"G.W. Gilmers Letter," Telegraph and Texas Register, February 15, 1843

Summary: Printed remarks made by Thomas Gilmer concerning his views on Texas annexation. He believed the U.S. would eventually annex Texas for a variety of reasons. In his view, Texas would create new markets for the whole country, the North would not risk disunion over the slave issue, and past precedents concerning other takeovers of Spanish territory required Texas annexation. He also said that Mexico could never reconquer Texas and that if the U.S. did not admit the latter, Great Britain would control it. The interests and destiny of the U.S. demanded the admission of Texas to the Union.

Relative to the annexation of Texas to the U States

WASHINGTON, Jan. 16th, 1843

DEAR SIR:--You ask if I have expressed the opinion that Texas would be annexed to the United States. I answer yes; and this opinion has not been adopted without reduction or without a careful observation of causes which I believe are rapidly bringing about this result. I do not know how far these causes have made the same impression in others; but I am persuaded that the time is not far distant when they will be felt in all their force--The excitement which you apprehend, may arise; but it will be temporary, and, in the end, salutary. The excitement of prejudice or passions is to be deprecated under any government, as it only confirms error and injustice. But the excitement of the mind, the popular intelligence, is always beneficial; and it is indispensable in free governments. It leads to investigation. It establishes truth, justice, and the public good. It is the surest and safest means of guiding against the artifices of those who afraid to trust their fellow men with the privileg[sic] of thinking, have been always willing and ready to think for them.

Without having time, just now, to consider this subject in the various interesting and comprehending aspects in which it may be viewed, I do not hesitate to say that it is capable if approached in a proper spirit of doing more to consolidate the conflicting interests and prejudices of our Union, than any question which has arisen since the foundation of our Republic. I proceed to notice, very briefly, some of the objections you animate.

I am, as you know, a strict constructionist of the powers of our Federal Government, and I do not admit the force of mere precedent, to establish authority under written Constitutions. The power confered by the Constitution over our Foreign Relations, and the repeated acquisitions of territory under it, seem to not to leave this question open as one of expediency. As such it cannot be considered a Southern or local position. It affects and interests every portion of the Union.

I assume what no one will deny that under the jurisdiction of the United States, the large and unusually fertile territory of Texas will be rapidly peopled, and that an immense accession will be made to our strength and productive energies. The settlement of Texas under those auspices, will open a market at home for the manufacturers and agricultural products of all the non slave holding States--a market which otherwise, can only avail them under the restrictions and disadvantages of foreign competition. The means of supply for those States will be increased in the same manner. This is true, not only of the Eastern Atlantic States, but of the country extending over the fertile valleys of the Ohio, the Mississippi, and the Missouri. It will be more prominently valuable to these than all the home market which legislation can force by the artificial means of impoverishing one interest for the purpose of giving bounties to another. On the true principles of social and commercial intercourse, it will be reciprocal and mutualy[sic] advantageous. The only interest in the Union, which as such surely, could find a reason for opposing the measure, is the interest of the cotton and sugar planters of the Southern and Southwestern States. The annexation of Texas could foster a competition for which they could find no immediate equivalent, except in the vast acquisition of national wealth, prosperity and harmony which would result.

But you anticipate objections, with regard to the subject of slavery. This is, indeed, a subject of extreme delicacy; but it is one on which the annexation of Texas will have most salutary influence. Some have thought that the proposition would endanger our Union. I am of a different opinion. I believe it will strengthen the Union. I believe it will bring about a better understanding of our relative rights and obligations. Slavery is one of these subjects, which the people of the slaveholding States are content to leave where the Constitution of our Union found it. They ask for no new concessions to their rights guaranteed by that instrument--they are prepared to make none to prejudices which they must cease to respect, when, under the garb of civil or religious fanaticism, they become criminal. Are our countrymen of the non-slave-holding States disposed to assume, that they will not live at peace with us on account of our State institutions--institutions recognized and guaranteed by positive provisions of the Constitution? If this be so, the second it is known to all, the better for all. It is obvious that the Union is already dissolved, or, that its burdens are all on one side, its benefits on the other, when such a state is generally evinced. But I do not believe, that such is the disposition of the masses of our fellow citizens of the non-slave-holding States. I believe, that the security so long enjoyed under our Constitution, has taught them, as it has us, to regard it in its spirit and letter as indispensible to our future common welfare, and to deprecate any revolution, affected by flaunt or force, which shall impose on southern obligations. I have not been an [illegible word] or indifferent observer of events for the last few years. To [illegible word] them, or to animadvent[sic] on the want of American feeling, which they have sometimes disclosed might only add to prejudices already too much exasperated.

It should be the first wish of every American to allay an excitement which is fast ripening into crime. I aver any belief, that there is no measure which would have a happier tendency to repudiate a charge so unworthy of countrymen, so incompatiable[sic] with the duties of fellow-citizens, and permanent foundation of mutual rights and mutual interests as the annexation of Texas. The foreign dangers which threaten the infancy of our republic are forgotton[sic] in the meridian of our strength. They no longer exist in force enough to bind us together. Our present dangers are nearer home. They can be averted only by the agency of some cause powerful enough to revive the feelings of other days to absorb the selfishness[sic] of predated patriotism. These sentiments are already extinct in that bosom, which does not [illegible word] at the contemplation of our country's unequalledprosperity and grandeur, as they are befuddled by the dawning nation. Nations, like individuals, must live up to their destiny, and we trust in the part assigned us by our position on the globe. Our federative union, in the spirit of its [illegible word] [illegible word] [illegible word] [illegible word] indefinite extention[sic]. Space [illegible word] [illegible word] will only succor its strength by multiplying its blessings. In any other print it would not have been long preserved even by the Old Thirteen.

By then, I am right in supposing that our countrymen of the non-slave holding States are not disposed to renounce their union with the slave holding States. If I have not erred in supposing that like ourselves and all the rest of mankind, they can and do perceive the force of that mysterious power, which binds individuals in society, and States in union, by rendering conflicts of opinion and interest the very source of harmony [illegible word] [illegible word] [illegible word] strength, I do not apprehend any evil consequences [illegible word] the excitement which the subject will give to.

The action of no Government, State or Federal, on the subject of slavery, can produce any thing but mischief--Its end, like its origin, is within the compass only of [illegible word] laws and man has neither the wisdom to [illegible word] nor the power to arrest, though he is the agent of their fulfilment. When the Federal Constitution was adopted, slavery existed (I believe) in all the States. That it does not exist now in a large majority of the original States, is owing less to their philanthropy than their interest--Slave labor is unprofitable in grain growing counties--Instances of voluntary emancipation are as frequent in those states where slave labor is most profitable as they ever were in grain growing States. The culture of cotton and sugar in the United States has done more to withdraw slavery southward, than expedients which the wisdom of this or other generalities could devise. In a process which does no violence to our federal compact none to private rights, which hazards neither our social peace nor the Union.

England, whose possessions and jurisdiction extend over so large a portion of the globe, whose influence is felt every where, will either possess or control Texas, if it does not come under the jurisdiction of the United States. The prejudices of England against slavery are philosophically confined to sympathetic meetings, populous harangues, and a neighborly disposition to see us dissolve our Union on account of it. If she abolishes it in her West Indies, it is only to multiply it in her East Indies. It is impossible that Mexico can ever subjugate Texas. Though covering a much larger extent of territory and numbering many more people, Mexico is really in no better condition than Texas. There is more probability of revolt in other provinces than of the reconquest of Texas. The fashions of dress are not more [illegible word] in their changes than are the forms of Mexican [illegible word]. I apprehend it is destined to some time, to [illegible word] to a state of civil chaos, giving signs of energy, but occasionally spasmodic convulsions in a body of [illegible word] priests and mercenary soldiers, whose victims the people have long been. Texas is recognized by our Government and by the most powerful Governments of Europe, as exempt from her dominion. Spain is as likely to reconquer Mexico itself, as Mexico Texas. it is true Mexico has not formally recognized Texas, as one of the nations of the earth. She still claims the right to conquer or dispose of her. Texas then in all probability will exist through some form of government, independent of Mexico. Will she be independent of European influences prejudicial to us, fatal to the harmony of two rival cotemporous[sic] Republics?

Having acquired Louisiana and Florida, we have an interest and a frontier on the Gulf of Mexico and along our interior to the Pacific which will not permit us to close our eyes or fold our arms with indifference to events which a few years [illegible word] [illegible word] in that quarter. We have already had one question of boundary with Texas, other questions must [illegible word] [illegible word] [illegible word] laws and on other points of necessary [illegible word], which it will be difficult to adjust. The relations of Texas and her relations with other Governments [illegible word] [illegible word] condition which inclines her people (women as well as men) to unite their destinies with ours. This must be done soon or not at all. There are numerous tribes of Indians along both frontiers, which can easily become the cause of the instruments of border wars. Our own population is pressing onward to the Pacific. No power can restrain it. The pioneer from our Atlantic seaboard will soon kindle his fires and erect [illegible word] [illegible word] [illegible word] Rocky Mountains and on the Gulf of California. If Mohammed comes not to the mountain, the mountain will go to Mohammed. Every year adds new difficulties to our progress in that direction a progress as [illegible word] [illegible word] [illegible word] as the current of the Mississippi. These difficulties will soon--like mountains [illegible word]--

"Make enemies of [illegible word]

Which now like kindred crops

Might mingle into one."

THOMAS W GILMER.

Source Copy Consulted: "G.W. Gilmers Letter," Telegraph and Texas Register, February 15, 1843, p. 1