Crisis In The Southwest

Keith Benson Military/Diplomatic History 2.10.2007 Dr. Dorwart Response to Crisis in the Southwest Crisis in the Southwest, a celebrated work by career historian Richard Bruce Winders, seeks to offer in-depth analysis of the events that led to Texas’ independence from Mexico, to its eventual annexation into the United States as the nation’s 28th state. Dr. Winders is a renowned authority on Texan-Mexican-American history and is, currently, curator at the Alamo Museum in San Antonio. In the beginning of this work, Winders laments the weaknesses of textbooks and textbook based history classes. Winders, as other historians and social studies educators have, especially recently, complains that textbook based history presents students with a notion of finality; that once a chapter in a book has ended, the issue being studied has been resolved finally, and completely. He writes, “Textbooks, which are poor tools for leaning history arranged in chronological order and divided into chapters…which implies a clean break from the past and is somehow a self-contained historical episode.” While I do agree with Winders’ assertion, and was eager to read Crisis in the Southwest through Winders’ historical pedagogy and methodology, I was disappointed to find this book does in fact resemble a textbook; minus the hard-cover and pictures. Dr. Winders delivers this book, and approaches the Texan-Mexican, MexicanAmerican struggle with a nativist, pro-Texan, pro-American voice; giving little voice to Mexicans from which land was taken. Similar to history textbooks in classrooms today, the voice of the “losers” are noticeably absent, and also that of the common Mexican, Texan, or American. Furthermore, Dr. Winders’ partiality toward celebrated frontier folk

heroes such as David Crockett, Andrew Jackson and, Sam Houston especially, communicates that Dr. Winders is actively “cherry-picking” information for this work, as opposed to objectively allowing the events to unfold themselves. In the Cast of Characters portion of the text, Winders writes about Houston: “Flamboyant and headstrong, Sam Houston made an impression wherever he went.” While consistently referring to Sam Houston in glowing terms, Dr. Winders neglects to mention Sam Houston was a slave owner and much wanted to see slavery exist and flourish in the Mexican-Texas (where it was ended by Mexico), the Republic of Texas, and eventually, the state if annexed to the United States. Also, when referring to a period in which Americans were immigrating to Mexican-Texas by purchasing land from Mexican appointed impresarios, Dr. Winders repeatedly refers to the American immigrants as colonists, when the term “immigrant” or “settler” would be more accurate. By referring to the Americans who settled in Texas as colonists as opposed to “settlers”, Dr. Winders’ seeks to establish congruence with colonists of the original thirteen colonies who eventually take up arms for their independence. Winders’ pro-American agenda is obvious in Crisis in the Southwest-much like American history textbooks of the past and present. The central thesis to Crisis in the Southwest is that war between the United States and Mexico was inevitable due to early “colonists” perception of land ownership and individual rights and Texas’ geographical location in relation to the prevailing zeitgeist of “Manifest Destiny.” Winders explains early in this book that American “colonists” in Texas were operating under the illusion that once their local impresario (Mexican equivalent to

feudal lord) was paid in full for land they were occupying, the land became theirs to own completely, and do whatever they pleased. Winders writes, “Americans, on the other hand, believed strongly in the ownership of private property, such that land, once it had been acquired, could not be taken away without due process. Persons in the United States were operating under a serious misconception – namely, that land in Mexico was for sale.”(8) Winders further explains that the Mexican view of land ownership was that, generally, land in Mexico was always truly owned by Mexico, regardless of occupancy. This misinterpretation would be very troubling in Mexican-Texas where American agrarian settlers viewed land ownership as “their livelihood”. After a series of perceived encroachments by the Mexican government such as raising taxes and outlawing slavery, “colonists”, financed heavily by American citizens and the American government, eventually went to war with Mexico in effort to secure its independence from Mexico; which, in 1836, was eventually achieved. Further, Texas’ original geographical location from the Red River, which borders present day Louisiana, to the Pacific Ocean, to Oregon Country, came to represent a prize to the United States, following the Louisiana Purchase and the spreading doctrine of “Manifest Destiny”. Following the purchase of Louisiana in 1803, the defeating of the British in 1812, and the expulsion of the Spanish in 1816, Winders explains Americans were increasingly beginning to adopt the belief that America was destined to control and unite all lands south of Canada, north of Mexico, and between both the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans. Texas lay directly in the middle of the country and, from American’s standpoint, interfering with destiny as long as it owned by Mexico.

Winders explains the significance of “Manifest Destiny” by including one of the few quotes by a Mexican, historian Miguel Quiroga commented, “It is dangerous to underestimate the power of an idea, especially one that captures the imagination of a people.” Winders explains “Manifest Destiny”, represented much more than a westward “land grab” as commonly presented in history books. It represented agrarian Americans with a greater opportunity to sustain themselves and prosper financially, the duty to spread their Anglo-western culture and race, and finally and perhaps most significant, God’s will to control and own the land. Winders writes about Manifest Destiny, “God intended for Americans, because of their supposed superior intuitions and character, to spread across the land as a testimony to His power and generosity.”(72) Subsequently, Texas had to become part of America. While Crisis in the Southwest does succeed in outlining individual battles and legislative events that led to Texas finally becoming a state, the book fails to do any more. Judging by the Bibliographic Essay, which consists of mostly secondary sources, it is clear Dr. Winders did exhaustive research on the subject but fails to give this book a real-time voice by lacking primary documentation. And, after reading Winders’ introduction, I find this book is indeed a perpetuation of the current history texts Winders decried in the Introduction. The voice in this book singular in it pro-Anglo perspective, narration and justification of events. Perhaps I was expecting too much from Dr. Winders and Crisis in the Southwest, but to my dismay, this was in fact a textbook – only smaller.