Expansion and Reform
Essential Questions
- How did transportation developments and industrialization affect the nation’s economy?
- How did the North and South differ during the first half of the 1800s?
- How did domestic and foreign policies reflect the nationalism of the times?
- What changes did Andrew Jackson represent in American political life?
- What major political issues emerged during the 1830s?
- How did the Second Great Awakening affect life in the United States?
- What were the main features of the public school, penitentiary, and temperance reform movements?
- How did reformers try to help enslaved people?
- What steps did American women take to advance their rights in the mid-1800s?
- What were the causes of westward migration?
- How did the revolution in Texas lead to war with Mexico?
- What were the effects of the Mexican-American War and the California Gold Rush?
Key Terms
Digital History Textbook
The Era of Good Feelings
The Era of Good Feelings was a period of dramatic growth and intense nationalism. The spirit of nationalism was apparent in Supreme Court decisions that established the supremacy of the federal government and expanded the powers of Congress. American interest and power in foreign policy was especially apparent in the Monroe Doctrine. Industrial development enhanced national self-sufficiency and united the nation with improved roads, canals, and river transportation. Forces for division were also at work. The financial Panic of 1819 led to the emergence of new political parties. The Missouri Crisis contributed to a growing sectional split between North and South.
Jacksonian Democracy
The period from 1820 to 1840 was a time of important political developments. Property qualifications for voting and office-holding were repealed; voting by voice was eliminated. Direct methods of selecting presidential electors, county officials, state judges, and governors replaced indirect methods. Voter participation increased. A new two-party system was replaced by the politics of deference to elites. The dominant political figure of this era was Andrew Jackson, who opened millions of acres of Indian lands to white settlement, destroyed the Second Bank of the United States, and denied the right of a state to nullify the federal tariff.
The Roots of American Economic Growth
After the War of 1812, the American economy grew at an astounding rate. The development of the steamboat by Robert Fulton revolutionized water travel, as did the building of canals. The construction of the Erie Canal stimulated an economic revolution that bound the grain basket of the West to the eastern and southern markets. It also unleashed a spurt of canal building. Eastern cities experimented with railroads which quickly became the chief method of moving freight. The emerging transportation revolution greatly reduced the cost of bringing goods to market, stimulating both agriculture and industry. The telegraph also stimulated development by improving communication. Eli Whitney pioneered the method of production using interchangeable parts that became the foundation of the American System of manufacture. Transportation improvements combined with market demands stimulated cash crop cultivation. Agricultural production was also transformed by the iron plow and later the mechanical thresher. Economic development contributed to the rapid growth of cities. Between 1820 and 1840, the urban population of the nation increased by 60 percent each decade.
Religion in the Early Republic
Two currents in religious thought--religious liberalism and evangelical revivalism--had enormous impact on the early republic. Religious liberalism was an emerging form of humanitarianism that rejected the harsh Calvinist doctrines of original sin and predestination. Its preachers stressed the basic goodness of human nature and each individual's capacity to follow the example of Christ. At the same time, enthusiastic religious revivals swept the nation in the early nineteenth century. The revivals inspired a widespread sense that the nation was standing close to the millennium, a thousand years of peace and brotherhood when sin, war, and tyranny would vanish from the earth. In addition, the growth of other religions--African American Christianity, Catholicism, Judaism,the Mormon Church--reshaped America's religious landscape.
Pre-Civil War Reform
During the first half of the nineteenth century, reformers launched unprecedented campaigns to reduce drinking, establish prisons, create public schools, educate the deaf and the blind, abolish slavery, and extend equal rights to women. Increasing poverty, lawlessness, violence, and vice encouraged efforts to reform American society. So, too, did the ideals enshrined in the Declaration of Independence, the philosophy of the Enlightenment, and liberal and evangelical religion. Reform evolved through three phases. The first phase sought to persuade Americans to lead more godly daily lives. Moral reformers battled profanity and Sabbath breaking, attacked prostitution, distributed religious tracts, and attempted to curb the use of hard liquor. Social reformers sought to solve the problems of crime and illiteracy by creating prisons, public schools, and asylums for the deaf, the blind, and the mentally ill. Radical reformers sought to abolish slavery and eliminate racial and gender discrimination and create ideal communities as models for a better world.
Pre-Civil War American Culture
At the end of the 18th century, the United States had few professional writers or artists and lacked a class of patrons to subsidize the arts. But during the decades before the Civil War, distinctively American art and literature emerged. In the 1850s, novels appeared by African-American and Native American writers. Mexican-Americans and Irish immigrants also contributed works on their experiences. Beginning with historical paintings of the Americana Revolution, artists attracted a large audience. Landscape painting also proved popular. An indigenous popular culture also emerged between 1800 and 1860, consisting of penny newspapers, dime novels, and minstrel shows.
Westward Expansion
Until 1821, Spain ruled the area that now includes Arizona, California, Colorado, Nevada, New Mexico, Texas, and Utah. The Mexican war for independence opened the region to American economic penetration. Government explorers, traders, and trappers helped to open the West to white settlement. In the 1820s, thousands of Americans moved into Texas, and during the 1840s, thousands of pioneers headed westward toward Oregon and California , seeking land and inspired by manifest destiny, the idea that America had a special destiny to stretch across the continent. Between 1844 and 1848 the United States expanded its boundaries into Texas, the Southwest, and the Pacific Northwest . It acquired Texas by annexation; Oregon and Washington by negotiation with Britain; and Arizona, California, Colorado, Idaho, Nevada, New Mexico, Oregon, Utah, and Wyoming as a result of war with Mexico.
The Pre-Civil War South
In the decades before the Civil War, northern and southern development followed increasingly different paths. By 1860, the North contained 50 percent more people than the South. It was more urbanized and attracted many more European immigrants. The northern economy was more diversified into agricultural, commercial, manufacturing, financial, and transportation sectors. In contrast, the South had smaller and fewer cities and a third of its population lived in slavery. In the South, slavery impeded the development of industry and cities and discouraged technological innovation. Nevertheless, the South was was wealthy and its economy was rapidly growing. The southern economy largely financed the Industrial Revolution in the United States, and stimulated the development of industries in the North to service southern agriculture.
The Origins and Nature of New World Slavery
This chapter places American slavery in global, comparative perspective. It looks at slavery’s origins; definitions of slavery and how it differs from other forms of subordination and exploitation; how American slavery differed from slavery in classical antiquity, African society, medieval Europe, and Islamic societies; the evolution of American slavery in the colonial, revolutionary, early national, and antebellum eras; and slavery’s impact on American culture, economics, and politics.
Antislavery
This chapter examines the growth of antislavery thought, the colonization movement, the emergence of immediatist abolition, and political antislavery.
The Era of Good Feelings was a period of dramatic growth and intense nationalism. The spirit of nationalism was apparent in Supreme Court decisions that established the supremacy of the federal government and expanded the powers of Congress. American interest and power in foreign policy was especially apparent in the Monroe Doctrine. Industrial development enhanced national self-sufficiency and united the nation with improved roads, canals, and river transportation. Forces for division were also at work. The financial Panic of 1819 led to the emergence of new political parties. The Missouri Crisis contributed to a growing sectional split between North and South.
- The Growth of American Nationalism
- Shifting Political Values
- Strengthening American Finances
- Protecting American Industry
- Judicial Nationalism
- Conquering Space
- Defending American Interests in Foreign Affairs
- The Growth of Political Factionalism and Sectionalism
Jacksonian Democracy
The period from 1820 to 1840 was a time of important political developments. Property qualifications for voting and office-holding were repealed; voting by voice was eliminated. Direct methods of selecting presidential electors, county officials, state judges, and governors replaced indirect methods. Voter participation increased. A new two-party system was replaced by the politics of deference to elites. The dominant political figure of this era was Andrew Jackson, who opened millions of acres of Indian lands to white settlement, destroyed the Second Bank of the United States, and denied the right of a state to nullify the federal tariff.
- Rise of Democratic Politics
- Emergence of a New Party System
- The Presidency of John Quincy Adams
- The Presidency of Andrew Jackson
- Indian Removal
- Nullification
- The Celebrated Bank War
- The Whigs
The Roots of American Economic Growth
After the War of 1812, the American economy grew at an astounding rate. The development of the steamboat by Robert Fulton revolutionized water travel, as did the building of canals. The construction of the Erie Canal stimulated an economic revolution that bound the grain basket of the West to the eastern and southern markets. It also unleashed a spurt of canal building. Eastern cities experimented with railroads which quickly became the chief method of moving freight. The emerging transportation revolution greatly reduced the cost of bringing goods to market, stimulating both agriculture and industry. The telegraph also stimulated development by improving communication. Eli Whitney pioneered the method of production using interchangeable parts that became the foundation of the American System of manufacture. Transportation improvements combined with market demands stimulated cash crop cultivation. Agricultural production was also transformed by the iron plow and later the mechanical thresher. Economic development contributed to the rapid growth of cities. Between 1820 and 1840, the urban population of the nation increased by 60 percent each decade.
- The Roots of American Economic Growth
- The Growth of the American Economy
- Accelerating Transportation
- Speeding Communications
- Transforming American Law
- Resistance to Technological Innovation
- Early Industrialization
- The Growth of Cities
- The Eve of the Industrial Revolution
- The Transformation of the Rural Countryside
- The Disruption of the Artisan System of Labor
- The Introduction of the Factory System
- Labor Protests
- The Movement for a Ten-Hour Day
- The Laboring Poor
- Immigration Begins
- Social Mobility in the North
Religion in the Early Republic
Two currents in religious thought--religious liberalism and evangelical revivalism--had enormous impact on the early republic. Religious liberalism was an emerging form of humanitarianism that rejected the harsh Calvinist doctrines of original sin and predestination. Its preachers stressed the basic goodness of human nature and each individual's capacity to follow the example of Christ. At the same time, enthusiastic religious revivals swept the nation in the early nineteenth century. The revivals inspired a widespread sense that the nation was standing close to the millennium, a thousand years of peace and brotherhood when sin, war, and tyranny would vanish from the earth. In addition, the growth of other religions--African American Christianity, Catholicism, Judaism,the Mormon Church--reshaped America's religious landscape.
- Introduction
- Religious Liberalism
- Simple Truth in the Open Air
- Evangelical Revivalism
- Enslaved African Americans and Religious Revivalism
- Religious Ferment
- The Mormons
- American Catholics
- American Jews
- African American Churches
- Religious Freedom and the Founders
- Religion and the U.S. Constitution
Pre-Civil War Reform
During the first half of the nineteenth century, reformers launched unprecedented campaigns to reduce drinking, establish prisons, create public schools, educate the deaf and the blind, abolish slavery, and extend equal rights to women. Increasing poverty, lawlessness, violence, and vice encouraged efforts to reform American society. So, too, did the ideals enshrined in the Declaration of Independence, the philosophy of the Enlightenment, and liberal and evangelical religion. Reform evolved through three phases. The first phase sought to persuade Americans to lead more godly daily lives. Moral reformers battled profanity and Sabbath breaking, attacked prostitution, distributed religious tracts, and attempted to curb the use of hard liquor. Social reformers sought to solve the problems of crime and illiteracy by creating prisons, public schools, and asylums for the deaf, the blind, and the mentally ill. Radical reformers sought to abolish slavery and eliminate racial and gender discrimination and create ideal communities as models for a better world.
- Introduction
- Moral Reform
- Social Reform and the Problem of Crime in a Free Society
- The Struggle for Public Schools
- Assisting the Disabled
- Radical Reform and Antislavery
- Antislavery Timeline
- Women's Rights
- Utopian Socialism
Pre-Civil War American Culture
At the end of the 18th century, the United States had few professional writers or artists and lacked a class of patrons to subsidize the arts. But during the decades before the Civil War, distinctively American art and literature emerged. In the 1850s, novels appeared by African-American and Native American writers. Mexican-Americans and Irish immigrants also contributed works on their experiences. Beginning with historical paintings of the Americana Revolution, artists attracted a large audience. Landscape painting also proved popular. An indigenous popular culture also emerged between 1800 and 1860, consisting of penny newspapers, dime novels, and minstrel shows.
- Introduction
- Creating a Distinctly American Culture
- American Transcendentalism
- The American Renaissance
- American Ethnic Literature
- The Artist in American Society
- The Birth of American Popular Culture
Westward Expansion
Until 1821, Spain ruled the area that now includes Arizona, California, Colorado, Nevada, New Mexico, Texas, and Utah. The Mexican war for independence opened the region to American economic penetration. Government explorers, traders, and trappers helped to open the West to white settlement. In the 1820s, thousands of Americans moved into Texas, and during the 1840s, thousands of pioneers headed westward toward Oregon and California , seeking land and inspired by manifest destiny, the idea that America had a special destiny to stretch across the continent. Between 1844 and 1848 the United States expanded its boundaries into Texas, the Southwest, and the Pacific Northwest . It acquired Texas by annexation; Oregon and Washington by negotiation with Britain; and Arizona, California, Colorado, Idaho, Nevada, New Mexico, Oregon, Utah, and Wyoming as a result of war with Mexico.
- Zorro: Ficton and Fact
- Spanish America
- Impact of the Mexican Revolution
- The Donner Party
- Opening the West
- Pathfinders
- Mountain Men
- Trailblazing
- Pioneers
- "Go West … and grow up with the country"
- Life on the Trail
- Manifest Destiny
- The Texas Revolution
- The Texas Question in American Politics
- The U.S.-Canadian Border
- The Pacific Northwest
- The Mexican War
- The Face of Battle
- War Fever and Antiwar Protests
- Peace
- The War's Significance
- The Political Crisis of the 1840s
- The Gold Rush
- Conclusion
The Pre-Civil War South
In the decades before the Civil War, northern and southern development followed increasingly different paths. By 1860, the North contained 50 percent more people than the South. It was more urbanized and attracted many more European immigrants. The northern economy was more diversified into agricultural, commercial, manufacturing, financial, and transportation sectors. In contrast, the South had smaller and fewer cities and a third of its population lived in slavery. In the South, slavery impeded the development of industry and cities and discouraged technological innovation. Nevertheless, the South was was wealthy and its economy was rapidly growing. The southern economy largely financed the Industrial Revolution in the United States, and stimulated the development of industries in the North to service southern agriculture.
- Introduction
- The Old South: Images and Realities
- The South's Economy
- Southern Nationalism
- Southern Radicalism
The Origins and Nature of New World Slavery
This chapter places American slavery in global, comparative perspective. It looks at slavery’s origins; definitions of slavery and how it differs from other forms of subordination and exploitation; how American slavery differed from slavery in classical antiquity, African society, medieval Europe, and Islamic societies; the evolution of American slavery in the colonial, revolutionary, early national, and antebellum eras; and slavery’s impact on American culture, economics, and politics.
- The Impact of the Slave Trade on West and Central Africa
- Slavery in Historical Perspective
- Defining Slavery
- Slavery in the Ancient, Medieval, and Early Modern Worlds
- The Newness of New World Slavery
- Justifications of Slavery
- Slavery in Africa
- Why Africa?
- Enslavement
- The Middle Passage
- The Origins of New World Slavery
- Slavery in Colonial North America
- Slavery’s Evolution
- The American Revolution and Slavery
- Antebellum Slavery
- What was Life Like Under Slavery
- Slave Labor
- Slave Family Life
- Slave Culture
- American Slavery in Comparative Perspective
- Slave Resistance and Revolts
- The Economics of Slavery
- Abolition
Antislavery
This chapter examines the growth of antislavery thought, the colonization movement, the emergence of immediatist abolition, and political antislavery.
- Introduction
- The Rise of Antislavery Thoughts
- Was the Revolution a missed opportunity to end slavery?
- The Impact of the Revolution on Slavery
- The Decline of Antislavery Sentiment in the South
- Colonization
- A Dead-End on Slavery
- Immediate Abolition
- Anti-Abolitionist Violence
- Who Were the Abolitionists?
- Division in the Antislavery Movement
- Black Abolitionists
- The Underground Railroad
- Abolitionists and Violence
Assignments and Readings
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america_story_of_us_ep_3_westward_and_ep_4_division.pdf |
1815-1849_review_guide.pdf |
ultimate_guide_to_the_presidents_episode_2.pdf |
Presidential Ambition: A 19th Century Political Campaign Project
Reform Movement Social Media Campaign
- Inspired by: What U.S. History Would Have Been Like With Hashtags
* PLEASE NOTE - The links in the dating profile section of the assignment are now apparently blocked at school. Please see the picture below for what successful dating profiles look like.
The Oregon Trail
The Oregon Trail
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Slideshows
Videos
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