Joffree Herrera
E portfolio
ECON 1740
I really enjoyed this online class. It was laid out just the way I would expect an online class to be.
Students were expected to read a chapter from the text book American Economic History by Jonathan
Hughes and Louis P. Cain. Once the chapter had been read there was a test available online consisting of
25 questions relating to the material in the chapter. I really appreciated that Dr. KT Magnusson choose
to leave all of the test open until the end of the semester. This made it really convenient to get all the
chapters read at my own pace and without the stress of multiple due dates. We read 15 chapters from
the book including:
 Chapter 5: West Ward Expansion.
The constitution settlement of 1789-1791
The struggle between church and state
The constitutional convention
The land ordinances of 1785, 1787, 1790
territorial gains 1790, 1853
 Chapter 6: Population and the labor force
Expansion of African slavery
The rise of king cotton
Income and wealth distribution
 Chapter 7: Law and the rise of classical American capitalism
Property rights & Political powers
 Chapter 8: Transportation, internal improvements, urbanization
Rail roads, steam boats, canals, and roads
 Chapter 9: Agricultural Expansion
population, farm size, farm wealth comparison
Cotton as a foreign exchange
Dependence on slavery, labor intensive slavery
western expansion of northern agriculture
 Chapter 10: Special topic, the debate over slavery
Slave history & slave family
The debate included:
slavery being a rational way for southerners to maximize profits and wealth
slavery was growing before the civil war
slave agriculture was more successful than family farming
The demand for slaves was increasing
breeding was a myth
southern economy was growing faster than the north
 Chapter 11: The Early Industrial Sector
Direction of change in manufacturing
The industrial revolution
American innovations
The course of expansion
Economic considerations
 Chapter 12: The Financial Community and the International Economics
The development of currency and banking
The first and second banks
Antebellum capital market
The business cycle
 Chapter 13: Economical effects of the civil war
Cost of the war
How the war was financed
recovery period
 Chapter 14: Railroads and economic development
completion of the railroads
grants for construction
economic growth
attack on big business
 Chapter 15: Post civil war agriculture
The farmers complaints
Closing the frontier
 Chapter 17: industrialization and urban growth
The growth of industry & market expansion
 Chapter 18: Big business and government intervention
Munn vs Illinois
The Antitrust Act
The Sherman Act
 Chapter 19: Financial development 1863- 1914
The national bank act
The Bland Allison Act of 1878
The Sherman Silver Purchase Act of 1890
Gold standard Act 1900
 Chapter 20: The Giant Economy And Its International Relations
Trends in trade and payments
US share of world trade
In addition to reading the book I also read the article Timeline: The Abolition of the Slave Trade by
Andrea Curry. I really liked reading her article; she was very informative while keeping it simple at the
same time. Some things that I highlighted while reading were…
“In 1783 the British Quakers established the antislavery committee that played a huge role in abolition.”
“In 1833 slavery was abolished thought the British Empire.”
The article Timeline: The Abolition of the Slave Trade really ties into the information covered in Chapter
10 from the text book.