Southern Historical Society Papers, Volume 28.
Reverend J. William Jones, Ed.

The recent actions of the political conventions of the Republicans and Democrats, in Philadelphia and Kansas City, appear to make it opportune and appropriate for some notice of a few points of history, and to observe the prospects of the future.

In the platforms of both parties there is one item, or matter, to which I desire to refer, and to direct attention. It is the item of making new States of the Territories of New Mexico, Arizona and Oklahoma. The Republicans in their platform say: ‘We favor home rule for and the early admission to Statehood of the Territories of New Mexico, Arizona and Oklahoma.’

The Democrats in their platform say: ‘We denounce the failure of the Republican party to carry out its pledges to grant Statehood to the Territories of Arizona, New Mexico and Oklahoma, and we promise the people of those Territories immediate Statehood and home rule during their condition as territories, and we favor home rule and a territorial form of government for Alaska and Porto Rico.’

From these quotations from the two platforms, it seems that in the success of either party the result must be that the Territories shall be admitted as States of the United States.

Some points of history.

My purpose is now to recite a few facts of history concerning the Territory of Arizona. This Territory is a part of the great Mexican purchase by the United States from Mexico, through the treaty of Guadaloupe-Hidalgo, of the United States with Mexico in 1848, growing out of the Mexican war, and five years later by the Gadsden purchase. By these two acquisitions of territory, the United States made a great expansion. By the treaty the United States acquired 522,568 square miles, or 334,443,520 acres of new territory, and by the Gadsden purchase the United States received other new territory of 45,535 square miles, or an area of 29, 142,400 acres.