Download or read book To Conquer a Peace written by John Edward Weems and published by . This book was released on 1988 with total page 550 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The text of this book represents not a catalogue of names, dates, and statistics of the war between the United States and Mexico but an attempt to tell the story of that conflict and to depict its color, drama, tragedy, and meaning mainly through the use of ten principal characters who participated in the war and who left behind written accounts. Some men in government during the administration of James K. Polk used a four-word maxim to describe the goal of the United States in the war against Mexico, which resulted from years of bickering and bitterness between the two nations. A paraphrase was used even by General Winfield Scott, a Whig and thus a political opponent of Democrat Polk. The words were "to conquer a peace."