Romanticism Notes

I. Introduction

A. Unrestrained growth characterized nearly every aspect of American life from the
beginning of Andrew Jackson administration in 1829 to the onset of the Civil War (1861.)

B. Mexican War swept land westward with claiming the Southwest territories, and the
negation of new borders with the British in the Northwest.

C. Fur Traders and Gold Diggers appeared.

D. Population

1. Doubled between 1790 and 1830, and doubled again before 1870.

E. Small cities were faced with urbanization

F. Individualism

1. Was faced with the reality of poverty and those not educated

G. Reform was as much the age as expansion

1. Its aim was less the creation of a new society, than the reform of the one promised in
the Declaration of Independence.

2. Reform groups sprang up across the land.

3. Utopian communities were created.

a. Between 1820and 1850, 58 communities were founded.

4. The most effective American reformers in this period did not seek to overturn the
social system or escape it; rather they sought to adapt new industrial conditions to
traditional American values.

5. Education

a. Before 1800 no state had a system of public education

b. By 1860, every state had tax-supported public schools, in some cases extending
through college.

c. It encouraged libraries, newspapers, museums, trade and professional

associations, and, most of all, the lyceum (an association of citizens who invited
prominent intellectuals to give public lectures.

i. The first lyceum was organized in Massachusetts in 1826.

6. Woman's Rights
 a. Women were minors controlled under their husband or male relative.

b. Women were hired as teachers.

i. This proved women were intellectually capable of being doctors, lawyers, etc.

ii. Although openings were available in many fields, they were mainly reform
leaders.

c. They wanted the right to vote.

7.

H. America was propelled by two forces

1. Dissatisfaction with the present

2. Optimism about the future

a. Was based in part on the dynamic progress in science and technology.

b. Excelled in practical application of scientific knowledge.

c. New technologies were created

i. The reaper- for agriculture purposes in the west.

ii. New roads, canals, and railroads.

iii. Railroad was the center of the expanding economy with 10,000 miles by 1860

iv. A new system of communications bound together the country.

v. First telegraph line strung between Baltimore and Washington in 1844.

d. Social Costs to the Industries

i. Mass production

ii. Machines replaced workers

iii. Child Labor was preferred for they worked for less.

e. Basic American values were being left far behind.

3.