He then held that the resolution of the
House declaring the treaty of annexation between the United States of
America and the Republic of Texas to be the fundamental law of union
between them, without and against the consent of the Senate, was a
direct and undisguised usurpation of power and a violation of the
Constitution. In the storm of opposition he lifted his feeble voice in
condemnation of the violation of treaties, and the disregard of the
sacred obligations of mankind. "I am highly gratified," were his final
words, "I am highly gratified that the last public act of a long life
should have been that of bearing testimony against this outrageous
attempt. It is indeed a consolation that my almost extinguished voice
has been on this occasion raised in defense of liberty, of justice, and
of our country." Of the war with Mexico, he was wont to say, "that it
was the only blot upon the escutcheon of the United States." Aged as he
was, he would not rest until he had made his last appeal for peace with
Mexico. He also prepared supplementary essays on war expenses: the first
of these was published in 1847, the second in 1848. For months all his
faculties, all his feelings were absorbed in this one subject. These
pamphlets were widely circulated by the friends of peace. The venerable
sage had the comfort of knowing that his words were not in vain. Peace
with Mexico was signed on February 2, 1848.

* * * * *

Mr. Gallatin was no believer in the doctrine of 'manifest destiny,'--the
policy of bringing all North America into the occupation of a race
speaking the same language, and under a single government. On February
16, 1848, before news of the signature of the treaty at Guadalupe
Hidalgo, by Mr. Trist, the American negotiator, was known in New York,
Mr. Gallatin condemned this idea in a remarkable passage, in a letter to
Garrett Davis:--

"What shall be said of the notion of an empire extending from the
Atlantic to the Pacific and from the North Pole to the Equator? Of
the destiny of the Anglo-Saxon race, of its universal monarchy over
the whole of North America? Now, I will ask, which is the portion
of the globe that has attained the highest degree of civilization
and even of power--Asia, with its vast empires of Turkey, India,
and China, or Europe divided into near twenty independent
sovereignties? Other powerful causes have undoubtedly largely