The American System

1. The American System Advanced History Chapter 12

2. Nationalism • Patriotic Americans took pride in factories • Self-imposed embargoes; war • British competitors make it difficult for American factories to succeed • Tariff of 1816 • Protection tariff • 20-25% on the value of dutiable imports • Still not high enough to provide safeguard

3. Henry Clay’s Plan • Wanted to develop a profitable home market • “American System” 3 main parts • 1. strong banking industryeasy and abundant credit • 2. protective tariff tariff revenue fund 3rd part • 3. network of roads and canals ability to trade all over US • This would tie the country together politically and economically

4. Need for New Modes of Transportation • Invasion of Canada partly failed due to roads (or no roads at all) • 1817, Congress voted for $1.5 million for states for internal improvements • Madison voted ^ unconstitutional (states on their own) • Success: Erie Canal completed by New York in 1825 • Direct federal support was strongly opposed because such outlets would drain the population and create competing states beyond the mountains

5. Erie Canal

6. Era of Good Feelings • James Monroe • Nominated in 1816, lost miserably (183 electoral votes to 34 electoral votes • Founding Fathers age and nationalism • Possibly the least distinguished of the first 8 presidents • Monroe was experienced and level-headed • Great at interpreting popular interests • Pushed northward into New England and then westward into Detroit to inspect military defenses

7. Era of Good Feelings • Not necessarily true • Tranquility and Prosperity did occur during Monroe’s presidency • BUT… • Issues of tariff, the bank, internal improvements, and the sale of public lands were all contested during the time • Sectionalism • Prosperity for individual states (industry/transportation revolution) • Issue of slavery beginning to rise

8. Panic of 1819 • Good feelings quickly dissolved in 1819 • Economic panic • Deflation, depression, bankruptcies, bank failures, unemployment, soup kitchens, and overcrowded penthouses (debtors’ prison) • 1st national financial panic since Washington • Contributing factors • Over-speculation in frontier lands • Bank of US involved in outdoor gambling • Wildcat banks • Foreclosed mortgages on farms • Panic of 1819 created backwashes in political and social world • Poor severely strapped • Inhumanity of imprisoning debtors • Mothers torn from infants

9. Growing Pains in the West • Expansion west continued • Addition of 9 states • Alternated between free and slave states (VE, KY, TN, OH, LA, IN, IL MS, AL) • Such an expansion because… • 1. partly a continuation of westward expansion • “the Ohio fever” • Cheap land

10. Additional Developments • Cumberland Road • Began in 1811 • Ran from western Maryland to Ohio Valley • Other additional innovations • Steamboat, canals, highways • Land Act of 1820 • Authorized a buyer to purchase 80 untouched acres at $1.25 an acre in cash • Demand of cheap land, demand of cheap transportation, and demand of cheap money • Wildcat banks

11. Slavery and Sectional Balance • Issue in the West pertaining to slave states • MO wanted to be a slave state • Tallmadge Amendment • No more slaves to be brought into the state • Gradual emancipation of children born to slave parents already there • Southerners angered by amendment and eventually beat it • Growing differences between the North and South

12. Missouri Compromise • 1820, bundle of 3 compromises • Congress allowed MO to become a slave state • ME (originally part of MA) became its own free state • Balance was kept equal (12 free, 12 slave 15 years) • Future bondage was prohibited in remainder of LA Territory (boundary was Southern MO) • “dirty bargain” • North and South both win • South won MO • North won concession that Congress could forbid slavery in remaining states

13. Missouri Compromise

14. Sharing Oregon and Acquiring Florida • Treaty of 1818 • Monroe administration negotiated treaty with Britain • Pact permitted Americans to share Newfoundland fisheries with Canadian cousins • Also fixed vagueness of northern limits of Louisiana • 49th parallel Lake of the Woods (MN) to Rocky Mountains • Treaty provided a 10 year joint occupation of the untamed Oregon Country (no surrender of rights on either side)

15. US-British Boundary Settlement, 1818

16. Spanish Florida • Bulk of FL under Spanish rule • Revolutions break out in South America • Argentina (1816) • Venezuela (1817) • Chile (1818) • Andrew Jackson extreme force • Spain ceded Florida 1819

17. Menace of Monarchy • Europeans monarchs looking for allies • Austria, Prussia, and France • Tried to restore autocratic Spanish king to ancestral domains • Endangering democracy of America • Great Britain leading the pact • Crushed newly won liberties in Spanish America • Britain asks America jointly back off Latin America republics

18. Monroe Doctrine • British feared American seizure of Spanish land • Threaten British possessions in Caribbean • Monroe Doctrine • 1823, 2 basic features • 1. Non-colonization • 2. Non-intervention

19. Monroe’s Doctrine Appraised • Protection on land • Protection from monarchy • “Self-Defense Doctrine” • Never made law • Personalized statement of the policy of President Monroe • Deepened isolationism