Who is Nicholas Trist?

Nicholas Trist was a distinguished looking American who negotiated the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo which ended the Mexican American War and gave the United States 500,000 square miles of land at the cost of $15 million.  Why then was he arrested by the United States on March 17, 1848 on orders from President Polk?

The answer is a political one...it begins with Trist arriving in Mexico with authority to negotiate the peace treaty with Mexico along certain lines outlined by the President.  By the time the treaty was actually signed on February 2, 1848, Trist had long since been called back to Washington by his government.

Trist was a vain, stiff-necked sort of guy from Virginia who had a habit of ignoring orders.  He chose to ignore these orders as well..  Mexico was refusing to even negotiate at the time and Polk wanted to take a harder line, Trist wanted to appease Mexico.

Back in Washington, an "All Mexico Movement" had started with the idea of gaining all of Mexico. It was made up of antislavery advocates and extreme Manifest Destiny enthusiasts and actually became known as the Destinarians.  Polk was upset with them, upset with Trist's insubordination and said, "if the present opportunity be not seized at once, all chance of making a treaty will be lost...possibly forever."

One politician is noted as saying about Trist after the treaty was signed, "the treaty was negotiated by an unauthorized agent, with an unacknowledged government, submitted to a dissatisfied Senate."
On March 17th, Trist was put under arrest by US soldiers in Mexico City.  It was not the end of peace problems with Mexico.

Next time...Anti-slavery Limbo
__________________________
Today in Pioneer History:  On April 8, 1846, General Zachery Taylor defeats a superior Mexican force at the Battle of Palo Alto, north of the Rio Grade before the war is even declared.