Topic 13 Westward Expansion
The focus of this topic is American westward expansion from roughly 1820 to 1850. Your written sources for this topic pertain to the Mexican-American War (1846-48); your visual source pertains to the California Gold Rush (which began in 1848). Another important event that features in Out of Many but that is (weirdly!) not mentioned by name is the Texas Revolution of 1835-36, by which Texas won independence from Mexico. One of the most famous events of that revolution was the battle at the Alamo in 1836. Those are some of the major events for this topic. Make sure that you also familiarize yourself with one of the most important ideas for understanding this period in American history: Manifest Destiny.
Remember:
• Make sure that you are on track to do at least 4 student-responses by the end of the summer session. (Including Topic 13, there are only 3 topics left!)
• If you are not the first person to answer a particular question, make sure that your answer covers new ground.
• When discussing a source, go into lots of detail! Show me that you have carefully read, understood, and thought about the source.
• Graded posts need to be at least 300 words long.
• If every question gets answered at least once, everyone who submitted a graded post by the deadline gets a point of extra credit.
Key Terms (Use and discuss key terms into your answer.)
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Santa Fé Trail
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Wilmot Proviso
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Manifest Destiny
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Whigs
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"Fifty-four Forty or Fight"
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free-soil movement
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Texans and Tejanos
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sectionalism
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Stephen Austin
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Sutter's Mill
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Empresarios
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Sam Brannan
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The Alamo
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"Gold Mountain"
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The Texas Revolution (1835-36)
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The diggings / placer gold
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The Republic of Texas
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"Petti-coated astonishments"
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James K. Polk
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Mariano Vallejo
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Mexican-American War (1846-48)
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California Foreign Miners' Tax of 1850 and 1852
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Californios
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frontier of accommodation vs frontier of domination
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Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo
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John C. Calhoun
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Nueces River (see the Map 14.5 on p. 301 of Out of Many; the Nueces River is the border between the Republic of Texas and the area disputed by Texas and Mexico. See also the Primary Sources on the Mexican-American War.)
Focus Questions
Tying the readings together (Draw on at least two of the assigned readings.)
1. What did Mexico do that Polk says prompted him to ask Congress for a declaration of war? What aspect of Polk's argument does Abraham Lincoln attack? And finally: if, as Lincoln asserts, the declaration of war on Mexico by the US was unjustified, why did Polk provoke a war with Mexico?
2. How had the attitude of the US government towards Native Americans, as evidenced by John C. Calhoun's statements at the end of the Mexican-American War, changed since Andrew Jackson announced the policy of Indian Removal in 1830? (Note: this question requires you to tie together the readings from this topic and Topic 10.)
3. According to Calhoun, where can democracy thrive? In what other source have we encountered a similar argument? (This question requires you to tie together your Topic 13 material and material from one of the previous topics.)
4. How did the California Gold Rush impact Californian society? (Focus on the late 1840s and the 1850s.)
Out of Many, Ch. 14 (Draw on multiple parts of the chapter.)
5. Assess American history from the 1830s to the 1850s in the light of Manifest Destiny. (In other words, use specific events to illustrate what Manifest Destiny was and to describe its influence on how Americans viewed the west.)
6. Trace the different extent to which the frontiers in Oregon, Texas, and California moved from frontiers of accommodation to frontiers of domination. (Feel free to draw on The West!)
7. Compare and contrast the free-soil movement and abolitionism.
Primary Sources on the Mexican-American War (Polk, Lincoln, and Calhoun)
8. Why does Calhoun oppose the incorporation of Mexico into the United States? What differences does Calhoun see between previous US expansion and the proposed incorporation of Mexico? (There are both obvious and not-so-obvious answers to this question.)
Video Clips on the Gold Rush from The West, by Stephen Ives
9. What kinds of people came to California during the Gold Rush? What tensions arose between some of these groups?
10. Describe what life was like for miners and others living and working in "the diggings" during the Gold Rush.
Attachment:- Video_Clips_on_The_Gold_Rush.zip