Era of Reform

1. Era of Reform Reasons for Reform Temperance and The Bottle Prison and Asylum Education and Leadership

2. The Age of Reform • Reasons: • The Great Awakening sparked interest that the individual could control their destiny and that “good deeds” will make the nation a better place • The middle-class feel that they should be models of behavior for the “unmannered and ill-behaved” • Finally, women are driving forces for reform because they are no longer kept at home and now have a voice (predominantly in the church)

3. The Temperance Movement • Lyman Beecher, a minister preached that drinking led to adultery, poverty and crime • Under Beecher millions of Americans confess they “have fallen into the hands of sin” and pledge to stop drinking

4. The Temperance Movement • In 1830, Americans drink an average of 5 gallons of liquor a year • Reformers argue that drinking causes domestic violence, public rowdiness and loss of family income • The real problem is Americans have the habit of drinking all day

6. Asylums and Prison Reform • Dorothea Dix addressed how the insane were treated • She found that the insane were “degraded, beaten, naked and chained” in prisons with criminals • She urged lawmakers to build public asylums

7. Asylums and Prison Reform • Dorothea also discovered that people were placed in prisons for debt, people were subjected to cruel punishment and children were not treated any different than adults • She is responsible for helping eliminate sentencing for debt, ending cruel punishment and getting states to establish juvenile court systems • She argues that people can change if they are placed in proper environments and given an education

8. Prison Life

9. Education Reform • Only the wealthy were able to get a good quality education • Horace Mann, pushed for public education funded by taxes • He argued that “education was the great equalizer” for the poor and minorities

10. Educational Reform • In 1837, Olberlin College begins admitting women and African Americans • In cities young boys at 14 left school to work to help their families

11. African Colonization • The American Colonization Society in 1817 pushed for the release of slaves and their return to Africa • Some Northerners support this because they believe that blacks should be separate from whites • Some Southerners support colonization because they would ship away free blacks • 1,400 African Americans go to Africa colonize Liberia

12. Membership to the American Colonization Society

13. American Anti-Slavery Society • Founded in 1833 it sponsored lectures, sent antislavery petitions to Congress, published journals and printed pamphlets that attacked slavery • Free slaves would tell their stories to a white audience • The society's activities were usually attacked by mobs supporting slavery

14. Henry Lloyd Garrison • Published The Liberator, a newsletter that demanded an end to slavery • His writings angered Southerners because he wants slaves freed immediately • While in Boston in 1835 a mob will beat him. The beating wins people to his cause. Because it exposes supporters of slavery as inhumane individuals

15. Frederick Douglass • Born to a white father and black mother • Ship caulker who escapes slavery to become a leading abolitionist speaker • His book, The Narrative Life of Frederick Douglass exposes slavery’s horrors • He will publish The Lone Star, an abolitionist paper

16. Sojourner Truth • Freed slave who claimed to her “heavenly voices” • She spoke out for women’s rights and for abolition • In 1851 demanded to speak at a women’s convention in Ohio • Lectured about the cruel treatment encountered as a slave.