February 05, 2009

February 03, 2009

.....Continue Unit 6: Slavery and Sectionalism

 Hand out Ids, Defines, Describes, Locate for Chapter 18 and Chapter 19
Chapter 18, Renewing the Sectional Struggle, 1848 - 1854

Chapter Themes:
Theme (1) The sectional conflict over the expansion of slavery that erupted after the Mexican War was temporarily quieted by the Compromise of 1850, but Douglas's Kansas-Nebraska Act of 1854 exploded it again.

Theme (2) In the 1850s American expansionism in the West and the Caribbean was extremely controversial because it was tied to the slavery question.

Chapter Learning Objectives: (1) explain how the issue of slavery in the territories acquired from Mexico disrupted Amreican politics from 1848 to 1850.
           (2) point out the major terms of the Compromise of 1850 and indicate how
this agreement attempted to deal with the issue of slavery.
           (3) indicate how the Whig party disintegrated and disappeared because of
its divisions over slavery.
           (4) describe how the Pierce administration engaged in various pro-
southern overseas and expansionist ventures.
           (5) describe Douglas's Kansas-Nebraska Act and explain why it stirred the
sectional controversy to new heights.

Hand out Checking Your Progress worksheets for Chapter 18

Class Discussions:

(1) The conflict created by the Mexican War acquistions and explain how the Compromise of 1850 tried to resolve them. Focus on the extreme delicacy of the sectional adjustment.

(2) The breakup of the second two-party system in relation to the slavery controversy. Show how the Whig demise and Democratic divisions paved the way for the Republicans.

(3) The connection between the proslavery expansionist schemes, particularly the Cuban affair and the Gadsden Purchase, and the sectional controversy. Emphasize southern hopes and northern fears of potential slavery expansion to the Caribbean or Central America.

(4) The Kansas-Nebraska Act and explain why it aroused such wrath in the North. Particular attention might be paid to the railroad-promoting Douglas, with his theory of "popular sovereignty," and to the rise of the "free soil" ideology in the North.

(5) The characters and drama of the Senate debates over the Compromise of 1850, especially the roles of Webster, Clay, Seward, and Douglas.

(6) The Fugitive Slave Law and the Underground Railroad as running sores in the sectional conflict.                                                                                                           

Chapter 17, Manifest Destiny and Its Legacy, 1841 - 1848

Chapter Theme: American expansionism gained momentum in the 1840s, leading first to the acquisition
of Texas and Oregon, and then to the Mexican War, which added vast southwestern territories to the United States.

Chapter Learning Objectives: (1) explain the spirit of "Manifest Destiny" that inspired American expansionism in the 1840s.
(2) indicate how American anti-British feeling led to various conflicts over debts, Maine, Canadian rebellion, Texas, and Oregon.
(3) explain why the movement to annex Texas gained new momentum and why the issue aroused such controversy.
(4) indicate how the issues of Oregon and Texas became central in the election of 1844 and why Polk's victory was seen as a mandate for "Manifest Destiny."
(5) describe how the issues of California and the Texas boundary created conflict and war with Mexico.
(6) describe how the dramatic American victory in the Mexican War led to the breathtaking territorial acquisition of the whole Southwest.
(7) describe the consequences of the Mexican War, especially its effect on the slavery question.

Discuss:
(1) The movement toward expansion in relation to the theories of American "Manifest Destiny" and
"mission." The focus might be on how the drives to acquire Oregon, Texas, and California arose from the general belief that America should expand across the continent.

(2) The role of women in the westward expansion of the 1840s to Oregon and elsewhere. Compare their
outlooks and concerns to those that dominated the "manifest destiny" ideology.

(3) The origins of the Mexican War in relation to Polk's desire for California and the narrow issue of the Texas boundary. Analyze the charges by the war's opponents that Polk's essential aim was to add new slave territory to the United States. Consider the long-term results of the Mexican War

Chapter Themes: (1) The explosion of cotton production fastened the slave system upon the South, creating a complex, hierarchical racial and social order that deeply affected whites as well as blacks.

(2) The emergence of a small but energetic radical abolitionist movement caused a fierce proslavery backlash in the South and a slow but steady growth of maderate antislavery semtiment in the North.

Chapter 16 Learning objectives:

(1) point out the economic strengths and weaknesses of the "Cotton Kingdom."
(2) describe the southern planter aristocracy and identify its
strengths and weaknesses.
(3) describe the nonslaveholding white majority of the South and
explain its relations with both the planter elite and the black slaves.
(4) describe the nature of African-American life, both free and slave,
before the Civil War.
(5) describe the effects of the "peculiar institution" of slavery on
both blacks and whites.
(6) explain why abolitionism was at first unpopular in the North and
describe how it gradually gained strenght.
(7) describe the fierce southern response to abolitionism and the
growing defense of slavery as a "positive good."

Discuss:
(1) The complex relations among the different elements of southern society; planter-aristocrats, small planters, poor whites, slaves, and free blacks. Contrast the dominant slaveholding elite with the mass of poorer whites who nevertheless supported slavery.

(2) The nature of slavery. Explain how slavery was both an economic institution and a social system that shaped whites and blacks alike, including their social and family life.

(3) The lives of blacks under slavery. Show both the burdens of the system and the slaves' struggles to survive and maintain humanity.

(4) The various responses to slavery, from radical abolitionism to the defense of slavery as a positive good and why the abolitionists had such a great impact even though they were an unpopulary minority.

(5) The operation of a typical large plantation or the working life of a typical large-plantation owner, including relations with overseers and slaves.

(6) The black family and black religion. Consider how slavery affected both white and black views of women, family.

(7) The paradox that slavery often involved intimate and personal relationships between individual whites and blacks, even while it maintained a strict and often violent system of control over the slaves as a group. Why was this "paternalistic" element of American slaveholding so important to southerns' self-justification of slavery.

           (2) The attempt to improve Americans' faith, morals, and character affected
nearly all areas of American life and culture, including education,
the family , literature, and the arts-culmination in the great crusade
against slavery.

Chapter 15, Learning Objectives:
(1) describe the changes in American religion and their effects on culture and
social reform.
(2) describe the cause of the most important American reform movements of the period.
(3) explain the origins of American feminism and describe its various manifestations.
(4) describe the utopian and communitarian experiments of the period.
(5) identify the early American achievements in the arts and sciences.
(6) analyze the American literary flowering of the early nineteenth century, especially
in relation tdo transcendentalism and other ideas of the time.

Class discussions:
1. Explain the revivals of the Second Great Awakening and their broad cultural implications.
How the spirit of social reform grew out of individual conversion, and how religious
change was linked to the wider democratic movements in American society.

2. the nature of the nineteenth-century family and its relation to society, stressing
particularly how the "cult of domesticity" and women's "separate sphere" gave women
a specially defined role in society. how female reformers began to advocate their
own rights as well as the betterment of others.

3. the early women's movement as on of the most important reforms and explain the obstacles
it faced. the relationship between women's growing activism and the broader reforms
of the antebellum era.

4. explore the "perfectionist" and "utopian" quality of early American culture, as revealed
in both the utopian communal experiments and philosophical movements like transcendentalism.
Point out the involvement of many writers in reform movements and experiments like
Brook Farm.

5. the general American perception of Irish immigration to America and the historical "image"
of Irish-Americans and their culture from the nineteenth century - acutual experience of
Irish-American immigrants over several generations.

6. "messages" especially aimed at children and women reveal prevalent social attitudes, as
well ass the nature and purposes of nineteenth-century education.

7. the absolutely crucial role that basic "infrastructure"- particularly transportation,
communication, and water/sanitation facilities- play as a foundation in the early
stages of lindustrial development.

8. one or more of the utopian communities, such as the Shaker communes, New Harmony, Oneida,
or Brook Farm. Consider how the success or failure of such efforts should be judged.

****** Remember  Test on Chapters 14 & 15 Will be 12/08

Chapter Themes: (1) In the era of Jacksonian democracy, the American population grew rapidly and changed in character. More people lived in the raw West and in the expanding cities, and immigrant groups like the Irish and Germans added their labor power to America's economy, sometimes arousing hostility from native-born Americans
in the process.

                          (2) In the early nineteenth century, the American economy developed the beginnings of
industrialization. The greatest advances occurred in transportation, as canals and railroads bound the Union together into a continental economny with strong
regional specialization.

Chapter learning objectives:
(1) describe the movement and growth of America's population in the early nineteenth century.
(2) describe the effects of Irish and German immigration on American society.
(3) explain why America was relatively slow to embrace the industrial revolution and the factory.
(4) describe the early development of the factory system and Eli Whitney's system of interchangeable parts.
(5) indicate the nature of early industrial labor and explain its effects on workers, including women and children.
(6) describe the imnpact of new technology and transportation systems on American business and agriculture.
(7) describe the sequence of major transportation and communication systems that developed from 1790 to 1860 and indicate their economic consequences.
(8) describe the effects of the market revolution on the American economy, including the new disparities between rich and poor.

We will work in class on the beginning of Chapter 14.

Class Discussions:

(1) Irish and German immigrants and the reaction of the Nativists. Why the nativists felt that immigrant poverty and Catholicism posed a threat to American democracy. Consider the important role that the Catholic church
played in the lives of Irish and German Catholic immigrants despite the opposition of nativists.

(2) Examine the effects of early industrial development on labor and society. Show how the change from a subsistence to a market economy affected workers,
farmers, and expecially women.

(3) Consider the various stages of the market and transportation revolutions. Focus on the particular significaance of the steamboat and the canal, and
their gradual replacement by the railroad.

(4) Analyze the relation between the growing national economy and the regional economic specialization of the Northeast, South, and Midwest. Point out the paradoxical way in which economic development both united and divided the sections.

Homework :
Read Chapter 14 Use the Identify, Describe, Defines, Locates for the chapter "Checking Your Progress" worksheets. 

November 17, 2008

Chapter 13 - The Rise of a Mass Democracy, 1824 - 1840

Chapter Themes:
Theme (1) The election to the presidency of the frontier aristocrat and common person's hero, Andrew Jackson, signalled the end of the older elitist political leadership represented by John Quincy Adams. A new spirit of mass democracy and popular involvement swept through American society, bringing new energy as well as conflict and corruption to public life.

Theme (2) Jackson successfully mobilized the techniques of the New Democracy and presidential power to win a series of dramatic political battles against his enemies. But by the late 1830s, his Whig opponents had learned to use the same popular political weapons against the Democrats, signaling the emergence of the second American party system.

Bell Ringer: Flow Chart - create a flow chart to fill in the missing events  (DOK3) (DI)
a. British Warships attacks the Chesapeake
b.
c. Madison asks Congress to pass the Non-Intercourse Act
d.
e. France takes concillatory steps
f.
g. Congress declares war.

Bell Ringer:  Ten Question Quiz - Unit 5, The New Nation: 1789 - 1800

•   see Lesson Plans for 10/14 - check the Bell Ringer Question
•   go over the Identify, Defines, Describes
•   go over the CYP worksheets
•   review Chapter 11