Primary Sources, November 13

Here are the two latest sources are group has found.

http://tsl.state.tx.us/exhibits/annexation/part4/page2.html

The primary source was found by using a word search for Texas annexation. The website is sponsored by the Texas State Library and Archives Committee. This is a reliable source, because it is sponsored by the state and uses original archives for their sources of information. The primary source is a letter written by James K. Polk to a committee in Cincinnati that was debating the Texas issue. They wanted to know where Polk stood on the issue of annexation.
Polk’s letter to the Cincinnati committee, who opposed the annexation of Texas, was very straight forward and short. Polk firmly stood by his view for the immediate annexation of Texas. He believed that since Texas is connected to the Mississippi Valley, and was once part of the American territory. America has the right to bring Texas into the United States. Also, he stated that Texas should have never been ceded away to Spain when the United States acquired Spanish’s Florida. Polk also fears that if the government is to reject Texas’s acceptance to enter the United States. The British will try to bring Texas under their control. He also stated that to ensure that this will never happen again in the future. He is in favor for Oregon to become a state as well.
I believe that Polk’s letter was very simple and easy to understand. He simply stated why he was in favor of the Texas issue and his reasons for believing so. He did not get in great depth about politic issues behind his decision, and did not mention anything about the South or the expansion of slavery in his letter.

The second source, http://caho-test.cc.columbia.edu//dbq/11014.html#D, includes the Republican Party platform of 1856. It shows that by the middle of the decade, a new party had risen in opposition to the Democratic Party's position on the territories. For the Republicans, slavery had to stay confined to the South, and the Constitution itself forbade any growth into the territories. It is also interesting to note that the platform uses language such as "in the spirit of Washington and Jefferson" to support their own policies. The irony, of course, is that both men were Southerners and slaveowners, but Republican Party's appeal is to their views on the federal government. Of course, this is also a slight jab at the Democrats, who claimed ideological lineage with Jeffersonian thought throughout the 19th century. This source could be very useful at seeing the evolution of free-soil thought in the 1850s, especially as it relates to national politics.