n vote for the
hasty surrender of the line of 54 deg. 40', on which so much had been
staked in the Presidential campaign, gave the Whigs an advantage
in the popular canvass. The contrast between the boldness with
which the Polk administration had marched our army upon the territory
claimed by Mexico, and the prudence with which it had retreated
from a contest with Great Britain, after all our antecedent boasting,
exposed the Democrats to merciless ridicule. Clever speakers who
were numerous in the Whig party at that day did not fail to see
and seize their advantage.

The Mexican war had scarcely begun when the President justified
the popular suspicion by making known to Congress that one of its
objects was to be the acquisition of territory beyond the Rio
Grande. Perhaps it would be fairer to say that he expected such
acquisition to be one of its results. He ably vindicated the policy
of marching a military force into the territory between the Nueces
and the Rio Grande, by the fact that he was memorialized to do so
by the still existing Congress of Texas, on the urgent plea that
Mexico was preparing to move upon the territory with a view to its
recapture. In this Congress of Texas, the same body that completed
the annexation, there were representatives from the territory in
dispute beyond the Nueces; and the President felt that they were
in an eminent degree entitled to the protection of our government.
Events were so hurried that in three months from the formal
declaration of war, and before any victory of decisive significance
had been achieved, the President sent a special message to Congress,
in which he suggested that "the chief obstacle to be surmounted in
securing peace would be the adjustment of a boundary that would
prove satisfactory and convenient to both republics." He admitted
that we ought to pay a fair equivalent for any concessions which
might be made by Mexico, and asked that a sum of money should be
placed in his hands to be paid to Mexico immediately upon the
ratification of a treaty of peace. As a precedent for this unusual
request, the President cited the example of Mr. Jefferson in asking
and receiving from Congress, in 1803, a special appropriation of
money, to be expended at his discretion. As soon as the reading
of the message was concluded, Mr. McKay of North Carolina, chairman
of the committee of ways and means, introduced a bill, without
preamble or explanation, directing that two m