Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo as Treaties are The Supreme Law of The Land

The Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo(Tratado de Guadalupe Hidalgo in Spanish), officially entitled the Treaty of Peace, Friendship, Limits and Settlement between the United States of America and the Mexican Republic,^[1]is the peace treaty signed on February 2, 1848, in the Villa de Guadalupe Hidalgo (now a neighborhood of Mexico City) between the United States andMexico that ended the Mexican–American War (1846–48).

With the defeat of its army and the fall of its capital, Mexico entered into negotiations to end the war. The treaty called for the US to pay $15 million to Mexico and to pay off the claims of American citizens against Mexico up to $3.25 million. It gave the United States the Rio Grande as a boundary for Texas, and gave the US ownership of Californiaand a large area comprising roughly half of New Mexico, most of Arizona,Nevada, Utah, and parts of Wyomingand Colorado. Mexicans in those annexed areas had the choice of relocating to within Mexico's new boundaries or receiving American citizenship with full civil rights. Over 90% chose to become US citizens.

The US Senate ratified the treaty by a vote of 38–14. The opponents of this treaty were led by the Whigs, who had opposed the war and rejected Manifest Destiny in general, and rejected this expansion in particular.^[2]

Negotiators

The peace talks were negotiated byNicholas Trist, chief clerk of the US State Department, who had accompanied General Winfield Scott as a diplomat and President Polk's representative. Trist and General Scott, after two previous unsuccessful attempts to negotiate a treaty with General José Joaquín de Herrera, determined that the only way to deal with Mexico was as a conquered enemy. Nicholas Trist negotiated with a special commission representing the collapsed government led by Don Sezok Couto, Don Miguel de Atristain, and Don Luis Gonzaga Cuevas of Mexico.^[3]

Terms

Although Mexico ceded Alta Californiaand Santa Fe de Nuevo México, the text of the treaty^[4] did not list territories to be ceded, and avoided the disputed issues that were causes of war: the validity of the 1836 secession of theRepublic of Texas, Texas's unenforced boundary claims as far as the Rio Grande, and the 1845 annexation of Texas to the United States.

Instead, Article V of the treaty simply described the new U.S.–Mexico border. From east to west, the border consisted of the Rio Grande northwest from its mouth to the point Santa Fe de Nuevo Mexico (roughly 30 degrees north), as shown in the Disturnell map, then due west from this point to the 110th meridian west, then north along the 110th Meridian to the Gila River and down the river to its mouth. Unlike the New Mexico segment of the boundary, which depended partly on unknown geography, "in order to preclude all difficulty in tracing upon the ground the limit separating Upper from Lower California", a straight line was drawn from the mouth of the Gila to one marine league south of the southernmost point of the port of San Diego, slightly north of the previous Mexican provincial boundary at Playas de Rosarito.

Comparing the boundary in the Adams–Onís Treaty to the Guadalupe Hidalgo boundary, Mexico conceded about 55% of its pre-war, pre-Texas territorial claims^[5] and now has an area of 1,972,550 km² (761,606 sq mi).

In the United States, the 1.36 million km² (525,000 square miles) of the area between the Adams-Onis and Guadalupe Hidalgo boundaries outside the 1,007,935 km² (389,166 sq mi) claimed by the Republic of Texas is known as the Mexican Cession. That is to say, the Mexican Cession is construed not to include any territory east of the Rio Grande, while the territorial claims of the Republic of Texas included no territory west of the Rio Grande. The Mexican Cession included essentially the entirety of the former Mexican territory of Alta California, but only the western portion of Santa Fe de Nuevo Mexico, and includes all of present-day California, Nevada and Utah, most of Arizona, and western portions of New Mexico, Colorado, and Wyoming.

Articles VIII and IX ensured safety of existing property rights of Mexican citizens living in the transferred territories. Despite assurances to the contrary, the property rights of Mexican citizens were often not honored by the U.S. in accordance with modifications to and interpretations of the Treaty.^[6][7][8] The U.S. also agreed to assume $3.25 million (equivalent to $88.9 million today) in debts that Mexico owed to United States citizens.

The residents had one year to choose whether they wanted American or Mexican citizenship; Over 90% chose American citizenship, which included full voting rights. The others returned to Mexico (where they received land), or in some cases in New Mexico were allowed to remain in place as Mexican citizens.^[9][10]

Article XII engaged the United States to pay, "In consideration of the extension acquired", 15 million dollars (equivalent to $410 million today),^[11] in annual installments of 3 million dollars.

Article XI of the treaty was important to Mexico. It provided that the United States would prevent and punish raids by Indians into Mexico, prohibited Americans from acquiring property, including livestock, taken by the Indians in those raids, and stated that the U.S. would return captives of the Indians to Mexico. Mexicans believed that the United States had encouraged and assisted the Comanche and Apacheraids that had devastated northern Mexico in the years before the war. This article promised relief to them ^[12]

Article XI, however, proved unenforceable. Destructive Indian raids continued despite a heavy U.S. presence near the Mexican border. Mexico filed 366 claims with the U.S. government for damages done by Comanche and Apache raids between 1848 and 1853.^[13] In 1853, in the Treaty of Mesilla concluding the Gadsden Purchase, Article XI was annulled.^[14]

Results

The land that the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo brought into the United States became, between 1850 and 1912, all or part of ten states: California (1850),Nevada (1864), Utah (1896), andArizona (1912), as well as the whole of, depending upon interpretation, the entire state of Texas (1845), which then included part of Kansas (1861);Colorado (1876); Wyoming (1890);Oklahoma (1907); and New Mexico(1912). The remainder (the southern parts) of New Mexico and Arizona were peacefully purchased under theGadsden Purchase, which was carried out in 1853. In this purchase the United States paid an additional $10 million (equivalent to $280 million today), for land intended to accommodate atranscontinental railroad. However, theAmerican Civil War delayed construction of such a route, and it was not until 1881 that the Southern Pacific Railroad finally was completed, fulfilling the purpose of the acquisition.^[15]