19th Century Reformers and Social Change

*Abolitionists and Reformers

*Dorothea DixShe launched a movement for the better treatment of the mentally ill – and for prison reform. At the time, many people suffering from mental illness were locked away in prisons. Worse still, there was a widespread belief that the mentally ill felt no pain – nor warmth or cold – and that delegating them to substandard living conditions was therefore justifiable.

*Lyman BeecherThe nation’s most popular minister, he encouraged the growth of benevolent societies to help spread Christianity and do good works. His daughter gained greater fame still – she was the author of the novel Uncle Tom’s Cabin.

Benevolent societies would include groups like: The Salvation Army The YMCA Christian Missionary Workers

*Temperance This movement encouraged moderation in the use of alcohol. Eventually advocates of prohibition would take over the movement, and by 1919, alcohol had been banned altogether.

*Horace MannHe established the “Common School Movement” to teach children – mostly immigrant children – the virtues of the republican way of life. His views were often considered Nativist. He worried that immigrants and poor children were too ignorant to participate in a democratic society; moreover, he feared that anti-American traditions persisted among immigrant groups.

*Nativism

This is defined as “hostility towards foreigners.” Irish and Chinese immigrants suffered as a result of the belief during the 1840s. In California, heavy immigration due to the gold rush quickly turned to hostility between Americans and new immigrant groups. Meanwhile in the East, heavy immigration from Ireland due to the “Black ’47” potato famine resulted in overcrowding and anti-Catholic feeling.

*Nativists

*Susan B. Anthony This woman was once arrested for casting a ballot illegally in a New York election. She was considered the leader of the woman’s movement, even for years after she was replaced by younger, more energetic, and more demanding leaders. She did not live long enough to see the 19th Amendment to the Constitution passed – giving women the right to vote in national elections.

*Elizabeth Cady StantonShe organized the Seneca Falls Convention and was the principle author of the Declaration of Sentiments. She was a strong advocate for woman’s suffrage and equality of the sexes.

*The Seneca Falls Convention

This 1848 meeting in upstate New York was the first time that women had publically demanded the right to vote. The Declaration of Sentiments was ratified by the women – and men – who attended the meeting. The document itself contained some very questionable rhetoric. It argued that if even the “ignorant Irishman in the ditch” or – gasp – African-Americans were allowed to vote, women should be granted the franchise.

*Gradualism This term refers to the slow and regimented ending of slavery over time. Advocates of this method believed the slave trade would end first, and then, that slavery would be phased out. In fact, most Northern states had ended slavery in there states during the early part of the 19th Century using these tactics. People born into slavery would be emancipated –

Women were freed at the age of 18.

Men would be freed at the age of 21.

*Compensated Emancipation

Paying slave owners to emancipate their slaves – which many argued the government should do in order to end the institution of slavery – was referred to as this. During the Civil War, Lincoln continually proposed and considered the possibility of compensated emancipation in the border states and in Washington, D.C.

*The American Colonization SocietyThis organization purchased the freedom of many enslaved African-Americans, and then sent them to Africa or other faraway lands. The nation-state of Liberia was established in this way.

*AbolitionismThis movement argued that all enslaved people should be emancipated immediately, without any compensation to slave owners. This was considered an extremely radical version of social reform. Very few northern whites ascribed to the belief. Who did?

Frederick Douglass

Harriet Tubman

Sojourner Truth

Elijah Lovejoy

David Walker

William Lloyd Garrison

*William Lloyd Garrison

He was the abolitionist newspaper editor who established The Liberator and vowed to oppose slavery come what may. Originally an advocate of gradual emancipation or compensated emancipation for slaves, Garrison would become more steadfastly anti-slavery and more radical in his views as the years moved along. Too some degree, he even rationalized violence.

*The Grimke SistersThese sisters – who witnessed slavery firsthand in South Carolina – would eventually move to the North so as to be safer when condemning the “peculiar institution” – slavery. Surprisingly few women spoke out against slavery, since public speaking was considered outside normal gender roles. Notable exceptions included Harriet Tubman, Sojourner Truth, and Harriet Beecher Stowe.

*Frederick Douglas

This runaway slave turned abolitionist spoke out on lecture tours, claiming that he had stolen his own body! He also established an abolitionist newspaper called The North Star. During the Civil War, he encourage Lincoln to free the enslaved and to let them fight for their own freedom.

“No man can be truly free whose liberty is dependent upon the thought, feeling and action of others, and who has himself no means in his own hands for guarding, protecting, defending and maintaining that liberty”

*Elijah Lovejoy

He was killed in Alton, IL for publishing an abolitionist newspaper; his printing press was thrown into the Mississippi River. When the murder took place in 1837, it was one of the first times that white mobs had killed a white man over the issue of African-American slavery.

*David WalkerHis Appeal to enslaved African-Americans explained that violence against their masters was justified. When the book reached the South, it was banned and burned. Within two years of the publication of the work, it’s author had been poisoned to death.

*Nat Turner’s Rebellion

He led a violent uprising in Virginia in 1831, which resulted in the bloodiest slave revolt in all American history. Over fifty whites were killed in Southampton County. After a month of anxiety in Virginia while Turner was on the lam, he was captured, hanged, and then skinned. Hundreds of suspected conspirators were put to death as well. Southern states ratcheted up restrictions on the enslaved population afterwards.

*Denmark VeseyHe was a free black – and a minister – from South Carolina who organized a revolt against slavery in 1822. The plot was uncovered, and dozens were executed.

*Gabriel He planned out a slave revolt in Richmond, VA in the year 1800. Before the plan was put into action, however, it was discovered. Dozens of conspirators were put to death. Gabriel’s plan – which involved both African-Americans and whites – was to take the Governor hostage and negotiate an end to slavery.

*The Stono Rebellion

In 1739, a group of South Carolina enslaved men led by “Jemmy” attempted to escape to Spanish-controlled Florida using violent force. Dozens died in the failed effort. Fears of slave revolts caused Southerners to impose slave codes of the most severe form. The bloodletting in South Carolina seemed to be encouraged by the Spanish. Any effort to undermine the institution of slavery was viewed as an attack on the social hierarchy of the entire South and punished severely.