Title: Becoming Part of the United States | Mexican | Immigration and Relocation in U.S. History | Classroom Materials at the Library of Congress | Library of Congress
Headings: Becoming Part of the United States
Becoming Part of the United States
The Land Changes Hands

Content: This treaty gave the victorious nation an enormous amount of land, including what would later become the states of California and Texas, as well as parts of Colorado, Arizona, New Mexico, Utah and Nevada, in exchange for a token payment of $15 million. Scribner's statistical atlas of the U.S., Plate 16
Scribner's statistical atlas of the U.S., Plate 15
One more important piece of land changed hands in 1854, when the U.S. bought what is now southern Arizona and New Mexico from the Mexican government for $10 million. This land deal, known as the Gadsden Purchase, brought the U.S. a much-coveted railroad route, and helped open the West to further expansion. With two strokes of a pen, the larger nation had expanded its size by one-third. And almost overnight, tens of thousands of Mexican citizens had become residents of the United States. Next Section Land Loss in Trying Times