Chapter 11--Religion and Reform (1820-1860)

I. Individualism: The Ethic of the Middle Class

A. Ralph Waldo Emerson and Transcendentalism
1. Ralph Waldo Emerson advocates for Transcendentalism
Every person possesses an inner light that can illuminate the highest
truth and put him/her in direct touch with God.
2.
Sparked the American Renaissance, a movement characterized by
an outpouring of first-class novels, poetry, and essays.
3. Emerson criticized the new industrial society, predicting that it would
drain the nations spiritual energy.
4. Emersons message reached hundreds of thousands of people through
writings and through lectures on the Lyceum circuit.

B. Emersons Literary Influence

1.
Henry David Thoreau:

Walden turned to nature for inspiration

Used observations of nature to discover essential truths about

life and the universe.

Civil Disobedience urged individuals to resist unjust laws

2.

Margaret Fuller:

Feminist (advocate of womens rights) writer

Argued for women social and psychological independence.

3.

Walt Whitman:

Leaves of Grass focus on the individual.

4.
Nathaniel Hawthorne (The Scarlet Letter, 1850) and Herman Melville
(Moby Dick, 1851) addressed the opposition between individualism and
social order, discipline, and responsibility.
5.
Utopias: Ideal communities that sought to achieve perfection (withdraw
from conventional society)

6.
The most important was Brook Farm (1841)~~a communal experiment.
~~Members hoped to develop their minds and souls and then uplift
society.
7.
Brook Farm failed financially, the transcendentalists abandoned their
attempts to fashion a new social organization, yet their passion for
individual freedom lived on in the movement to abolish slavery.

II. Rural Communalism and Urban Popular Culture

A. Mother Ann Lee and the Shakers
1.
Led by Mother Ann Lee, the Shakers were the 1st successful
American communal movement.
2.
Shakers believed that God was both male and female, but they eliminated
marriage and advocated celibacy, equal rights for women.

B. Arthur Brisbane and Fourierism

1.
To solve problems of fiercely competition, Charles Fourier and Arthur
Brisbane advocated cooperative work groups called Phalanxes that
would replace capitalist wage labor with Socialism and liberate both men
and women

C. John Humphrey Noyes and the Oneida Community

1.
John Humphrey Noyes, is the leader of Perfectionism
2.
Perfectionists believed that people could aspire to perfection in their
earthly lives and attain complete freedom from sin
3.
Noyes sought to free women from being regarded as their husbands
property and to free them from endless childbearing and rearing
~Free Love
4.
The Oneida community prospered by Silverware Production.

D.
Joseph Smith and the Mormon Experience
1.
Joseph Smith organized the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day
Saints;
2.
Smith believed in polygamyhaving more than one wife at a time.
3.
Smith and his brother were murdered; Brigham Young led the
Mormons to Utah.
4.
The Mormon War was a bloodless encounter; President James
Buchanan was afraid that if he tried to eliminate polygamy it might set a
precedent that could be used to end slavery.
5.
Mormons affirmed traditional patriarchal authority; encouraged hard
work and entrepreneurship and endorsed private ownership of property.

E. Urban Popular Culture

1.
As utopian reformers organized new communities on the land, rural
migrants and foreign immigrants created a new culture in the cities.
2.
Between 1800 and 1840, America experienced a high rate of urban
growth. By 1860, New York numbered over 1 million residents. Urban
growth generated a new urban culture.
3.
Blackface minstrelsy: white actors used blackface in shows that
promoted racism and stereotypes.
~~ Reinforced white supremacy and class criticism of elite control of
industry and politics.
4.
Nativist Movement: 1) Distain for immigrants; 2) Called for an end to
immigration; 3) Aimed mostly at Irish (Catholics) who are Democrats.

III.

Abolitionism

A.
Black Social Thought: Uplift, Race Equality, and Rebellion
1.
Black Social Thought: Uplift, Race Equality, and Rebellion:
2.

David Walker:

An Appeal to the Colored Citizens of the World

Justified Slave Rebellion

Advocated violence to end slavery

3.

Nat Turners Rebellion (1831):

Claimed to have revelations from Jesus

Rebellion in VA that killed 55 whites

60 blacks, including Turner, were killed in retaliation

As with all rebellions, slave laws became harsher.

B.
Evangelical Abolitionism
1.

William Lloyd Garrison:

Radical abolitionist

Founded The Liberator immediate and uncompensated

end to slavery

2.

The American Anti-Slavery Society:

Founded by Garrison and Theodore Weld

Helped show the violence of slavery

3.

3 strategies of the American Anti-Slavery society

1) The Bible against Slavery

2) Assisted Blacks to escape via Underground Railroad
3) Sought support from legislators.

C.
Opposition and Internal Conflict
1.

Abolitionists were few in number

Many in the North benefitted from slavery (textile manufacturers)

2.
Amalgamation: Many whites opposed the intermarriage of whites
and blacks
3.
Elijah Lovejoy: Murdered in Illinois, outspoken abolitionist and
editor of newspaper.
4.
Gag Rule All anti-slavery petitions in the House would not be
discussed.
5.
The abolitionist movement split over womens rights: Garrisons
American Anti-Slavery Society supported womens rights
6.
Some abolitionists established the Liberty Party and nominating
James G. Birney for president in 1840, but he won few votes.
7.
The very strength of abolitionism proved to be its undoing because it
aroused the hostility of the majority of the white population.

IV. The Womens Rights Movement

A. Origins of the Womens Movement
1.
Republican MothersInstruct their sons in the principles of liberty
and government.
Separate Sphere Expectation that women had different roles in

society.
2.
Dorothea DixReform mental health and social institution (mental
hospital, prison, asylums)
3.

Horace Mann Father of Education

Tax-Supported elementary schools

4.
By the 1850s, most teachers were women, in part because of Catharine
Beechers arguments that women were the best qualified to instruct the
young but also because women could be paid less than men.
5.
Grimke Sister: used Christian and Enlightenment principles to claim
equal civic rights for women.

C.
The Program of Seneca Falls and Beyond
1.
The leading feminists met at Seneca Falls, NY in 1848.
Declaration of Sentiments: All Men and Women are created equal.
Relied on the Declaration of Independence.
2.
Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Susan B. Anthony led the campaign for
equal voting, legal and property rights for women.
3.
In 1860, NY granted women the right to collect and spend their own
wages, and to control property they brought into their marriage.