Santa Anna signed Texas's independence in secret — then went home and Mexico voided it. The treaty that ended the Texas Revolution wasn't legally valid, and everyone knew it.
On May 14, 1836, captured Mexican General Santa Anna signed two agreements with the Republic of Texas at Fort Velasco — one public, one secret — supposedly ending the Texas Revolution and granting Texas independence.
The secret treaty was the real prize: it promised Santa Anna would order all Mexican forces south of the Rio Grande, personally advocate for Texas independence in Mexico City, and establish the Rio Grande as the permanent boundary.
Neither agreement was ever ratified by the Mexican government. The Mexican Congress declared Santa Anna's actions scandalous, voided both treaties, and ruled that he had 'offered nothing in the name of the nation' — his captive status made everything legally moot.
Historian Will Fowler argues Santa Anna played the situation brilliantly: he committed only to letting Texas commissioners present their case, knowing Mexico would never honor agreements made under duress — buying him his freedom at zero real cost.
Sam Houston spared Santa Anna's life specifically to use him as a bargaining chip. Santa Anna was kept prisoner, paraded to Washington D.C. to meet President Andrew Jackson, and didn't reach home in Veracruz until February 1837.
The treaties weren't even called 'treaties' until President James K. Polk resurrected the term in 1845 to justify going to war with Mexico — a characterization Abraham Lincoln famously challenged in 1848 through his Spot Resolutions.