Summary: Large-scale textile production began in the United States during this era of factories in places like Lowell, Massachusetts. As America grew economically it also began to assert its authority in the Western Hemisphere. The Monroe Doctrine boldly stated that the hemisphere was off limits to European intervention. Beginning in 1824 the United States began the resettlement of Native-American tribes east of the Mississippi. The era of "Jacksonian Democracy" was one where many say that the values of the "common man" reigned supreme. In the 1830s, the Whig party emerged as an opposition party to the Democratic party of Jackson. Several state legislatures began to claim that they could nullify federal laws that were not in the interests of their individual states.
Keywords
Monroe Doctrine (1823): proclamation that countries of the Western Hemisphere "are not to be considered as subjects for future colonization by any European powers."
Removal Act of 1830: Congressional act that authorized the removal of all Native-American tribes east of the Mississippi to the west; the Trail of Tears and other forced migrations caused the deaths of thousands.
The Liberator: abolitionist newspaper began by William Lloyd Garrison in 1831
Spoils System: a system used heavily during the presidency of Andrew Jackson whereby political supporters of the winning candidate are given jobs in the government
Nullification: in reaction to tariff legislation passed in 1828, the South Carolina legislature explored the possibility of nullification, by which individual states could rule on the constitutionality of federal laws. Other Southern legislatures later discussed the idea of nullifying federal laws in their own states.
Whig party: political party that emerged in the 1830s in opposition to the Democratic party; Whigs favored policies that promoted commercial and industrial growth.
THE GROWTH OF THE FACTORY
Economic growth was a key component of Henry Clay's American System, and measures were taken to expand American industry in the aftermath of the War of 1812. American industries were protected by the Tariff of 1816, which raised important tariffs by 25 percent. At the same time, state governments began improving road, river, and canal transportation systems.
Before 1820, almost all products made in America were completed using a system borrowed from Europe, called the putting-out system. Under this system, merchants would buy the raw materials, recruit dozens, or in some case hundreds, of farm families to do the work, and then sell the finished product. Many shoes in New England were made in this manner; women and children would make part of the shoe, which would be finished by experienced shoe makers.
Beginning in the late 1780s, the textile industry started to use power-driven machines and interchangeable parts. All power in these early factories came from water, so the early factories were all located along rivers. Most were located in New England or the Middle states. In the 1790s, factories like those in Lowell, Massachusetts, began to weave cotton imported from the south. With the introduction of the cotton gin in the same decade, more cotton became available, and production boomed. By 1840, the textile industry employed nearly 75,000 workers, almost half of them women.
The workforce of many of the early factories was hired using the "Lowell System." Young women from surrounding areas were brought in to work. They worked for a pittance in horrible conditions and slept in dormitories provided by the factories. The young women saw this as temporary work, as many went home after several years, after making some money (and in some cases spending it). This constant turnover of workers kept worker demands low, which pleased the factory owners. An economic middle class of manufacturers, bankers, and their families began to grow. Factory towns such as Lowell, Massachusetts began to grow rapidly in area.
An economic panic hit the United States in 1819, caused by the recovery of European economies after the Napoleonic Wars, by money policies of the National Bank, and by the efforts of officials at several branch banks of the National Bank to enrich themselves through speculation. It was not until the 1830s that worker strikes began; during this era there were also drives to influence state legislatures to shorten the workday. A real labor movement did not develop in the textile industry until the 1840s.
THE MONROE DOCTRINE
The Monroe Doctrine estimated the fact that America now was beginning to consider itself a major world power, announced by President Monroe in 1823. Many Latin American nations had announced their independence in the Napoleonic era, and many in Latin America and in the United States felt that the Spanish and the French might send armies to reassert their control of the region. The Monroe Doctrine stated that countries in the Western Hemisphere were no off limits to European control. (These states "henceforth are not to be considered as subjects for future colonization by any European powers.")
POLICY TOWARD NATIVE AMERICANS
In 1824, President James Monroe proposed that all Native Americans be moved west of the Mississippi River. Conflict had continued east of the Mississippi between settlers and various Native-American tribes. Even though tribes had signed legal treaties for land, settlement constantly encroached on Native-American territories. Monroe claimed that his proposal would benefit the Native Americans, stating that settlers would never bother them as long as they settled west of the Mississippi River. Some tribes such as the Cherokee, adopted systems of government similar to those used in many states, but even that did not stave off the pressure for removal.
The state of Georgia pressured the Cherokee to sell the land they held in that state. The Cherokees felt they held a valid treaty for the lands that they lived on and decided to take their case to the federal court system. In an 1831 decision, Cherokee Nation v. Georgia, Chief Justice Marshall stated that Native Americans had no real standing in court, since they were not a state or a foreign country. Nevertheless, Marshall affirmed that the Cherokee had a right to the lands that they possessed.
The Constitution states that it is the job of the executive branch to enforce the laws or decisions of the other two branches. Andrew Jackson was now president, and a large part of his reputation was based on his successful fights against the Indians. Jackson declined to take action to enforce this decision, stating "John Marshall has made his decision: let him enforce it." In his inaugural speech, Jackson affirmed his support for Native-American removal. During the War of 1812, Jackson led troops against the Creek tribe. As a result, the Creeks lost over 60 percent of their tribal lands. Congress had already passed and Jackson signed the Removal Act of 1830, which authorized the removal of all tribes east of the Mississippi.
Tribes were forced to move beginning in 1831; the horrors of these journeys, sometimes undertaken during winter months, are very well documented. In 1838, the Cherokees were finally marched west at gunpoint in what is now called the Trail of Tears; nearly one-third died of disease or exhaustion along the way. Many Native Americans were never able to adjust to the alien environment found west of the Mississippi. Indian resistance continued in Florida until 1841.
THE SECOND GREAT AWAKENING
The rise of industry, the growing commercialization of cities, and westernization, all fundamentally altered America in the years 1800 to 1830. Transportation was rapidly changing; a national road linked the Potomac and the Ohio rivers, and the Erie Canal was completed in 1825. The lives of vast numbers of ordinary people were being altered as a result of these economic and social changes.
In the midst of these transformations, the Second Great Awakening reaffirmed the role of religion in the lives of believers. The movement began in the late 1790s and reached its zenith in the 1830s. Where earlier Calvinist preachers had spoken of predestination, preachers of this era such as Timothy Dwight and Charles Finney proclaimed that one's actions on earth played at least some role in the individual's fate after death. During this period, revival meetings, some lasting as long as a week, would cause followers to faint, speak in tongues, or writhe uncontrollably. The Second Great Awakening began as a rural phenomenon, but by the 1820s it spread to the cities as well. Evangelical sects such as the Methodists and the Baptists also grew in popularity.
Women played a significant role in the revivalism of the era. Many women became dedicated Christians and worked as volunteers for Protestant churches. In addition, many of these churches set up "academies" to educate women.
Other Reform Movements
Many individuals involved in the religious fervor of the era wanted to use that enthusiasm to reform society. Many wanted to act to improve the lives of those living in the cities and others with disadvantages. Dorothea Dix campaigned for better treatment of the mentally ill in the 1830s and 1840s. A prison reform movement also developed. In addition, a large temperance movement developed in this period, urging the working class to not drink in excess. Individuals such as Horace Mann spoke out for formal education for all children, the expansion of the school year, and the need for rigorous standards of teacher training.
Many Christians, especially in the North, began to speak out forcefully about the treatment of American slaves. In the 1820s and 1830s, the abolitionist movement gained a large number of supporters. Abolitionists considered slavery to be a sin. The most prominent abolitionist was William Lloyd Garrison, who founded The Liberator, his antislavery newspaper, in 1831. Some were against slavery for other reasons. The American Colonization Society, founded in the South in 1817, opposed slavery on the grounds that it encouraged contact between blacks and whites; members of this organization urged slave owners to free their slaves and return them to Africa.
Frederick Douglass, an ex-slave, was another leader of the abolitionist movement, who in 1845 would write the Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, a key text for those who opposed slavery. In 1831, Nat Turner, a slave in Virginia, organized a bloody revolt that killed 60 whites. As was the case in the Stono Rebellion, the revolt was brutally repressed, and Black Codes and other restrictions on slaves in Southern states became more harsh.
POLITICAL REFORM: THE JACKSONIAN ERA (1829-1841)
Alexis de Tocqueville and other visitors from Europe noticed a different spirit in America than what existed in European countries. Tocqueville viewed with wonder the egalitarian system that he observed in virtually all aspects of American life. Many political changes both before and during the presidency of Andrew Jackson accentuated the sense that the "common man" reigned in this era.
Changes were already taking place in how presidential candidates were chosen. In 1800, only five states chose electors to the Electoral College by popular vote. By 1824, 18 out of 24 states chsoe electors in this manner. By the 1824 campaign, banners, posters, buttons, and hats were commonplace (the 1828 campaign was the first time when these were mass-produced).
In addition, more and more people could vote. By 1824, property qualification, long a method to keep the "rabble" away from the political process, had been eliminated in most states. Blacks (even free blacks in the North) and women were still excluded from the political process.
THE ELECTION OF 1824
In this election, Secretary of the Treasury William Crawford, Speaker of the House Henry Clay, Secretary of State John Quincy Adams, and Tennessee's Andrew Jackson, all ran for president. All of them considered themselves Republicans (the party was now referred to in many newspapers as Democratic-Republican). Jackson won the most popular votes, but only 38 percent of the electoral votes, so the election was turned over to the House of Representatives. Speaker of the House Henry Clay threw his support to Adams, who won in the House and then appointed Clay to the position of secretary of state.
For the next four years, supporters of Jackson did everything they could to sabotage the presidency of John Quincy Adams, constantly reminding themselves of the "corrupt bargain" between Adams and Clay that had decided the 1824 election.
THE 1828 PRESIDENTIAL ELECTION
The 1828 presidential campaign was the model for many political campaigns of the future. Campaign rallies were held by supporters of both Quincy Adams and Jackson. Mudslinging was a daily occurrence during the campaign. Jackson's supporters claimed that Adams stole the 1824 election and gave too many fancy dinners; they also claimed that when he had been envoy to Russia, Adams had helped procure American prostitutes for the Russian tsar. Supporters of Adams said that Jackson was a murderer and an adulterer (the charge was made that his wife was an adulteress as well). Jackson won the election handily; under him, the Democratic party became the first real political party of the United States.
JACKSON AS PRESIDENT
Andrew Jackson had been born in a log cabin, but when he was elected president in 1828, he was a planter and slaveholder. He was the first president from the West and had first achieved fame by fighting Native Americans. Jackson, however, was not naive in terms of politics; he had been a congressman and a senator from Tennessee, in addition to serving as the territorial governor of Florida. Jackson was personally popular, especially with the common people.
Jackson also expressed loyalty to those who supported him politically. He infrequently consulted with his appointed cabinet, relying instead on his "Kitchen Cabinet," the inner circle of his political supporters. Jackson also utilized the spoils system to give other political supporters jobs in the government.
Jackson also wanted to return to the Jeffersonian ideal of America as a nation of independent yeoman farmers. He opposed excessive government involvement in economic affairs, fearing that in most cases only wealthy interests benefited from that involvement. In modern terms, Jackson favored "smaller government" and was not afraid to use the power of the presidential veto to stop government programs he thought were excessive. At the end of his presidency, Jackson appointed Roger B. Taney as chief justice of the Supreme Court; the Taney court would validate almost all of Jackson's decisions favoring states rights.
To many of his opponents, Jackson was a paradox. While he spoke of the need to limit the influence of government in society, he increased the power of the presidency. Opponents often referred to him as "King Andrew I." On the issue of slavery, Jackson was no friend of abolitionists; he was a slave owner and was opposed to reform of the slave system.
THE NULLIFICATION CONTROVERSY
Jackson was forced early in his presidency to face the issue of the power of the states in relation to the power of the federal government. In 1828, Congress passed a bill authorizing new tariffs on imported manufacturing of cloth and iron. The cost of these goods rose dramatically, and legislators in South Carolina began to revisit the doctrine of nullification, whereby individual states could rule on the constitutionality of federal laws. Jackson's own vice president, John C. Calhoun of South Carolina, stated that the practice of nullification was a necessity to protect states from the potential tyranny of the federal government.
In 1830, a debate in the U.S. Senate over western land sales between Robert Hayne of South Carolina and Daniel Webster of Massachusetts evolved into a debate on nullification. In the Webster-Hayne Debate, Daniel Webster argued that if nullification were to proceed, the results would be "states dissevered, discordant, belligerent; on a land rent with civil feuds, or drenched... in fraternal blood!" President Jackson was a believer in states' rights but firmly opposed the concept of nullification.
New tariffs were imposed on imported goods, and in November 1832 a specially called convention in South Carolina voted to nullify the law imposing these tariffs. Jackson moved troops and federal marshals to South Carolina to collect the tariff payments there; Congress authorized these decisions when it passed the Force Act. John Calhoun resigned as vice president (Jackson suggested privately that he should be hanged). A crisis was avoided when the Congress passed a bill, acceptable to South Carolina, that lowered the tariffs to be collected.
THE BANK CRISIS
The second bank of the United States was chartered in 1816 (it was a crucial part of Henry Clay's American System). The bank issued national currency, regulated loan rates, and controlled state banks. The bank had been run since 1823 by Nicholas Biddle. As stated previously, Jackson was suspicious of government involvement in the economy. These suspicions extended to the national bank.
Henry Clay was going to run for president in the 1832 election and wanted to use the Bank as a campaign issue. Clay began pushing to have the Bank rechartered, even though its original charter did not expire until 1836. Clay was convinced that national support of the Bank would swing supporters his way. Jackson vetoed the rechartering proposal, claiming it served special interests and little else. This increased his popularity with the public and helped ensure his reelection in 1832.
Jackson wanted to destroy the national bank, and in 1833, he ordered that money be removed from it and placed in state or local banks (Jackson's political enemies called these his "pet banks"). To keep the national bank going, Biddle increased interest rates and called in loans that had been made to state banks. The results of this Bank War would eventually be the panic of 1837 and a depression that would last into the 1840s.
THE WHIG PARTY: A CHALLENGE TO THE DEMOCRATIC-REPUBLICANS
In the 1830s, the Whig party emerged as the major opposition party to the party of Jackson. The Whigs and the Democratic-Republicans battled for elections throughout the 1830s and 1840s. Taking their lead from the legacy of Andrew Jackson, the Democrats generally favored a limited government. They saw urbanization and industrialization as necessary evils; the America they favored was still essentially a Jeffersonian one.
The Whigs favored more governmental involvement in commercial activities and favored the national bank and industrial growth. They were opposed to rapid and uncontrolled settlement of the West. Consistent with their view of a more activist government, the Whigs also were more likely to sponsor reformist legislation. Predictably, businessmen from the North and Northeast supported the Whigs, as did Southern planters. The Democrats were generally supported by the "common man," which included small farmers, factory workers, and smaller merchants. A Democrat Martin Van Buren won the 1836 election, but Whig William Henry Harrison was elected in 1840. Harrison died after one month in office and was succeeded by John Tyler. Developments in Texas and American expansionism would become important issues during his presidency.
CHAPTER REVIEW
To achieve the perfect 5, you should be able to explain the following:
~A new production system developed in textile mills such as those that existed in Lowell, Massachusetts, in the early nineteenth century.
~The Monroe Doctrine boldly proclaimed that the Western Hemisphere was off limits to European intrusion.
~Beginning in 1824, it was official American policy to move Native-American tribes east of the Mississippi; the horrors of many of these relocations are well documented.
~The Second Great Awakening influenced many to become involved in reform movements, including the abolitionist movement.
~The presidency of Andrew Jackson is celebrated as an era when the "common man" reigned supreme, although Jackson greatly expanded the powers of the presidency.
~The Democratic party of Andrew Jackson was the first real political party in American history.
~Jackson's tariff policy caused a renewal of interest in the policy of nullification in several Southern state legislatures.
~In the 1830s, the Whig party emerged as the major party opposing the Democratic party of Jackson.
Time Line
1790s: Beginning of the Second Great Awakening
1816: Second Bank of the United States chartered / Tariff of 1816 imposes substantial import tariffs / Election of James Monroe
1819: Panic of 1819 (unemployment lasts until 1823)
1820: Missouri Compromise / Reelection of James Monroe
1820s: Growth of New England textile mills
1823: Monroe Doctrine
1824: Proposal by President Monroe to move Native Americans east of the Mississippi River
1825: John Quincy Adams elected president by House of Representatives (no candidate had won a majority in Electoral College)
1828: Andrew Jackson elected president
1830: Passage of Indian Removal Act in Congress / Webster-Hayne Debate
1830s: Growth of the Whig party
1831: Cherokee nation goes to court to defend tribal rights in Cherokee Nation v. Georgia / First issue of William Lloyd Garrison's The Liberator published
1832: Andrew Jackson reelected / Nullification crisis after nullification of tariffs by South Carolina
1834: First strike of women textile workers in Lowell, Massachusetts
1836: Democrat Martin Van Buren elected president
1840: Whig William Henry Harrison elected president