Gadsden Purchase
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Image:Gadsden Purchase Cities.png The Gadsden Purchase is a 29,640 mi² (76,770 km2) region of what is today southern Arizona and New Mexico that was purchased by the United States from Mexico in 1853. The purchase included lands south of the Gila River and west of the Rio Grande.
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Overview
After the end of the Mexican-American War in 1848, border disputes between the United States and Mexico remained unsettled. Land that now comprises lower Arizona and New Mexico was part of a proposed southern route for a transcontinental railroad. U.S. President Franklin Pierce was convinced by Jefferson Davis, then the country's Secretary of War, to send James Gadsden (who had personal interests in the rail route) to negotiate the Gadsden Purchase with Mexico. Under the resulting agreement, the U.S. paid Mexico $10 million (equivalent to $233 million in 2004 dollars[1]) to secure the land. The treaty included a provision allowing the U.S. to build a transoceanic canal across the Isthmus of Tehuantepec, though this option was never exercised. The acquisition of land in this purchase defined the final boundaries of the continental United States.
Purpose
The Gadsden Purchase was intended to allow for the construction of a southern route for a transcontinental railroad, and was also designed to fully compensate Mexico for the lands taken by the United States after the Mexican-American War. In 1848, the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo had ended the military conflict between the two nations, but had provided only a token amount of money in compensation for the vast territory ceded by Mexico to the United States. On December 30 1853, U.S. Minister to Mexico James Gadsden and Mexican President Antonio López de Santa Anna agreed on the price of $10 million for the Gadsden land, which valued the included territory at around $337 per square mile ($130/km2).
Controversy
As originally envisioned, the purchase would have encompassed a much larger region, extending far enough south to include most of the current Mexican states of Coahuila, Chihuahua, and Sonora as well as all of the Baja California peninsula. These original boundaries were opposed not only by the Mexican people, but also by anti-slavery U.S. Senators who saw the purchase as tantamount to the acquisition of more slave territory. Even the small strip of land that was ultimately acquired was enough to anger the Mexican people, who saw Santa Anna's actions as yet another betrayal of their country and watched in dismay as he squandered the funds generated by the Purchase. The Gadsden Purchase helped to end Santa Anna's political career.
The purchased lands were initially appended to the existing New Mexico Territory. To help control the new land, the United States Army established Fort Buchanan on Sonoita Creek in present-day southern Arizona on November 17 1856. The difficulty of governing the new areas from the territorial capital at Santa Fe led to efforts as early as 1856 to organize a new territory out of the southern portion of the New Mexico Territory. Many of the early settlers in the region were, however, pro-slavery and sympathetic to the South, resulting in an impasse in Congress as to how best to reorganize the territory.
U.S. Statehood
In 1861, during the American Civil War, the Confederacy formed the Confederate Territory of Arizona, including in the new territory mainly areas acquired by the Gadsden Purchase. In 1863, using a north-to-south dividing line, the Union created its own Arizona Territory out of the western half of the New Mexico Territory. The new U.S. Arizona Territory also included most of the lands acquired in the Gadsden Purchase. This territory would be admitted into the Union as the State of Arizona on February 14 1912.
See also
- Mexican Cession
- U.S.-Mexico border
- Historic regions of the United States
- Country Club Disputeda:Gadsden-aftalen
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