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Introduction to the United States - History

Week 1 - Discovering America
Week 2 - American Revolution and the Constitution
Week 3 - National Quests and Expansion
Week 4 - Slavery and the Coming of the Civil War
Week 5 - Civil War - Course of the war
Week 6 - Industrialisation
Week 7 - Poverty and Reform in the 20th Century
Week 9 - The Cold War
Week 10 - Feminism

Week 1 - Discovering America

The First Group of Settlers - Jamestown

There was no complete definition of the map of America. Only the coastline was known at this time. California puzzled people and was thought to be an island. Francis Drake described California as the "backside of America".
The Spanish sought gold in America. The first permanent English settlement was in Jamestown. In May 1607, people settled in Virginia to colonise it. Christianity was bought along as well. They gained many resources. The settlers mined for metals. Jamestown was in a swamp and they had lack of food and suffered from malaria. The settlers were from a gentleman's class and were not good at farming or building. They spoke about making wine and not growing food. Captain John Smith was their leader. He lived in Virginia for two years and requested more practical people. Oxbridge students were not very useful there. The colony struggled. They turned to cannibalism and consumed the dead out of hunger. They then turned onto each other. Only a third of the settlers were left by 1662. The Jamestown settlers mistreated the local Indians (Powhatan people). Despite the bad treatment, they helped them with food. The settlers referred to the locals as savages. In 1622, there were fights. Tobacco helped to get money as a cash crop. Private land was also encouraged.

The second Group of Settlers

In 1620, Plymouth was established as a desire to spread the Protestant word. They struggled in the UK so they decided to emigrate. They set sail on the Mayflower and went to Hudson Bay and landed in Cap Cod more northerly. They met an English speaking Indian. 10 years later Boston was founded. Religious puritans encouraged the emigration to America. John Winthrop was the governor there. In 1640, 10,000 people were in Massachusetts. After a murder of a white trader, it caused many wars. They sort revenge against the local people. The local people were slashed by the sword and their towns were destroyed by the soldiers. To make it stop, the locals gave themselves to the Christian God. The settlers used Psalm 2.8 to justify their violent actions against the Native Americans.

About the Natives

There were 10 million local people in America at the time of the settlers arriving. They had been there between 10-30 thousand years. The natives were very diverse. The Sioux Indians are similar to the stereotypical idea we have about the Native Americans. They all lived differently. They all adapted to their environments. Some chiefs were as powerful like kings. Today, there are still these communities in existence. The natives could not believe what they found about the settlers and tried to make friends. The locals were called Indians as Columbus was trying to get to the West Indies and arrived in America instead. The colonists were surprised why the natives did not control their lands. They wanted them to convert to the European way of thought.

Colonial America

They tried to recreate the UK - politically, geographically and socially. The Europeans were not new to empire building. They saw the colony as an economic resource. They were looking for fur, metal and fish and were in abundance. There was so much fish at Cap Cod, that they named the area after it. Turkey was much faster in America than in Europe. William Conan said the US was similar to Europe. They started to catalogue the flora and forma. Eventually, the settlements became successful. Misery and vice did not figure in the new society after the initial problems. Native locals became ill from smallpox, plague and other Western diseases, as they had no immunisation. Alfred Crosby referred to "Imperial Biologicalism." The natives did take advantage of the new animals. They swapped English goods for fur - one tribe asked for stainless steel cutlery.

African Americans

J. Sanders, 1619 - ships coming into Jamestown. There was a ship coming in. It was a mystery and it was Dutch. It came in to trade and their cargos were slaves.

There was a labour crisis and was unable to enslave the natives and so the settlers sort African slaves. They were used to work on the Virginian cash crops. African slaves were seen as objects. People were packed into the ships like sardines. I in 3 people died on the ships on the journey to America.
2 distinct systems emerged:
South - tobacco and tension still. Jamestown suffered from the beginning.
New England - healthy climate and easier growth. Purists used children from 6-7 years old for outside work.
Both of these settlements were controlled by the monarchy. New England was to replicate Purism, but they developed their own diverse version of social etticate. The new society was being planted.

Week 2 - American Revolution - the constitution

In Philadelphia, people celebrated the end of being under rule of the UK in 4th July 1977. The Americans wanted independence from the UK because the following created a distance between England and America:

In 17th August 1775 – Massachusetts

Tom Pain – there were documents published that helped to turn people against England.

The Revolution Achieved:

Helped to implement changes and make them change faster.

John Adams – “a radical change in the principles, opinions, sentiments and affections of the people was the real American Revolution.”

Criticisms – The constitutions – its formation

They made laws regarding settlements and land rites. Documents had limited power except military. Tensions appeared between the states. The system was needed to be overhauled.

1886 – protest of angry farmers – Capt. Daniel Shades led the protest. It sent shockwaves to the elite. A fear spread in the elite about the ordinary people. They decided the problems needed to be solved. An entirely new document of law was formed with 2 houses. State leaders were alarmed by the military ability to take over their states as set out in the document. This plan was not received well.

Alexander Hamilton – the old plan did not work so a new one was made. Ideas of Supreme Court were designed. American constitution took 4 months to write. In September 1787 it was signed. Charles Beard suggests it's for the people but they put in clauses for the leaders own gains.

Slaves were not allowed to vote. Office of president was not considered at first.

Week 3 - National Quests and Expansion

After last week's exploration of revolutionary fervour, this week I want to turn towards the construction of a new nation. I want to start with a quote by learned scholar William Ellery Channing in 1841. He is looking back on the decades that have elapsed since 1776

It is no wonder that Channing saw these years as tumultuous and significant. Alongside the American Revolution, and the French, he witnessed the forging of a new nation. Between the Revolution and the Civil War, the United States expanded economically, setting down the roots of an industrial economy, gained social and national identity, and gained ground geographically, situating itself as a continental power, with territory for Atlantic to Pacific shores.

Economy and industrialization

After the ratification of the constitution, the federalist faction assumed control of the government, with decorated war hero George Washington celebrated as the first President of the United States. Far from relishing his new position, Washington described himself as a condemned man en route to execution. His sentiments reflected a sense of personal unease about his new responsibilities; concern for what trials might befall the republic and its inexperienced leaders, together with a cognition of the huge economic debts already built up by the fledgling nation. The constitution, as we discovered last week, provided only a rough guide to governance, and it became the task of America's new political leadership to decide the path their national experiment would take.

Raising revenue, choosing appropriate paths of economic development and forging the character of the working nation proved an important concern for politicians. Alexander Hamilton, who assumed control of the Treasury in 1789 until 1795 (he died in 1804 after a duel with political opponent Aaron Burr in 1804) advocated a strong central government to marshal the forces of capital and commerce. Mindful of the rapid industrialization occurring across the Atlantic, Hamilton favoured the construction of a modern manufacturing, industrial economy after the British model. As first secretary of the Treasury, he created a national bank, tariffs, debt funding, and currency regulation. These measures helped assist the rise of manufacturing in the new nation by acquiring foreign investment, assuring financial stability, and putting the government in credit.

Hamilton's measures clearly benefited a particular sector of American society - rich mercantile, industrial entrepreneurs, men based largely in the North. The tenets of Hamilton's plan provoked opposition from within the revolutionary cadre itself. John Madison and Thomas Jefferson articulated serious reservations over the commercial scheme, preferring instead a vision of agrarian America, a nation of virtuous farmers, tilling the land rather than tending the machine. In their agrarian republic, states retained more power to control affairs [this is something we talked of last week, and will continually rear up as an issue in the US] Looking to Britain, Jefferson saw industrialization as a corruptive force, creating and then alienating an urban poor. This dispute emerging in the early republic laid the basis for the two party system.

Meanwhile, it is possible to see that, over the next few decades, developments going in the North implemented Hamilton's vision of industrial capitalism, while movements in the South (as well as the West) saw the creation of an agricultural foundation for the nation after the Jeffersonian ideal.

North

The years immediately after the revolution witnessed the tentative rise of a manufacturing economy. The first factory to produce woollen cloth started operations at Hartford, Conn in 1788 and tailored the suit worn by Washington at his presidential inauguration. The nascent industrial sector struggled at first - despite its famous patronage the Hartford woollen factory closed. Budding industrial magnates faced an array of difficulties - a scarcity of skilled labour and capital, high wage costs, and a lack of machinery. Many citizens appeared happy to rely on the dominant and entrenched European market, while others agreed with Jefferson as to the unhealthy lifestyle of the city, a view confirmed by those visiting Britain. Joshua White, a cotton dealer who visited the UK in 1810 exclaimed: "it is maddening folly and stupid policy to aim at a rivalry with Great Britain in her manufactures; and from the moment we see such places as Manchester and Birmingham in our country, should we date the commencement of a system fraught with principles most inimical to the happiness of the people."

Despite this slow start, the industrial revolution in the North took hold. Within the span of two decades, New England had emerged as the primary industrial region of the United States. Entrepreneurs benefited from Hamilton's financial reforms, with 29 banks in major Northern towns by 1800. The wars that wracked Europe from 1793 until 1815 also aided the development of a national industrial sector. The boycott of foreign trade instituted by Jefferson encouraged industrial innovation and infrastructural development.

Technology proved an instrumental force in facilitating national economic development. Keen American inventors capably employed and modified European techniques and machinery. Prodigious inventor Eli Whitney pioneered the crafting of identical products, with interchangeable parts, thus favouring the rise of assembly line modes of production. Oliver Evans from Philadelphia developed the first automated flourmill in 1803, which though rudimentary (one worker poured wheat down a chute and a second moved the barrels of flour emerging the other end of the machine) established an important precedent in labour division.

Technological advance and the rise of the factory system was most obvious in the American textile industry. Where previously, the craft had relied on small scale artisan production, based around family units, and localized, the new factory based method concentrated production in large units, where large numbers of workers completed proscribed tasks, locked it into a national, even international economy.

The birth of the American textile factory reads more like a spy story than a tale of tailors. Cognizant of its industrial pre-eminence, Britain forbade skilled textile operators from emigrating, lest they yield their secrets to competing magnates. Nonetheless, keen exponents of American industrial espionage visited England, memorizing the machine schematics, or smuggling out plans.Samuel Slater, a skilled mechanic from Lancashire, secretly left for the New World in 1789, having committed machine plans to memory. Settling in Rhode Island, Slater oversaw the creation of a new cotton operation. The factory produced cotton thread, which was then shipped out to individual artisans, working from home. By 1812, 130,000 spindles turned in 213 factories.

The next major development in the textile industry was the power loom, pioneered by Francis Cabot Lowell in 1813. Again, Lowell took his inspiration from British precedent, obtaining plans from a contact in the mother country. Lowell implemented his scheme in an old paper mill in Waltham, near Boston, to impressive results. Later, the Lowell family extended its influence, harnessing the power of the Merrimack River to create a brand new operation under the auspices of the Merrimack Manufacturing Company (1822). The company advanced a modern system of factory production based on concentrated operations in one building, efficient management and centralized marketing strategies. The factory town called Lowell (formerly East Chelmsford). In 1820, the New England cotton industry was valued at $2.5mill - ten years later it was worth $15mill.

Budding industrialists in the North were aided by an attendant revolution in transportation. Dubbed internal improvements, government and private individuals during these years endeavoured to make trade swift, cheap, and easy by constructing roads, canals, railroads. The Wilderness Road was opened in 1795, carrying traffic along Daniel Boone's famous trail through the Appalachians to Kentucky. The Philadelphia-Lancaster turnpike was finished in 1794, and 4,00 miles of turnpikes (toll roads) had been constructed by 1821. The early 1800s also saw a boom in water transport, with the construction of thousands of miles of canals, linking river routes. The Erie Canal, opened to traffic in 1825 spanned 363 miles from New York to Lake Erie. In its first year of operation, the 'big ditch' took $1 million in tolls. Steamboats further assisted river travel, negating the practice of many sailors to cut a boat up and sell it at their downstream destination. By the 1830s, steamboats navigated the waters of the Mississippi, Missouri and Arkansas rivers, taking people and produce to diverse locales.

The rise of an industrial North entailed the rise of the city. Urban growth in this period increased exponentially. Boston, New York and Philadelphia combined only counted 50,00 residents in 1800. By 1850, Boston had 140,000; while New York hit the 1 million mark in 1860. The rise of city, and industry, also reflected a mass influx of foreign migrants to the US after 1815. In the 1830s, 600,000 migrants entered the US while the next decade that figure jumped to 1.7mill. Immigration proved an essential force in stoking Northern industry, providing workers and consumer demand for the new nation's products.

South

So we are starting to see a new demographic - urban, worker in the North. This is different in South. In these years only 4 large towns existed (Mobile, Savannah, Baltimore and Charleston) and only I city - New Orleans (pop 120,000 in 1850). These years extraordinary economic growth in southern states, but from a different source, and leading to a different econ/social structure. From the 1790s, cotton began to overtake tobacco as a staple crop of the southern economy. With a suitably tropical climate and burgeoning demand from UK mills, plantation owners switched production, while new lands brought under cultivation were put over to cotton. By the 1830s, cotton emerged as the South's greatest export, worth $30 million per year, and making up 40% of the US export market.

Technology played a significant role in facilitating the cotton kingdom. Eli Whitney, an inventor, developed the cotton gin machine in 1793, creating a swift and efficient way of separating the cotton fibre from the seed. Whitney's innovation allowed a labourer to collect 50 times as much cotton. This new system, and its large profits and attendant requirements for a large labour force, bolstered the institution of slavery. The plantation economy, large rural estates based around the subjugation of soil and slaves became enshrined as a distinctively Southern mode.

Society

As early as 1789 we can detect a stirring sense of American nationalism. The 4 July has been celebrated since that year, the eagle, the flag and the founding fathers all enshrined as heroic emblems of the new republic. Economic progress and national independence joined to create a burgeoning sense of national self confidence. In 1799, British Minister to the US Robert Liston commented that Americans have "such an overweening idea of American prowess that they do not scruple to talk of the United States as an overmatch for any nation in Europe." Pronouncements in the swathe of popular publications depicted a vibrant and assured new society. In the Democratic Review of 1839 one article described the nation as "unterrified and free spread its wings like a young eagle, opened its undazzled eye to the midday sun, and, soaring far aloft, purged and unsealed her long abused sight at the fountain itself of heavenly radiance." Despite huge increases in population, (4mill pop 1790 to 8mill 1814), communities forged a sense of unity and nationhood.

The term Uncle Sam (used to describe the US government) came into circulation in 1812, used to explain the US stamp on military wagons during the war with Britain.

Domestic art and literature blossomed, although critics continued to point to the lack of a distinctively American cultural tradition. Noah Webster argued for the American language as distinct to English, creating his famous Dictionary and spelling book. Painter Thomas Cole, originally from Birmingham, celebrated the wildness of American nature over the humanized, rural landscapes of the Old World. James Fennimore Cooper, Washington Irving, Nathaniel Hawthorne and Herman Melville emerged as the leading exponents of American literature. Intellectuals in New England emerged as active and lively commentators on US society. The Transcendentalists (dating to 1836) were a Boston based group of literati and learned individuals united by their belief in going beyond the senses, attaining true enlightenment and self-discovery through communication with what they called the Divine Oversoul. Primary exponent Henry David Thoreau is today revered as a great American intellectual by civil rights and environmental campaigners, who commend him for his belief in individual action against corrupted authority and egalitarian perspectives on human relations with other species.

If we look at some of these people, there is a clear pride in their country and its achievements. Take Henry David Thoreau - Q passage on Nature. However, many of these people also displayed an ardent anxiety over the direction of American society.

Thoreau, for one, feared the effects of rampant industrial growth on human character and surrounding nature. [Nature Q] The evils of industrialization also disturbed Washington Irving. American industry appeared to be succumbing to the pollution and poverty typical of many British cities of the time. Despite its proclaimed goals of republican virtue, with its model factory of comfort, moral instruction, and lectures for female borders, Lowell had fallen prey to industrial degradation. By 1840, the Arcadian factory town which Dickens had compared favourably with "those great haunts of misery" - the English manufacturing city - looked akin to the grimy urban conurbations so vividly depicted in his novels.

While Thoreau articulated his alienation from New England commercial exigencies by taking an extended sojourn living alone in the woods on July 4 1845, others sought to create alternative societies. The wealth of ideas about different lifestyles signal this period as a kind of hippy movement for the 19th century. Between 1800 and 1900 more than 100 of these communities sprang up, mostly in New England. I will just mention a few of them here.

The Shakers, so called for their belief in violent fits as proof of the visitation of the Holy Ghost, and predilection for visions and prophecies, were formed in 1774 by Ann Lee. Called Mother Ann, she presided over a community poised for the second coming of Christ and sworn to celibacy. Each Shaker group lived in a large family house, with sexual segregation. Skilled and industrious, the Shakers earned a reputation for crafting distinctively simplistic, well designed furniture, and their pieces today fetch a high price at auction and have spurred many emulators.

Robert Owen, paternal manufacturing owner and utopian socialist, fashioned a community at New Harmony, Indiana in 1825, taking over from an earlier community of Rappites (a group who took the Bible literally and renounced marriage and sex). Owen's secular community was based on equality, education and communal work. Initially successful, the commune nonetheless foundered through discord not least for the proclaimed policy of free love and "enlightened atheisim".

Perhaps the most famous of these communities was Brook farm - frequented by the Boston literati and transcendentalist crowd. Founder George Ripley envisaged a society based on high thinking and plain living (much like Essex univ I guess). The community flowered. Largely because of an attached school, providing fees for residents, although some intellectuals did not respond well to the communal tasks required of them.

While some sectors of US society were encouraging freedom of expression, leisure, conviviality, others saw a little too much carousing courtesy of alcohol. Cheap corn from Kentucky meant that liquor was a luxury affordable to many. It had evolved into a national pastime by the 1820s. Temperance had not been a rousing cry in the past - John Adams for instance had drunk a tankard of hard cider for breakfast. But by the early 19th, reformers were couching alcohol consumption as a problem. In 1829, Secretary of War John Eaton estimated that ¾ of labourers drank 4 ounces spirit a day. They engaged in a widespread campaign to outlaw liquor and encourage abstention, citing religious piety, economic productivity and social consequences.

Movements for women's rights also began to emerge. Abigail Adams noted to her husband John in 1776: "in the new code of laws which I suppose it will be necessary for you to make, I desire you would remember the ladies, and be more generous to them than your ancestors. Do not put such unlimited power in the hands of husbands. Remember, all men would be tyrants if they could." Evidently she was ignored.

Anyhow, women gained opportunities courtesy of economic expansion, changing their sphere from the family to the factory. However, social etiquette dictated passivity, purity and piousness as ideal female traits. [Cult of true womanhood doc] In the Young ladies book of 1830 women are instructed that "in whatever situation a woman is placed in from her cradle to her grave, a spirit of obedience and submission, pliability of temper, and humility of mind, are required from her." Values of religion, home life were seen as stabilizing forces in the period of rapid economic change, but despite the idea of 'separate but equal' women could not vote, earned ¼ of men's salaries, and could not become lawyers, doctors, or ministers.

Female reformers began to articulate opposition to this state. Revolts and unrest sprung from a growing sense of empowerment and female solidarity at the textile mill. Up at 5, working by lamplight until 12, with just ½ hour for dinner, then another shift til 7pm, women workers grew to analogize their plight with that of slaves. In a pronouncement of the Lowell Female Labour Reform Association compared plight one worker notes we are "nothing more nor less than slaves in every sense of the word. Slaves, to a system of labour which requires them to toil for five until seven o'clock, with only one hour to attend to the wants of nature - slaves to the wants and requirements of the 'powers that be'"[zinn] Connections between sexual and racial equality were further developed at the Seneca Falls Convention in 1848. Organized by Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Lucretia Mott, the meeting of 300 women represented the first women's rights convention. Their statement drew on the principles enshrined in the declaration of independence in the way that subsequent movements would.

Westward expansion

In 1790, 3,900,000 Americans lived within 50 miles of the Eastern Atlantic Coast. By 1840, 4,500,000 had crossed the Appalachians to seek their fortunes in the Western interior. This idea of 'going West' in the famous phrase of New York journalist Horace Greeley is ingrained and evocative in the American psyche. The West became synonymous with future and progress. Later on in the 19th century, famous Western landmarks such as the Grand Canyon and Yosemite Valley would become important parts of asserting American national identity. Beat writer Jack Kerouac in On the Road (1957) (a celebration of the open highway) notes "pouring over a map of the US, reading books about the pioneers and savouring names" After his journeys, he remarks "So in America when the sun goes down and I sit on the old broken-down river pier, watching the long, long skies over New York and sense all that raw land that rolls on one unbelievable huge bulge over to the West Coast."

The first movements West took place in the late 1700s with farmers unhappy with the rocky soils of New England seeking new lands over the horizon in Ohio, Kentucky, Illinois and Indiana. Emigrant yeoman farmers also moved into this region from the South, unable to compete with the large-scale plantation agricultural system. Skirmishes with local Native Americans lent the region a reputation as a wild frontier outpost, a meeting point between savagery and civilization as renowned historian Frederick Jackson Turner would later put it. The pacification of local tribes through treaties, war, and removal signalled the dominance of US settlers in the Old Northwest.

In 1803, the purchase of Louisiana Territory from France for $15 million effectively doubled the size of the US. The new acquisition included all territory from the Mississippi to the foot of the Rocky Mountains - a vast area scarcely explored by Europeans. In passing over the land, French minister Talleyrand said: "I can give you no direction. You have made a noble bargain for yourselves, and I suppose you will make the most of it." Americans certainly did.

The following year, Jefferson instructed his private secretary Meriwether Lewis, and captain William Clark to explore this area, catalogue its resources, travel routes, and make trade relations with resident peoples. By April 1805, the Corps of Discovery had shipped back 30 boxes plants, animals, bones, artefacts. When they finally returned from the 4,000-mile trip to the Pacific, Lewis and Clark brought tales of strange creatures, imposing mountains, and an array of different societies. They also brought back 2 grizzly cubs, which Jefferson kept in a stone pit on the white house lawn.

Tales of streams filled with beaver inspired trappers and mountain men to follow in Lewis and Clark's footsteps, and they established a lucrative and vibrant western fur trading industry based in St Louis. Paths blazed by trappers were subsequently used by Gold rush miners, settlers, slaves, Mormon emigrants - people all driven to travel West in hope of promise.

This whole westerly movement, thousands of Americans rushing for metals, land, and freedom from persecution in Texas, California, Oregon, or Utah was underscored by the idea of Manifest Destiny. Coined by journalist John L Sullivan in 1845, it stated that "NOTHING MUST INTEREFERE WITH THE FULFILMENT OF OUR Manifest Destiny to overspread the continent allotted by Providence for the free development of our yearly multiplying millions." The following year William Gilpin read a similar pronouncement to the US Senate: "The untransacted destiny of the American people is to subdue the continent - to rush over this vast field to the Pacific Ocean - to animate the many hundred millions of its people, and to cheer them upward to teach old nations a new civilization - to confirm the destiny of the human race. Divine task! Immortal mission! Let us tread fast and joyfully the open trail before us! Let every American heart open wide for patriotism to glow undimmed, and confide with religious faith in the sublime and prodigious destiny of his well-loved country." The destiny of Americans to take the West appeared beyond contention, incontrovertible, absolute, sanctioned by nation, God and the dollar. Indigenous populations were regarded as unworthy for the land. George Lepner, of the Southern Literary Messenger, remarked: "The savage must ever recede before the man of civilization. The square mile which furnishes game to a single family of hunters, will support a thousand families by agriculture and the mechanic arts!" Hence to Lepner Natives had rights of way on soil only until the agriculturalist and the rancher came along.

This mythology of national progress chose its heroes early - woodsman and Indian killer Daniel Boone (1734-1820) was canonized [biblical, leading settlers, natural adversity, virgin Mary figure, determined gaze] The other painting on the sheet is equally laden with imagery of divine right, human ingenuity and undaunting progress] These are important for they show the west as a promised land, a realm of unfettered opportunity, a location where the new nation flexed its muscles and assured of own destiny.

Assumed sense of control and destiny, but how in practice did Americans accomplish this feat so swiftly? There were huge impediments to conquering that much land - natural adversity, local tribes with detailed geographic knowledge. But a number of things were in the Americans favour - population raring to go West - desire for profit and land hunger, immigration, federal government assistance (ec and mil), disease - smallpox blanket, technology - from colt 45 to the railroad, and national sense of conviction.

Conclusion:

We can see this era as a massive period of change and expansion

Political leaders develop their authority, the economy takes off industrially, population grows exponentially and land acquisition is huge.

The national debt, which Washington so fretted over, was paid off by 1835, and with the annexation of California in 1848 the US became a truly continental nation. This expansion as we have seen was marked by huge sense of national self-confidence. Nonetheless, as we will discover next week, discord lurked beneath the surface. Henry David Thoreau for one elected to spend a night in a Massachusetts jail because he refused to pay his poll tax. The reason - opposition to a US war with Mexico, and ultimately to slavery.

Week 4 - Slavery and the Coming of the Civil War

Why was there slavery?

Economic gain and profit, Survival of the union.

People in the north appreciated why there was slavery in the south. In the early 1800s, there was a big demand for cotton and slavery becomes popular in this industry. The north believed it would die out, as plantations now had become not as profitable. By 1850 – 1 million tons of cotton from the south was exported. Cotton was their main form of income. Slaves were crucial to the southern economy. At the same time, by the mid 19th century, the only place were slavery was, was in the south. Slavery had died out in the north at the time of the American Revolution.

American South

They were used as having landscapes of plantations. In fact only 25% of the people had slaves. Less than 1% had slavery numbering over 100. A typical southerner did not have any slaves. Importing slaves by this time was outlawed but the families of the original slaves are kept. The south is considered a plantation society. The general belief in the south is to keep the slaves and have more slaves by encouraging reproduction. Some historians think slaves had a community and whipping was rare. Others look at the dehumanisation. There was no policing and masters could treat the slaves however they wished. An average slave worked 12 hours/day. Families were broken up.

African American Society – distinct culture/community. Subjugation/families separated. Slaves had no rights but could be tried in a court of law. The masters were fearful of revolt. There were few revolts but the ones that happened were suppressed. Punishments for revolt was hanging. The slaves could run away, work slowly or damage machinery. Escaping was very difficult. They tried to go to Canada. They made themselves feel better by song and religion. They were regarded as property.

The Civil War

North was changing and becoming modern and slavery was dying out. South was disadvantaged and had a different outlook. There was not many cities and immigration. Slavery became the variable that separated the north and south. Slavery contradicted American ideals of liberty and equality. Northerners saw this was hypocrisy. The printing press became a weapon against slavery. David Walker was a free black man in Boston and wrote a leaflet about slavery. The south was not very happy about it and wanted him arrested. Georgia put up a reward for his arrest. He was found dead outside his shop. This lead to the Fugitive Slave Act. The act meant that any federal marshal knowing of an escaped slave was legally reliable to report them. There was a drive to conquer the west for new territories and an issue of control of power in the west. South wanted slavery in the west but north didn’t. In California there was big fines and jail terms for helping slaves to escape. Violent clashes in Kansas between north and south supporters broke out. Constitution meant that the slaves can never be free. Dred Scott case was the decision of a slave wanting to be truly free living in a free state. It was ruled that he was still the property of his master and he stole himself from him. Only 4 states allow African Americans to vote.

Harpers Ferry attack - John Brown was from Kansas and opposed slavery. He was ruthless. He raided Harpers Ferry in 1859 in Virginia. They were trying to create a revolution. They seized the feudal armoury. The townspeople attacked Brown et al. The rebellion failed. Brown was hanged as a traitor.

Abraham Lincoln (Republican) stood against slavery. He was a moderate on slavery and thought it would naturally die out but its spread throughout the west worried him. He was seen as a radical in the south. Lincoln didn't abolish the Fugitive Slaves Act though. He was not going to stop slavery in the south. He disliked like the way in which the law disallowed and allowed slavery. There was a separate government set up in Montgomery, Alabama in the south as the south opposed Lincoln. At his inaugural address, Abraham Lincoln attempted to avoid conflict by announcing that he had no intention "to interfere with the institution of slavery in the states where it exists. I believe I have no lawful right to do so, and I have no inclination to do so." He added: "The government will not assail you. You can have no conflict without yourselves being the aggressors."

Jefferson Davis took the view that after a state seceded, federal forts became the property of the state. On 12th April 1861, General Pierre T Beauregard demanded that Major Robert Anderson surrender Fort Sumter in Charleston harbour. Anderson replied that he would be willing to leave the fort in two days when his supplies were exhausted. Beauregard rejected this offer and ordered his Confederate troops to open fire. After 34 hours of bombardment the fort was severely damaged and Anderson was forced to surrender.

Week 5 - Civil War - Course of the war

There are 23 million northern people and 9 million in the south. 50% are from Africa and 4/5 of factories are in the north. The North tried to convince the south to join the Union. Neither side was well prepaid for war. Henry Steel Colinger said Europe was a good military force compared to US. The south had a good military expertise. A North Carolina paper said the southern army would gather the best materials when the North is scraped from the sewer. Both sides thought it would be over quick with their armies of a similar size. The people took picnics to see the battle of Ballrun. The North tightened its navel domination.

1862 – there was a fight where many died. Heavy rains caused a lot of mud and affected the armies. Robert Elees is the leader of the Confederate Army (south). He is loyal though he freed slaves and is Virginian. Grant led the Vicksburg conflict. Some units lost up to 85% of their people. 600,000 troops died in total and that was 2% of the population.

The first armies were volunteers. Whey did they want to fight?

North – pride, keeping the Union. There were many immigrant families. They felt they owed the country as they were given opportunities. They saw the south as traitors.

South – pride. They were unified behind slavery though the majority did not come from slave holding families. They believed without slavery, their economy would suffer.

Slavery and War

People who were moderate about it became radical on both sides. Lincoln became anti-slavery. He took an early stance against it and knew this would enrage the south. By mid 1862, there were steps taken in getting the slaves free. Freeing slaves would free the slaves in the southern army.

22/09/1862 – Slaves are declared free from 1863. Riots in the north broke out, as people fear southern ex-slaves would take their jobs. If Afro-Americans are allowed to join the army, why can they not become US citizens? The Afro-Americans did heavy work but saw it a fight for freedom.

1861 – slavery was the reason for the Confederate leaving the Union (Alexander Stevenson).

12/04/1864 – the Fort Pillow Massacre. A fifth of people left the plantations.

Propaganda and Social Hardship

The north points to the flag as a symbol of unity and posters of the bald eagle. The posters kept citizens morale and support. Blockages stopped the southern citizens having materials such as soap. The north had access to the publishing equipment. After a while, both the north and the south made it compulsory for people to go to war but $300 could get you another person to do it on your behalf if you were called up. The Irish in New York rioted over this. The medical provisions were poor in the army until women nurses were employed. Both north and south struggled to feed their POWs. In Georgia, there was a POW camp that had 32,000 people with only a stream for water. There was hardly any food and lots of disease. Some states were divided and fought on both sides such as Mississippi.

The End of the War and its Significances

Morale fell and armies retreated. The south had no morale and lack supplies. The battles were long and drawn out. There was a slash and burn policy in the south by the north so the south could not feed themselves. Columbia was levelled. 1865 – the last troops surrendered.

War was fought at 10,000 locations and was known as the "brother's war".

Jeffery L. Ward (historian) wrote what would happen without war. Civil war shaped and defined people.

Reconstruction

It lasted until 1874. It was the reconstruction of the southern states, the Union and the freed men’s lives. President Johnson started the reconstruction. The southern governments were dismantled and made them rewrite their constitutions. Both sides recovered their economy.

13th Amendment – disallowed slavery

14th Amendment – it rejects

15th Amendment – it stopped race being the reason of not voting.

Civil Rights Act – 1875

The Afro-Americans were now allowed o hotels, theatres and to vote and be involved politically. Some states prevented ex-slaves to get jobs and racial injustice remained in the south. The Ku Klux Klan was formed and 13th-15th Amendments were ignored in the south.

1900 – white oligarchy took over the USA. Measures were employed to bar illiterates from voting and moved polling stations. It left northern big businesses in control. For the average poor black or white, life was the same as before. There were legal rights but they weren’t always in forced for the blacks.

Week 6 - Industrialisation

People had moved in from the Civil War. Investment in manufacturing had increased 10 fold.

4 million people mining and services in 1860 and 11 million people mining and services in 1900

US had become industrialised in a third of the time it took the UK.

Causes:

§ Civil War gave a push for industrial growth by demands for armaments led by to growth in the north economy. However, short term it reduced trade. War encouraged banking and innovation

§ Natural resources are in abundance. The purchase of California gives them more money. The coal, steel and iron industries took off to transfer the resources into materials. Deep shaft mining took off.

4 million tons coal was mined in 1860 and 100 million tons coal was mined in 1884

This is needed to build railroads. Such towns like Pittsburgh. Technology took off by hydraulic mining and drilling. Machines are used with new techniques. They are more curious and innovative with the new transport links and refrigeration that led to a meat packing company as devised by a butcher.

68 hours – 1 acre of wheat and now, 1 hour and 19 minutes for one acre of wheat.

The typewriter was created. The telegraph was extended from its initial use in the civil war. Electricity started to be harnessed. The railroads fuelled industrial growth and covered the country. The travelling was more comfortable. The air break stopped accidents as before there was 1 accident per week. It made workers more mobile. They still feared native attacks. After the ceremony of the first trains – national railroad, there was more track made. There was more railroad than Europe in the late 1800s. Animals were taken on trains to slaughterhouse. Previously the wooden wagons took much longer to travel about. The government was vital to the success of the railroad companies. Thomas Ellison and other inventors used government aids to work on new technologies. Corporate America starts to gain legal rights and power.

The rise of the Corporation

Businesses start to emerge based on industrialism. They are hierarchical with different departments. There is a drive to merge businesses together to create monopolies. There was large-scale consolidation to make economies of scale. It made it easier for divisions of labour and to eliminate competitors. Time to make something in a factory is all very important to drive down costs. Labour is needed and comes mostly from immigration from Europe that is cheap. Theses new settlers are a new market to sell goods to. The labour force work hard and their social values are centred on thrift. It creates urbanisation. In 1900, there are 1 million in NY and 1.5 million in Chicago.

South

They do not become very industrialised and still have plantations. There is cotton, tobacco and fabric. 15% south employed in manufacturing and it lacks immigration. People are as rich in the south.

Consequences

Social change – cultural values. Many start to accept new technology and that anyone could become an inventor. “Social Darwinism”. Russell Conwell (Graduate from Yale Law School) said its your duty to get rich. He thought poverty was your own fault. People saw welfare was not the government’s responsibility and it was the individual’s problem. Access to success may have been fraudulent, being rich, having access to money and knowing rich people.

Rockefeller – was a bookkeeper. He made lots of money by fraud to make money out of oil and standing oil.

Factories and stock were destroyed in order to gain an advantage over the competitors. There is a lot of consumption and development and the wealthy want to show their kindness by giving money to Unis.

Electricity appears in urban areas and used in factories. Skyscrapers were being built to show off materials and visual supremacy. The average person found a city to be dirty and with disease. Small businesses struggle. There state did regulate the railroads. Immigrates wanting to survive socially and economically.

Henry George – “Progress and Poverty” – he refers to the gains of the rich and the average man does not share in with the economic growth and wealth.

Mark Twain in his book writes that wealth does not lead to high culture.

There are riots for low wages in cities and railroad workers. Real tension breaks the changes of the strong working class. National parks are created to help the dirtiness of industrialisation. The streets are dirty. Street lighting is bad and there aren’t enough schools. There are issues with pollution. People try to save wild America in the west. Not everyone is happy with progress. A conservation movement is heavily sponsored by Theodore Roosevelt. People were concerned about resources being used up.

Week 7 - Poverty and Reform in the 20th Century

Conditions in expanding urban centres were bad. Eventually it provokes criticism. Many towns grew from factory villages and the railroad. Towns on railroads did well. Politically in the new cities the rulers lacked experience so they improvised. City bosses controlled the governing.

Populism – political party that was alarmed at failing farm prices.

1890s, economy went into a depression. Liberty freedom and equality was not so much the case.

Roosevelt and Franklin – Progressive Area – 1900-1917.

Progressive Area tried to end squallier from industrialism and believed social Darwinism. A belief grew that government had a responsibility towards the people. A social harmony was needed to get rid of poverty. The urban Protestant middle class was keen to end poverty. Newspapers become critics of government and business. It raises concerns. The criticisms were national due to national circulation.

Reforms were within cities and the state. There are more economic constraints and proabition brings women’s rights, environmentalism. This was not a revolution but the desire of the middle class to help the poo at the hands of the industrialism. This wasn’t a socialist ideal.

Politics

Changing ways policies are made. Management structures are changed to become less corrupt and more efficient. They wanted to make elections candidates less corrupt. Secret ballots are now used. Politics were made more honourable.

Social

There was high crime. Services for health etc was introduced. 1990-4, states in the West allowed women to vote. There was a drive to limit child labour. 1910 – 1914 – 7 states gave women even more rights and people feared immigration and saw them as part of a way of eroding America’s ideals. The corporations’ powers are to be reduced.

Roosevelt wanted reforms. He created forest reserves and national monuments (Grand Canyon) to save resources. They aren’t radical. Progression made the state regulate political and economic controls.

Great Depression - 1929-1933

Stocks on the US stock exchanger collapsed. Prices and production fell. 10 million unemployed with bank closures. The jobless were ashamed and ill. For most, the economic collapse was a surprise as there was a boom in the 20s. Products such as refrigeration and radios are sold with the new consumerism. Demand wasn’t consistent. Wages were low as there was an over production with goods not being sold and especially in farming. There were also war debts. In October 1929, there was a Wall Street Crash. It was terrible in a country that promised prosperity. There was little confidence and debts weren’t being paid.

Dust Bowl

It started in the early 30s and farmers on the plains created it.

Government was not sure how to react to the depression. It had a global impact. There was a demand got another reform. It was called by Franklin Roosevelt called New Deal. Free market had dominated the economy and was replaced with government intervention. New Deal starts in 1932. Reforms were scientific.

Confidence was restored by the government by their intervention.

Week 9 - Cold War

Berlin wall - built in 1961 to stop people leaving the east and joining the west. The west was a capitalist democracy and the west was communist.

In April 1947, the cold war was named. It ended in December 1991.

Conflicts were there between Russia and the USA before WWII back in the 1910s. The USA did not like Communism spreading into east Europe. Stalin failed to follow some principles that UK followed. Russia was seen as not conforming to US ideals. Germany needed to be stabilised and Russia refused to send goods to the other 3 zones in Germany. France, US and UK’s zones merged together. Stalin saw capitalism like warlike. The US saw it as a threat. There was a concern about Communism spreading and they didn't join IMF and the World Bank.

In the Truman doctrine, it suggests policies of the US that they will give financial aid to countries that have the same economic and social ideals as the US. The Truman doctrine lead to containment and the US will then answer Russian force with force.

In 1948, France, US and UK start to restructure Germany. Russia does not agree and makes blockades. The Berlin airlift is used to bring in good to get around the blockades. Thomas Jefferson did not see it was US' place to interfere but foreign policy had now been changed. In 1950, North Korea was communist and south was right wing and US backed. It used to be Japanese run but there was a split. Joseph McCarthy created anti-communism in the US as it unnerved people about any left wing agreement. He looks for communists in the government and the military. Pamphlets were given out to people criticising communism. The anti-communism entered culture. It was seen as a threat to free trade.

Defence

An idea of keeping ahead military wise was developed. It had the atomic bomb and so they saw themselves as superior. There was a drive to have the best weapons in the US and Russia and led to an arms race. With new nuclear weapons, people thought it would be possible to survive a war. In 1950s, a cartoon of Burt the Turtle was created and he taught school children to "duck and cover" from bombs. There is domestic prosperity in the US. Nuclear power is seen as the fuel of the future. There were concerns about weapons being misused.

Cuban Missile Crisis

Way back, the Monroe document referred to the US wanting to interfere with Cuban affairs as the Spanish controlled it. Fidel Castro in Cuba set up socialist reforms and set up trade with Russia. US does not like this alliance and invades in the Bay of Pigs. During 1962, Russian military arrived in Cuba and points missiles at the US. They saw it was fair as the US had missiles pointing at Russia in Turkey. JFK understood that if they both fired, the world would be destroyed but urged Russia to turn back. Eventually Cuba backed down as long as the US did not invade. The US thinks this as a triumph.

They see that having a strong military will allow them to stop communism but it does not work in Vietnam. In 1954, the French leave the country and believe in the domino theory of countries falling to communism. Martin Luther King spoke out against the Vietnam War.

The Russian/US conflict led never to war but it was very tense and unnerving.

Monroe Doctrine - 1823

It makes a statement about wanting to be the best and not wanting alliances. They are arrogant and want to be the biggest power. They think at this point Britain will look after them.

Communism

Week 10 - Feminism

There was a feeling of suffering amongst women but it was never voiced.

In the 1950s, man was in control of his household and moving the lawn was a symbol of this. Parents want to raise capitalist Christian children. There was a post-war baby boom. There were also more education and jobs available.

In the 60s, there are a lot of protests movements. There was politics for students and many universities protested such as Berkley, CA. the students campaigned against nuclear power and war and civil rights. There was a new left politics. This fed into campaigns for women and gay rights. There was a drug culture relating to the students's campaigns. There was a move away from the institution of marriage. The anti-war brought different cultures together. In contract to the civil rights movement, women had greater roles in the campaigns. Career opportunities were restrictive but more women wanted to have jobs. There was an amendment to the Civil Rights Act that included the discrimination by gender. The experience of working made women see life differently and changed their goals and desires.

Rosa Parks was a significant activist. Women took tactical ideas from the Civil Rights movements. Many women were in the Civil Rights movements but while they were against racism, there was sexism there too. This led to women wanting to have a campaign in their own right and not tagged along with the Civil Rights movements.

Some saw that women's suppression was the cause of capitalism and age-old suppression by men was dominating.

Frances Beale criticised feminism for its lack of anti-racism.

It was terrible if someone was black and a woman.

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