rom the President, with instructions to treat with Mexico on the basis
of Slidell's proposals of 1845, arrived. Trist was a clerk in the
Department of State, and Scott refused to recognize or have any
relations with him. After much unseemly bickering and the conciliatory
services of the British Minister to Mexico, the general and the envoy
made peace, and negotiations were opened, only to be broken off by Santa
Anna upon his arrival from the north. On August 19 and 20, the battle of
Cherubusco seemed to convince the Mexicans that further resistance would
be futile, and Trist again offered peace on the terms of 1845, except
that the United States would reduce the amount of money to be paid by
$5,000,000. But the armistice under which the negotiations had been
renewed was broken, and on September 8 and 13, the battles of Molino del
Rey and Chapultepec were fought, and the capital was occupied on
September 14. A revolution in the affairs of Mexico now took place, and
the new Government appointed commissioners on November 22, to treat with
Trist.

However, the news of these battles and victories had aroused the
expansionist instincts of the people of the United States, or at least
of the articulate classes, to the point of demanding the annexation of
the whole of Mexico. Sober newspapers, like the New York _Evening Post_,
officers of the navy and the army, like Commodore Stockton and Colonel
Jefferson Davis, the hero of the battle of Buena Vista, and leading
politicians, John A. Dix, Lewis Cass, and Secretary Walker, urged the
Government to make an end of Mexico by prompt dismemberment. Although
the election of Representatives in 1846 had resulted in giving the Whigs
control of the House, Congress seemed disposed to yield to the popular
clamor as they came together in December, 1847, when the news of the
raising of the American flag over the city of Mexico was fresh in the
public mind.

Polk found his Cabinet divided on the subject of "all Mexico," with the
preponderance of influence in favor of annexation. Buchanan gave out a
public letter in which he said, "Destiny beckons us to hold and civilize
Mexico." Walker threatened to urge the absorption of Mexico in his
report to Congress. The flag should never be hauled down from the
ramparts of the captured capital of Mexico. Polk resisted this pressure,
but he recalled Trist just before the beginning of the final
negotiations with Mexico. On the advice of General Scott, Trist