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Jeffersonian and Jacksonian Democracies, Religious Re-Awakenings, and the Roots of American Self-Confidence

Washington warned against the creation of political parties while Jefferson claimed that parties and political debate were at the very heart of democracy.

Parties formed almost as soon as the first administration stepped into power.

The Federalists, Democratic-Republicans, Whigs, Democrats, Know-Nothings, Free Soilers, and Republicans do not exist today as they were once constituted in the antebellum world. Post-Civil War we became a two-party system with little chance for minority voices to prevail (or even be heard in many cases).

Late 18th and Early 19th Century Politics

The following slide runs you through the years as the United States expands. Note the expansion of slavery or at least of the slavery debate.

While other sectional disagreements, including many states rights issues, will arise over the years, slavery is always the key.

Washington had warned against the divisiveness of political parties…

…but they become part of the American political landscape almost immediately.

http://www.posterenvy.com/servlet/the-1646/2-Poster-Set--dsh-/Detail

The election of 1800 almost led to session or civil war. The Constitution’s election rule were so poorly articulated that mistakes were inevitable.

Jefferson was running against Adams again, but they had new running mates. The states would vote for two men for president. The man with the most votes would be President while the runner-up would be Vice-President. In the 1800 election however, Jefferson’s Democratic-Republican running mate Aaron Burr garnered the same number of winning votes as Jefferson. The election, as dictated by the Constitution, went to the House to decide who would be President. The House was weighted toward the Federalists who hated Jefferson (remember the Alien and Sedition Acts, etc.).

Ultimately, Jefferson was granted the Presidency after many tie votes. This was clearly what the people had intended, but partisanship almost sank the union, as Washington had warned.

Largely due to the 3/5th Clause, that gave the South greater electoral power, the Presidency was dominated by Democratic-Republicans for the next 7 presidential terms. Four of the five initial presidents were Virginians.

The Democratic-Republicans dominate for almost 30 years.

Jefferson 1801-1809

Madison 1809-1817

Monroe 1817-1825

Adams 1825-1829

The election of 1824 was another highly controversial election. Despite the clear plurality for Jackson, nobody had a majority of the electoral votes. When Crawford died after the election was sent to Congress to be decided, Clay gave his votes to Adams. Adams then had the majority of votes and became America’s sixth President.

An angry Jackson called this the ”Corrupt Bargain”. He would, however, win the presidency four years later.

Jackson

leads his new

Democratic Party

to victory in 1828.

The Whig Party formed in 1833. It is a pro-industry, anti-slavery group that included a young Abraham Lincoln. It coalesced as a challenge to what was seen as Jackson’s dangerous populism.

Henry Clay and John Quincy-Adams form the National Republican Party in response to Jackson’s Democratic Party in 1830.

The National Republicans morph into the Whig Party in 1833.

As the Whigs bickered among themselves, the new Republican Party would arise as the main challenger to the Democrats. It’s first candidate for President was John C. Fremont, a popular figure with a romantic background as a frontiersman. He lost to Buchanan in the 1856 elections.

The second Republican to run for the presidency was Abraham Lincoln. He’d become President in 1861. His election in 1860 ignited the Civil War.

In 1854 the Whigs dissolve into several factions, one being the new Republican Party

Fremont

Two parties arose in the late 1850s with somewhat narrow agendas. One was the Nativist or Know-Nothing Party, that extolled the virtues of being born in the United states while expressing a revulsion for immigrants and particularly whose who were Catholic..

The second was a party that opposed slavery in the territories. It was also a Whig Party offshoot known as the Free Soil Party.

The abolitionist ‘s

Free Soil Party to a large extent joined the Republicans …

…and the Nativist or Know-Nothing party takes root and is extremely effective in the mid-1850s.

Now we’ll go back to 1800 and briefly introduce some the more important events of the early 19th Century.

We begin with the ultimate winner of that highly contested election of 1800, Thomas Jefferson.

Jefferson 1801-1809

Virginia

Democratic-Republican

Wealthy Plantation Owner

Jefferson inherited a problem from Adams. The Haitian Revolution had been supported by the Federalists, due largely to their hatred of the French (whose slave plantations belied their core Revolutionary values).

Jefferson, however, was a French supporter and a slave owner himself. While he may have had sympathy for the rebellious slaves, he was more concerned with recovering good relations with the French. Therefore, he abandoned the policy of support for the slave rebels.

Haiti would win its independence despite Jefferson’s position. We would not recognize, nor help this fledgling republic and this would have repercussions for the small country throughout its history.

Haitian Revolution 1791-1804

The Muslim societies of North Africa demanded tribute of merchants ships that sailed near their shores. The U.S. followed standard trade routes into the Mediterranean and were subjected to the North African demands.

The so-called Barbary pirates sailing out of Tunis, Algiers, Tripoli, and other African coastal ports captured American vessels and kidnapped the sailors. The United states declared war and sent naval vessels to patrol the area.

The Marine officer Stephen Decatur became famous for leading a daring raid on Tripolitan ships and another unit soon captured a Tripolitan town. The war ended in 1805, but the U’S. ultimately ended up paying tribute nevertheless.

Tripolitan Wars

1801-1805

Religion

19th Century America

American reaction to the Enlightenment paralleled Europe’s Romantic era. The expansion of Christian churches was explosive, with huge numbers of Americans returning to the religious fold. This included the establishment of hundreds of new denominations.

The Cane Ridge Revival

Kentucky 1801

Often referred to as the largest gathering of the so-called Second Great Awakening with upwards of 10,000 participants.

The Supreme Court of the United States was not well delineated in the Constitution and it got off to a rocky start. John Jay was the first Chief Justice, but resigned after five years largely because there wasn’t enough to do. Also in these days (and, in fact, until the 1880s) the Justices were forced to “ride circuit”, that is to travel across the country to serve as appellate courts justices for much of the year.

John Rutledge and Oliver Ellsworth would each take a turn before 1800, but then everything changed. John Adams appointed John Marshall to the Court during his final weeks in office. Marshall would reshape the Court and set precedents that continue to this day.

The Court first met in the old Royal Exchange in New York.

Gets this home in 1935.

Read your text for a more detailed account of the Marbury v. Madison case. It was this case that is often credited with establishing “judicial review”, that is, the Court’s right to determine the Constitutionality of laws.

Marbury

Madison

1801

While Jefferson lost to his old nemesis (and cousin) John Marshall in the Marbury case (remember, Jefferson said states had the right to determine any laws Constitutionality), he was nevertheless considered to be one of the stars of the Enlightenment.

He was a renowned architect, a brilliant scientific expositor, and an admired political philosopher. He designed much of the University of Virginia and his own house at Monticello which is still considered to be one of the wonders of colonial architecture.

University of Virginia

An early American archaeologist and paleontologist.

Monticello

In 1803 Jefferson would negotiate with Napoleon to double the territory of the United states with the Louisiana Purchase. No nation would ever again be able to shut off the Mississippi River trade.

Jefferson sent the Lewis and Clark expedition to survey the Louisiana Territory, as well as lands father West in the hope and anticipation that these would become part of the United States in the near future.

Many protested the purchase, caliming that this would lead to disputes over slavery in the new territories. These protestors were, of course, right.

Ft. Clatsop Winter 1805

On the Oregon coast.

In 1804, the former Secretary of the Treasury Alexander Hamilton, and the sitting Vice-President of the United States, Aaron Burr would duel.

Burr killed Hamilton and then ran from prosecution.

1804

In 1807 Jefferson imposed an embargo on Britain, who had continued to harass and kidnap American merchants as well as providing guns and other support to indigenous peoples in the Northwest Territories.

The embargo would do little to the British, but it sent the American economy into a downward spiral.

1807 Embargo

Jefferson did little to deal with slavery issues, despite his claims that these were among the most important problems of the day. He never did free his own slaves and, in fact, would be accused of fathering children with one of his slaves, Sally Hemings.

This accusation would be largely corroborated with DNA evidence in the late 20th century.

James Madison, the driving force behind the Constitution, became President in 1809. A shy man by nature, he met his wife Dolly through Jefferson and her gregarious nature altered the scope of First Ladies forever after.

Madison

1809-1817

Virginia

Democratic-Republican

Wealthy Plantation Owner

He would be talked into invading Canada and declaring war on Britain, largely by wealthy merchants. It was a disaster that would define his presidency.

War of 1812

Hull Surrenders Fort Detroit

Tecumseh

Early on, the great Shawnee leader Tecumseh helped the British take Ft. Detroit. He died a year later at the Battle of the Thames.

The British kept most the American fleet locked in Boston Harbor, although the relatively new frigate U.S.S. Constitution won a handful of victories for the U.S. and Commodore Perry succeeded dramatically in battle on Lake Erie. These were among only a few bright spots of the war for the Americans.

Despite Victory Off Massachusetts Coast

U.S. Can’t Break Blockade

The British captured and burned the brand new capital at Washington, D.C. forcing Madison to escape and to fight a guerrilla war.

The British do, however, fail to capture Baltimore, inspiring Francis Scott Key to pen the Star Spangled Banner.

Washington Burns

Ft. McHenry

1814

The one soldier who does find success in the war is Andrew Jackson, who defeats indigenous people who have seen their opportunity to rise up during this time of Anglo-American conflict.

Jackson’s army wipes out the Creeks at Horsehoe Bend.

Creek War and Battle of Horshoe Bend

1812-1814

Neither side wanted to be fighting the war after the Americans had come to their senses. A negotiation team was sent to Ghent to hammer out a treaty which was signed Dec. 24th, 1814.

Treaty of Ghent 1814

Article X “Wheras the traffic in slaves is irreconcilable with the principles of humanity and justice, and wheras bith His Majesty and the United States are desirous of continuing their efforts to promote its entire abolition…”.

Ironically, the Americans won their only major land victory against the British at the Battle of New Orleans after the treaty was signed.

Battle of New Orleans

Dec. 1814-Jan. 1815

Yet another Virginian became President in 1817. He had the good sense to appoint a yankee (i.e. a Northerner) as Secretary of State, John Quincy Adams.

Monroe 1817-1825

Virginia

Democratic-Republican

Wealthy Plantation Owner

After Monroe had sent Andrew Jackson to Florida to attack the Seminole and to eliminate or disrupt the base for runaway slaves, Spain realized it couldn’t stop this incursion.

Soon after, Secretary of State Adams will negotiate a treaty with Spain that will give Florida to the U.S. and establish a border at what is then the southwestern corner of the country. This would be known as the Adams-Onis Treaty.

Monroe sends Jackson after the Seminole

1817

Spain Cedes Florida to U.S.

1819

After the original charter for Hamilton’s Bank of the United States had lapsed, Congress renewed the charter. The Southern states were livid. They felt that their own state banks were being undercut by the Federal government and its big money allies in the North.

The state of Maryland tried to tax the federal bank. Chief clerk of the bank, James McCulloch, refused to pay, at which point Maryland brought suit. The case went all the way to the Supreme Court, who ruled that states cannot impose laws on the federal government and that the implied powers of the federal government were authorized in the Constitution to enforce it’s “necessary and proper” duties to sustain a vibrant economy.

McCulloch v. Maryland

1819

McCulloch v. Maryland highlighted the contest over states’ rights, that is, a strong central government versus local rule…but the major states’ rights issue was slavery. This issue would eventually break the United States apart.

Slavery Issues Dominate American Politics In The Early 19th Century

In the late 18th century, many had predicted that the institution of slavery would collapse under its own weight, but the invention of the Cotton Gin would inadvertently give it new life.

“King Cotton” became the staple crop of the South and this was seen by plantation owners to require an increase in slavery.

Cotton Gin 1792

In 1820, the fears of those who opposed the Louisiana Purchase came to seem prescient. Settlers had carved an area out of the western territories and applied to enter the union as the slave state of Missouri. Northerners, complaining that this would throw out the balance of representation between free and slave states, voted to reject the application.

Henry Clay, of Kentucky, came up with a plan to mediate. Missouri would come into the union as a slave state, but then Massachusetts would be cut in half, the northern half coming into the union as the free state of Maine. Also, at the line above the southern border of Missouri (36 degrees, 30 minutes), all future states would come in free.

In 1822, the Denmark Vesey slave conspiracy furthered fanned the flames of fear in the South. The Carolinas had huge slave populations (and in South Carolina) outnumbered whites. There was a constant fear of uprising. This and anger over restrictions on slavery in the territories led Southerners to virulent anti-Northern sentiments.

July 1822

Many Latin American colonies were fighting for and winning independence from Spain.

Other European powers were now looking to capitalize on Spain’s losses. The U.S. had its own reginal interests, both in Latin America and the continental northwest.

John Quincy Adams wrote a speech for James Monroe’s 1823 State of the Union address that warned the Europeans to cease any new aggressive policies in the Western Hemisphere. This “Monroe Doctrine” would be invoked by U.S. presidents throughout the 19th and 20th centuries to justify its own incursions.

Work in the Early Republic

Work in the Early Republic became very different once steam powered factory work became prevalent. While the unskilled poor had always lived rough lives, even the artisan classes were now being forced into factories where they would become wage workers (what Marx called “wage slaves”). Until then, the artisans largely kept their own hours and commanded decent salaries.

Industrial Revolution

Artisans have relatively high levels of independence, determining working hours and work pace.

“Mechanics” mostly supported the Federalists and were solicited for votes.

Federalists disdained and abused the poor.

Child Labor

Poor, working class children in the Northern industrial sectors were little more than slaves.

Subsistence Farmers and Westward Expansion

As shown earlier in this presentation, the 1824 election was highly contested and turned on what Jackson called “the Corrupt Bargain” between J.Q. Adams and Henry Clay.

But, now Adams was president. He was a highly qualified man, having been an ambassador, senator, representative, and Secretary of State. He had left the Federalist Party and joined the Democratic-Republicans and still later would become a Whig. He seemed more interested in the health of the country than partisanship. Still, his presidency was largely ineffective, in some measure due to Jacksonian opposition.

John Quincy Adams

1825-1829

Massachusetts

Wealthy Lawyer

Still, Adams had some successes. In 1825 the Erie Canal opened. Adams had earlier lobbied for such a canal and now it was complete.

The canal connected Lake Erie with the Hudson River and dramatically improved trade. It did, however, result in the deaths of thousands of working men who built the canal. While the investors and politicians were feted, the workers were buried without fanfare.

Soon after, railroads began to appear, making the canal projects obsolete.

Erie Canal

1825

363 miles from Lake Erie to Albany

Usually canal building uses slave or convict labor. The Erie use Irish, Welsh, & German immigrant workers.

“Workers were housed in shanties like animals in barns.” Sheriff 1996.

“Accidents, fever, cholera, fights, and snakebite exacted a heavy toll on the workforce, many of whom were buried as they fell on the towpath.” http://www.wabashanderiecanal.org/Canal_History.html

1827 Baltimore and Ohio Railroad is reputed to be the first commercial freight line in operation.

By 1826, the United States was ready to celebrate the 50th anniversary of the Declaration of Independence. Many, throughout the world, that the country had lasted this long. The celebration would be known as the American Jubilee.

One of the most bizarre occurrences in American history took place on July 4th, 1826, the day of the Jubilee. Both John Adams and Thomas Jefferson, members of the committee to write the Declaration of Independence, died.

July 4, 1826

Along the Eastern seaboard, much work was related to the sea. While this offered opportunities for greater wealth, it also often offered a quick death.

Both fishing and whaling took men far from shore and in some cases around the world.

Whaling was among the most lucrative and most dangerous of the professions. Entire communities (e.g. New Bedford and Nantucket) devoted themselves to the whaling profession. Men would go to sea for years at a time. Many never returned. Some returned empty handed. Others came with home with prize of whale products that would give them money to provide for their families for years at a time.

1820 Sinking of the Whaleship Essex

Their whaleship’s hull was crushed by a giant sperm whale.

Herman Melville would base his novel Moby Dick on a newspaper serialization written by one of the Essex survivors, Owen Chase.

Whale fats were used for lighting and as grease for machinery.

From sperm whales came substance like ambergris (a kind of slimy digestive aid that helped sperm whales swallow sharper parts of squid). This would be used as a base for fine perfumes.

Spermaceti from the sperm whales head provided the material for non-smoking candles. Such candles were prized throughout the colonies. Sperm whales teeth were used for scrimshaw (tooth carving), which was a peculiarly American artform.

Baleen whales, like humpbacks and blues, provided huge amounts of blubber for lighting and grease, and also the baleen for women’s combs and industrial tools. (Baleen is what whales use to strain large amounts of plankton. Sperm whales, on the other hand, are toothed whales and are more closely related to dolphins and killer whales.)

After suffering the humiliating (politically contrived) defeat in the 1824 elections, Jackson swept to victory over John Quincy Adams in 1828. It was a reflection of Jackson’s popularity with the working classes and southern slave owners, most of whom were also anti-intellectuals (and Adams was the epitome of intellectualism).

The campaign was brutal. Our elections today are tame by comparison. Jackson’s campaign called Adams a pimp, and the Adams campaign returned the favor by calling Jackson’s wife a prostitute. (Jackson would accuse Adams of murder when his wife died of a heart attack.)

Jackson 1829-1837

Tennessee

Born poor, parlays political success into financial success…becomes wealthy plantation owner.

Jackson’s tenure as president was a tumultuous and dangerous time. (Maybe not so unlike today.) Political and personal scandals, racism, talk of independence and secession, financial crises, religious cults, slave rebellions, and fundamental differences in the interpretation of democracy kept the wheels of political opposition turning.

Just before Jackson’s inauguration, Congress passed an importation tax to help Northern industries compete with European (especially British) goods. Southerners took exception to this and threatened to nullify the law in the South (in other words, whey would refuse to enforce it).

1828 Importation Tax

South Says It Benefits Only Northern Manufacturers

South Considers Nullification

Nullification Crisis

1830-32

While Jackson might have agreed with his Vice-President Calhoun that the law was unconstitutional and worthy of nullification…

…he had to agree with his nemesis Webster that such a nullification movement could lead to dissolution of the union. Jackson would have none of that on his watch.

Jackson

John C. Calhoun (South Carolina)

Daniel Webster (Massachusetts)

It was during these years that French social philosopher Alexi de Tocqueville wrote his famous work Democracy in America.

Despite its many flaws, Tocqueville would say, Americans seemed to have a deep faith in democracy and in the institutions that purported to be democratic. (This, of course, may have been part of the brilliance of the Jacksonians who co-opted the term for their Democratic Party.)

Tocqueville in America

1831-32

The House and the Senate would debate about the very meaning of democracy, republicanism, federalism and states rights, and most importantly, the status of slavery.

The slave issue was a constant presence and would lead to sectional hatreds that would eventually tear the union apart.

Senate

Jackson never hid his hatred for indigenous peoples. Early in his presidency, he worked with Congress to legally remove native peoples from their homes in the East to the deserts of the West.

Jackson firmly believed that whites and Indians could not co-exist and that as the victors, white Americans had the right to all Indian lands despite treaties to the contrary.

The Indian Removal Act of 1830

Indian Removal Act 1830

Osceola

Not all Americans agreed with Jackson. The Supreme Court wrote a rather confused opinion in Cherokee v. Georgia (the latter were attempting to take Cherokee lands) where the very status of the Cherokee was debated. Were they a sovereign nation or wards of the state? Marshall and the majority wrote that their unclear status resulted in a lack of ”standing” meaning that they had no rights to bring a case in court.

In Worster v. Georgia, they backed off of this position and claimed that the U.S. had deemed the Cherokee competent to agree to treaties and were therefore an autonomous nation whose borders were not subject to Georgia law.

It would be a hollow victory for the Cherokee however, since it was Jackson who would be charged with enforcing the Court’s decision.

Cherokee Nation v. Georgia and Worster v. Georgia

1831

During this debate over the Cherokee, the Sac and Fox tribes had returned from the plains. Their great chief Black Hawk had reasoned that if they had to fight for land, they shouldn’t be fighting with other indigenous peoples on the plains. Instead they should be fighting for their homeland in then Illinois.

The Black Hawk War ensued. (Abraham Lincoln served in the Illinois militia, but never saw combat). Black Hawk and his son were captured and sent to Washington D.C. where there portraits vividly captured the sentiments of proud defeated people. It seems to be the look of resignation in the face of the American onslaught.

Black Hawk War 1832

Sac and Fox

Another seminal event in the debates on race took place at the same time. Nat Turner, a Virginia slave, led a violent revolt that killed 50-60 whites and as many black slaves, who were executed following the revolt.

Many things have been written about Nat Turner, some of which might actually be true. What is certain is that the rebellion led to greater repression of slaves in the South and also to greater efforts by abolitionists in the North. The Confessions of Nat Turner became a best seller in the North and this alone increased Southern hatred for Northerners.

Nat Turner

Aug. 1831

The Peggy O’Neal scandal shows a different side of Jackson. As brutal, cruel, and racist as he could be, he was also loyal to his friends (and very shrewd). Jackson had know little Peggy since she was a girl in the boarding house run by her father. Jackson and his best friend, Martin van Buren, stayed there when they first came to Washington, D.C.

Peggy got caught up in a scandal as a young women when her husband died suspiciously and she immediately remarried her husband’s best friend, John Eaton, who was a member of Jackson’s cabinet. Despite threats by other members of his cabinet to resign if he didn’t distance himself from the scandal, Jackson stood by Peggy.

His cabinet, including Vice-President Calhoun, did resign. This, ironically, left Jackson to appoint a cabinet that was closer to him politically and to appoint his good friend Van Buren to the Vice-Presidency.

John Eaton

Jackson, in a nod to his constituents who agreed to back off in the Nullification Crisis, decided to destroy the Bank of the United States. He couldn’t simply defy the Congressional Charter, but he did find a way to render the bank effectively useless. He puled it’s funds.

Whether or not this was the primary cause of the ensuing panic, The economy did crash. Many, including former supporters, blamed Jackson. Jackson, in turn, ruined their careers.

1834

Jackson Pulls U.S. Funds from Bank of United States

Crockett Blames Jackson for Economic Panic

One such victim of Jackson’s wrath was Davy Crockett from Tennessee. His career in ruins he would heed the call of his old friend Sam Houston to fight for Texas independence from Mexico.

Many Americans were given land grants by, first the Spanish and then the Mexicans. Immigrants, like the Austin family, brought slaves with them. After negotiations with the Mexican government failed, the Texians (or Texicans) and their Tejano allies, fought for and ultimately achieved independence after an initial disaster at the Alamo in San Antonio but ultimate victory at San Jacinto over Santa Anna.

Davy Crocket and a host of others died at the Alamo, an event that continues to have a controversial history. Mexican and American historians see it very differently.

After the Battle of San Jacinto, Texas applied for American statehood, but was rejected because of the slave state/free state balancing act. Texas became an independent country as many Tejanos began to think they’d made a mistake.

Battle of San Jacinto

April 21, 1836

As tensions rose over slavery and sectional hatreds, religious tension arose within communities. Despite the growth of many stable and supportive religious denominations, cults had also increased dramatically in the latter phases of the Second Great Awakening.

The case of the Kingdom of Matthias is instructive. Matthias combined his and his followers’ religious fanaticism with sexual excess. It all led to murder.

The case became famous throughout America and was also significant in that one of America’s most renowned feminists was a survivor of the cult. In her youth she had been a slave named Isabella Baumfree and was a servant to Mathias. She would later change her name to Sojourner Truth.

1834

Black churches began to proliferate throughout the country. African-American forms of preaching and gospel music became prevalent. (The entertainment aspects of the African-American church services who would translate them into minstrel shows with whites in “black face” singing gospel songs.

To this day, Americans of many ethnicities imitate black cultural forms, often missing the point or message.

African American Churches

Methodist and Baptist

Many blacks and whites in the South continued to hold onto Vodum (Voodoo), although to this day it remains an underground faith.

In 1836, Martin Van Buren defeated Henry Clay and his new Whig Party. Jackson’s racist policies continued under Van Buren, despite that fact that Van Buren was a Northerner.

If you’ll recall back to lectures on American Indian history, it was during Van Buren’s presidency that members of the Five Civilized Tribes were forcibly relocated West, in what the Cherokee call “The Trail of Tears”.

1836

Whigs

Versus

Van Buren

1837-1841

from New York

Upper Middle Class Northern farming heritage. (His father owned six slaves.

Jacksonian Democrat

The man behind Jackson’s Democratic Party takes the blame for the Panic of 1837, despite the fact that the conditions for the economic collapse were set during the Jacksion administration..

The panic would turn into a Depression that would last well into the next decade.

Early in the Van Buren administration, a large expedition set out to explore the Pacific, despite the fact that the United States had no western ports.

It was by all accounts a huge scientific success.

Later in the century, when the U.S. did have western ports in California and the Pacific Northwest, Samoa and Hawaii became American territories.

For a fascinating history of this expeditions see Nathaniel Philbrick’s Sea of Glory: America’s Voyage of Discovery – The U.S. Exploring Expedition 1838-1842.

U.S. Exploring Expedition 1838

In 1839, a Spanish slave ship, the Amistad, was overtaken off the coast of Connecticut by American authorities. It had been bound for Cuba with a hold full of kidnapped Africans. The Africans risen up and killed most of the crew, leaving the pilot and navigator alive.

The Americans put the Africans on trial for murder, but a spirited defense team of abolitionists, that included former president John Quincy Adams, brought the case all the way to the Supreme Court. (Roger Taney, a former slave owner, had replaced the recently deceased John Marshall as Chief Justice.) The court concluded that the Africans were not yet slaves, as they had not yet been sold in the Cuban slave markets, and were therefore not subject to slave codes. They, agreeing with the defense, said that the Africans were kidnap victims engaging in lawful self-defense.

The Africans were sent back to Africa.

Southerners were irate, believing that this might foster further slave revolts.

Amistad 1839

William Henry Harrison, purported war hero (War of 1812) promised to restore the Bank of the United States and to revive the economy itself. He swept into office, but died of several week later.

At the time, it was claimed that he died of a cold brought on by his long outdoor inauguration speech in foul weather. Other reports say that he didn’t actually get sick until three weeks later and might have died from drinking polluted, swap water (prevalent in D.C. at the time. He was the first president to die in office.

1840 Colt

Samuel Colt’s .45 caliber pistol became the first machine tooled commodity with interchangeable parts. In addition to this, it’s rapid fire capabilities and easy reloading would change the way people used weaponry for protection and would certainly change warfare.

Harrison 1841

Whig Party

Virginia

Wealthy Plantation Owner

With Harrison dead, John Tyler became president, although this had not been a forgone conclusion. There was no clear statement of succession in the Constitution.

Tyler 1841-1845

Democrat, then Whig…but state’s rights advocate; and eventually a representative in the Confederate government.

Begins the process of Texas annexation.

Virginia

Wealthy Plantation Owner

Ante-Bellum Work ~ Slaves, Wage Slaves, Refugees and Their Manifest Destinations

The very nature of work in the North had been changing in the Early Republic and Antebellum years. The Industrial Revolution had created factory jobs with a new set of work conditions. Karl Marx called this new condition “wage slavery”, while Northern industrialists called it “free labor”.

Southern plantation owners would point to the poor work conditions for labor in the North and claim that their slaves were better off. The fact that Northern workers were regularly laid off and consequently subject to starvation was evidence enough. Their slaves, they said, were always taken care of.

Few in the North were sympathetic to this perspective.

From artisan and farmer to factory worker…what Marx called wage slavery.

While the term “wage slavery” made it’s point, it was still hyperbole when measured against the realities of slavery.

An abolitionist movement began to spread throughout the North, also abolitionists were always in a small minority and were considered radicals. Some like William Lloyd Garrison were among the armchair radicals, while others like John Brown were violent anti-slavery activists.

Frederic Douglass, a former slave himself, often sat back stupefied by the slavery debates in the white abolitionist community (somewhat akin, I think, to Malcolm X’s skepticism about the motives of white Civil Rights activists in the ‘60s).

19th Century Abolitionists

1847

1831

The dirty laundry of the North was its surreptitious complicity in slavery. Often, Northern industrialists would publicly denounce slavery and its inhuman conditions while at the same time accepting the benefits of and even privately promoting slavery. They got cheap raw materials through cheap Southern slave labor.

Northern Industrial Complicity

I’ll let the American-American historian Louis Henry Gates speak on this issue. The history of the Underground Railroad is steeped in mythology. Professor Gates does a good job debunking those myths at:

http://www.pbs.org/wnet/african-americans-many-rivers-to-cross/history/who-really-ran-the-underground-railroad/

Compare Gates’ explanation to that found in Foner.

Underground Railroad

1820s – 1860s

Harriet Tubman

Levi Coffin

Quaker Abolitionist

Abolitionist Critic of the UR, not for it’s intent but for its self advertisement.

Frederick Douglass

By the mid 1840s the slavery question became a dominant topic of political conversation, but many saw it as a problem not in its own right, but as an element of the state’s rights debate and of questions about territorial expansion.

Americans increasingly expected to annex Western lands. They were looking for resources (metals) and ports (in California).

James K. Polk ran for the Presidency on just this platform, promising expansion. His campaign claimed it was a God-given right and responsibility.

Polk 1845-1849

Democrat

Tennessee

Wealthy Plantation Owner

1845

O’Sullivan

Popularizes Term

Manifest Destiny

Polk encouraged Congress to finish the Texas annexation process and then manipulated Mexico into a war that would give the United States what is today called the Southwest. (To Mexico it had been their Northwest).

The United States committed atrocities in Mexico before finally taking Mexico City. They then debated taking all of Mexico, but circumstances led them to annex only the Northern parts in the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo.

In 1853 the U.S. would buy another chunk of the desert for railway access and add it to the Arizona territory. This was known as the Gadsden Purchase.