1. Reform Movements of the Early 19th Century

2. Educational reform
Public schools began to open to create an educated population of voters
Teacher’s began to be specially trained and their salaries increased
More schools opened
School attendance became mandatory through elementary school
High schools began to become more common

3. Horace Mann 1796 – 1859 President of the Massachusetts Senate
Stepped down to head the new Massachusetts School Board for 12 years
Established the standard other states would follow for creating public school systems and teacher-training programs

4. Calvin Wiley 1819 – 1887 North Carolina’s first school superintendent
Championed creating state standards for what should be taught in schools
More difficult to get children in school in the South because they were needed for farm work

5. Female Education Emma Willard’s Troy Female Seminary in NY (1821)
Mary Lyon’s Mount Holyoke Female Seminary in MA (1837)
Elizabeth Blackwell: 1st woman to earn a medical degree, built hospital for women and children staffed entirely by women

6. Prison reform
Inmates were not separated by offense and prisons included the violent & mentally ill
Idea of rehabilitation rather than punishment began to take hold
States began to build modern prisons (penitentiaries) to house long-term prisoners

7. Mental health reform
Mentally ill received no treatment, kept in prisons with common criminals where they received not even the most basic of medical care and were often tortured
The field of “mental health” didn’t exist yet

8. Dorothea Dix
1802 – 1887
Former teacher who took up the plight of the mentally ill
Traveled and wrote articles to expose the abuses suffered by the mentally ill
Dorothea Dix Hospital in Raleigh was named after her in 1856

9. Labor Reform
First labor unions began to form – pushed for higher wages, shorter workdays
Early unions had little success – ignored by employers, not supported by the government who saw them as a threat to American industry

10. Abolitionist Movement
Movement to end slavery in the United States
Took on several different forms
Championed primarily by Northerners and women
Opposed slavery on moral grounds

11. Gradualism
Earliest form of abolitionism called for the gradual freeing of the slaves – stop importing new slaves, then phase out slavery over time
Slave owners would be compensated for their lost property
South would have time to adjust its economy

12. American Colonization Society
1816
Called for freeing the slaves but then sending them back to Africa
Helped establish country of Liberia in East Africa as a home for repatriated slaves
Too many slaves to be effective, too expensive to transport millions
Most slaves at this point had never seen Africa and didn’t want to go

13. David Walker
1785 – 1830
Free African-American from Wilmington, NC who settled in Boston
Published pamphlet “Appeal to the Colored Citizens of the World,” calling for a violent rebellion by slaves; pamphlet was banned throughout the South
Died under mysterious circumstances – murdered?

14. William Lloyd Garrison
1805 – 1879
Editor of the Liberator – an abolitionist newspaper in Boston
Demanded immediate emancipation of the slaves rather than any kind of gradual end to slavery
Founded American Antislavery Society in 1833 – by 1838 the AAS had over 250,000 members

15. Harriet Beecher Stowe 1811 – 1896
Author of Uncle Tom’s Cabin, a novel which exposed conditions under which slaves lived in the South
Made real to many Northerners how brutal the slave system could really be

16. Sarah & Angelina Grimké
Grew up on plantation in South Carolina but became avid abolitionists
Wrote and gave speeches on the realities of slavery

17. Frederick Douglass 1818 – 1895 Born a slave, but escaped at age 20
Became a speaker and writer – his autobiography was a bestseller
Convinced many whites that Africans were intelligent and capable of learning (many in the South had made claims that Africans were not)
Second wife was white, which cost him support of fellow African-Americans in his later years

18. Sojourner Truth
1797 – 1883
Born a slave in NY, gained her freedom when NY emancipated all slaves in 1827
Became a famous abolitionist speaker, especially after her “Ain’t I a Woman?” speech in 1851

19. Reaction to Abolition Movement
Obviously, most people in the South opposed the abolition movement
Many in North feared the divisiveness that the movement would cause between North and South; they would rather maintain the status quo and avoid conflict
Some in North feared that freed slaves would all move North, flooding the job market and driving down wages
Others feared that if the South’s economy collapsed, it would send the entire nation into a massive economic depression

20. Temperance Movement Men who drank often neglected their families
Many bars and saloons, high rate of alcoholism, especially along the frontier and in large Eastern cities
1833: American Temperance Union created
1851: Maine banned sale of alcohol; by other states had done so as well

21. Women’s Rights Movement
Women’s traditional roles in the North began to change as fewer families worked on farms
As women began to take on more social roles and become active in reform movements, they began to demand more political rights

22. Lucretia Mott
1793 – 1880
First American “feminist” to push for women to gain access to a voice in politics
Like many women, began her social activism with the abolitionist movement

23. Elizabeth Cady Stanton
1815 – 1902
Argued for women’s suffrage, right to divorce, own property, and access to birth control
Also strongly supported the abolitionist and temperance movements

24. Susan B. Anthony
1820 – 1906
Traveled Europe and the US giving 75 – 100 speeches each year for over 40 years
Also a force in the abolitionist and temperance movements
Arrested in 1872 for illegally voting the presidential election

25. Seneca Falls Conference
1848, Seneca Falls. NY
Organized by Mott and Stanton
Issued the “Declarations of Sentiments and Resolutions” which added “and women” to the Declaration of Independence’s “all men are created equal”
Began the call for suffrage for women