The Second Great Awakening and The Antebellum Social Reform

The Second Great Awakening

• wave of religious rivals 1790-1840

• key idea: millenarianism

  • 2nd Coming of Christ was immanent, humanity nearing the end of the history

  • US had. a divine mission to redeem the world by its example

• like First Great Awakening, the Trans-Atlantic was linked to similar movements in Britain

• highly emotional new forms of worship (controversial)

• tied to social, economic, and political changes

• many schisms and new sects

• common theological points:

  • individual choice in salvation

  • emotional conversion

  • personal relationship with God

• unlike the First Great Awakening:

  • broader and more diverse

  • rejected predestination

  • anyone could interpret the scripture

  • remaking society, not just religion

    • social reform movements started

    • utopian experiments

Antebellum Social Reform

• same forces led to social reform movements

• middle class Christian reformers create a “Benevolent Empire”

  • private organizations tackle numerous issues

    • poverty

    • prostitution

    • prison and asylum reform

    • child labor

    • alcohol

    • healthcare

    • slavery

  • women used domesticity to claim their leading roles

    • duty to safeguard morality obligated them to reform society