my goodness, how the Mexican-American
War started when we learned a lot more about a
subject that was, at best, really boring when we learned
about it in high school. The story of how Texas
became a state here on Our American Stories.
Host
Lee Habeeb
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