Here’s a question to test your knowledge of western hemispheric history: What country, having won its independence from another country on the battlefield, adopted a constitution that guaranteed the right of its citizens to own persons of color as slaves, prohibited slave owners from emancipating their slaves without the consent of the legislature, required any such emancipated slaves to leave the country, and prohibited free persons of color from permanently residing in the country or becoming a citizen?
Hint: the Baptist university from which I graduated from both college and law school was established by that country in 1845 by an act of its legislature. If you need another hint, how about “Remember the Alamo”? Yes, that country was the Republic of Texas. It was formerly a province of Mexico. In 1836, after defeating the Mexican army under General Santa Anna in the Battle of San Jacinto, it declared its independence and adopted the above referenced constitution. And my university? Baylor.
San Antonio, Texas, home of the Alamo, was the home of my grandparents and parents. It still feels like home to me in a certain nostalgic sense, and I know it is part of my root structure. One of the things I love about San Antonio is the strong influence of the Mexican culture, especially the food but also the family traditions and warm hospitality of the majority population. I also love the German cultural influence on San Antonio and the Texas Hill Country.
Lately, I have been distressed by the words and actions of the current Texas governor and Republican led legislature, most recently on so called “election reform” legislation that seems tailor made to make it harder for non-white Texans to cast their ballots. Honestly, it looks like a desperate attempt to prevent black and Latino voters from combining with more progressive white voters to shift the balance of political power in the state.
Perhaps history can shed light on the current political divide. A recently published book, written by three Texans and extraordinarily well documented, is titled “Forget the Alamo: The Rise and Fall of an American Myth.” If you have a chance, please read it. My high school Texas history course was more myth than fact. For generations, authorities in Texas have suppressed the facts in favor of the myths. Without taking away any interest you may have in reading this book, let me share some highlights.
The primary motivation for the rebellion by Anglo settlers against Mexico was to preserve their legal right to own slaves of African descent. They were deemed to be essential to the economic sustainability of the lucrative cotton crop, which in turn was deemed essential to the sustainability of the settlement. Virtually all the settlers came from southern states where slavery was lawful, and many brought their slaves with them. The Mexican constitution declared all human beings to be equal in the sight of God, and slavery had been abolished throughout Mexico. Santa Anna and other Mexican authorities offered concessions to the Anglo settlers, but these were refused. One proposal would have required emancipation after a specific number of years. Another would have required emancipation of newborn children of slaves. For several years, the settlers tried to get around the law by drawing up contracts that made it sound like the slaves were indentured servants or voluntary laborers. Ultimately, leaders of the settlers decided that their economic survival required independence from Mexico, which could only be secured by armed rebellion.
A significant percentage of the population of what was then a province of Mexico under a federal system where significant autonomy was given to local officials, had no desire to take part in armed hostilities against Mexico. Some of these were Latinos, but many others were Anglos who were living in ways not requiring slave labor. Serious divisions existed between multiple factions of the population. Those who favored rebellion sorely needed a rallying cry, a cause that would transcend all their differences and motivate voluntary enlistment of fighters in sufficient numbers to defeat the Mexican army. There were a number of skirmishes, some involving the deaths of Mexican soldiers. But still there was no appetite for military conflict among the majority of the population. And so we come to what we know as the Alamo.
The Alamo is not the old church building that tourists see in modern San Antonio. It was a series of connected structures within a walled perimeter almost a quarter of a mile long. And it was not completely walled. It was never intended to be an actual fort. The walls had no holes through which to fire a rifle. There were no parapets riflemen could use for cover. The “commander” of the small group of men who decided to defend the Alamo against Santa Anna’s forces was a 26 year old lawyer named William Barret Travis from Alabama with no military experience, and who had abandoned his wife and law practice to avoid paying his substantial debts to discover new opportunities in Texas. Jim Bowie was a land speculator with a string of fraud cases in his wake and a drinking problem that often took him “hors de combat” for several days at a time. Davy Crockett was a politician whose fame was mostly myth. Travis’s main gift was writing letters that could stir others to action. Repeated and desperate calls for reinforcements were largely unheeded, and the Alamo battle was tactically a disaster. Virtually all the Texians were killed, some while vainly trying to escape from the Alamo.
While all this was going on, Sam Houston had the ear of US President Andrew Jackson, and it would appear that Jackson and Houston saw this rebellion as an opportunity for the US to greatly expand its territory. There is evidence that US Army soldiers entered Texas from Louisiana, wearing black covering over their uniforms, and were involved in the force of Texians who successfully executed a surprise attack upon the forces of Santa Anna at the battle of San Jacinto…the victory that led to Texas independence from Mexico. A myth says Santa Anna was distracted by an arduous and prolonged sexual encounter with a female sympathetic to the Texians cause, dubbed the “yellow rose of Texas.” It all makes for a great story.
But that is certainly not the end of the story. Texas and Mexico disagreed about which river marked their southern border. And when, on 29 December 1845, Congress enacted the annexation resolution making Texas a part of the United States, as a slave state, it curiously did not delineate the southern or western borders of the new state. The next year brought the Mexican American War which, after the defeat of the Mexican army and the fall of its government, conveniently secured a treaty with Mexico that ceded to the US 525,000 square miles of Mexican territory we now know as California, Nevada, Utah, most of Arizona, the western half of New Mexico, the western quarter of Colorado, the southwestern quarter of Wyoming and parts of Oklahoma and Kansas. The US “generously” paid $15 million for this new territory, but required Mexico to bear responsibility for debts claimed by the Texians (including debts related to injuries or death of slaves).
General U S Grant famously called the Mexican War a “wicked war that was rooted in imperialism and the expansion of slavery.” He is said to have argued that the Civil War was God’s punishment for our engagement in the Mexican War.
Some things have not changed. White Texans sometimes refer to Latinos as “greasers,” as if they were somehow an inferior culture. And we know what terms many use for African Americans. Actually the latter group are a real minority in Texas, except for Houston and parts of Dallas. Latinos constitute the majority population of south Texas, and perhaps soon will have the same numbers as whites. Demographics clearly have begun to shift from red to blue, and the descendants of those original Anglo settlers are not about to allow the descendants of their former slaves to combine with the descendants of the “Tejanos” (Mexicans who opted for US citizenship as part of the treaty ending the Mexican War), to secure the levers of political power. It’s as if you can hear the governor of Texas shouting out “Remember the Alamo!”