Pre-Civil War America

1. Pre-Civil War America A Study in Contrasts

2. Nationalism Favoring national interests over state or sectional interests Northwest Northeast South

3. Issues Holding Nation Together • Nationalist Tendencies • John Marshall Court • Foreign Policy

4. Nationalist Tendencies • Era of Good Feelings (1815-1824) • No opposition to Republican Party • Post-War Legislation • Preparedness (standing army, etc.) • 2nd Bank of the United States – under consideration • Bonus Bill of 1817 – vetoed by Madison • Improvements in Transportation • National road (1817) – federally funded • Turnpikes, etc.- state or private funding • Erie Canal (1825) – funded by NY state

5. John Marshall Court • Based on Marbury v. Madison (1803) • established principle of judicial review • McCulloch v. Madison (1819) • states do not have right to tax federal agencies • Dartmouth College Case (1819) • states cannot alter the terms of a contract • Gibbons v. Ogden (1824) • states do not have power over interstate commerce

6. Foreign Policy • Settled disputes between Great Britain and the U.S. • Rush-Bagot Agreement (1817) • Eliminated most armed ships on Great Lakes • The Convention of 1818 • Clarified fishing rights north of Louisiana Purchase • Provided for joint occupation of Oregon • Transcontinental Treaty (1819) • settled issues between the U.S. and Spain • Monroe Doctrine (1823) • Hands off the Americas • U.S. not to participate in European affairs

7. Northwest Northeast South Sectionalism Favoring state or sectional interests over national interests

8. Laborers Manufacturers Farmers Composition of Northeast

9. Large Plantation Owners Small Planters Farmers Composition of South

10. IndependentFarmers Composition of Northwest

11. Issues Dividing the Nation • Public Land Policy • A Protective Tariff • Internal Improvements • Slavery Expansion

12. Public Land Policy • Should lands be offered to settlers at a low price or a high one? • Should they be opened to settlement rapidly or slowly? • Should “squatters” who occupied lands before they were opened for sale have any rights to the lands they farmed?

13. A Protective Tariff • Should there be high tariffs to protect United States industries? • Or should there be a low tariff which would allow foreign goods to come in cheaply in exchange for American agricultural products?

14. Internal Improvements • Should the federal government spend money to build roads and canals, or at least help states and private companies to build them?

15. Slavery Expansion • Should the territories be closed to slavery on the model of the Northwest Ordinance? • Or should slave owners have the right to take slaves with them into the territories just as they might take cattle or horses?

16. Laborers Farmers Manufacturers Northeast • Public Land Policy: Opposed: • Manufacturers could lose labor supply • Farmers would have competition in NW • Protective Tariff: Favored • Internal Improvements: Favored • Would keep tariff high • Slavery Expansion: Opposed: • Immoral

17. Farmers Large Planters Small Planters South • Public Land Policy: Divided: • Large Planters favored rapid settlement • Small Planters opposed squatters’ rights • Protective Tariff: Opposed: • No benefits • Internal Improvements: Opposed: • To keep tariff low • Slavery Expansion: Favored

18. IndependentFarmers Northwest • Public Land Policy: Favored cheap land, rapid settlement, squatters’ rights • Protective Tariff: Favored: • To increase markets (NE & NW) • To encourage western manufacturing • To build roads and canals • Internal Improvements: Favored • Slavery Expansion: Opposed (NW should remain free)

19. Intersectional Differences Blurred • The American System • Proposed by Henry Clay, representative from Kentucky • Overlapping Sectional Interests • Sectional differences not absolutely clear-cut

20. The American System • By this plan there would be high tariffs to promote eastern manufactures. • The revenues would be used to build the transportation system needed by the west and to improve the navigation of southern rivers. • Sections would provide domestic markets for each other: • The eastern textile mills would provide a domestic market for Southern cotton. • Eastern cities would provide a market for western grain and meat.

21. Overlapping Sectional Interests • In much of Tennessee, Kentucky, and Missouri: • Slaves and plantations were few in number. • Life in large areas of these states resembled that in the NW more than that of the South. • Although the Northeast was the center of manufacturing and contained the largest cities, the majority of the people there were still rural farmers until some time after 1850.

22. In New England the demand of manufacturers for higher tariffs was strongly opposed by shipping interests which would lose money if we imported fewer goods. • In their demands for cheap land, Westerners found allies among the factory workers of the Northeast. • Even workers with no idea of getting farms of their own thought their wages would be better if others had a chance to go west. • The commercial interests of southern ports such as New Orleans and Baltimore made money from intersectional trade and had close ties with northern bankers.

23. Other Major Trends • Jacksonian Democracy • A tendency to serve the common man • Romanticism and Reform • Reaction to industrialization • Focus on nature, feeling, emotions • Manifest Destiny • The idea that United States was destined to extend its boundaries westward to the Pacific, perhaps even northward to the Arctic Sea and southward to the Isthmus of Panama.