Tyler + Polk 1841 - 1849 Flashcards
This deck covers the religious and cultural developments in Antebellum America, including Evangelical protestant revivalism, social reforms, ideals of domesticity, and the rise of a uniquely American form of artistic and literary expression.
Define:
Manifest Destiny
Manifest Destiny was the belief that the United States was intended by God to rule the entirety of North America. Fulfilling this mission was the end goal of the American government during the first half of the 1800s.
Define:
Utopia
Utopia is a state of perfect society on Earth.
During the 1840s, there were several attempts to create utopian communes, including Brook Farm (where Nathaniel Hawthorne resided for a short period), the Oneida Community in New York, and Iowa’s Amana Community.
Written by Henry David Thoreau, what did Walden chronicle?
Walden is a record of Henry David Thoreau’s experience living by himself in a small cabin on Walden Pond. More than a mere autobiography, in Walden, Thoreau describes his attempts to use his observations about the natural world to discover essential truths about life.
What did Thoreau argue in his essay Civil Disobedience?
Thoreau contended that individuals have a duty to disobey when the government enacts laws that violate one’s conscience.
Thoreau was primarily motivated by the injustice of slavery and his own opposition to the Mexican-American War. Civil Disobedience influenced figures such as Gandhi and Martin Luther King Jr.
The Oneida Community, founded in 1848, lasted for decades, but was roundly condemned by most Americans. Why?
Open marriages were considered scandalous.
The Oneida Community was a commune in upstate New York. Oneidans believed that children should be raised by the community, rather than by individual parents. The Oneida Community’s practice of open marriages (the sharing of marital partners with other members of the community) and free love were considered scandalous.
Charles Guiteau, the assassin of President Garfield, lived in the Oneida Community for a time, but proved unpopular. While there, he was known as “Charles Get-Out,” due to the usual response to his attempts to find a romantic partner.
Who wrote The Scarlet Letter?
Nathaniel Hawthorne
In The Scarlet Letter, Hawthorne condemned Puritan bigotry in Massachusetts.
In what style of writing did Edgar Allen Poe specialize?
Poe specialized in depicting the macabre, dark stories of crime and murder that were designed to thrill his audience.
Herman Melville’s works, such as Moby Dick, Billy Budd, and Typee, criticize what American characteristic of the pre-Civil War period?
Melville criticized American optimism. Unlike the Transcendentalists, Melville’s writings convey a belief in original sin and that man was inherently imperfect.
To what cause did Dorothea Dix dedicate her life?
Dix dedicated herself to reforming treatment of the mentally ill. Dix advocated for human treatment and separate asylums (the insane were typically housed with criminals prior to her efforts).
What prominent prison reform took place during the antebellum period?
The most prominent prison reform was a change in focus from punishment of the criminal to rehabilitation. The first prison focused on reform was Auburn, built in New York in 1821.
How did newly arrived Catholic immigrants, such as the Irish and Germans, respond to efforts to establish free public schools?
Concerned that the free public schools started by reformers such as Horace Mann would be used to proselytize their children with anti-Catholic teachings, German and Irish Catholics created their own schools.
In addition to Noah Webster’s Blue Backed Speller, what text did the free public schools adopt as they began to spread in the 1840s?
McGuffey’s Reader
McGuffey’s Reader contained lessons designed to emphasize values such as hard work and punctuality, and attempted to instill social, “American” values in young people.
Who called the Seneca Falls Convention?
The Seneca Falls Convention, the first organized women’s rights conference, was called in 1848 by Lucretia Mott and Elizabeth Cady Stanton. Every prominent women’s rights advocate (and quite a few men) attended.
What did the Seneca Falls Convention propose?
Prominent feminists, including Susan B. Anthony and Elizabeth Cady Stanton, proposed equality for women, including legal, property, and voting rights. Though the Seneca Falls Convention and the women’s movement were overshadowed by abolitionism, the Convention marked the beginning of the women’s rights movement.
After it won independence from Spain in 1823, Mexico invited Americans to settle Texas’ northern frontier. Why?
The Mexican government had neither the troops nor funds to protect the state from raids by the Comanche Indian Tribe. Mexico hoped that a strong group of settlers along the northern frontier would protect the state.
The American settlers were known as “Texians.”
What was the response to Mexico’s invitation to Americans to settle in Texas?
The response was overwhelming. By 1830, Americans in Texas outnumbered Mexicans by 3 to 1.
Many Americans arrived from the South and brought their enslaved people with them.
Who is considered the Father of Texas?
Stephen F. Austin
Austin, for whom Texas’ state capital is named, led the first group of 300 settlers to Texas in 1822, where they set up homesteads along the Brazos River. Following independence from Spain, the new Mexican government ratified the land grants to the new settlers.
In addition to banning further American immigration to Texas in the 1830s, Mexico enacted two laws that enraged American settlers. What were they?
First, Mexico required anyone already living within Mexican territory to convert to Roman Catholicism. Second, Mexico passed legislation banning the enslavement of people.
Americans simply ignored both laws. Most enslavers simply converted their slaves into “lifetime indentured servants”, a distinction without a difference that only served to irritate Mexican authorities.
How did the Mexican government respond to American settlers’ refusal to stop their enslavement of people and refusal of Roman Catholicism?
The Mexican government banned immigration by Americans, an act Americans simply ignored as they continued to pour over the border.
Who seized power of the Mexican government in 1834?
Antonio de Padua María Severino López de Santa Anna y Pérez de Lebrón, often known as Santa Anna or López de Santa Anna, declared himself dictator in 1834.
When he met with Stephen F. Austin in Mexico, he intercepted a letter that Austin had sent to the government in Texas, urging them to separate and form their own separate state from their present state of Coahuila y Tejas. Santa Anna considered this request treasonous and had Austin arrested.
What happened to Stephen F. Austin and Santa Anna, after Austin’s arrest?
After spending 1.5 years in jail, Stephen F. Austin went back to Texas.
Suspecting the Texans would rebel once more, Santa Anna marched northwards to Texas with an army of 6,000 men to destroy the suspected insurrection against the Mexican government.
Explain the significance of the Alamo.
In present-day San Antonio, an old missionary called the Alamo was attacked by Santa Anna and his 6,000 troops since they refused to abandon the city to the Mexican army.
Although it was a technical defeat for the Texans, it was also a moral victory for them, since it unified them in their desire for an independent country, a country that would allow for slavery and Protestantism.
Following the Battle of San Jacinto, General Santa Anna recognized Texas as an independent nation. How did the Mexican government respond?
The Mexicans deposed Santa Anna, and continued to consider Texas an official part of Mexico.
This unsettled state would prevent the American annexation for years, and contribute to the Mexican-American War.
Both Andrew Jackson and Martin van Buren denied requests for annexation from Texas. Why?
Both Presidents were concerned that annexation of the Republic of Texas would lead to war with Mexico. Further, Texas was such a large territory that it was anticipated that the territory would be separated, meaning five separate slave states would come into the Union, engendering fierce political opposition.
A Southerner, President John Tyler had an annexation bill introduced to the Congress, which was rejected despite concerns about growing British influence in the region.
