APUSH
CHAPTER 9 NOTES
“THE TRANSFORMATION OF AMERICAN SOCIETY, 1815-1840”
(the following is for pages 268-272)
THE REVOLUTION IN SOCIAL RELATIONSHIPS
 Americans questioned authority to an unprecedented degree. An attitude of individualism
sprouted and took firm root in antebellum America. Now Americans used the word to
signify positive qualities: self-reliance and the conviction that each person was the best judge
of his or her own true interests.
 Even as Americans widely proclaimed themselves a nation of self-reliant individualists and
questioned the traditional basis of authority, they sought to construct new foundations for
authority.
The Attack on the Professions
 Intense criticisms of lawyers, physicians, and ministers exemplified this assault on authority.
 It peaked between 1820 and 1850.
 Professionals were often transients and thus not accepted completely in the towns and cities
they moved to.
 Samuel Thomson convinced people that you didn’t need education or a license to practice
medicine, so by 1845 every state had repealed laws that required licenses and education to
practice medicine.
 Also, people would dismiss their pastors if they didn’t like their message.
 Dueling became a widespread frontier practice.
The Challenge to Family Authority
 Children engaged in a quiet questioning of parental authority.
 Economic change gave children the choice of working at home for their parents or venturing
out on their own.
 They wanted to decide for themselves when and whom to marry
 It also became more common for women to get married out of birth order from their sisters.
 There became a growing number of long engagements as women wanted to wait to give up
their independence.
Wives and Husbands
 Relations between wives and husbands were changing during the 1820s and 1830s toward a
form of equality
 They adopted a separate but equal doctrine. Men were superior in making money and
governing the world and women as superior for their moral influence on family members.
 Women had to raise children and became more involved in deciding how many children they
wanted to have.
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By 1900 the average woman was bearing 3.98 children compared to 7.04 children in 1800.
This was due to the shift in the type of work that was needed by child laborers.
The decline in birthrate was accomplished by abstinence from sexual intercourse (including
between married couples) or by abortion.
By 1865, popular tracts had familiarized Americans with a wide range of birth-control
methods, including the condom and the diaphragm.
Supporters of the ideal of separate spheres did not advocate full legal equality for women.
However, it did enhance their power within marriage.
Horizontal Allegiances and the Rise of Voluntary Associations
 The traditional patriarchal family was an example of a vertical allegiance: the wife and
children looked up to the father for leadership. Authority flowed from the top down.
 Vertical Allegiances: people in a subordinate position identify their best interests with the
interests of their superiors rather than with those of other individuals in the same subordinate
position
 Vertical relationships became less important in people’s lives
 Horizontal allegiances: People began identifying more with people in a similar situation as
they are.
 Maternal and debating societies exemplified the American zeal for voluntary associations –
associations that arose apart from government and sought to accomplish some goal of value
to their members (for example temperance societies)
o They encouraged sociability
o They were vehicles for members to assert their influence
 Moral-reform societies represented collective action by middle-class women to increase their
influence in society. Targets were alcoholism and prostitution.
(the following is related to page 273)
Alexis de Tocqueville – “Democracy in America” (1835)
- Frenchman who travels the U.S. and writes about his observations
- describes every aspect of our govt. from national to local
- shows how Americans are always trying to move forward and get ahead
- shows how whites treated each other as equals but could be very cruel to other races
and groups
- shows growth of nation thru internal improvements (roads, canals) and growth of
factories and expansion of trade