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An Age of Reforms

An Age of Reforms. 1821 – 1855. Introduction. Challenges to traditional values & institutions Social injustice & instability The emergence of mvmts. to “reform” the nation Women’s rights, school reform, abolition Optimistic faith in human nature. Religion & Revivalism. Decay of piety

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An Age of Reforms

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  1. An Age of Reforms 1821 – 1855

  2. Introduction • Challenges to traditional values & institutions • Social injustice & instability • The emergence of mvmts. to “reform” the nation • Women’s rights, school reform, abolition • Optimistic faith in human nature

  3. Religion & Revivalism • Decay of piety • Deism – “rational” religious doctrines • Universalism & Unitarianism – salvation was available to all

  4. Religion & Revivalism, cont. • Decline in commitment to organized churches & denominations • Most Ams. continued to hold strong religious beliefs • Second Great Awakening (~1801)

  5. Religion & Revivalism, cont. • Efforts to fight spread of religious rationalism • Methodism founded by John Wesley • Revivals – religious gatherings designed to awaken religious faith

  6. Religion & Revivalism, cont. • Combined a more active piety w/a belief in a God whose grace could be attained through faith & good works • Individual & social reform were possible • Influential leaders – Charles Finney & Lyman Beecher

  7. Religion & Revivalism, cont. • Female converts outnumbered male • Enslaved blacks interpreted the Christian message as a promise of freedom • In the East, many free African Americans worshipped in separate churches

  8. John Lewis Krimmel, Black People's Prayer Meeting, watercolor, ca. 1811, depicting a Methodist service in Philadelphia

  9. Religion and Revivalism, cont. • Gabriel Prosser’s plan for slave rebellion (1800) • Captured & hanged • Spirit of revivalism was also strong among Nat. Ams. – Handsome Lake

  10. Religion and Revivalism (cont) • Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints (Mormon)

  11. The Romantic Impulse • Romanticism • Am. artistic mvmt. • Valued strong feeling & mystical intuition over calm rationality • Appealed to feelings & intuitions of ordinary people • Innate love of goodness, truth, & beauty

  12. An American Literature • Washington Irving • James Fennimore Cooper (The Last ofthe Mohicans) • Walt Whitman (Leaves of Grass)

  13. An American Literature (cont) • Herman Melville (Moby Dick) • Nathaniel Hawthorne (Scarlet Letter) • Edgar Allen Poe

  14. The Transcendentalists • Philosophical & literary mvmt. • Emphasized living a simple life • Celebrated truth found in nature & in personal emotion & imagination • Ralph Waldo Emerson (“Nature” & “Self-Reliance) • Henry David Thoreau (Walden)

  15. Visions of Utopia • Experimental groups who lived together & tried to create a perfect place • Brook Farm in West Roxbury, MA • Nathaniel Hawthorne • Robert Owen & New Harmony (IN) 1825 • Individual freedom vs. demands of communal society

  16. Redefining Gender Roles • Oneida community in upstate NY rejected traditional notions of family & marriage, founded by John Humphrey Noyes • Shakers commitment to complete celibacy, founded in late 1774 by Mother Ann Lee in England

  17. Remaking Society • Reform mvmts. were mostly led by women • Temperance • Education • Care of the poor, the handicapped, & the mentally ill • Treatment of criminals • Rights of women

  18. Remaking Society, cont. • Protestant revivalism – crusade against personal immorality • Temperance – crusade against drunkenness • Am. Temperance Society (1826) became a major national mvmt.

  19. Remaking Society, cont. • Education • Effort to produce a system of universal public education • Horace Mann – education was a way to protect democracy

  20. Remaking Society, cont. • Principle of tax-supported elementary schools est. in every st. by 1850s • Quality of public ed. varied widely • Institutions to help disabled

  21. Remaking Society, cont. • Rehabilitation • Prison & hospital reform • Mental health reform • Dorthea Dix

  22. The Eastern State Penitentiary in Philadelphia

  23. The Crusade Against Slavery • Early opposition to slavery • Colonization – effort to resettle African Ams. in Africa or Caribbean • American Colonization Society (1817) • Liberia est. 1821

  24. Garrison and Abolitionism • The Liberator (1831) • Opponents of slavery should talk about its damage • Demand immediate, unconditional, universal abolition of slavery • Extension of all the rights of Am. citizenship

  25. Garrison and Abolitionism, cont. • American Antislavery Society (1833) • Frederick Douglass founded North Star • Abolitionism divided, growing radicalism of Garrison • Division w/in Am. Antislavery Society (1840)

  26. Garrison and Abolitionism, cont. • Underground railroad • Personal liberty laws (TBJ vs. FSL) • SCOTUS (1842) • Liberty Party (1840) stood for “free soil”

  27. The Rise of Feminism • 1st Am. feminist mvmt. • Lucretia Mott • Elizabeth Cady Stanton • Dorothea Dix • Harriet Beecher Stowe • Drawing parallels between plight of women & slaves

  28. The Rise of Feminism, cont. • Seneca Falls Convention (NY, 1848) • Adopted “Declaration of Sentiments and Resolutions” • Sojourner Truth

  29. Domesticity & Changes in the Am. Family • Family as an institution, inspired new conceptions of its role in Am. Society • Traditional inequalities remained • Oberlin College (OH, 1837) • Mt. Holyoke College (MA, 1837)

  30. Domesticity & Changes in the Am. Family, cont. • “Cult of domesticity” – new domestic ideology • Women as guardians of “domestic virtues” • Custodians of morality • Detached from public world • Had real meaning for relatively affluent women

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