The Ferment of Reform and Culture 17901860

1
Chapter 15

• The Ferment of Reform and Culture 1790-1860

2
Reviving Religion

• Thomas Paine-(Age of Reason) All churches were
  set up to terrify and enslave mankind.
• Deism- Relied on reason and science. Believed in
  a supreme being.
• Unitarians- God exists as one person and the
  essential goodness of human nature.
• How did this contrast the doctrines of Calvinism?

3
The Second Great Awakening

• Reaction to the growing liberalism in religion
  started in the South but swept into the
  Northeast.
• Camp Meetings-Thousands gather for several days
  to find religion.
• Methodists and Baptists reaped the biggest
  benefits.
• Peter Cartwright and Charles Grandison Finney
  were revival preachers.
• Feminization of religion was a key point of the
  era.

4
Fragmentation of Religion

• The Burned Over District-Western New York where
  many sermonizing preaching took place.
• Widened the lines between classes. Presbyterians,
  Episcopalians, Congregationalists and Unitarians
  continued to attract the more wealthy.
• Methodists and Baptists and new sects tended to
  come from less prosperous and less learned
  communities of the rural West and South

5
Mormons

• Founded by Joseph Smith in the Burned Over
  district.
• New Religion that spread world wide.
• A cooperative sect, drilled militia for defense,
  and polygamy.
• 1844 Smith murdered at Carthage, Illinois.
  Brigham Young takes control and leads them to
  Utah.

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• Overcame harsh conditions in the Semi-arid
  region.
• By 1848 5000 arrived and more were on the way.
  Some by two wheel cart making the 1300 mile
  journey.
• Prosperous Frontier theocracy. Washington
  government marched in 1857 against the mormons.
  Not willing to follow anti-polygamy laws.
  Delayed statehood until 1896.

7
Free Schools

• Advocates for free education met stiff opposition
  early on looked at it as chiefly to educate the
  poor.
• Education began to improve from 1825-1850.
  Laborers pushed for more instruction for their
  children.
• One room schools with 8 grades became the
  standard.
• Stayed open a few months. Most teachers were men
  who knew little more than the children teaching
  the 3 Rs.

8
Influential Educators

• Horace Mann- campaigned for better school houses,
  longer school terms, higher pay for teachers, and
  expanded curriculum.
• Noah Webster-improved textbooks, Reading
  lessons used by millions, promoted patriotism.
• William McGuffey- McGuffeys Readers.

9
Higher Education

• With the 2nd Great Awakening came the small
  denominational liberal arts colleges especially
  in the South and West.
• Struggles early with educational opportunity.
• Womans higher education was frowned upon. Too
  much learning would hurt the feminine brain.
  They would be unfit to marry.
• Emma Willard-Established the Troy Female
  Seminary.
• Oberlin opened its doors to women in 1837 also
  admitted black students.

10
Age of Reform

• The Second Great Awakening inspired many reforms
• Modern idealists dream of a new old Puritan
  vision.
• Cruelty, War, Intoxication, discrimination,
  slavery
• Reaffirm traditional values in the growing market
  economy.

11
Examples

• Imprisonment for debt-improved with the vote of
  the labor pushing state legislatures.
• Insane- Old view unclean spirits, treated as
  beasts chained to walls. Dorothea Dix assembled
  reports describing conditions. Persuasion
  resulted in improvements.
• Peace- American Peace Society (1828)-Advocated
  for end to wars (William Ladd)

12
Intoxicating Drinks-Temperance Movement

• Customs and hard labor led to excessive drinking
  in all occasions.
• Hurts the workplace and family life.
• American Temperance Society in Boston 1826.
• Sign Temperance Pledges, Cold Water Army
• Novel Ten Nights in a Barroom and What I Saw
  There 2nd in sales to Uncle Toms Cabin

13
How to combat the problem

• Moderate drinking rather than totally abstaining.
• Legislation push for Prohibition
• Neal S. Dow- Father of Prohibition, sponsor the
  Maine law of 1851. Outlaw manufacturing and sale
  of Liquor.
• Dozen states followed in Maines steps but most
  repealed within a decade.
• By civil war, less drinking among women and less
  consumption of hard liquor per capita.

14
Women movements

• Women fared better than Europe.
• More women avoided marriage compared to colonial
  times. 10 spinsters
• Women considered weak but refined compared to men
  strong but crude.
• Lucretia Mott- Quaker who was disturbed when she
  and fellow woman were not recognized as delegates
  in London for an Anti Slavery movement.
• Elizabeth Cady Stanton-advocated suffrage for
  women. Kept the word obey out of marriage
  ceremony.

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• Susan B. Anthony- strong advocate for the womans
  movement. Women were nicknamed Suzan Bs.
• Pioneers Dr. Elizabeth Blackwell first graduate
  from medical school, Margaret Fuller edited a
  journal The Dial, Lucy Stone retained her
  maiden name Lucy Stoners
• Amelia Bloomer- Bloomers short skirts with
  Turkish trousers- Dress reform see page 333

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• Seneca Falls- Womans Rights Convention in 1848.
• Declaration of Sentiment- in the spirit of the
  Declaration of Independence declaring all men and
  women are created equal.
• Formal demand for Vote
• Womens rights were overshadowed by the Civil War
  and Slavery.

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Utopian Communities

• Communities were set up of a cooperation or
  communist nature.
• Seeking more cohesive communities and idealistic.
  
• Robert Owen- New Harmony, Indiana 1825.
• Brook Farm, Massachuesetts 1841- Philosophy of
  transcendentalism, prospered for 5 years until
  fire.
• Oneida Community, New York- Practice free love,
  complex marriages, selection of partners.
  Prospered for 30 years. See page 336

18
Scientific Achievements

• Americans more interested in practical gadgets
  than in pure science.
• John J. Audubon- painted wildfowl in natural
  habitats. Birds of America popular book.
• Medical Practice- Little to no improvement,
  bleeding out still used.
• Surgery- tied down, shot of whiskey, saw off the
  limb.
• 1840s when several American doctors employed
  ether and laughing gas as anesthetics.

19
Artistic Achievments

• Little contribution to Architecture. Greek
  revival.
• Painting suffered from lack of leisure. Force to
  go to England. Art was considered sinful.
• Gilbert Stuart-Several portraits of Washington.
• John Trumball recaptured the scenes of the
  revolution.
• After 1812, increase in human landscapes (Hudson
  River School)
• Music moving towards rhythmic darky tunes
  popularized by whites.

20
National Literature

• Boost from Nationalism.
• Washington Irving- Rip Van Winkle, The Sketch
  book, The Legend of Sleepy Hollow.
• James Fenimore Cooper-The Spy, The
  Leatherstocking Tales, The last of the Mohicans.

21
Transcendentalism

• Philosophy that Truth transcends the senses.
  It cant be found by observation alone.
• Every person possess an inner light that can
  illuminate the highest truth and direct contact
  with God. Oversoul
• Associated with commitment to self-reliance,
  self-culture, and self-discipline. Hostility to
  authority.

22
Transcendentalists

• Ralph Waldo Emerson- Trained as a Unitarian
  minister. Lecturer Phi Beta Kappa address
  The American Scholar throw off European
  traditions and embrace the riches of America.
• Ideals reflected that of expanding America.
• Outspoken critic of slavery.
• Henry David Thoreau-reduce bodily wants to gain
  pursuit of the truth. Essay On the Duty of Civil
  Disobedience influenced future movements like
  Mahatma Gandhi and Martin Luther King.

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• Walt Whitman- Leaves of Grass- Highly romantic,
  emotional, and unconventional.
• Love for the masses, caught the excitement of the
  expanding U.S..
• Louisa May Alcott-wrote Little Women.
• Emily Dickinson-Themes of nature, love, death,
  and immortality.
• William Gilmore Simms-the cooper of the South

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• Edgar Allan Poe- orphaned at an early age, ill
  health, and married to a 13 year old wife who
  died of tuberculosis. Suffered from hunger,
  cold, poverty, and debt. Failed at Suicide, fell
  into drink.
• Gifted Poet The Raven, excelled in horror type
  short stories.l
• Nathaniel Hawthorne- The Scarlet Letter
  describing the Puritan practice of forcing an
  adultress to wear a scarlet letter A.
• Herman Melville- went to the sea, inspired Moby
  Dick.

25
Historians

• Most historians of prominence were from New
  England.
• Abolitionists were among the numbers.
• New England interpretation dominated the
  historical perspective.