The Antebellum Period An Age of Reform 1820-1860

Deism Rational thought and observation dictate daily actions God (“The Supreme Architect”) created the Universe, but not a part of day-to day life Resulted from the Age of Enlightenment

The Second Great Awakening Reaction to the rationalism of the Enlightenment and the Revolution Calvinism (Puritan beliefs) attacked the liberal ideas of society and other Protestant churches New Calvinism: allowed free will in salvation Charles Finney: “The Father of Modern Revivalism” Allowed women to pray in mixed meetings Extemporaneous preaching Publicly censured sinners in sermons Coined the term “burned-over district”

The Second Great Awakening and Reform Only in northern states did the movement play a part in reform. Massachusetts to Ohio

South and New Frontier South and New Frontier Baptist and Methodist circuit preachers Outdoor revival and camp meetings Largest Protestant denominations by 1850

Millenialism Belief that the world would end with the second coming of Christ William Miller predicted it would be October 21, 1844 Continued as the Seventh-Day Adventists

Mormons Church of the Latter-Day Saints Founded by Joseph Smith in 1830 Book of Mormon: traced the connection between the Native Americans and the lost tribes of Israel NY-OH-MO-IL Smith was murdered by a local mob Under leadership of Brigham Young, the group migrated to Utah Cooperative social organization aided survival polygamous

Communal Experiments Shakers 6000 members by the 1840s Held property in common Men and women kept separately Forbade marriage and sexual relations Died out by the mid-1900s

The Shakers

New Harmony (Indiana) Secular Utopian socialism An answer to the problems of industrialization

Oneida Community (New York) Started by John Humphrey Noyes in 1848 Social and economic equality Shared property and marriage partners Planned reproduction and communal child-rearing Prospered economically by producing silverware

Brook Farm Massachusetts Communal experiment started by Protestant minister George Ripley “a more natural union between intellectual and manual labor”

Architecture Reflected democracy of ancient Athens Classical Greek styles Columned facades

Arts and Literature Genre Painting: portraying everyday life of ordinary people Hudson River School of art: scenes of nature

Literature Nationalistic Washington Irving James Fenimore Cooper: The Last of the Mohicans Nathaniel Hawthorne: The Scarlet Letter Herman Melville: Moby Dick

Transcendentalism Romantic movement in art and literature that stressed intuition and feelings and the study of nature Comparable movement in Europe Jo March and Transcendentalism

Ralph Waldo Emerson Nationalistic Wanted to create a new American culture Spiritual over material Stressed self-reliance and independence Critic of slavery in the 1850s Expressed philosophy of transcendentalism in Nature Wrote the “The American Scholar” Oliver Wendell Holmes called it “America’s Intellectual Declaration of Independence.”

Henry David Thoreau Lived by himself for 2 years in the woods Nature revealed to him the essential truths about life and the universe Walden (1854) “On Civil Disobedience”: advocate of non-violent protest Inspired Gandhi and Martin Luther King

Walt Whitman Provides a transition between transcendentalism and realism Wrote temperance novel, Franklin Evans Leaves of Grass was an attempt to reach out to the common man through an American “epic” Supporter of the Wilmot Proviso, although he later believed the abolitionist movement was a threat to American democracy.

Temperance 1826: Protestant ministers founded the American Temperance Union 1820: 5 gallons of hard liquor per person in 1820 Overshadowed by the abolitionist movement

Public Asylums Increasing number of criminals, emotionally disturbed, and poor Set up state supported prisons, mental hospitals (Dorothea Dix), and poorhouses

Public Education Free common schools Horace Mann: worked for compulsory attendance, longer school year, and better teacher education 1840s: tax supported schools spread to other states Moral education (hard work, punctuality, and sobriety): William Holmes McGuffey Higher education: several (Mt. Holyoke and Oberlin) schools began to admit women

Robert Owen and Socialism Social reformer and one of the founders of socialism and the cooperative movement People are products of their environment Religion is based on imagination and makes people weak

The Women’s Rights Movement Industrialization reduced the economic benefit of children (families reduced from 7.04 in 1800 to 5.42 in 1830). Women had the time to devote to religious and moral organizations

Origins Sarah and Angelina Grimke, Lucretia Mott, and Elizabeth Cady Stanton didn’t like that men opposed their antislavery activities Seneca Falls Convention (1848) Declaration of Sentiments Stanton and Susan B. Anthony led movement for equal voting, legal and property rights

Cult of Domesticity Men and women’s roles in society defined by the urban, middle-class Men: responsible for economics and politics Women: home and children Moral leaders Educators of children