Book Review

Robert W. Johannsen called it "America's forgotten war" in a 1996 article. Eclipsed by the Civil War and located in one of the darker recesses of America's collective psyche, the Mexican-American War nonetheless refuses to fade completely from historical memory. Last year, with nervous anticipation, academics on both sides of the border (not to mention politicians, border residents, and trade negotiators) commemorated the sesquicentennial anniversary of the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo that ended the conflict. The three works reviewed here shed light on that critical episode that reduced Mexico to less than half of its former self and enlarged the American national domain by a third, sealing the fate of the two nations. These works also show that—as María Gayón Córdova has insightfully observed—the scholarship of the Mexican-American War is peculiar in that some aspects and battles have been overstudied while others remain in near absolute darkness. This is understandable if we consider that some of the epic stories that came out of that conflagration served as prime building materials for evolving national narratives, particularly in Mexico. And yet, at the same time, the Mexican-American War raged over such a large territory and involved such a bewildering cast of local and regional characters and power brokers that there is plenty that we still ignore. Marcela Terrazas Basante and María Gayón Córdova add geographic breadth to this story as they examine the conduct of the war in Baja California and Mexico City respectively, while the editor Donald S. Frazier has put together the first encyclopedia of the war, making it more manageable.

1

By her own admission, Terrazas Basante's book is not strictly a local study but a more ambitious work about the role of Baja California in the turbulent bilateral relations of Mexico and the United States during the war and its aftermath. En busca de una nueva frontera not only gazes at the torn polity of Baja California at midcentury but also seeks explanations for the state of affairs in such distant realms as the ideological underpinnings of American expansionism, Mexico's political instability at the national level, filibustering expeditions all along the United States-Mexico border, and Anglo-American attempts to open a transcontinental passage through the isthmus of Tehuantepec. Terrazas Basante is at her best when she focuses on her home region. While Baja California hung in the balance between Mexico and the United States during the war years, local society was deeply divided as some supported the retention of this remote territory by Mexico while others openly collaborated with the American troops to annex Baja California to the United States. The author highlights the tensions between self-interest and national identity (a phenomenon that can be readily observed in other regions engulfed by the war), pointing out that many wealthy residents were in favor of incorporation by the United States to safeguard their properties. Conversely, those who wanted to remain a part of Mexico consisted of Catholic priests who feared the introduction of Protestantism into Baja California, Spaniards who construed the war as a clash between Hispanic and Anglo-American cultures, and the lower strata who mistrusted American rule. Less successful are the author's forays beyond Baja California, where she is often forced to rely on the work of others and to cover ground that is all too familiar to specialists. Terrazas Basante concludes that Baja California remained within Mexico's fold largely because—unlike Texas, New Mexico, and Alta California—the American government did not consider the possession of Baja California as absolutely essential in the final settlement with Mexico. As its title indicates, En busca de una nueva frontera brings new information to light and raises a few thorny questions.

. . .