Social Reform in Transitional America: The Rise of Morality and Education

1. Chapter 9 – Religion and Reform(1815-1855) Section 1 – Reforming Society

2. Urban (?) Problems mostly in the North • Poverty • Alcoholism • Illiteracy • Overcrowded housing • Poor healthcare • Abuse of women • Declining moral values

3. Protestant Revivalists • Reform movement based on religious faith • (Democratic principles of the 2nd Great Awakening began the 1830s reform movement) • Reformers rejected Puritan idea that God predetermined people’s lives. They believed God was all-powerful but that God allowed people to make their own destinies. • Charles Grandison Finney • Emphasized individual’s power to reform themselves • Lyman Beecher • Taught that good people would make a good country • Raised 13 children. Among them: • Henry Ward Beecher (preacher and lecturer) • Harriet Beecher Stowe (author of “Uncle Tom’s Cabin”) • Catherine Beecher (key figure in women’s education)

4. The Transcendentalists • Transcendentalism • No public rituals • No group worship • Private, inward, spiritual discovery, searching and insight • Humans are naturally good • Urged people to have the courage to act on their own beliefs  lead to moral, meaningful lives helping to reform society. • Ralph Waldo Emerson • People can rise above (transcend) the material world and become aware of the spirit that is in all of nature • Well-known American poet

5. Transcendentalists, continued • Henry David Thoreau • Neighbor of Emerson’s; Also a famous writer (Walden) • Walden Pond was owned by Emerson. • Thoreau built a cabin and spent two years thinking, reading, writing and observing nature. • Why should we be in such desperate haste to succeed, and in such desperate enterprises? If a man does not keep pace with his companions, perhaps it is because he hears a different drummer. Let him step to the music which he hears, however measured or far away. • Opposed the Mexican War and refused to pay taxes. Jailed in 1846. • Was anti-slavery; personally helped escaped slaves go north. Civil Disobedience group work

6. The Temperance Movement • Temperance Movement – An organized campaign to eliminate the drinking of alcohol. • In the early 1800s, Americans drank more alcohol per person than at any other time in US history! • Reformers valued self-control and self-discipline so they opposed drinking. • Women especially saw drinking as a threat because they and their children were often abused by drunken men. • By 1834, the American Temperance Society had 7,000 local organizations with over 1,000,000 members. • Members of Temperance Societies urged people to take pledges not to drink alcohol. Abstinence – refraining from doing something. • In 1842, a 33 year-old lawyer (AL) looked forward to the “happy day, when . . . the victory shall be complete – when there shall be neither a slave nor a drunkard on the earth.” • Impact of the Temperance Movement – • 1851 – Maine became the first state to ban the manufacture and sale of all alcoholic beverages. Some other states followed. • Protests led to the repeal of most of those laws • Between the 1830s and the 1860s, alcohol consumption in the US dropped dramatically. From 1800 to 1830, Americans drank on average about 7 gallons of alcoholic beverages per year. By 1860, it was down to 2 gallons.

7. Public Education • Reformers concerned about the lack of public education. • Many schools old • Textbooks and other materials scarce • Quality of teaching was poor • Geography of mid-Atlantic and southern states were isolated farms separated by poor roads  discouraged building schools. • Beginning in the 1820s, many poor and middle-class citizens started asking for tax-supported public schools.

8. Public Education, continued • Horace Mann • Grew up in poverty • Educated himself in his local library • Became a lawyer • Elected to MA state legislature • 1837 – MA 1st Secretary of Education • Believed in “an absolute right to an education of every human being that comes into the world.” • Supported raising taxes for free public education • Began the system of grade levels • Success in MA encouraged other states • By 1850, most northern states had free public elementary schools • 1821 – MA set up first public high school • By 1860, there were 300 in US. • 1848 – became a Congressman and opposed slavery I beseech you to treasure up in your hearts these my parting words: Be ashamed to die until you have won some victory for humanity. Horace Mann, speech to graduating class at Antioch College in Ohio, June 1859.

9. Public Education, continued • Moral Education • Public schools at that time taught self-discipline and good citizenship • How to behave; stand in line and wait their turn; deal with others politely; respect authority; thrift; honesty; temperance • McGuffey’s Readers • First widely used textbooks – used to teach reading and values • Written by William Holmes McGuffey who educated himself and became a teacher at 13. • First series of McGuffey’s Readers were published in 1836.

10. Public Education, continued • The Limits of Reform • Schools more common in north than south • Schools more common in urban areas than in rural areas • Girls often discouraged from attending or actually prohibited once they learned to read and write • Black students often kept out • Where black students were allowed, students were often segregated (?). • Opportunities for women and African Americans in higher education were even less. • Some private colleges (Oberlin, Amherst, Dartmouth) allowed a small number of African American students. • Two black colleges (Avery, and Wilberforce) were founded during this time. • Several private colleges (Oberlin, Grinnell) allowed both men and women as students.

11. Reforming Prisons • Prior to the 1800s, criminals were punished by branding them (?) or putting them on display in stocks. • In the early 1800s, as a REFORM, states started putting criminals in prisons in hopes they would reflect on their wrongdoing and become law-abiding citizens. • 1841 – Boston schoolteacher, Dorothea Dix, visited a MA jail. She saw men and women, young and old, sane and insane, first-time offenders and hardened criminals, all crowded together. Many were in rags, poorly fed, and chained together in cells that were not heated. • Dix spent 2 years visiting every jail in MA. She submitted a report about what she found to the state legislature. • The state improved prison conditions and created separate institutions for the mentally ill. • As a result of Dix, 15 other states also built hospitals for the mentally ill.

12. Utopian Communities • Most reformers tried to improve all of society but some formed their own utopian communities (small societies seeking perfection in social and political conditions). • Utopia is a fictional place from literature that describes a place where there is no greed, sin or egotism, and where people lived as equals in prosperity. • Among the most famous: New Harmony, IND founded in 1825 by Robert Owen. Owen wanted a town in which well-educated, hardworking people would share property in common and live in harmony. However, the people gave in to laziness, selfishness and arguing. • Brook Farm – near Boston. Attracted intellectuals, writers and transcendentalists. Included the father of Louisa May Alcott, and also the novelist Nathaniel Hawthorne. Lasted 1841-1847. • Most utopian communities were religious. • Shakers – offshoot of the Quakers. Began in 1787. Goal is to have lives of productive labor, moral perfection and equality among men and women. Best known for their furniture. Their population peaked at 6,000 in 1840. There are few left today.