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The Second Great Awakening
A series of evangelical Protestant revivals that prompted thousands of conversions and widespread optimism about Americans’ capacity for progress and reform. New utopian societies as well as the literary/ scholarly ideal of transcendentalism come out of this. Brought together different denominations based on shared evangelical ideals of a "perfect society". Appealed mostly to the middle class with ideas of free will, striving for advancement, and free church. -
The Benevolent Empire
A web of reform organizations, heavily Whig in their political orientation, built by evangelical men and women influenced by the Second Great Awakening. Mostly lead by Congregational and Presbyterian Ministers. Targeted drunkenness, adultery, prostitution, and crime with large- scale organizations. Created homes for orphans and the insane. Anti- alcohol, which resulted in carnivals banned, especially those enjoyed by people of color. this was called "temperance"- aka voluntary abstinence -
Mormonism
Joseph Smith published the book of mormon in 1830. With the fervor that resulted, he organized the Church of the latter day saints. Seeing himself as a prophet in a sinful, individualistic society, he emphasized family as the heart of religious and social life, encouraged practices that led to individual success: frugality, hard work, and enterprise, as well as communal discipline. His goal was a church-directed society that would restore primitive Christianity and encourage moral perfection. -
The rise of the Minstrel Show
Popular theatrical entertainment begun around 1830 in which white actors in blackface presented comic routines that combined racist caricature and social criticism. The racial stereotypes of minstrelsy — which can be traced up through radio, film, television, and beyond — had an immense and enduring impact on American popular culture. -
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Changing Gender Roles
Domesticity- A middle-class ideal of “separate spheres” that celebrated women’s special mission as homemakers, wives, and mothers who exercised a Christian influence on their families and communities: excluded women from professional careers, politics, and civic life. Changed with the realization that this was not possible for many women. Women began to claim spiritual authority. Advanced female and public education. Women also inspired improvements in public asylums, hospitals, and prisons -
Nat Turner's Rebellion
In August 1831, Turner and a group of relatives and friends rose in rebellion and killed at least 55 white men, women, and children. Turner hoped to seize weapons from a nearby armory and take up a defensive position in the Great Dismal Swamp, counted on other slaves coming to support him. His plan failed: the white militia dispersed his poorly armed force and took their revenge, including the slaughter of many local slaves who had no role in the rebellion. sowed terror among whites in the south -
The American Anti Slavery Society
Founded by William Lloyd Garrison, it was the first interracial social justice movement in the United States, which advocated the immediate, unconditional end of slavery on the basis of human rights, without compensation to slave masters. WLG also supported women taking a role in the abolition movement. Aided abolition through an aggressive print campaign, the underground railroad, and a petition campaign to congress. Many supporters were deeply religious -
Penny Papers
Sensational and popular urban newspapers that built large circulations by reporting crime and scandals. The cost of printing had fallen, facilitating this change. During this period, Edgar Allen Poe found success publishing stories in magazines and papers, establishing the "popular novel", as well as detective and mystery genres -
The gag rule
A procedure in the House of Representatives from 1836 to 1844 by which antislavery petitions were automatically tabled when they were received so that they could not become the subject of debate. -
The Panic of 1837
During the Jackson Presidency, his failure to promote banking systems came to a head when the New York banks ran out of specie in May of 1837. What followed was a significant economic collapse. the recession persisted for approximately seven years. Nearly half of all banks failed, businesses closed, prices declined, and there was mass unemployment. -
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the American Renaissance
a mid-nineteenth-century flourishing of literature and philosophy. Inspired by European romanticism, people like Ralph Waldo Emerson argued that people needed to shake off inherited customs and institutions and discover their “original relation with Nature,” in order to enter a mystical union with the “currents of Universal Being.” Mostly popular among the northern middle class. Inspired: Walt Whitman, Margaret Fuller, Emily Dickinson and Henry David Thoreau. -
Maine Prohibition Law
The nation’s first state law for the prohibition of liquor manufacture and sales. Upheld in the state Supreme Court. Met with resistance from many working class (white men) who enjoyed drinking "refreshers" during the day