The Market Revolution

Introduction: The Regional Dimension of Market Revolution Market revolution: national in scope, but with important regional variations Manufacturing and industrial revolution in New England, northeastern cities Commercialization of farming driven by transportation revolution in northwest Cotton Revolution in south Result: regional economies, but with increasing economic integration between northeast and northwest as processes worked in tandem Laid groundwork for political sectionalism

What is a Market Revolution? Not just more economic activity, but a new market orientation Detaches people from local markets, connects them to distant commercial markets For-profit, cash farming displaces subsistence and safety-first farming

What is a Market Revolution? Leads to rising debt, rising risk, increased opportunities, increased consumption, increased dependency on factors beyond local control Also new way of organizing work, new kind of relationship between worker and employer Gives rise to social reform movements

What is a Market Revolution? Undermines patriarchy, changes gender roles in complicated ways New domestic ideal for urban middle class More women and children in manufacturing workforce Radicalizes women as workers, reformers, feminists

Which group would NOT benefit from the growth of the market-based economy? Plantation Owners Women Slaves Immigrants

The Northern Economy before 1815 The eighteenth-century composite farm Goal: competency Means: safety-first agriculture, Yankee ingenuity Households and neighborhoods: the borrowing system Stable, patriarchal social order

The Northern Economy before 1815 Pre-industrial manufacturing The workshop system The putting-out system (Outsourcing?) Sources of transformation: European wars stimulated production of surpluses, raised standard of living, but did not really alter market orientation Rising population, land shortages made competency difficult to achieve, undermined patriarchal households New government policies promote national economic development Transportation improvements and industrialization revolutionized the northern economy

Economic and Political Impact of the War of 1812 Spur to manufacturing and economic independence Indians subdued, opening northwest to unhindered white settlement Clay, the National Republicans, and the American System The Second National Bank The Tariff of 1816 Internal improvements Bottom line: government policy underwrote market revolution

Labor is the source of value

Transportation before 1815 Overland travel Bad roads High freight costs Long travel times River travel One way trips easy enough The steamboat But benefits uneven: must live near a river

Transportation Revolution Surge in western population, but limited access to eastern markets Canal boom: the Erie Canal, 1825 364 miles long, 40 ft wide, 4 ft deep Linked Great Lakes to Albany and NYC Transformed the northern economy

Transportation Revolution Consequences in old northwest Population explosion Boom in canal-building, commercial farming Mechanization: the McCormick reaper Raised standard of living, increased dependency on credit, distant markets

Transportation Revolution Consequences in the northeast End of safety-first farming Enabled urban growth, manufacturing Provided growing domestic market for manufactured goods Integrated northeastern and northwestern economies, which grew in tandem Impact on communities and households

The Transportation Revolution is an effect of the Market Revolution? True False

Industrial Revolution: British Origins What made it possible? Capital from merchant class Mass markets Mechanized production Cheap free labor (wage labor)

The Lowell Mills Francis Cabot Lowell Integrated productive processes (cleaning, spinning, weaving) under one roof at Waltham mills By 1836, 17,000 workers, mostly women and girls

The “culture” of the Lowell Mills

Daily Schedule for Lowell Mill Girls

Mill Girl, 1850 “This fine daguerreotype shows a neatly dressed textile worker about twelve years old. The harsh working conditions have taken a toll on her spirit and body: the young girl’s eyes and mouth show little joy or life and her hands are rough and swollen. She probably worked either as a knotter, tying broken threads on spinning jennies, or a warper, straightening out the strands of cotton or wool as they entered the loom” (Henretta, 296).

Significance of Mill Girls Female labor helped keep production costs down, which made goods cheaper, which was tied to middle-class growth It reshaped society and brought more women into the workplace

Booth Cotton Mills Museum Boott Cotton Mills Museum. URL: http://www.nps.gov/archive/lowe/2002/loweweb/visiting/lowe_photos/photo_19.htm

The Lowell Mills were an example of which aspect of Adam Smith’s capitalist theories? Division of Labor Laissez-Faire Positive-Sum Game Trade

Summary Before the Market Revolution: Slow transportation Many things produced in the household Production outside the home in a workshop economy Most Americans lived in rural areas Most women confined to the “domestic sphere” After the Market Revolution: Better transportation (railroads, etc.) Rise of factory system Urban growth Some women worked outside the home in factories

Impact of Industrialization Destroyed artisan class Segregation of work from life Preindustrial workshops Masters and workers “like a family” Work and living space the same Social lives integrated Industrial system Masters absent, workers in boarding houses Neighborhoods segregated Socializing segregated: class-based values, conflict surrounding forms of leisure (esp. drinking)

Impact of Industrialization Undermined patriarchal family Children earning own wages, more independent Altered outlook and lives of women Time and work discipline Adjusting to industrial rhythms Led to further calls for reform Religious ferment (change), social reform, utopian experimentation

Market Revolution and Community Northern responses to industrial and commercial transformation Some profited from it Some rejected it Many victimized by it It gave rise to new forms of community, new religious movements

Social Hierarchy Industrialists Capitalists Middle Class Wage Laborers Poor

Opinion Poll: Which of the following happened the most in response to the Market Revolution? Many Profited from it Many Rejected it Many were victims of it