1845 Mexican elections

Liberty Party nominee Miguel Huddleston.

The 1845 Mexican elections took place in August 1845 for the purpose of choosing the Congress of the United States of Mexico. The Continentalist Party won a majority of seats in the Mexican Senate, allowing the Continentalists to appoint their leader, Senator Pedro Hermión of Jefferson, to the Presidency.

The main issue of the election was the growing conflict between the U.S.M. and the Confederation of North America in the Broken Arrow region between the Mexican state of Mexico del Norte and the North American confederation of Vandalia. Silver deposits were discovered early in 1844 in the disputed border region between the two nations, and prospectors from the two nations were engaged in an increasingly acrimonious competition for the most valuable claims.

Incumbent President Miguel Huddleston of the Liberty Party wished to avoid war with the C.N.A., and he spent much of 1845 attempting to reach a settlement with his opposite number, Governor-General Winfield Scott. However, Huddleston and Scott were hampered by the fact that Scott's bellicose Minister of War, Henry Gilpin, wielded more power in the ruling Unified Liberal Party (and in Scott's own Cabinet) than Scott himself did.

By the time the Libertarian caucus met to choose a presidential nominee in July 1845, the two countries were on the brink of war. Nevertheless, Huddleston was popular enough among the caucus that he was able to win the nomination. In his campaign, Huddleston spoke of the nation's rising wealth, the growing amity between the races (which, unfortunately, was not true), and his agricultural expansion program in the southern states of Durango and Chiapas.

Continentalist nominee Pedro Hermión.

The leading figure in the opposition Continentalist Party was Senator Pedro Hermión. Hermión had won over the Continentalists in the May 1843 Henrytown Convention with his Scorpions in a Bottle speech, in which he warned of a looming and, as he saw it, inevitable war with the C.N.A. As the conflict in the border region grew more severe, Hermión repeated his warnings of imminent war. The destruction of the Mexican mining camp of Morelos by North American vigilantes, and the deaths of 156 Mexican prospectors throughout the region, added weight to Hermión's warnings.

When the Continentalist caucus met in July, Hermión was the obvious choice for the party's presidential nominee. On the campaign trail Hermión spoke of "the coming struggle for the continent" and the "martyrs of Morelos." Hermión's skilled oratory combined with news of renewed fighting on the border shortly before voters went to the polls helped gain the Continentalists the victory on election day.

The 1845 Mexican Senate Elections

State	Continentalist Party	Liberty Party
Arizona	2	2
California	2	2
Chiapas	1	3
Durango	1	3
Jefferson	4	0
Mexico del Norte	4	0
TOTAL	14	10

On election day, the Continentalists were able to gain a majority in the Senate of fourteen, thanks mainly to gains in California, where the Libertarians lost half of the delegation, and Mexico del Norte, where all of the Libertarian candidates went down to defeat. Party discipline held in the Senate, with all fourteen Continentalists voting for Hermión, and all ten Libertarian members voting for Huddleston.

At his inauguration the next month, Hermión insisted that, "We do not want war with any nation," but added that "we do not shrink from action when it is necessary. We know what is ours, and we mean to keep it."

---

Sobel's source for the 1845 Mexican elections is Harper Reichart's The Election of 1845: The Mandate for War (Mexico City, 1956). Election results are from the 14 August 1845 issue of the Mexico City Tribune.