Mexico Turns Down U.S. Offer For Texas

The presidential emissary arrived at Mexico City on Nov. 27, 1845, prepared to pay top dollar to maintain the peace south of the Rio Grande.

James K. Polk beat Henry Clay by a whisker in the election of 1844 on the popular appeal of his campaign promises to bring the Republic of Texas into the national fold and to establish indisputable dominion over Oregon. Willing to wage simultaneous wars against Mexico and Great Britain, the president-elect preferred to keep his word without shedding a single drop of blood.

Polk moved quickly to pacify the Mexicans, whose feelings had been hurt by the recent congressional vote in favor of the annexation of Texas. Shortly before his March 1845 inauguration, the tactful Tennessean recalled the American minister, whose conduct had made him persona non grata, and dispatched a private citizen to take the political temperature south of the border.

In spite of his fluent Spanish and prior residency in the foreign country, William S. Parrott badly misjudged the Mexicans