Antebellum Reform Movements
Era of the Common Man
Cause : Started in the 1820's universal white male suffrage spread.
Effects
- Andrew Jackson, a "common man" was elected.
- Candidates had to campaign to appeal to common people
- The common man gained more influence in government
Women's Rights
- Women saw taking care of society as an extension of taking care of the home
- Women resented men giving them secondary roles in reform
- Women, like men during the "Era of the Common man" wanted more
Mental Hospitals
Dorothea Dix - exposed inhumane treatment of the mentally ill
- States created mental hospitals, not prisons, to give the mentally ill proper help
Prisons
Reform: Prisoners were treated inhumanely
- were sometimes jailed just for being in debt
- Prisons began focusing more on rehabilitating prisoners and "debtors" prison was abolished
Public Education
Reform:
- Education was only affordable for the wealthy
- Many believed the country could only survive if citizens were educated.
- Horace Mann- Pushed for public tax- supported schools with required attendance
Abolitionism
- Abolition of slavery
Abolitionism - The abolition of slavery was the biggest and most divisive issue of religion
- Tension over the issue of slavery contributed to the Civil War