Treaty Signed: U.S. Gains California and Beyond
The Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo, signed on February 2, 1848, ended the Mexican-American War and transferred roughly 525,000 square miles of territory from Mexico to the United States, including all of present-day California, Nevada, Utah, and parts of Arizona, New Mexico, Colorado, and Wyoming. The US paid million and assumed .25 million in claims against Mexico. The treaty guaranteed that the roughly 80,000 Mexicans living in the ceded territory could choose American or Mexican citizenship and that their property rights would be respected. In practice, Anglo settlers systematically dispossessed Mexican landowners through legal chicanery, unfamiliar English-language courts, and outright violence over the following decades. The war itself was deeply controversial in the US: Abraham Lincoln challenged the war's legality as a congressman, and Henry David Thoreau went to jail for refusing to pay taxes that funded it.
February 2, 1848
178 years ago
Key Figures & Places
Mexican-American War
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Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo
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Mexican–American War
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Mexican–American War
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Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo
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Mexico
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California
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Arizona
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Nevada
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Utah
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Colorado
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New Mexico
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Wyoming
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Río Bravo
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Texas
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United States
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