1. The importance of Republican Motherhood/Cult of Domesticity
Most APUSH exams have one to two multiple choice questions and the writers use straightforward definitions, quotes and even picture to see if students can identify these concepts DBQ was devoted to this topic

2. Social & Cultural movements- pre-civil war
Lowell factory workers= Massachusetts farm girls mainly , eventually replaced by Irish immigrants who would work for cheap
Women’s movement
Middle class women
Legal & educational rights
Ties to anti-slavery & temperance movement
Conventions in NE and Midwest but not South
SENECA FALLS CONVENTION-1848
Led by Elizabeth Cady Stanton & Lucretia Mott
Declaration of Sentiments & Resolutions=greater rights for women: suffrage, right to retain property after marriage, greater divorce & custody rights, equal educational opportunities
APUSH Test Tip= know what reforms the convention called for and what it did not- ie. Did not call for more liberal abortion laws or equal pay for equal work

3. Notable women in this time
Dorothea Dix= reform for the treatment of mentally handicapped people as well as prison reform. NOT in women’s rights movement
Sarah Grimke=one of first women
to publically support abolition
& women’s rights

4. Abolition movement
American Colonization Society=worked to return freed slaves to Africa mainly led by middle-class men & women
William Lloyd Garrison=editor of The Liberator-abolitionist newspaper & a founder of the American Anti-Slavery Society. Called for emancipation of slaves
Frederick Douglass=black abolitionist who also fought for women’s rights & equality for Native Americans
APUSH Test Tip- most know Douglass & questions for sure but also know Garrison – the writers like him

5. Transcendentalism & Utopian Communities
Transcendentalism=philosophical & literary movement of the 1800s that emphasized a simple life that celebrated truth in nature, personal emotion & imagination
Henry David Thoreau & Ralph Waldo Emerson top writers
Utopian communities=perfect life achieved through conscious act of Brook Farm, New harmony & Oneida Community
Escape competitive America
Regulate your moral behavior
Create cooperative life in harmony with others

6. Culture
Education-McGuffey Readers, more newspapers, more training for teachers, better schools
Art=Hudson River School- led by Thomas Cole, painted landscapes to celebrate beauty of America-first actual art school

7. Gathering Storm 1840-1860 Manifest Destiny= US will expand
Sea to shining sea
God given right
Americans support
Texas- Lone Star republic
Jackson opposed annexation- why?
America divided over Texas until added in 1845
Oregon-dispute with Britain over boundary=54 / 40 or fight!

8. Mexican War
Polk justifies war by claiming Mexican troops crossed into America over Rio Grande/vs. Nueces River boundary dispute & killed soldiers
Lincoln & others support war, Whigs do not
Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo ends the war & US gains CA, NM, UT, most of AZ, NV, parts of CO & WY. + Rio Grande is border-period.
WILMOT PROVISO=called for no slavery in these new lands. Never became law but eventually endorsed by all but one of the free state legislatures-issue of expanding slavery
APUSH Test Tip=easy to believe this was a law, but actually passed twice by House and rejected by Senate. Test writers may use the phrase “passage of the Wilmot Proviso” as a tempting but WRONG answer

9. Compromise of 1850
Key players= Stephen Douglas, Daniel Webster, Henry Clay & John C. Calhoun
Not a player=Abe Lincoln
Provisions:
Admit CA as a free state
Abolish slave trade in DC but continue to protect slavery in DC
Pass a more stringent fugitive slave act
Establish territorial govts of NM & UT but no decision on slavery there yet

10. Events that led to Civil War
Popular Sovereignty
Stephen Douglas is the champion of this idea
Settlers of a given territory would have sole right to decide whether or not slavery would be permitted
KS / NE Act- 2 territories & those states get to choose
Consequences= Missouri Compromise 1820 erased
Slavery can expand beyond South leads to huge debate
Bloody Kansas
Split in Democratic Party
Republican Party forms
Violence in Congress

11. More events Dred Scott Case 1857
APUSH Test Tip=important to remember which compromises, acts & Supreme Court decisions restrict the expansion of slavery& which do not
Dred Scott Case 1857
Ruling= Dred is a slave & no right to sue in court. Constitution says they are private property & can be taken into any territory regardless of free or slave state
Consequences= invalidates the NorthWest Ordinance of 1787 & Missouri Compromise of Becomes major issue in Lincoln-Douglas debates. Deeper divide between North & South

12. And still more… Election of 1860 Republicans v/ Democrats:
Abe- Republicans accept slavery where it exists but don’t want further expansion in to territories
Democrats split
Northern Democrats favor Douglas & popular sovereignty
Southern Democrats support Breckinridge, extension of slavery to territories & annexation of Cuba
Consequences: Lincoln wins electoral vote but not majority of popular vote & 7 states led by (you guessed it) SC secede from the Union