Texans love to fight. See, we're fussin' and fightin' right now about the state, it's history, and other goofy stuff some people find out in those dusty square things... maybe they're rectangular or somethin'... books, that's it! We read about Texas in books! Hot damn! I gotta relative who's name's on the San Jacinto Monument. That pointy thing that's taller than the Washington Monument. You know... Washington was one of those damn Yankees. They like to think they had a revolution up there, but we show'd 'em how to do it up right. Ain't nobody ever had a revolution like us here in Texas. Only dumb thing Texans ever did was not listen to Sam. Sam was a genius. Sam liked to drink, and liked Injuns... so what? Wanna fight?? Sam said we should declare independence again instead of joinin' those loons east of tha Sabine in their confederacy of dunces. Lotta dead Texans cause folks didn't listen to Sam. Me, since we can do it, and just for the hell of it... causin' confusion to the poor critters livin' where the hell they live outside of Texas... me, I'd say let Central Texas be it's own state, just so's liberals like me can raise hell! Kinky for Guvner, Willie for one Senator, and somebody cool, like Moonbeam Jackson, for tha other. What tha hell. Did I say that already?? We like things big in Texas. You ask my wife!
You're right, it was a breach of contract issue with settlers as the ones in breach against a new owner that was, well, a dick. Slavery was just one of the issues...
Charles Whitman, Lee Harvey Oswald, David Koresh, etc. larger-than-life-legends, indeed. god bless Texas!
FFB, remember it's the victors that get to write the history. The winners of wars always become the more noble participant. And, your textbooks had to be approved by the Texas Board of Edjication, whose members have to run for election. Do you think they would get elected if they said something disparaging about Texas? The board has always had a political agenda, recently approving schoolbooks defining marrige and barely holding off creationism. There are also some interesting conspiricy theories concerning Andrew Jackson and Sam Houston. It seems that General Sam served under Old Hickory in the Creek Indian wars and the War of 1812. Jackson was an ardent Manifest Destiny believer, despising the native peoples he had fought brutal wars against. Some say he actually sent his old friend , the disgraced senator, to Texas to direct the independence movement in an effort to add Texas to the United States as a 'slave' state to bolster political power against the abolitionist. Here, read this account: http://www.houstonculture.org/hispanic/conquest2.html
Fatty, do you honestly think that all history books are written the same, depending on the author, publisher, and schools it sells to, there are going to be things that should be in there that isn't. There are science books that doesn't teach evolution. Most text book for "world history" never mention or usually just a blip about Japanese Occupation of China and the rape of nanking while spending whole chapters on the Holocaust. Most "world history" books talks about Europe but don't mention Africa till it's time to talk about slavery in U.S. when the early Northern African civilization was one of the most influencial ones in the world. How many chapters do you see in the world history books do you see talking about U.S. independance? Compare that with how many you see about tear of sorrow or just the greater western expansion. Independance usually takes several chapters and go into every detail about most of the battles. Expansion basically starts with "Indians and European settler have conflics, battles starts, we won" next.
The best thing my parents ever did for me is move to Texas when I was about 2 yrs. old. I realized it later in life when we moved back to Florida... after 18 months we moved to Texas. When I married my true TEXAN wife, we made sure and have both kids in Texas... We had moved to NM for a while after our son was born, but quickly oved back to Texas before our daughter was born. Yes, I'm a Florida native, but that's only handy on vacation... I was raised as a Texan, and was educated as a Texan, and I'm as Texan as they get -even in the eyes of my Florida relatives that know I was born there... They all wish they lived in Texas.
To clarify it wasnt the focal point as the reason for Texas Independence, it was on a list of reasons that was discussed. None the less it was discussed and it is one of the reasons for independence and you can't change that. History has some ugly things and beautiful things, you take the good with the bad. Slavery is just apart of the ugly side of Texas history.
Great, great piece. Everyone here knows I'm from Texas (most people don't even know my real name...they just call me "Texas". I'm on written on a couple of my teacher's roll as Texas), and of course I get asked the general questions all the time. People tend to tease me about things like that, but I go along with it, and I sort of like it. I'm proud.
TEXAS isn't the "spurs" or the "mavericks"... TEXAS is the TWO-TIME CHAMPION ROCKETS or "Este güey NJRocket está loco... LOCO LOCO LOCO..."
i always thought the "are you a cowboy?" and "does everyone have horses?" questions were just exaggerations. i didn't think anyone ever actually asked that stuff. but when i was in europe, someone from canada was in our room and the first thing she asked was "do you all ride horses?" i was kinda stunned but just explained we're like most normal people (except better than them of course). also funny in Rome i put on my UT cap one day and just off seeing the word Texas on the front some Italian guy, who you could tell probably didn't know english, passing by about 20 feet away said "Howdy." i barely even had the cap on when he said it. so we're a pretty worldwide brand.
To clarify: a poster stated that the Main reason for Texas' independence was slavery. I stated that was false. I'm not saying Texas never had slaves. So did most of the country. Remember, the North had slaves as well. What I'm disappointed in is that y'all's history books are focusing on that as being a large reason for our independence. It is false. Save the slavery issues for the civil war. That war has already been bastardized into the slavery issue. BTW, aboloshing slavery was a mild aside of the civil war. Lincoln owned slaves, himself.
Ummm... we did... I shouldn't SMILEY it... feel ashamed that we did... ... But I guess it was for the better that us mexicans didn't take San Jac... imagine no one recognizing TEXAS if it still belonged to MEXICO? That Italian dude would have said "Howdio" to francis 4 prez!
As with all wars, the main reason was economic. Anglo's wanted to develop (exploit) the potential they saw in in Texas that was being under utilized by the reigning government in Mexico City. Cotton plantations could provide riches for their owners if allowed to use the free labor from slaves. The story of the Civil War is the same story. It may be masked by 'States Rights" issues but the underlying basis is that the rich plantation owners wanted to stay rich, so they influenced the politicians to keep the 'state right' of slavery legal. Money buys power, power makes money. It's always about the rich getting richer.
Actually the poster said that the war was about slavery and you said it was a border dispute. So you both over generalized the issues. Oski was correct when he said that the right to own slaves was one of the issues that led to war and you were correct when said that salvery was not the only issue. The US did have slaves but that is besides the point in this discussion. After 1831 Mexico, which Texas was a part of, had outlawed the ownership of slaves and residents in the Northern regions of Mexico that is now Texas refused to give them up. Then Santa Anna came in, cut off immigration to Mexico from America into Texas and attempted to enforced the anti-slavery rule and others with an iron hand. Fast forward and the resistance led to a massacre at the Alamo Mission de San Antonio and Goliad which spurred the Texas fight for independence to victory at San Jacinto.
