Why did people defend the alamo?
The defence of the Alamo and the later independence of Texas were paradoxical events in the history of North America. Since 1771, Americans had come to regard the continent as theirs to “liberate” from European empires and uncivilised tribes. However, the USA was a small country in many ways and lacked influence in the governments of Europe. By an Act passed in Mexico in 1824, citizens of USA were invited to open businesses and farms in the Mexican province of Texas. Over the next 10 years, tens of thousands of Americans moved into Texas until they became the majority population and began to live by their own local conventions and laws, based on USA principles. In particular, they avoided paying Mexican taxes and imposed localised systems of peacekeeping and criminal justice. They made it clear that they wished to form their own sovereign state. The president of Mexico, Antonio López de Santa Anna, decided in 1835 that Texas had to be brought back into Mexican control and moved a milit
