600
AMERICAN HISTORICAL ASSOCIATION
Last spring the idea was very general in Mexico that Texas was the Botany Bay of the U. S. and that the Govt. of the North was secretly encouraging the emigration of bad men and vagabonds, who were destitute of principle, for the purpose of enciting them to rebel against this Govt. and produce confusion on the frontier, which would have been a pretext to enter the country and put things to rights ns Jackson entered Florida etc. This Govt. now believes that the settlers of my colony at least, are men of principle who will respect their oaths of fidelity, and will never forget that they have recd fortunes from this Govt. and favors which no other Govt ever extended to any people. The suspicions against the U. S. Govt. are also all removed. But what is deemed to be the , dignity of this Govt. will not suffer it to move the repeal of the law of 6 April unless some prominent reason can be given for so doing. I wish the people of Texas to giYe such a reason by proofs of fidelity and attachment to Mexico and the best way of mani- festing these proofs is through the news paper- Let it be what its title [The Me:vican Citizen] professes. A Jlf ewican defends every- thing that is mexican-but in gen 1 terms, without being in favor or against political parties. The parties of this country are not clearly defined and have not that definite and fixed character, nor permanency of purpose which parties generally have in other countries. Thus, since the to[t]al overthrow and imprisonment of Guerrero, a new party has sprung up composed of Guerreroists and Ped'rastristas, a most unnatural connection, for the former expelled the latter by the revolution of the Acordada, and it seems as tho they had now united to put down the present administration-that effected, the Guerreroists will per- haps enter the lists with Pedraza for the supremacy. If we enter into such a scramble we shall be like children in a mob, and as likely to be trodden upon by friends as by foes. Hence it is that l)ituated as we are, it is dangerous to be classed as belonging to any party. Our neutrality injures neither, for our weight is of not sufficient importance to injure or benefit either materially, and it may gain us the good will of both, or what is of just as much importance to us, both will let us alone. You are well aware that in my intercourse with this govt. I have followed a few fixed rules from which I have never deviated since 1821 when I first entered the country. In the first place I came with pure intentions. I bid an everlasting farewell to my native country, and adopted this, and in so doing I determined to fulfil rigiclly all the duties and obligations of a J,f exic(1Jn citizen-I have endeavored to keep n.11 the officers with whom I was in direct com- munication in a good humor, and to make friends of them. I ha~e excused and even invented plausable reasons to justify or explain
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