|
||
|
|
|
|
The Texas Boundary During the Texas Revolution.
First edition of this extremely rare 1836 printed circular, important for the history of Texas. The decree text conveys an amendment to the Treaty of 1828 between the United States and Mexico in order to deal with the original charge of that treaty for commissioners to survey the headwaters of the Arkansas and Red Rivers to fix the boundary between the two countries. Due to delays on both sides, the survey was not completed in the stipulated time. According to the Handbook of Texas, between 1819 and 1836 the Neches River was occasionally advanced as the eastern boundary of Texas. Specifically, the present decree cites the third article of the 1828 Treaty, which describes the survey's charge:
To fix this line with more precision and to place the land marks which shall designate exactly the limits of both nations each of the Contracting parties shall appoint a Commissioner and Surveyor, who shall meet before the termination of one year from the date of the ratification of this Treaty at Natchitoches on the Red River and proceed to run and mark the said line from the mouth of the Sabine to the Red River and from the Red River to the River Arkansas.
The present amendment, negotiated by Anthony Butler as Chargé d'affaires of the United States in Mexico, adds an article to the original Treaty, calling once again for the survey. Though the survey was completed, the Battle of San Jacinto (April 21, 1836) effectively invalidated the boundaries agreed upon.
Streeter (1256), notes:
The Mexico City edition (entry No. 1257A [i.e., the present item]) gives the date as April 20. As the Texans had been victorious at San Jacinto on April 21, 1836, the treaty was meaningless as far as Texas boundaries were concerned.
The circular was issued on June 18, 1836 by Mexico's then-acting Secretary of Foreign Affairs, José Maria Ortiz Monasterio. The lag between the Texan victory in April and the printing of the Treaty in June is probably best explained by the bureaucratic inertia of official Mexican government printing.
Rarity:
WorldCat locates only four copies: (OCLC: 16070233) Indiana University (Lilly Library), New Mexico State, Baylor (Texas Streeter Collection items), and (OCLC: 28084931) Yale.
Streeter (Texas as a Province and Republic) 1257A, cites only UT and Streeter's personal copy. Streeter notes: "A copy of this, catalogued with the heading, "The Revised Southwestern Boundary Treaty of 1836, Arizona and Texas," brought $400 (entry No. 13) at the Bauer Americana Sale at Parke-Bernet December 2, 1958."
