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Communitarianism
Robert Owen advocated communitarianism as a nonviolent way to guarantee that factory owners paid employees fairly for their effort. Owen, a British factory owner, had rigorous workplace behavior guidelines, luxurious residences, and free public education. New Lanark became the world's largest center for cotton manufacturing thanks to its 1,500 workers. -
American Colonization Society
The American Colonization Society pushed for the gradual abolition of slavery as well as the colonization of Africa by black Americans. The society's plan was to buy slaves and set them free. They supported them after they arrived on the west coast of Africa and paid for their transportation there as well. They succeeded in establishing Liberia, and from there they carried out their plan. -
New Harmony
A utopian village called New Harmony was established in 1825. George Rapp established the Harmony settlement, which Robert Owen bought and eventually renamed New Harmony. In order to create a role-model community where social equality and education might flourish, Owen built New Harmony. -
Temperance Movement
To decrease the amount of drinking in the United States, a movement known as the Temperance Movement was established in 1826. The movement encouraged moderate alcohol consumption or total abstinence from alcoholic beverages. -
Perfectionism
Reform movements and revivals began to popularize the idea of perfectionism, where society is thought to be capable of constant improvement. Under the concept of perfectionism, temperance became a movement from moderate consumption of liquor to a crusade to eliminate drinking. More people began to become pacifists and abolitionists. -
Common School
All children could attend Common Schools, which were public school systems sponsored by taxes. Horace Mann, an educational reformist, believed that by integrating children from all layers of society in a single educational experience and empowering the less fortunate to climb the social ladder, public education could bring equality back to a society that had become divided. He was ultimately able to assist and educate a large number of kids who were unable to further their own education. -
Gentleman of Property and Standing
Mobs of merchants with strong ties to the South known as "the gentleman of property and standing" interfered with abolitionist gatherings in Northern cities. One of the founders of the American Anti-Slavery Society, William Loyd Garrison, was led through the streets in 1835 while wearing a rope around his neck. Elijah P. Lovejoy, an anti-slavery editor, was murdered by a mob in 1837 when he was defending his newspaper. -
Gag Rule
In 1836, abolitionists flooded the capital with petitions for freeing slaves. The House of Representatives adopted the gag rule to prohibit their petitions. -
Shakers
The Shakers were a thriving religious community that substantially impacted the world. They were founded by Mother Ann Lee in the late eighteenth century and peaked in 1840. They believed that God had a dual personality, one female and one male, which thus made both sexes spiritually equal and their work meaningful. They were among the first to market herbal medicines, flower, and vegetable seeds and breed cattle for profit. -
Liberty Party
Abolitionists who supported using politics to further antislavery objectives founded the Liberty Party. The American Anti-Slavery Society split from the Liberty Party, which promoted the abolitionist cause. The party promoted the idea that the Constitution forbade slavery. -
Brook Farm
New England transcendentalists established Brook Farm to demonstrate how manual and intellectual labor can coincide. They were inspired by Charles Fourier, a French social reformer who pioneered the idea of shared living and working spaces with private property. Brook Farm is similar to a small university, with leisure time devoted to the arts. However, Brook Farm only attracted teachers, writers, and ministers who disliked farm labor. -
Dorothea Dix
A Massachusetts schoolteacher named Dorothea Dix was a big advocate of treating the insane with more humanity. When Dorothea started working as a teacher at the Cambridge Jail in 1841, she was horrified to learn that inmates with mental illnesses were housed there with no support or medical attention. Before the Civil War, 28 states built mental institutions as a result of her work throughout the years. -
Oneida
John Humphrey Noyes established the influential and controversial utopian community of Oneida in upstate New York in 1848. Noyes went to an unusual lengths to prove that man may attain moral perfection. He claimed in his sermons that he and his disciples had attained such perfection that they were in a "purity of heart" state. Oneida was a very autocratic society that persisted all the way up to 1881. -
Woman Suffrage
After the Seneca Falls convention, women first gained the right to vote, which is known as woman suffrage. Seneca Falls served as the starting point for the next 70-year fight for women's suffrage. The Declaration of Sentiments denounced the entire system of inequity that barred women from accessing jobs, higher education, and other opportunities. In the early women's rights movement, women persevered in their quest for equal rights, which meant demanding access to all forms of freedom. -
Uncle Tom's Cabin
Uncle Tom's Cabin was the most influential piece of antislavery literature of the entire period. Written by Harriet Beecher Stowe, the novel was modeled on the autobiography of fugitive slave Josiah Henson. By 1854, the book sold more than 1 million copies. The dramatic novel portrayed slaves as unfortunate, suffering humans, which caused many to sympathize with enslaved people. -
