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THE POINSETTIA
by Archie P. McDonald |
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Every
Christmas your house and
mine brightens with the seasonal introduction of the poinsettia plant with its
red and green leaves and tiny yellow blooms. Perhaps you would like to know how
such came to be.
Joel Robert Poinsett, a son of South Carolina, was educated
in Connecticut and England in languages, law, and medicine, and traveled extensively
in Europe and Asia before accepting a diplomatic post as American minister to
Mexico during the administration
of John Quincy Adams.
Adams won the presidency over Andrew Jackson in
1824 due to what John Randolph dubbed "a corrupt bargain between a Puritan and
a blackleg." Adams, of course, was the Puritan, and Henry Clay the blackleg, or
villain. Despite Jackson’s greater number of popular and electoral votes in a
field of four candidates, he failed to win a majority of the electoral votes.
The House, led by Clay, voted in second-place finisher Adams, who then appointed
Clay secretary of state.
Adams wanted to court western votes in the hope
he could face down a certain challenge by Jackson in 1828, so in 1825 he sent
Poinsett to Mexico to move
the boundary as far westward as possible from the Sabine
River line to which the U.S. and Spain had agreed in 1819, two years before
the successful Mexican revolution.
Adams, who had negotiated the treaty
for the U.S. while serving as President James Monroe’s secretary of state, appears
to have been more interested in impressing western voters than actually acquiring
more land—land that might one day host slavery.
Poinsett believed in
his mission and made a sincere effort to achieve it, but made serious blunders
in the process. First, he disclosed his mission in a public address prior to taking
up negotiations with the Mexican government. Then Poinsett helped to establish
York Rite Freemasonry in Mexico,
unaware that doing so created a rival political party to the Scottish Rite Masons
who ran the country. Thus the Escoceses now had to contend with the Yorkinos for
control of Mexico.
This did not make the government agreeable to transfer portions of the country’s
northern provinces to the U.S., even for the $1 million Poinsett offered in 1827.
So he came home only with the beautiful flower he found in Mexico,
which was named, in his honor, the poinsettia.
© Archie P. McDonald
All
Things Historical
December 11
, 2005 column
(A syndicated column in over 40 East Texas newspapers.
This column is provided as a public service by the East Texas Historical Association.
Archie P. McDonald is director of the Association and author of more than 20 books
on Texas.)
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