Papers of Mirabeau Buonapart~ Lamar
No. 640 [1837?] A. B. LONGSTREET, f AUGUSTA? GEORGIA?], T'O [M. B. LAMAR, AUGUSTA 1 GEORGIA?] vVe consider the advantages & disadvantages of the Union The advantages are 1st. Immediate protection 2d. alternate security from war with Mexico on one hand & the U. S on the other. I do not add the advantage of our boasted form of Governt. because Texas can adopt that form, if she chooses, with the improvements upon it which experience has suggested. Ansicer. If at this time Texas can maintain herself against Mexico, she never can hereafter have any thing to dread from her. Indeed Texas must enlarge her borders with every conflict with that power- Little is to be apprehended from war with the U. S. Her institu- tions & the habits of her people, are utterly opposed to war. She never has engaged and never will engage in an offensive war- and the probability of her so doing demimishes as her limits increase- for this simple reascn ; every war of conquest adds power to that section of the Union in which it is carried on, and every other sec- tion will consequently oppose it~ 'I'he Senate also will be an insuper- able barrier to warR of conquest. The states conterminous to Texas, and those alone cari feel a deep interest in conquering her; but would the remote states allow. them to do it- so far from it; the remote states will not consent to her voluntary subjugation- A thing worthy to be r·emembered by the Texians; for it is a ·warning to her not to be careless of her political Institutions in the hope that they are soon to be useless. She cannot for twenty years at least, (I doubt wheth- er she ever can be) received into the Union without some humiliating concessions, which will be ultimately dangerous, if not ruinous to her interests. She cannot until new states formed imniediately on her northern border, and the southern states together, make a ma- jority in congress- V.Till this ever be the case. States ever have grown up more rapidly in the N. vVest than in the So. vVest; and they are always more powerful in population- So it will be until until [sic] the states reach the Pacific But the states most interested in conquest, are the very ones which would have identity of feeling, interest, & consequently friendship, with Texas. ·Could the southern states be goaded to a war with Texas- No, because Texas is filled with their brothers & their children; and it is the land of their retreat as their own lands wear out, or dangers thicken at the North. But suppose war with the U. S. and conquest by them. What then.? Why Texas will then be annexed to the U. S. Just what is desired· by the majority in Texas now. But I have no fear of a war. From the establfshment of our Government Canada -has reposed in peace on one extreme of our country & Florida & Mexico ·on the other, without.the first movement towards an offensive war by the U. S. upon either. •. If the experiment of our Governt. has placed any 1-Library,
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