What to do in Santa Fe

Santa Anna signed the treaties of Velasco which established the Rio Grande as the boundary between Mexico and Texas, and of course Santa Fe is on the Texas side of that river.

Almost immediately, Mexico tried to reneg on that treaty, claiming it was signed under duress. Well, how many treaties to end wars aren’t signed under duress by the losing party?

But it is probably understandable that Mexico would refuse to honor their obligations under the treaty. After all, this is the same country that perpetrated the atrocities at the Alamo and Goliad.

But consider what might have happened if Mexico had honored the treaty. Perhaps the Mexican-American war would have been avoided. And Mexico would have avoided losing not only Santa Fe, but also all the rest of New Mexico, plus Arizona, California, Nevada, Utah, Colorado and more. About 55% of its land.

^ A lot of people would say that’s a particularly Tejano point of view. I’ll look into it the reneging thing.

But it would seem maybe Santa Fe didn’t give a shit what happened thousands of miles away in Texas and Mexico. Mexico and Texas didn’t give much of a shit about northern New Mexico in those days.

Santa Fe, and northern New Mexico was very, very remote from Mexico - the people with long family history there consider themselves Spanish, not Mexican. In the 400 year history of northern NM, it was ‘Mexico’ only for about 25+ years. It was ‘New Spain’ until Mexican independence. That’s the way locals look at it anyway.

And again, the northern New Mexicans never considered themselves part of Texas, no matter what Texans thought.

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Originally Posted by Meadow Skipper

^ A lot of people would say that’s a particularly Tejano point of view.

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This - I've seen some recent historical reports that the reality at the Alamo may not have been anything like the tale we learned in school...

ETA: Here is the article I was thinking about: https://www.npr.org/2021/06/16/10069...bryan-burrough

I’d seen that.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Texas_Revolution

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The revolution began in October 1835, after a decade of political and cultural clashes between the Mexican government and the increasingly large population of Anglo-American settlers in Texas. The Mexican government had become increasingly centralized and the rights of its citizens had become increasingly curtailed, particularly regarding immigration from the United States. Mexico had officially abolished slavery in Texas in 1829, and the desire of Anglo Texans to maintain the institution of chattel slavery in Texas was also a major cause of secession.[1][2][3][4][5] Colonists and Tejanos disagreed on whether the ultimate goal was independence or a return to the Mexican Constitution of 1824. While delegates at the Consultation (provisional government) debated the war's motives, Texians and a flood of volunteers from the United States defeated the small garrisons of Mexican soldiers by mid-December 1835. The Consultation declined to declare independence and installed an interim government, whose infighting led to political paralysis and a dearth of effective governance in Texas. An ill-conceived proposal to invade Matamoros siphoned much-needed volunteers and provisions from the fledgling Texian Army. In March 1836, a second political convention declared independence and appointed leadership for the new Republic of Texas.

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