Reforming American Society

Reforming American Society Chapter 8

Second Great Awakening • New Religious movements • New philosophy • Utopian communities • Reforms • Should religious leaders take an active role in bringing about social changes?

Religion Sparks Reform A renewal of religious sentiment known as the Second Great Awakening inspired a host of reform movements. Many modern social and political reform movements grew out of the reform movements of the 19th century. The most famous preacher of the 19th century was Charles Grandison Finney he inspired emotional religious faith, using speaking style that was as much drama as prayer and sermons.

Finney seated the most likely converts in his audiences on a special “anxious bench” where he could fasten his eyes upon them. Finney and his contemporaries were participants in the Second Great Awakening. These preachers rejected the 18th century Calvinistic belief that God predetermined one’s salvation or damnation.

Religious ideas current in the early 19th century promoted individualism and responsibility similar to the emphasis of Jacksonian democracy on the power of the common citizen. Christian churches split over these ideas as various denominations competed to proclaim the message of a democratic God, one who extends the possibility of salvation to all people. Such a gathering was called a revival an emotional meeting designed to awaken religious faith through impassioned preaching an prayer. A revival would usually last 4-5 days. (Day and Night)

The Second Great Awakening revolutionized the American religious tradition by teaching individual responsibility was the way to salvation. The Second Great Awakening also brought Christianity on a large scale to enslaved African Americans. Camp meetings held by the new Baptist and Methodist churches were opened to both blacks and whites. In the rural South though they were segregated in pews of their own but worshiped in the same churches.

In the East African Americans worshiped in separate black churches. Membership in the African Methodist Episcopal Church grew rapidly. It became a political, cultural, and social center for African Americans providing schools and other services that whites denied them. Eventually the African American church developed a political voice and organized the first black national convention.

African American churches supported its followers by giving its members a sense of community an inner faith and the spiritual and political support to oppose oppression. The church became an integral part of life for free and enslaved African Americans whose religious worship reflected their unique beliefs and experiences.

Transcendentalism and Reforms Many reform-minded individuals sought an alternative to traditional religion but found revivalism too public a forum for religious expression. By the mid-1800s some Americans were taking new pride in their emerging culture. Ralph Waldo Emerson a New England writer nurtured his pride and led a group practicing transcendentalism a philosophical and literary movement that emphasized living a simple life and celebrated the truth found in nature in personal and imagination.

The transcendentalists movement spawned a literary movement that stressed American ideas of optimism, freedom, and self-reliance. Emerson’s friend Henry David Thoreau put the idea of self-reliance into practice. Thoreau believed in the importance of individual conscience he urged people not to obey laws they considered unjust. Henry David Thoreau transcend lists beliefs would be reflected at Walden Pond by stressing self-reliance and ability to be close to nature.

Rather than appealing to the emotions Unitarians emphasized reason and appeals to conscience as the paths to perfection. In New England Unitarians quickly attracted a wealthy and educated following. Unitarians believed conversion was a gradual process. Unitarians approach to religious experience differ from the revivalists – Unitarians believed conversion was achieved through gradual process using reason rather than through emotional moment in a revival.

Ideal Communities Some of the optimism of religious and social reforms also inspired the establishment of utopian communities experimental groups who tried to create a “utopia” or perfect place. These communities varied in their philosophies and living arrangements but shared a common goals such as self-sufficiency.

The communities were characterized by cooperative living and the absence of private property. Utopian communities included Brook Farm in Massachusetts established by George Ripley a Unitarian. The farm offered its members the chance to engage in intellectual activity while cooperatively running a farm.

Religious belief spurred other ideal communities. The Shakers who followed the teaching of Ann Lee, set up their first communities in New York, New England and on the frontier. Shakers shared their goods with each other believed men and women are equal. When a person became a Shaker they vowed not to marry or have children. Shakers depended on converts and adopting children to keep their communities going.

School and Prison Reforms By the mid-19th century Americans held a variety of philosophical positions and had joined together to fight the various social ills that troubled the U.S. Some social reformers focused on schools and other institutions. Prison's was an area that needed reforming according to a French writer.

Dorothea Dix was compelled by personal experience to join the movement for social reform. Dix visited a Massachusetts prison and discovered that the jails often housed the mentally ill. She would be instrumental in getting legislation passed to improve the prisons and to set up public hospitals for the mentally ill.

Education Reforms Before the mid-1800s there were no uniform education policy in the United States. Massachusetts and Vermontwere the only states before the Civil War to pass a compulsory school attendance law. Classrooms in the early schools were not divided by grade so younger and older students were thrown in a room together. Most children didn’t go to school pass the age of ten.

In the 1830s , Americans began to demand a tax-supported public school. • Pennsylvania established a public school system. • The system was optional and drew opposition since most of the children went to private school.

One remarkable leader in the public school reform movement was Horace Mann of Massachusetts. • In 1837 Mann became the first secretary of the Massachusetts Board of Education. • In 12 years he established teacher-training programs and instituted curriculum reforms. • He also doubled the amount of money spent on schools.

By the 1850s every state had provided some form of publicly funded elementary schools. • In the 1830s efforts to improve education included what? • States began to establish tax-supported public schools. • Curriculum changes. • Teachers received better training.

The Literature of the U.S. Margaret Fuller was one of the editors of the transcendentalist journal The Dial in 1845 Fuller published Women of the 19th century a work demanded equality and fulfillment for women.

American Writers Washington Irving- famous for his Legend of Sleepy Hollow became one of the first prominent American writer. James Fenimore Cooper- romanticized the Native Americans and frontier explorers in his tales, the most famous being the Last of the Mohicans.

Nathaniel Hawthorne- wrote over 100 tales and novels. His novel The Scarlet Letter with its setting, explored the persecution and psychological suffering that results from sin. Herman Melville-another new Englander wrote Moby Dick. Edgar Allan Poe-a poet and short story writer achieved fame as a writer of terror and mystery.

Walt Whitman- who published a volume of poetry in 1855 called Leaves of Grass. Whitman loved nature, the common people and American democracy and his famous work reflects these passion. Emily Dickinson- wrote simple, personal deeply emotional poetry.

Slavery and Abolition Slavery became an explosive issue as more Americans joined reformers working to put an end to it. James Forten a wealthy leader of Philadelphia’s free black community took an active role in variety of political causes. By the 1830s Forten had a fortune exceeding $100,000. Forten’s unwavering belief that he was an American led him to oppose the effort to resettle free blacks in Africa and also pushed him to oppose slavery.

African Americans increasingly were joined by whites in the public criticism of slavery. White support for abolition, the call to outlaw slavery was fueled by preachers like Charles G. Finney who termed slavery “a great national sin.”

The most radical white abolitionist was an editor named William Lloyd Garrison. Garrison was active in religious reform movements in Massachusetts, Garrison started his own paper The Liberator in 1831. Garrison pushed for the immediate emancipation –the freeing of slaves with no payment to the slaveholders.

In his Appeal to the Colored Citizens World published in 1829 David Walker a free black advised blacks to fight for freedom rather than wait for slave owners to end slavery. Many free blacks more willing to compromise than Walker had joined one of the many antislavery societies active by the end of the 1820s. Garrison and Walker’s idea on abolition was somewhat radical in that Garrison criticized churches and the government and Walker advocated armed black revolt.

Born into slavery in 1817 Frederick Douglass had been taught to read and write by the wife of one of his owners. Douglass would escape slavery by borrowing the identity of a free black sailor and carrying official papers. Garrison heard Douglass speak of his experiences as a slave he was so impressed that he sponsored him to speak for the American Anti-Slavery Society. Published his own antislavery newspaper the North Star.

Some of the anti-slavery groups have differ approaches some thought blacks should be resettled in Africa, others believed abolition could be achieved without violence. Still others thought violence would be necessary to achieve abolition. Still slaves never lost sight of their goal of freedom. 1

Nat Turner born into slavery in 1800 in Virginia. • Turner was a gifted preacher and believed he had been chosen to lead his people out of bondage. • In August 1831 Turner thought an eclipse of the sun was a sign from God. • He and about 80 followers attacked four plantations and killed almost 60 whites before being captured. • He would be tried and hanged. • In retaliation to the uprising whites killed as many as 200 blacks.

Turner’s revolt would harden the Southern whites attitude about some of the basic liberties for blacks- • The rebellion was bloody and frightened slave owners. • Whites believed the only way to stop any future revolts was to eliminate by law any personal liberties for slaves. 2/3

Liberties Lost In 1833 in Alabama forbade free and enslaved blacks from preaching unless a “respectable” slaveholder was in attendance. In 1835 North Carolina became the last Southern state to deny the vote to free blacks. In several states free blacks lost the right to own guns. In some Southern cities free blacks could no longer owen property, learn to read and write or work as carpenters or blacksmiths.

Proslavery Defenses Some of the proslavery advocates used the Bible to defend slavery citing the passage Ephesians 6:5- “Slaves obey your earthly masters with fear and trembling, with a sincere heart as you would Christ.” Southern slave owners argument actually benefited blacks by making them part of a Christian civilization. By the 1830s most white ministers in the South agreed that slavery and Christianity could coexist.

Abolitionists continued to campaign for emancipation. One way was to swamp Congress with petitions to eliminate slavery in the District of Columbia. Why was the District of Columbia so important? Southern representatives countered in 1836 by securing the adoption of a gag rule. What is a gag rule? A ruling limiting or preventing debate on an issue which meant that citizens submitting petitions were deprived of their right to have them heard. Gag rule would be repealed in 1844.

Women and Reform Women reformers expanded their efforts from movements such as abolition and temperance to include women’s rights. Elizabeth Cady Stanton timed her marriage in 1840 so she could accompany her husband London for the World’s Anti-Slavery Convention where here husband was a delegate. At the convention she met Lucretia Mott an abolitionist there friendship would help to form a society to advocate the rights for women.

Women’s Role in the Mid-1800s In the early part of the 19th century women were limited to what they could and could not do. Customs demanded that women restricted their activities after marriage to the home and family. Doing housework and child care were considered the only proper activities for married women. This became known as cult of domesticity. About one in ten single white women worked outside the home earning about half the pay as men doing the same job.

The main problems women faced in the mid 1800s were- • Women had limited legal rights. • They could not vote and were not allowed to work in many professions.

Women Mobilize for Reform Despite the limits placed on women many would join the various reform movements in hope of making changes. Many would be inspired by the messages of the Second Great Awakening. Women were often shut out of the meetings by disapproving men and responding by expanding their efforts to seek equal rights.

Women Abolitionists Sarah and Angelina Grimke daughters of a South Carolina slaveholder spoke for the abolitionist movement. In 1836 Angelina published An Appeal to Christian Women of the South in which she called upon women to overthrow this horrible system of oppression and cruelty. Several men denounced the female abolitionists.

In what ways were women excluded from the abolitionist movement? Women were not allowed to attend the meetings. This led them to work for other reform movements. The temperance movement the effort to prohibit the drinking of alcohol was another offshoot to the influence of the churches and women’s rights movement. Speaking at a temperance meeting Mary C. Vaughn attested to the evils of alcohol.

In the 19th century alcohol flowed freely in America. Liquor helped wash down the salted meat and fish that composed the dominant diet and development for anesthetics usage in the 1840s by doctors- dosed their patients with whiskey or brandy before operating. Many Americans however recognized drunkenness as a serious problem. Lyman Beecher a prominent minister had begun lecturing against all use of liquor in 1825. A year later the American Temperance Society was founded.

Education For Women Until the 1820s American girls had few educational open to them beyond elementary school. In 1821 Emma Willard opened on of the nations first academically rigorous schools for girls in Troy, New York. The school became the model for a new type of schools for women.

In 1837 Mary Lyon overcame heated resistance to found another important institution of higher learning. Elizabeth Blackwell applied to 29 medical schools before she was accepted in 1847 at Geneva College. She would be the first woman in America to receive a medical degree, Elizabeth Blackwell crusaded for the admission of women to medical schools in the United States and Europe.

African-American women faced greater obstacles to getting an education. In 1831 Prudence Crandall opened a school for girls. Two years (1833) later she admitted an African-American girl but the protested so vigorously against desegregated education that Crandall decided to admit only African-American students. In 1834 Crandall was forced to close the school and move out of town.

Women and Health Reform After receiving her medical degree Elizabeth Blackwell opened a Infirmary for Women and Children in New York. In 1850s Lyman Beecher’s daughter Catharine undertook a national survey on women's health. To her dismay she found 1 out 3 women to be sick.

Amelia Bloomer publisher of a temperance newspaper rebelled. Bloomer often wore a costume of loose-fitting pants tied at the ankles and covered by a short skirt. As women fought to improve conditions for others the mid-19th century many realized that they too were second-class citizens with few rights and privileges in American society.

Women’s Rights Movement Emerges The various reform movements of the 19th century helped the women’s movement by providing women with increased opportunities to act outside the home. In 1848 Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Lucretia Mott decided to hold a women’s rights convention. What would it be called? Seneca Falls Convention- named for the town it was held in. Stanton and Mott composed an agenda and detailed statement of grievances.

Women reformers made significant contributions to improving social conditions in the mid-19th century. Conditions for slaves worsened. Isabella Baumfree a slave for the first 30 years of her life took the name Sojourner Truth when she decided to sojourn throughout the country preaching and later arguing for abolition. Truth showed hard work was a central fact of life for most women.

The Changing Workplace 4 A growing industrial work force problems arising from manufacturing under the factory system. The Lowell Offering a journal written by and for female mill workers. In 1841 an article told of young girl who worked in the mills in order to save her families farm and some of the difficulties girls and women faced in the textile mill. This would be the start of changes that would occur in the way goods were manufactured.

Reforming American Society