Surveying the Mexican Border

The Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo, approved for ratification by the U.S. Senate in 1848, set the terms for ending the Mexican War. Mexico agreed to cede more than half its territory to the United States for $15 million. A new, 2,000-mile border between the two countries was to run along the Rio Grande and Rio Gila to the Pacific Ocean with a boundary commission from each country surveying and marking its location. Congress authorized the Army Corps of Topographical Engineers to conduct the survey for the United States.



Boundary between the United States and Mexico, map by William H. Emory, 1855	Oenothera primiveris, Evening Primrose Family, Herbarium specimen from Mexican Boundary Survey


Oenothera primiveris, photograph by Warren L. Wagner	Canis latrans texensis, coyote skull specimen, Texas, Frontera, from the Mexican Boundary Survey

E PLURIBUS UNUM —
OUT OF MANY, ONE

HISTORY OF CONGRESS
AND THE CAPITOL

Surveying the Mexican Border

E PLURIBUS UNUM — OUT OF MANY, ONE

HISTORY OF CONGRESS AND THE CAPITOL

Surveying the Mexican Border

E PLURIBUS UNUM —
OUT OF MANY, ONE

HISTORY OF CONGRESS
AND THE CAPITOL