Chapter 17 Terms and Definitions

Manifest Destiny: The belief, widespread in the 1840s, that the United States was fated by God to expand across the North American continent.
John Tyler: Vice president who became president after William Henry Harrison's death in 1841, the first VP to assume office this way; he frequently clashed with his own Whig party.
Oregon Trail: The overland route used by thousands of American pioneers in the 1840s to reach farmland in the Oregon Country.
"Fifty-Four Forty or Fight!": The expansionist slogan demanding all of the Oregon Country up to the Alaska border; the dispute was ultimately settled peacefully at the 49th parallel.
James K. Polk: The dark-horse expansionist elected president in 1844, whose administration annexed Texas, settled Oregon, and fought the Mexican-American War.
Texas Annexation: Congress's 1845 admission of the independent Republic of Texas into the United States, which angered Mexico and severed diplomatic relations.
Mexican-American War: The 1846–1848 war between the U.S. and Mexico, sparked by a border clash, that resulted in vast American territorial gains.
Zachary Taylor: American general whose victories in northern Mexico made him a national hero and propelled him to the presidency in 1848.
Winfield Scott: American general who led the campaign that captured Mexico City, including the storming of Chapultepec, effectively ending the war.
Bear Flag Republic: A short-lived independent state declared by American settlers in California in 1846 before its incorporation into the United States.
Wilmot Proviso: An 1846 proposal to ban slavery in any territory won from Mexico; it repeatedly passed the House but failed in the Senate, inflaming sectional tensions.
Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo: The 1848 treaty ending the Mexican-American War, in which Mexico ceded the Mexican Cession to the U.S. for $15 million.
Mexican Cession: The vast territory, including California and the future Southwest, ceded by Mexico to the United States in 1848.
California Gold Rush: The massive influx of "forty-niners" following the 1848 discovery of gold at Sutter's Mill, which rapidly grew California's population.
Forty-Niners: The nickname for the prospectors who rushed to California in 1849 seeking gold.