The Pursuit of Perfection The attempt to reach “perfection” individually and as a society during the antebellum era

I. The Second Great Awakening

A. Causes and Theology Possible origins of this second major religious revival “Millennialism” Free moral agency or “Free will” This is an Arminian revival, not a Calvinistic one like the first Great Awakening “Perfectionism” Competing Religious Belief Systems

B. The Frontier Phase Location: Kentucky frontier Camp Meeting setting Bizarre physical behavior Denominations affected No impact on societal reform

C. The Northern Phase “Burned-over” District Less emotional than the frontier Spawns Reform Societies Began at Yale College Ministry of Lyman Beecher Ministry of Charles Finney

II. New Voluntary Associations Produced Attack on societal evil— religious roots Attempt to baptize the market revolution The range of voluntary reform societies The success of the American Temperance Society Reform societies used religious techniques to advance their causes

III. Changes in the American Family

A. Marriage and Gender Issues The triumph of marriage for love More affectionate relationships between husbands and wives The “cult of true womanhood” Increasing division of the work places -- “doctrine of the two spheres” An era of deep female friendships

B. Parenting and Childhood The cosmic importance of parenting Childhood seen as a distinct stage of life More intimacy between parents and children— especially children and mothers Smaller families were the norm 25% drop in family size between 1800 and 1850

IV. Institutional Reform

A. Free Public Schools Free public schools increased dramatically between The role of moral indoctrination The appeal of education to lower classes Opponents of free public schools Key leaders in this public education movement

B. Special Institutions for Social Misfits “Perfecting” impulse Colonial treatment of these “special need” individuals John Locke’s Tabula Rasa model Special Antebellum Institutions emerged Growing problems and important reformers

V. The Emergence of Abolitionism Unachieved “perfection” leads to division within reform societies Early approaches to ending slavery --American Colonization Society (1817) William Lloyd Garrison --American Anti-Slavery Society (1833) --The Liberator

V. Abolitionism (cont.) Theodore Weld and the Grimke Sisters The geography of abolitionism Internal problems for the American Anti-Slavery Society Open split in the Society by 1840 The creation of the Liberty Party (1840)

VI. Early American Feminist Movement Grows out of abolitionism Important Early Leaders in the Feminist Movement The Seneca Falls Convention (1848) Popular signs of protest

VII. Radical Experiments in Perfection Utopian Socialism --Robert Owen Transcendentalism --Brook Farm (1841) The “water cure” and the diet of Sylvester Graham Phrenology Popularity of Séances and “spirit-rapping”