Jose Antonio Navarro: Balancing Heroism and Complicity

Introduction: Two Polarized Views of Navarro

The portrait that emerges of Jose Antonio Navarro in Jose Antonio Navarro: In Search of the American Dream in Nineteenth Century Texas, David McDonald's historical biography, is intended to be a complex and nuanced one. In the past, two polarized points of view of the Texas legislator have tended to dominate political discourse. One is the traditional portrait of Navarro as a true Texas patriot, based on his role in establishing an independent Texan state and shaping the legislation of Texas throughout his political career. The other view holds that Navarro was a collaborator with the enemy and should have aligned himself with Mexicans against Anglos. Adding to this controversy, McDonald's support for the slave trade and the Confederacy has earned him the ire of many contemporary historians.

McDonald's Biographical Project and Credentials

McDonald justifies his biographical project by underlining the many factual and ideological errors that have characterized previous biographies, which he views as excessively one-sided. He seeks a balanced, fully realized portrait of the Texas politician and rancher. It should be noted that McDonald's credentials as a historian are somewhat unusual. He is not an academic but rather a self-employed historian who has worked as the park historian for the Casa Navarro State Historic Site and as a consultant for PBS's American Experience. His book is explicitly geared toward a popular audience but still engages in serious historical research in his attempt to bring his subject to life and defend Navarro's reputation.

Navarro's Life as Texas History

Navarro lived to well over a hundred, so the story of his life is in many ways the story of Texas itself. Texas underwent a series of seismic revolutionary shifts, from Spanish colonization to Mexican control to independence to incorporation into the United States and secession during the Civil War. Because Navarro's life spanned so many different identities of Texas, McDonald calls the nineteenth century in Texas itself the "Age of Navarro." The book is divided into chronological chapters spanning the course of Navarro's life, rather than chapters broken down into topics or subjects: Roots (1762–1816), Emerging Leader (1816–1822), The Making of a Legislator (1822–1828), Businessman, Land Commissioner, and Politician (1828–1835), Mexican-Texan (1835–1840), Statesman and Prisoner (1840–1845), Tejano Spokesman (1845–1853), and Elder Statesman (1853–1871). These self-explanatory chapter titles reflect the different phases of Navarro's political career and character, and also reflect the development of Texas from a territory to an independent nation to a U.S. state.

The Making of an American Dream

Both Navarro's supporters and detractors called him a "Tejano"—a Mexican American living in Texas who aligned himself with the Texas independent movement. The book chronicles Navarro's life from birth to death, beginning with the influence of his family relationships and his political work in the Bexar County legislative assembly. In many ways, Navarro's tale is a classic American Dream story, beginning with humble beginnings as a merchant and smuggler and rising to become a major political and economic figure and one of the dominant landowners and ranchers of his area. Like Lincoln, he had little formal schooling and was largely self-taught. His uncle proved to be a critical figure in his nephew's advancement—a type of nepotism typical in the careers of many politicians of that era.

Navarro did not initially support an independent Texas, although most of his family members and associates did. After an uprising forced the Navarro family to leave Texas for Louisiana in 1813, Navarro began to be persuaded increasingly toward the pro-independence side. After Mexico declared independence from Spain and following his election to the Bexar city council and the newly emerged Mexican State legislature, Navarro emerged as an early force in support of colonization and the slave trade to support the burgeoning cotton industry. He allied himself with Stephen Austin and ultimately took the side of Texan independence. But according to McDonald, Navarro was characterized as a Mexican-American in the truest hyphenated sense: although he supported the American dream of progress and opportunity, he was also an advocate for the culture, values, and worldview of his people.

The Confederate Question and McDonald's Defense

McDonald's most controversial claim is that he denies Navarro was a supporter of the Confederacy in his heart, as is commonly assumed based on Navarro's actions. He claims this assumption arose from a misread newspaper article stating that Navarro supported Texans seceding from the Know-Nothing Party, not the Union. McDonald further argues that Navarro's personal letters to his friends, as opposed to his political speeches, suggest he supported the Union. However, these claims seem dubious given that Navarro's sons fought for the Confederacy and there are no explicit statements or actions by Navarro against its existence.

It is possible that, like some Texans, Navarro supported the Confederacy out of convenience rather than deeply felt ideology, or more in support of his state's culture than as a belief that secession was a legal or moral imperative. McDonald believes that the fact his sons fought for the Confederacy was due to his friendship with Sam Houston and other political allies, not out of personal ideology. But this explanation is undermined by the economic benefits McDonald accrued from slavery as a rancher and the advantages accorded to him by his political support of slavery.