Chapter 10: Democratic Politics, Religious Revival, and Reform

Manifest Destiny

  • In the 1840’s Americans began to believe that movement westward and southward was our destiny ordained by God

Jacksonian Democracy

  • 1820’s: Many states eased voting requirements allowing more people to vote, over three times as many white men voted in 1828 than in previous elections

  • Candidates would now have to appeal to the common man

  • Election also showed growing political power of the west

  • Born poor and lacking college education, Andrew was a man of the people

  • Opened new opportunities for the middle class and allowed greater participation in government

Spoils System

  • Term refers to bestowing an office on people based on political favors rather than fitness to serve

  • Did NOT need to be an elite

  • Goal was to rid government of corruption and privilege

  • Led to huge groups of people going to the White House for jobs they weren’t qualified for

  • Ends after the Civil War

Nullification Crisis (1832)

  • Devised by VP John C Calhoun

  • Argued that Constitution was a compact among the states

  • States had the right to nullify federal laws that the state considered unconstitutional

  • If the federal government refused to permit a state to nullify a law, the state had the right to leave the Union

  • South Carolina declared the Tariff of Abominations null and threatened to secede

  • Jackson threatened to hang Calhoun and sent troops to South Carolina

  • Henry Clay steps in with another compromise to save the Union (Missouri Compromise)

War Over US Bank

  • Jackson opposed the re-charter of the Bank

  • Removed government deposits and put them in local(pet) banks, destroying US Bank

  • Wildcat banks formed in the wake of the US Bank failure

    • money in circulation increased 300%, the number of loans made by banks 400%; inflation skyrocketed

  • English banks called in loans from states and investors

  • Led to the Panic of 1837

Reform Movements

  • The 2nd Great Awakening:

    • belief that people could reform themselves and society

    • took Christianity to blacks

    • Focused on the 2nd coming of Christ = need to reform society to hasten the new kingdom of God

    • Biggest impact was on women = evangelical mission gave them a sense of purpose

    • Frontier revivals featured emotional appeals and provided social meetings for settlers

  • Dorothea Dix: convinced states that the mentally ill belonged in hospitals instead of prison

    • also helped reform prisons and prisoners into useful citizens

  • Horace Mann: worked to establish state funded public schools

    • also developed teacher training programs and reformed the curriculum

  • William Loyd Garrison: editor of “The Liberator”

    • called for emancipation of slaves with no payment to the slave owners

  • Frederick Douglass: born a slave and taught to read

    • discovered that knowledge was a pathway from slavery to freedom

    • believed in abolition through political actions, and was an advisor to Lincoln

    • published the North Star

  • American Colonization Society (1816)

  • Wanted to gradually emancipate slaves and settle them back to Africa

  • Led to the founding of Liberia

  • Seneca Falls Conference: 1848

  • Held by Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Lucretia Mott

  • Nearly 300 women attended the women’s rights conference

  • Developed a “Declaration of Sentiments” based on the Declaration of Independence

  • Wanted the right to vote (suffrage)

  • Sojourner Truth: born Isabella Baumfree

  • Freed slave that preached to the country about abolition and women’s rights

  • She faced a lot of opposition but won over may with her eloquent speeches

  • Successfully sued and won her son back after he was illegally sold

Angelina and Sarah Grimke

  • White women who grew up on a Southern plantation

  • Talked about ills of slavery from a first hand experience, parents were slave owners

  • Taught slaves to read

  • Wrote books about abolition

  • Later moved on to women’s rights; linking similarities between women and slaves

Gag Rule (1835-1844)

  • Rule that forbid discussion of debatable topics in Congress

    • threatened freedom of speech

    • abolitionists couldn’t speak out

    • opposed by Northern Whigs (John Quincy Adams)

    • resulted in more protest by abolitionists

    • rescinded in 1844

New Religious Groups as Instruments of Reform

  • Utopian Societies: focus on community and withdrawal from society

  • Shakers: socially radical, abolished families, practiced celibacy and full equality between genders

Non-Religious Utopian Societies

  • New Harmony, Illinois (1825): Socialist group meant to be self-sufficient with no currency

  • Founded by Robert Owen, failed

  • Oneida, New York(1848): practiced Communism, reversed gender roles

  • Founded by John Humphrey Noyes

    • made high-quality silverware