The Early 19th Century - Madison to Manifest Destiny
History M25 - Krister Swanson - Moorpark College

Madison’s Presidency

• Tensions on the frontier + tensions over trade/shipping lead to…
• War of 1812, establishes final break from GB, gets us out of France/GB death grip
• Win leads to growing nationalism, sets stage for Jackson, Indian removal, etc.
• Dolley Madison sets standard for role of women in the capitol

Monroe’s Presidency

• 1820: Missouri Compromise shows growing tension over slavery
• 1823: Revolutions in Latin America lead to Monroe Doctrine – U.S. asserts itself as supreme power in Western Hemisphere
• Election of 1824: A “Corrupt Bargain” brings John Q. Adams to White House

Cultural and Religious Shifts

• The Family and Separate Spheres
• Push for greater public education
• The Second Great Awakening
• The Temperance Movement and Moral Reform (protecting the home)
• Growth of abolition (most northerners anti-black, free labor)

The Market Revolution

• Improvements in transportation (first roads & canals, then steamboats & RR’s)
• allows for expansion of manufacturing – early factories (textiles, shoes, etc.)
• Workingwomen  - seek autonomy & new opportunity
• start of wage labor system, workers subject to fluctuations in labor market
• Boom in banking, banks key to business development, bank notes become key part of money supply
• accompanying boom in commercial & corporate law, lawyers become central to economy
• Economic growth increases susceptibility to booms and busts (business cycle)

The Spread of Democracy

• 1828 (Jackson vs. John Q. Adams): voters now involved in selection  of presidential electors
• Partisan Identity grows (newspapers)
• Character issues dominate Election of 1828 (Jackson’s temper & toughness vs. Adams piety & intellect)

Jackson’s Democratic Agenda

• Spoils system: party loyalists throughout bureaucracy
• Limited government, & limited support for transportation & other things favored by big business
• Tax $$ for general benefit

Jackson & the Democrats

• Indian Policy and the Trail of Tears
• SC tries to nullify the Tariff of Abominations, Jackson uses force to make them comply
• Refuses to renew bank charter on argument that it only favors the elite
• Wins reelection on class antagonism created by Bank War
• Unregulated economy booms but then inflation goes crazy (unregulated money supply)
• Jackson tries to regulate, Banks respond with contraction & economy collapses in 1837
• Van Buren serves one term in panic conditions

Westward Movement

• Manifest Destiny - white culture destines to control all land from sea to shining sea
• Oregon Trail start of first push to far west - clash with Plains Indians
• The Mormon Exodus (NE to MW to Utah)
• American settlers push into the Mexican Borderlands (grow cotton in TX, etc.)
• 1836: TX wins its independence (Alamo)

Mexican-American War

• Politics of expansion driven by slavery
• Polk big expansionist, provokes war with Mexico
• Conditions are difficult but U.S. wins big, pays Mexico $15m for territory (CA, AZ, NV, UT, NM)
• This & Oregon finishes Manifest Destiny, gold discovered in CA, sets off settlement boom

Economic & Industrial Evolution

• MW easier to farm than NE
• Improvements in Ag technology also help
• Land Policy encouraged speculation but did make land more available to poor (land rich & labor poor)
• Mechanization makes manufacturing more efficient through mid-1800s

Railroads

• Push development in key industries (coal, iron, lumber, etc.)
• make industrialization & settlement possible at much greater distances
• Massive government aid & land grants to private RR companies
• This starts concentration of capital & very wealthy industrial upper class

Free Labor

• The Free-Labor Ideal: work to buy own land tools, prosper for self, hire another beginner to help him along
• Many pursue this ideal, creates mobile society
• Economic Inequality tough to explain with free labor model – many see slavery as primary cause of inequality
• Growing #s of immigrants from Germany & Ireland pursue this ideal

Continued Attempts at Reform

• The Pursuit of Perfection: Transcendentalists (look to self) and Utopians (build perfect societies)
• Women’s Rights Activists (Seneca Falls – start of suffrage movement)
• Abolitionists continued to push for emancipation throughout the 1840’s & 1850s