Chapter 10 Democracy in America 1815-1840

Property Qualifications Abolished

Older eastern states dropped property-owning requirements for voting to keep residents from moving west. By 1840, over 90% of adult white men were eligible to vote.

Alexis de Tocqueville’s Democracy in America

Visiting French aristocrat Alexis de Tocqueville observed that American democracy was more than a system of government—it was a culture centered on social equality, mass political participation, and an active public sphere.

The Information Revolution

Mass-circulation "penny press" newspapers, cheap pamphlets, and party organs fueled political engagement and public debate.

A Racial and Gendered Boundary

• As voting expanded for white men, it contracted for others.

  • Women remained disenfranchised under traditional legal coverture and the "Cult of Domesticity."

  • Most states stripped free Black men of the right to vote (e.g., Pennsylvania disenfranchised Black voters in 1838), embedding white supremacy into the definition of democratic citizenship.

The "American System" & The Era of Good Feelings

• A new National Bank (Second Bank of the United States, chartered 1816).

• A Tariff on imported manufactured goods (Tariff of 1816) to protect U.S. industry.

• Federal funding for internal improvements (roads and canals).

Panic of 1819

A financial crash caused by speculative land purchases in the West and a sudden drop in European demand for American agricultural exports. It shattered public trust in the Second Bank of the United States.

The Missouri Compromise (1820)

• Missouri was admitted as a slave state.

• Maine was admitted as a free state.

• Slavery was prohibited in the rest of the Louisiana Purchase north of latitude 36°30'.

The Monroe Doctrine (1823)

• The Americas were closed to further European colonization.

• The U.S. would abstain from involvement in European wars.

• European powers were warned not to interfere with newly independent Latin American republics.

The "Corrupt Bargain" of 1824

Four Democratic-Republican candidates ran for president in 1824. Andrew Jackson won the popular vote but failed to secure an Electoral College majority. The election went to the House of Representatives, where Speaker Henry Clay backed John Quincy Adams. When Adams appointed Clay Secretary of State, Jackson's supporters denounced it as a "Corrupt Bargain."

Second party system

Democrats and Whigs

Democrats

Favored states' rights, limited federal government, hands-off economic policy (laissez-faire), and expansion westward. Supported by workingmen, small farmers, and urban immigrants.

Whigs

Led by Henry Clay and Daniel Webster. Supported the American System, active government economic intervention, and moral/social reform movements. Supported by merchants, industrialists, and large plantation owners

The Nullification Crisis (1832–1833)

• South Carolina leaders, led by Vice President John C. Calhoun, opposed the 1828 "Tariff of Abominations," arguing it hurt Southern agriculture to benefit Northern manufacturers.

• Calhoun developed the theory of nullification, asserting that individual states had the sovereign authority to declare federal laws null and void within their borders.

• Jackson viewed nullification as treason. He persuaded Congress to pass the Force Act (authorizing military action to collect tariffs) while Clay negotiated a compromise tariff, defusing the immediate crisis.

Indian Removal Act of 1830

Authorized the forced relocation of the "Five Civilized Tribes" (Cherokee, Creek, Choctaw, Chickasaw, and Seminole) from the Southeast to western territories (modern-day Oklahoma).

Cherokee Nation v. Georgia (1831)

Ruled Native Americans were "domestic dependent nations" rather than sovereign foreign states.

Worcester v. Georgia (1832)

Chief Justice John Marshall ruled that Georgia state laws had no authority over Cherokee land. Jackson ignored the ruling, famously refusing to enforce it.

The Trail of Tears (1838–1839)

Under President Martin Van Buren, federal troops forcibly marched over 18,000 Cherokee west. Roughly 4,000 died from exposure, starvation, and disease along the way.

The Bank War (1832)

Nicholas Biddle (head of the Second Bank of the U.S.) sought an early recharter. Jackson vetoed the bill, denouncing the Bank as an unconstitutional monopoly that enriched wealthy elites at the expense of ordinary citizens.

Pet Banks & Specie Circular

Jackson withdrew federal funds from the National Bank and deposited them into local state-chartered "pet banks." In 1836, Jackson issued the Specie Circular, requiring public land to be bought only with hard gold or silver currency.

Panic of 1837

The collapse of paper money speculation, combined with foreign economic shocks, triggered a severe, prolonged economic depression that dominated Martin Van Buren's presidency.