June 12, 1848

Arkansas senator Ambrose Sevier, who played a prominent role in the negotiation of the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo at the end of the Mexican War, left Mexico City with the last occupying U.S. troops, carrying the ratified treaty in his saddle bag. Sevier shepherded the treaty through its U.S. Senate ratification, and President James K. Polk called upon Sevier to serve as a commissioner to guarantee its ratification in the Mexican congress.