what if America had Annexed all of Mexico after the Mexican-American war

anamarvelo

Banned
what whould happen if all of mexico not just the states of new mexico arizon ,utah and califya had been taken after the mexican american war
 
It would become like Ireland was to Great Britain, a colonial region that the US has little ability to control well and every oppurtnity to completely mess up and a long long cycle of violence.
 

anamarvelo

Banned
With or without a ban on slavery there?

it was below the misory compramise so when they became states after being organized from terriotorys
so ya slave states
but most of the people in mexico are fersly agist slavery so there a possiblity that the people may vote for to become a free state
 
it was below the misory compramise so when they became states after being organized from terriotorys
so ya slave states
but most of the people in mexico are fersly agist slavery so there a possiblity that the people may vote for to become a free state

The Yucatan might go Slave, and it can probably be forced on the Northern tier of States, due to sparse population, but basically these Slave States will be sandwiched between Free Northern states and Free Central Mexican States/Territories.
 
it was below the misory compramise so when they became states after being organized from terriotorys
so ya slave states
but most of the people in mexico are fersly agist slavery so there a possiblity that the people may vote for to become a free state

Given how racist the US was back then, do you really think Mexicans would have been allowed to form states and freely vote over anything? I'd rather thing they'd be an occupied territory, whose people wouldn't be considered citizens (except maybe the withe landowing elite) and thus would require the constant presence of the army. IOTL Mexico suffered many rebelions led by power Indians and Mestizos, ITTL there'd be even more, and many members of the elite would support rebels. So would probably many priests (no matter what the Catholic hierarchy does).

Mexico would be a huge problem for the US, even greater than the one Ireland was for Great Britain. Even more, it might led to the US government becoming more and more authoritatian, because, once you've see you can rule a territory manu militari (specially a territory so close to home) you might be tempted to try to rule the rest of your country in the same way.
 
Last edited:
what whould happen if all of mexico not just the states of new mexico arizon ,utah and califya had been taken after the mexican american war

Well, you are right on one thing; many Mexicans were fervently anti-slavery and it's very likely most of them would have been more than a little pissed off if the Southerners tried to force them to accept their 'Institution'.

TBH, I just don't see Mexico being completely annexed right away. In fact, it could possibly take as much as a half a century, maybe even slightly longer, to successfully accomplish this, if the U.S. even gets to that point.

There is one good thing about this, though: if the Wilmot Proviso were to be passed, there would be no way that slavery could spread any further than it already had. And perhaps inter-ethnic relations might actually be helped in the long run, as well, when the U.S. finally gets used to having a significant Mexican minority.
 
Well, you are right on one thing; many Mexicans were fervently anti-slavery and it's very likely most of them would have been more than a little pissed off if the Southerners tried to force them to accept their 'Institution'.

.

The Mexicans would have already been pissed off just by been ruled by foreigners, no matter what hapens with slavery. Remember there was a storng Mexican identity since at least 1800, and there's no way they wouldn't heve seen the Americans as foreign invaders with an alien culture and language. True, that Mexican identity might not have been that strong among Yucatec Mayans, who had their own religion and identity, but was very strong in the highly populated Central Valley of Mexico.

Of course, the Mexican society was a very divided one, and a wise foreign invader might have proffit form that. For example, he may have gained some support if they had done thing rights and taken certain meassures in order to improve the situation of the poor classes. But given how that's unlikely, since it's must more probable that the US would have allied with the elite than with the Indian masses (taking meassures that would deprive indians of their comunal lands, for example), and that they would still screw things up with at least a part of the old Mexican elite (who would feel left over and miss power) an American Mexico is not going to be a nice place to live in.

This would, in my opinion, delay the formation of "states" almost idefinently, until they are eventualy given back independence (as the British did in Ireland). At most, the US might keep some of the territories that form part of OTL modern Mexico.
 

Faeelin

Banned
The Mexicans would have already been pissed off just by been ruled by foreigners, no matter what hapens with slavery. Remember there was a storng Mexican identity since at least 1800, and there's no way they wouldn't heve seen the Americans as foreign invaders with an alien culture and language. True, that Mexican identity might not have been that strong among Yucatec Mayans, who had their own religion and identity, but was very strong in the highly populated Central Valley of Mexico.

Once in a while, I've wondered about a USA that ends up at war with a Spain that still rules Mexico in the 1820s, but is suffering continued unrest at home. If it starts a chain of events that ends up with an independent Mexico, what does it do?
 
The Mexicans would have already been pissed off just by been ruled by foreigners, no matter what hapens with slavery. Remember there was a storng Mexican identity since at least 1800, and there's no way they wouldn't heve seen the Americans as foreign invaders with an alien culture and language. True, that Mexican identity might not have been that strong among Yucatec Mayans, who had their own religion and identity, but was very strong in the highly populated Central Valley of Mexico.

Of course, the Mexican society was a very divided one, and a wise foreign invader might have proffit form that. For example, he may have gained some support if they had done thing rights and taken certain meassures in order to improve the situation of the poor classes. But given how that's unlikely, since it's must more probable that the US would have allied with the elite than with the Indian masses (taking meassures that would deprive indians of their comunal lands, for example), and that they would still screw things up with at least a part of the old Mexican elite (who would feel left over and miss power) an American Mexico is not going to be a nice place to live in.

This would, in my opinion, delay the formation of "states" almost idefinently, until they are eventualy given back independence (as the British did in Ireland). At most, the US might keep some of the territories that form part of OTL modern Mexico.

Unless the US go genocidal. Most of the population was "Indian" anyway. Definitely, chanches are that it would be a very dark scenario.
 
Unless the US go genocidal. Most of the population was "Indian" anyway. Definitely, chanches are that it would be a very dark scenario.

Well, if a particularly hawkish president takes office, and if the Southerners can convince the rest of Congress to reject the Wilmot Compromise and that slavery can be profitably extended southward(although changes might need to be made to allow it to evolve. This happened in DoD, btw.), then unfortunately, a dark scenario is indeed plausible. :(
 
Mexico becomes the USA's West Bank and Gaza Strip both at the same time, this becomes a classic ATL example of stupidity, imperial overstretch, and hubris in politics all at once. Mexico has had problems ruling all of Mexico, the USA will have far greater problems given its abysmal problems with finding the troops just to defeat Mexican armies on the battlefield. At the same time the USA finds itself like Israel in a situation where if it leaves, Mexico is a permanently hostile armed camp sharing a land border with it, if it stays it exhausts itself in a near-permanent war it has neither the means, the will, or the power to end, and where like Israel it's incapable of engaging in a genocide (in no small part because 19th Century America doesn't have the ability to do so against a people who whatever their Native roots look and sound more European than do the Navajo or the Cheyenne).
 
Its important to note that conscription merely to deal with occupied territories would be unthinkable. Its one thing to use conscription in a civil war, which was pretty opposed by a lot of folk anyways, but using conscription to keep the Mexicans down would be political suicide.

Im not saying we're going to see a counterculture and hippies in the 1850s or something but still, the point is America is going to have quite a few large problems finding enough bodies for a job this big.

Israel at least has the benefit of being able to devote their entire state and being to keeping the West Bank and Gaza strip as part of Israel.
 
Its important to note that conscription merely to deal with occupied territories would be unthinkable. Its one thing to use conscription in a civil war, which was pretty opposed by a lot of folk anyways, but using conscription to keep the Mexicans down would be political suicide.

Im not saying we're going to see a counterculture and hippies in the 1850s or something but still, the point is America is going to have quite a few large problems finding enough bodies for a job this big.

Israel at least has the benefit of being able to devote their entire state and being to keeping the West Bank and Gaza strip as part of Israel.

And even then it's never really found an answer as to how to halt Palestinian terrorism. Which is relatively speaking small-scale by comparison to what occupying the entirety of Mexico due to winning a war would involve.
 
Eh the most likely scenario is the US still taking the northern territories an maybe imposing a 'Republican' puppet government in Mexico City
 
Long term, the US is likely to lose control of Central/Southern Mexico - it is too densely populated by people who don't know English. However, the northern desert tier of Mexico - Baja California penninsula, and the states from Sonora to Tamaliupas - is likely to become Anglicized just as New Mexico, Texas, and California was. Possibly Sinaloa and Durango as well. If that happens, the rest of Mexico that stays culturally Mexican will still have a lot of US business interests, and the Tehuantepec Isthmus is likely to be the site of railroad portage tied to US interests like the Panama Canal Zone was, as per the McLane-Ocampo Treaty.

In the short term, a lot depends on the actual treaty that ends the war. The Mexicans could very well demand that the more populated Mexican states enter the USA as fully formed states. If so, I don't see how even the most rabid pro-slavery politician is going to restart slavery in those areas. Some of Mexico - the mostly empty, desert portion - might be considered territory under the Federal government. Those areas might be potentially open to slavery, but their geography dictates against plantation agriculture. I don't see them being dominated by slavers. The Yucatan area is the one area most likely to become a slave state (the native population was already treated as slaves), but the Yucatan is technically not part of Mexico at the time! It was independent, and had been since the same era as the Texan Revolution. But if all of Mexico is annexed, then likely a separate treaty will be sign annexing Yucatan, as the local elites had already asked outsiders to annex them.

Despite the inherent problems of two different languages, I don't see that the scenario that Snake Featherston sees - at least not at first. Mexico is definitely culturally different from the US, but there isn't any real sense of a Mexican nation at the time. The local populace is overwhelming rural and tied to their local identity; Mexican nationalism as we know it is a product of the revolutionary era (1910-1940).

The internal politics of Mexico at the time was between conservatives (landed aristocracy and the Catholic Church) and liberals (democrats and anti-clericalism of the Jacobin tradition). Not between Mexican nationalists and outsiders. Even the war with France is properly seen as a conservative vs liberal war, not a war of national liberation.

With US annexation, the liberals have triumphed (and probably become a very pro-US faction in Mexico provided they are able to become the local elites, and not US carpetbaggers), but the US doesn't have the severe anti-clericalism of Mexican liberalism. The US was vaguely anti-Catholic, but not the point of the French tradition of secularism which is way more anti-religious than anything found in the US First Amendment tradition. Quite likely, the Mexican Catholic Church will be reconciled to the US as it protects them from the worst excesses of the Mexican liberals. The US won't outlaw parochial schools, seize church land, or ban religious displays as the Mexican liberals often did or threaten to do. Likewise, the landed aristocracy will have some problems, but may be content since the rule of law will keep their estates intact instead of being seized.

In the short period of Mexican independence, Mexico will have had several decades of near constant war, have had several successful revolts (having lost Central America, Texas, and Yucatan), and failed in its first major contest with another power. The Mexican state doesn't have much legitimacy, and there won't be many who fight for it after an annexation treaty.

So we have about 10 years of peace with northern Mexico organized as several territories, and several Spanish speaking states down south. We may still have the US civil war, but the Confederates lose even more quickly as US naval control allows southern Mexico to stay in contact with Washington, and eventually a Union army from southern Mexico goes up into Texas. Even if some sort of slavery is instituted in Mexico under demands of the slaveholders, I see the region as too anti-slavery to secede and join the Confederacy. Certainly the peasants and liberals won't fight for the Confederacy, and the landed conservatives won't see any common cause with them either.

With that settled, we will see a better version of the Porfiriato from 1870-1910. The social and economic problems still remain, especially in southern Mexico, but there will be several decades of democratic elections, and self rule developed in northern Mexico as Sonora, etc. become states, probably with a large population from US and European immigrants. In other words, the major reason why Mexico exploded in the Mexican Revolution never happens.

The problem will come in that eventually land reform and the condition of the Mexican peasants in southern Mexico become a major issue, probably between 1900-1930. This will probably be combined with language differences still existing. It's at this point that Snake's Gaza/West Bank comment might come into being. However, there is also the possibility that some kind of land reform can be done. It really depends on how well the Socialist Party of Eugene Debs and Emilio Zapata convinces the major parties to do so. Perhaps by dressing it up as a rerun of the Homestead Acts combined with compensation to the big landowners. One advantage the US will have over the Porfiriato is the US is unlikely to have taken previously common land used by peasants and give them to individual investors. Instead, they either would have been given to the peasants earlier - ala the Homestead Act - or kept them in common. I don't see the kind of mass title stealing that occured under Diaz.

So depending on the specifics, you either have a massive blow up in southern Mexico over land reform, or a simmering discontent that slowly gets pacified. At that point, southern Mexico's fate is decided. It either becomes the US's Spanish Quebec, a troublesome region that stays in the country, or problems inspire a new nationalism that eventually causes the region to become independent. With about 70 years worth of history from the POD to this time, several mutually exclusive possibilities are equally plausible depending on how you develop the timeline.
 
what whould happen if all of mexico not just the states of new mexico arizon ,utah and califya had been taken after the mexican american war

Best-case scenario
U.S. lets Mexico go, almost with the same territories, sans Chihuahua, Sonora and the Baja peninsula; maybe at least the northern half of Sinaloa and Durango. They will probably end up finishing the Indian wars in the 1920's, since the indians in Southern Sonora would be very hostile and not too keen on renouncing to their lands. Mexico will still have a Revolution, but it will have a stronger agrarian background.

Worst-case scenario: (I'd wish to explore this one in a timeline, or possibly go collab on it)
Mexico gets screwed all over the whole deal, due to ol' fashioned Gringo racism and anti-Catholicism. We get an earlier American Civil War, more similar to the Lebanese Civil War, once the pro-Slavery politicians try to have their way into Mexico, with Unionists, Confederates, Yucatán, Mexican Liberals, Mexican Conservatives, Mayans, Sonoran tribes, Apaches, and other tribes duke it out into a massive free-for-all war (and possibly New England attempting secession again, seeing as how the Washington government dragged everyone into another nonsensical war). It will not be nice at all. It will end up in the partition of the United States and Mexico into several countries once the whole dust settles down, everyone hating each other too much to allow a future reunification.
 
I think the most the US will get would be the Baja Peninsula, bordering Mexican states, and *maybe* Sinoala and Durango with a satellite Yucatan. Southern/Central Mexico is fairly cohesive by 1845 though playing the elite against the church could produce some interesting results. Do not expect slavery to spread to the new territories in their entirety though.
 

Wolfpaw

Banned
Mexico's population as of 1849 was 6,868,700. By 1850 it had reached 7,485,200.

The US population of 1847 was 21,406,000. By 1850 it was 23,191,900.

This is also going to cause a major freakout because the American population had trouble enough accepting the roughly 1.6 million Catholics who lived in America in 1850 (7%). With the addition of Mexico, that brings the Catholic population to 30%.

Combine that with the fact that in 1850 15.7% of the population was black (3,641,128) and that puts minority groups at around 45% of the total population.

White Protestants are not going to like this.
 
Last edited:
Top