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The Bering Land Bridge Theory - Bering Land Bridge National Preserve (U.S. National Park Service)

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The continent of North America has been inhabited by humans for at least 16,500 years. As early as the 1500s, early settlers and European thinkers were interested in discovering how humans had come to populate North and South America. One theory suggested the migration of Norsemen across Greenland i…

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The geographical-cultural regions of North America: General perspective.

Inuit; in Alaska, northern Canada and the ice floes, and Greenland. The coasts of Alaska (A1), the Canadian coasts in the north (A2) and the island of Greenland, considered to be part of America (A3) fit within the boundaries of this cultural area.

Subarctic Area; it is the largest out of all of them, and the toughest in regard to its continental nature. It includes the Yukon and the territories of the northeast. Hunting and fishing are the resources which can be made use of in some way. The Canadian Shield (B1), the Northern Rockies (B2), the western Athabaskan subarctic area and the eastern subarctic or Algonquin (B4).

Southeastern strip of Alaska and its coast, with forests and oceanic tendencies.

California. Southern California is more dry, but is also included. It has a great quantity of Mediterranean resources; it is reminiscent of the Boreal Forest. It is the most populated area, and although no agriculture existed, there were a great deal of resources. They were excellent in basket making, as they did not know other things.

Interior plateau, Columbia River basin, and the mountainous regions. It includes the northern zone, Canada and meridional area of the United States (E1 and E2). Here we find the "Nez Percé."

Great Basin of the Rockies; including Death Valley, inhabited by desert cultures and nomadic family groups; the Shoshones and Utes are included.

Nevada, Arizona, Mexico, Sonora and Sinaloa, with ancient mesas and hills witnesses have seen a thousand times in the cinema. They are very complex areas, with ruins of the Mogollon tribes, Anasazi, "Pueblo Indians" and others, all very complex, of which are left remains and ruins of their settlements, guides to astronomical rituals, etc. Such are those in Chaco Canyon, and those of the Hopi Indians. They had a strong cultural resistance, and even today many continue living there in a similar way. In Mesa Verde we find stone villages, constructed based on limestone areas, located under ledges and adjacent to limestone mesas, or in the style of cellars in order to take advantage of the coolness in the summer and as a hiding place in the winter. Here ceramics are known, and those of great quality. Here also are the Navajos, and the Apache (Mescaleros, Tontos, Jicarillas, and others).

Definition of the area.- Geography.

The Arctic area was inhabited in nearly all of its totality. However, we only find one linguistic type.

The Arctic area refers to the zone above the polar circle; but this area can be defined by means of the isotherm of 10ºC in July. This isotherm marks the permafrost line (which does not permit forest growth). It is the limit of the tundra. This is a varied region in which is included Greenland, the northeastern extreme of Asia and the north of North America.

We distinguish three areas:

Subarea of the western arctic of Alaska.

Central Canadian arctic, which is the model we will use.

Greenland.

Their common factors are:

Their latitude, which produces 6 months of night and another 6 of day.

Very cold temperatures, which vary. In the east it is colder, owing to the cold currents which come down from the Arctic. On the western coast the warm Pacific currents smooth out the temperatures. The most extreme temperatures occur in the interior of the continent. In general they are below zero all year.

The ice floes, which are the cap of the frozen sea. The continental ice fields are in addition very irregular regarding terrain.

The central zone is whipped by winds and blizzards, in addition to fog when there is no wind.

Precipitation is minimal; the blizzards lift snow. The occidental zone is more humid.

The Arctic ecosystem

The Arctic ecosystem is unstable and young. It is only 10,000 years old- The Würm glacial stage, the last glacial period, ended 18,000 years ago. It can be divided into two subsystems.

Marine subsystem: In the marine subsystem are found cetaceans and pinnipeds, in addition to polar bears. But these animals are really very few, as the majority limit their activity to a seasonal and locational context. Many are migratory animals, and because of this the Homo Sapiens had to prepare themselves in order to find them. In addition, the rate of reproduction is very low and unstable, and the nutritional chain is very short (plankton- whale; plankton- fish- seal- bear). If, for example, the cold temperature of the water failed, there would not be plankton; and everything would go under. Because of this the most important resource is the hunting of marine mammals, although not everyone could hunt all the animals.

Terrestrial subsystem: There are many freshwater rivers with fishing, which all the Eskimos do. For them it is the primary resource; large fish which reach as much as 50 kg; salmon, sturgeon, etc. Almost all of the mammals are migratory and seasonal; the caribou search for moss and run from insects. The muskox lives in the Arctic all year. They live in community with the arctic partridge. On the ground there are in addition more animals with fur which were the cause of the entrance of the white man (arctic fox). They were hunted by the Inuit to decorate their dress.

The Inuit developed an enormous capacity for making use of things, in a permanent mobility. It is the most extreme case of hunter-gatherers; they were almost purely hunters. And they do not have nutritional deficits.

The language

The language was unified in Eskimo-Aleut. In the present they are separated into Eskimo and Aleut. Aleut is used in the Aleutian Islands. Eskimo can be differentiated into Yupik (5 languages in Alaska) and Inuit-Inupiaq, a chain of dialects spoken on all the islands and coasts as far as Greenland.

The inhabitants of the north-central zone of Canada are Inuit. Inuktitut is the common language which they all use, although it is a derivation of the ancient dialects in a modern language. Their physical type is of short stature, with a thick torso, fat in the cheeks, epicanthic folds, flat faces and broad noses. They have an elevated basal metabolism, and are capable of eating a great deal in only one sitting. They do not tend to suffer from cardiovascular nor dental problems, even though they did use them a lot.

In the present many physical problems derived from being sedentary have appeared.

Prehistory of the area

It is known well, a product of the last migration from Asia, and different colonizations, from Alaska towards Greenland. The last one from Siberia to Alaska was in 3000 B.C. In 2000 B.C., they crossed the whole arctic towards Greenland. They are known as Paleoeskimos. They show few similarities with the other Indians, and many with the Siberians. The climate at this time was more mild and there was less ice; they were not familiar with boats, nor sophisticated harpoons, nor sled dogs, nor did they live in houses made of skins. Their encampments were small, occupied very few days in the year, in familial groups.

Between 500 B.C. and 1000 A.D. the Dorset culture is established in the area. The area becomes colder, and the hunting grounds are extended. The populations are larger, the houses are more inhabited and semi-subterranean, of stone and turf. In them many animal remains are found. Stone lamps appear at this time, invented for ice houses, or igloos. They have abundant art made in ivory.

They decorated all their everyday objects. Towards 1000 A.D., they disappear.

A new migration from Alaska pushed these people. As there were more rivers in Alaska, canoes were invented (kayaks and umiaks). These new inhabitants would also bring technical innovations like the dismountable hunting harpoon. They were warriors and great ceramicists. Around 1000 the sea warms up, and there is more population; they emigrate in this manner to Greenland.

Between 160 and 1850 the small ice age is produced, which obligated the adaptation of the people of the Arctic, and their retirement from the coast. This group, called Thule, stays in this way relegated to history.

Subsistence in a glacial environment

The model of seasonal hunting.

The inhabitants find themselves obligated to continually move from one place to another. The Inuit mobility is great: they change houses six times a year. In the Bering Strait, however, they could stay in the same place for nine months. The model of the social nucleus is fluctuating according to the cycle of annual settlement. They meet in the ice floes, next to the hunting places (breathing holes of seals, hunting by waiting). This hunt can be done even during the long periods of darkness of the winter. Winter is critical because of hunger, because of which the proximity of companions is searched out. In March or April they separate in extended families. This dispersion was done for the time of hunting by stalking.

When the ice cap disappears (July) hunting can be done by kayak and canoe, especially for walruses.

When the summer came, the Inuit would abandon the ice and constructed tents of seal skin, and moved on to fishing with harpoons. They could reduce themselves to nuclear families.

In the summer there are eggs in their diet, and other animals. It is at this time that the great reunions happen in conjunction with the summer camps. Together the caribous are hunted, in diverse manners. These animals provide the skins for dress. The seal gives food and fat, and fuel for the stone lamps.

The use of many different weapons to hunt a multitude of different animals is to be highlighted.

The reunions were very productive on all levels. Once winter arrived, they built interconnected semi-subterranean houses. Mobility is continuous among all the arctic groups.

Settlement and dwellings

In Greenland, houses of stone are maintained. They are found semi-excavated on the ground, covered with ribs, turf, and skins. Some are very complex for various families. The houses were not private. The family that found it, used it, as private property of dwellings did not exist. The houses were not private in any way. The igloo, or ice house, had a round floor, a dome which started from a spiral model, with excavated entrances. In the interior ice furnishings were built to take advantage of the heat of the upper part. They were interconnected by means of galleries. The "Kashyn" are very large ceremonial houses, used in the winter for various families to meet.

Igloos could be covered with skins. Inside an igloo, it could be 8 or 10ºC.

The Inuit dress is made up of parkas of caribou skins (warm) and/or seal skin (impermeable) and trousers made of the same material. They have two sets, one with the hair facing inward and the other with the hair facing outward. Clothing was always decorated which permits the identification of the affiliation of the owner. They also used stockings, over which they wore hide boots and sandals on top. They do not wear snowshoes, as the surface on which they walk is not snow, but ice. These snowshoes are from the Boreal zone. The skin of the arctic fox was used only as a decoration, but when the fur trade began, they hunted them in abundance to sell them.

Technology

It should be highlighted that the Inuit increased the ability to overcome the environment by virtue of elaborate tools.

One of the principal tools was the stone lamp, known throughout the Arctic. It serves to heat ice houses. In this lamp seal blubber is burned; it gives light and heat, and does not produce smoke. It can be used for cooking.

They sewed impermeable diving suits, in order to avoid getting wet if they fell in the water, which they put on underneath the rest of their clothing when they went in kayaks. These kayaks were extremely elaborate instruments of hunting and travel. They were constructed of whale bone and skins, with pins outside to tie things to; in the interior nothing fits. They were for one person, but during the Russian domination they were built with two or three places. The umiak or open canoe was for springtime transportation and movement. All their weapons for hunting were specialized for one concrete type of animal. Short bows, made of whale bone, harpoons with a removable head, of multiple facets: double, triple, serrated, large, hooks, etc. They also used javelins, slings and dart throwers, and propellants made of bone. To hunt birds they used small lariats, with stones covered with leather.

The sled is exclusively arctic, pulled by dogs or by women. It can be made of nearly any material. They are all flexible, to accommodate them to the formations of ice floes. The dogs have a hierarchical behavior, in their position for the sled. The dogs are positioned in a fan.

Division of labor

The division of labor was fundamental, by sex. The couple was the basic unit of functionality. She sewed and cooked, and the husband hunted for the family, supplying the basic materials the rest of the family needs. The woman, in addition, is dedicated to caring for the clothing, for example, chewing the boots of the family to soften them for the morning. The children went inside the mother's coat until they could go alone. Weaning was done by means of the previous chewing by a family member, usually the mother, of the food which was then given to the child.

The man provides and the woman procures the instruments.

Arctic Society: The Inuit family.

Kinship and social structure

There are patrilineal tendencies in filial relationship and descent, the family being the father, the mother, the sons and their wives. There was not much to inherit, but this type of heredity was maintained. The extended families would in turn group with other families, reuniting in winter and summer. There are bands, macro-bands, groups and nuclear families, although the system was very flexible. There is an absence of formal leadership, and there are only temporary leaders by virtue of charisma and prestige, or chosen by the rest.

Betrothals were made from childhood, without any romanticism, only functionalism, and there was no matrimonial ritual. The marriage could separate before having children. Among the ancient Inuit there was polygyny, provided that the man could maintain more than one family. The most able hunters were prestigious and could give and share much more. It was thus even to the point that they could have a group of followers. In time of crisis polyandry could exist, although it was less durable.

The death of the man was frequent, and the rule was to remarry to give continuity to the nuclear family. Widows went so far as to commit suicide if they could not remarry.

The ideal was to have many relatives, real or fictional. Adoption was very standard, the children themselves being the ones who chose where to go. There is no tension between the father and the adoptive son. What matters is that the child be well taken care of, and there is no consecration of the biological family.

There were games in the open air or in houses. The boys and girls were coached from the time they were young in their roles as men and women. In the open air they had competitions of weapons, ability, ball games, hide-and-seek, blind man's bluff, etc. In the houses there were games of cords and knots, jacks, etc

Giving birth was normal, although the woman usually did it alone or assisted by another woman. During birth an adequate name of a relative or recently deceased friend was searched for. Until 8 years old, children were left to do whatever they wanted to. Starting then, they were taught the norms of etiquette, the relationships of care and respect between men and women, which transcended the familial nucleus. The difference of age was important in the rank of a person in the family. There was a distancing between boys and girls, and a special relationship between people with the same name (namesakes).

The system of "partners."

The system of "partners" was very common. From childhood two men would cooperate in the hunt. If one hunted, a ritual part corresponded to the other; they sang and danced together, they could interchange wives and couples, when circumstances did not permit mobility, like pregnancy; this was considered a solution of a practical character. The infanticide of daughters and the suicide of elders occurred when food could not be assured. The elders helped themselves to die when they realized that they could not serve the family.

Leadership and social control

The systems of social control were based on the mockery and derision of friends and family, the "what will the neighbors say of me?".

When there was a quarrel between two people, public duels were produced between the two challengers, whether they were of song, dances, or blows, which were all institutionalized.

The public confession of someone in the family exonerated the guilt of a crime or quarrel.

Inuit Ideology And Art

Worldview and myths

The Inuit had a very strong animistic base; everything for them has a supernatural part called "inua." The supernatural entities can be good, bad, guardians, etc. The majority of supernatural entities were dangerous. The personification of some supernatural beings was common, in the way of divinities. The most important was Sedna nuliayuk, a lady who lived in the depths of the sea, owner of all the animals and things of the sea. Her creation is based on a myth: Two ogres had an enormously hungry daughter, who even ate their feet. The parents, fed up, put her in an umiak and pushed it out to sea. But she grabbed the gunwale and the parents cut off her fingers from which all the marine animals arose.

Other peoples had the baby Sila, who guided the winds.

The Sun is feminine, and the Moon masculine, two siblings who chase each other. Some stars are also personified.

The Inuit cosmogony is based on stories, narrations, and myths with an ethical sense. There is no cycle of origin, there is not a creation. The primordial age continues there, in a supernatural world. The diverse spirits exchange skins by means of veils. There are giants who interact with the animals of their size (whales, bears) and dwarfs who do it with small animals. The giants are strong, and the dwarfs do not have strength.

The behaviors from the stories transmit ideas and ways of life: it regards fixing things, but if these become too complicated, there is a certain conformism.

The spirits are not believed in, they are feared.

Observances and taboos

Within this vision, every Inuit had a series of taboos and observances, and amulets in order to not irritate the inua. A respectful treatment is given to the catch of the hunt. Fresh water is given to seals after death. Caribou skins cannot be sewed when seals are hunted, nor can their meat be put together... In such a manner the terrestrial things like the marine cannot be put together.

The first important hunt of the boy (a seal) was carved up by the mother, and it was consumed by everyone except the boy, who was smeared with the blood of the prey.

Shamans could get a hold of supernatural components, in the search for their vision. The intermediary shaman (Siberian denomination) in the Arctic was called "angakoq." They were seers, witch doctors, the last resource when the Inuit could not deal with something. The angakoq can be a man or a woman, although the men were always more numerous. They had the capacity to handle and access the inua. The angakoq could search for vision through dreams, delirium or sickness. The external help they used was primarily not eating, self-torture, cold, and isolation. There was no veto to becoming a shaman. A vision was had, and another shaman taught them to transcend, using an esoteric language only able to be translated by other shamans. They taught themselves tricks of illusion and ventriloquy (to create a propitiatory ambiance). They could achieve clairvoyance regarding predictions of meteorological weather, cure, and transcend.

Shamans existed in all communities, and those who were full time specialists were maintained by others. When facing a great crisis it was the figure of the shaman who fixed things. Some were very feared, and could become dictators, who subdued communities through fear. The most powerful were men, who could overstep their power. Some who were especially maleficent could be expelled from their communities, which assumed being condemned to death.

The Inuit facing death

In the Inuit society, death had a period of mourning, which expelled the ghost from the place of death. The dead was bound up and covered, and was never taken out through the door, so that the ghost would not know how to return. The body was even burned. The primary period of mourning lasted 4 days- the number 4 is sacred in all of North America. The memory of the dead lasted a year, until the return to the place of death the next year.

For them the human being has three souls or inua:

1. The first is lost upon becoming sick, and is recuperated upon recovery.

2. Another is lost in death, and is directed to the underworld. This underworld is located in the sky, which for the Inuit is found above their heads in the manner of a dome.

3. A third soul- the ghost is associated with the name, character, and personality of the deceased. This inua should be scared away from the house. It is lost with the last breath.

The Inuit make their graves with stones or ice.

Artists and traditional art

Inuit art- or arctic without more, and also the Yupik- was ceremonial, in the way of masks, suits, costumes, etc. In the central area, things were much more simple.

Artistic objects were varied:

Oratory was very important; knowing how to properly speak was a must.

Song and dance, always in a context which transmits information based on a sentiment.

Elaboration and ornamentation of garments, which identified the social groups, like glass beads and paintings.

Works in stone and ivory, made by the men and shamans, as ideas, stories, and amulets. They were striking and demanded by the first explorers. They make bears, oxen, canoes, kayaks... also as toys. The latter were made for sale to westerners, and are by and for sale, which is also a source of income for the Inuit. They are commercialized by means of cooperatives; there are in addition artists to the west who live by it, and others who sell from time to time. There are shops and individual variations, and also recordings and lithographs, introduced by the westerners, which are cheaper and more productive, and well accepted.

Tattoos and paintings are widely diffused. Painting is to demonstrate transitory states, from the tate of enthusiasm for war, mourning, etc. Tattoos were made with needle and thread, and were made on the face, hands, and wrists, indicating a state and an appearance. For women, it indicated the predisposition to marry, with drawings on the forehead, the cheeks, and the chin.

Processes of Change in the Arctic

The first contacts

The process of change in the Arctic is similar to that produced in all of North America. It can be divided into three differentiated stages.

1. Period of exploration.

2. Period of commerce.

3. Period of colonization. This last stage can be subdivided into: Commerce, Army and Church.

During the First stage of exploration, 400 years ago, scientific maritime expeditions were conducted in the Labrador, in search of the Northern passage, which is found frozen, in addition to commercial and mining explorations. There were sporadic contacts with the Inuit, with light exchanges of goods. It is in this era that the first sicknesses are introduced. In America at this time there were no defenses against the European sicknesses.

The period of commercial hunting

In the Second stage, in the 19th and 20th Centuries (1900-1930), abundant trading posts were made use of for the hunting of the white fox, very desired by the European elites. The Hudson Bay Company (HBC) put permanent posts in the Eastern and Central Arctic. Each hunter would trap the foxes and deliver them in exchange for renting the traps and other goods. The fox is hunted in winter, but by reason of being an animal of the interior, the vital cycle of the Inuit was left disrupted. The Inuit, in addition were left indebted and ended up ruined by disrupting their cycle, even being able to die of starvation in many cases.

The confrontation with the Canadian Mounted Police followed all this. Later the missionaries arrived: Anglicans, Protestants... who would put the Inuit language in written form; this is of enormous importance, as in the present the Inuit use this writing to spread their traditions. In the central area the Roman Catholics were the most active. Boarding schools did not work in the Arctic, not so in the rest of North America, where they became authentic acculturation camps.

The Great Depression

With the Great Depression and the Second World War, the economy based on the hunting of furs sinks, and the commercial posts abandon their positions. This introduced great famines. After the Second World War, the U.S. Military bases helped the Inuit, who could work. In this way the fur trade was repaired, and in the present some continue trapping.

The Inuit in the present

In the Central Arctic the Inuit have introduced themselves in Canada. They have resisted intrusion, maintaining a great deal of their culture without assimilating themselves.

In the present they have changed: they are Canadians, and they are Inuit. They have developed as an ethnic group and have their own territory and laws. Recovery has happened since 1950, currently being some 150,000 individuals, many more than in the past.

The Inuit have realized a process of becoming sedentary in locations. In the 50s they established themselves in small coastal villages, and in the 80s, 70% lived in permanent settlements of 50 inhabitants. Their houses are of the western style, with schools, outpatient clinics, law and order. The Inuit suffer in their body the establishment of western foods and customs: they are fat, they have cavities and diabetes, and heart diseases previously unknown to their people.

They utilize western technological elements, but also harpoons, sleds, snowmobiles, airplanes, seaplanes, motorboats...

They have a high level of unemployment, with a social assistance which especially covers children- which causes the growth of the birth rate- and the state offers them temporary jobs. Among them the cooperatives of commercial arts, stone sculptures and engravings, which are sold far from the Arctic, have great success, and constitute and important source of income. These cooperatives maintain "denominations of origin." In great part they are made up of part-time artists, and when they have money available they go out to hunt. Well know artists also exist, who can earn a great deal of money. Some of their works tell stories (of the giant, of the old woman-wolf, of the dwarf...)

Political achievements

The Inuit do not have intermediaries to speak with the central government of Canada, and they do it directly. In addition, the climate that reigns in the Northwest Territories helps their isolation. In the Canadian provinces (Alberta, British Columbia...) the natives are a minority, not like in the Arctic, where some 80% are indigenous, and the whites are scarce and live in cities.

In the 60s they did not have representation in Parliament, but little by little they organized themselves in electoral districts, gaining representatives in the parliament of Ottawa. This has been possible because of the homogenization of the Inuktitut language, which has become an identity link. They have 22 native representatives. In the 70s, the Inuit Tapirisat was organized, the conference in which the reconfiguration of the Northwest Territory in two: the Northwest Territory itself and Nunavut (our land), desired by 85% or northerners. However, in the provinces it is looked down on. Nunavut is a territory in which rights would be recognized for the peoples of the Arctic: that they are different peoples, with nations and institutions, with preferential rights to lands and resources of fishing, hunting, and exploitation of lands.

In 1992 a referendum was made. Since 1999, Canada has three Nunavut territories, granting to their inhabitants powers and rights, although they are not a territory for the Inuit (for example, they lack their own justice system).

The Inuit are the people who have most achieved relating themselves without assimilating themselves to the western world, owing to two key factors: the use of a common language, and the rigorous nature of the climate in which they live.

Adaptation to change

Towards the end of the present century, the Inuit have begun to form private organizations to defend their interests. These organizations have influenced, for example, the resolution on the land claims. The Inuit Circumpolar Conference, founded in 1977, meets every three years and provides for the Inuit of Greenland and North America a meeting place for debating common problems, pressuring in favor of Inuit representation in planning for economic development and promoting the conservation of the environment.

Ancient Civilizations of the Pacific
Northwest

On this coast, the cultural models change from the Inuit in Alaska, towards the south. The cultural aspects are very variable owing to the distinct types of habitats. It is a very silhouetted coastline with fjords, islands, and bays, which correspond to 24,000 km of coasts. Forests are very abundant due to the high precipitation.

The geographical environment in which it is situated is of great importance, constituting itself facing the sea, which is the principal source of resources. There are abundant fjords and estuaries, which make the search for passages difficult. The vegetation is so abundant that certain spruces have acclimatized themselves to the sand and salt of the beach. Fog is a climatic constant, and abundant rivers and freshwater lakes exist.

The Columbia River is the major basin which drains from the American continent into the Pacific, although the Fraser, Nass, and Skeena rivers are also very important in the area. The control of rivers and springs was basic for the search for resources. Some groups lived on pirating.

Environment and resources

The arboreal mantle is very striking: conifers, "hemlock" conifers of enormous size, spruces, cypresses, marcescent trees, of rapid growth in the style of poles. The trees are of great height, and are used in the present for the logging and paper industries. It can be considered a temperate rainforest, with very weak floors easily washable by the great amount of precipitation.

In this region a very important vegetable harvest was produced, as there are many types of wild fruits (or forest fruits) with up to 40 distinct varieties. There are also lilaceous bulbs in the meridional latitudes, with which trading was done; the "camas" or sweet onion is famous. The growth of some plants was provided for by means of burning and agroecology. A multitude of ferns of variable size live in the area.

The "red cedar" of the cypress family- they are not cedars- of vertical grain and extremely durable wood, especially with the humidity there is, makes up the base of construction, dress, and multiple utilities even to the point of being called the "tree of life." From it they made tools as well.

In the rivers there are 5 different types of salmon, with different habits, which swim up the rivers at different times- autumn, spring- and some are fished for in the sea. Some are large and oily, others are lean and able to be stored. It is the primary resource in nearly all of the northeast coast. The sturgeon is also a significant resource, as well as the halibut, a species of bream, which is a resource of the open sea and weighs as much as 300-400 kg. The eulachon, candle fish, or "hooligan," is a species of anadromous smelt with high fat, it was used as the raw material for grease and oil, for which it was traded along the grease trails. A great quantity of scorpionfish type rock fish are utilized.

Marine mammals constitute another important resource; pinnipeds and otters, different types of whales, belugas, and orcas. These last were a mythical and recognizable animal. The sea otter is an animal enormously valuable for its skin, which in addition to covering, is impermeable. They were drivers of colonization.

The land animals utilized are the deer, caribou, grizzly bears (the 2nd carnivore) and the black bear. Hunting on land was always a complementary activity.

Marine birds produced eggs and meat resources. Also the Canadian goose.

The collection of seafood in the intertidal zones was a common activity, in which mollusks, bivalves, crustaceans, and echinoderms of great size were collected.

There are very dangerous red tides, which eliminate life and could provoke famines.

Octopus and other similar animals are also eaten.

The area hardly has any snakes, but does have flies, black flies, and mosquitoes, in addition to lice.

Pumas are known and feared. They have large areas of distribution.

Natural and cultural regions

There is an enormous incidence of wood as a raw material: from canoes to art, and a particular use of the environmental resources like fishing. The hierarchical social classes of the northwest coast occurs in a hunter-gatherer economy (fishers). The art is emblematic and is used as a sign of identity.

This peculiar formation of rivers and vegetation gives rise to

1. Interior coast of little depth, beaches and intertidal zones, with many resources. The waters are protected from the sea, and an enormous abundance of basic resources is found.

2. Open coast, very rough, with access to the marine mammals.

The denominations are of a linguistic type, and lack a political sense, as they were expansionist and warlike groups.

Tlingit, Haida, Tsimshian, Nishga, Gitksan, Haisla, Kwakiutl, Nuuchahnutl on Vancouver Island, Makah, the northernmost people of the coast of the U.S.

Towards the north, there is a series of tribes with similar languages, among the Chinook. These gave rise to the Chinook jargon, which is a mix of many languages, including Spanish and French.

In the northern zone, the Tlingit, Haida, and Haisla were those who best adapted to the traditional way of life in the Pacific Northwest. Towards the south, the progressive changes begin.

In the central area were those who spoke Wakashan, and the meridional zone would be the coast of Washington and Oregon.

The Settlements of the Pacific Coast

It is difficult to reconstruct the original model of settlements. Records can be found in the the diaries of the first Spanish explorers. According to these sources, they were permanent settlements on the beach, with wooden houses oriented to the sea. They were usually decorated, some made on posts, and they did not have chimneys, only one opening in the way of a door. The settlements consisted of 6-8 houses in a line, with the principal, largest house in the center. They used a plank platform for a pier. They were communal houses, with a noble lineage which lived completely inside. The plebeians and slaves also lived inside. The largest houses could fit as many as 500 people. Each family occupied its space with an established order. Some towns could become depopulated, when the people went away, taking the planks with them to make temporary settlements in the spring and summer.

The dwellings, characteristics and styles

The house was made of cedar wood, by means of a fixed structure covered with planks or boards, fitted or mounted in different ways, according to the different tribes. The roof planks were loose, and could be moved or taken out so that smoke would not accumulate. The interior had floorboards, and on occasions the floors were excavated in order to use it for storage, in the style of a central well covered over with boards where normal life could go on. Inside there were small houses separated by folding screens. In some cases one entered through felled posts.

The houses of the south were more simple, smaller, and less decorated.

Houses were profusely decorated. The posts were made of felled cedar, although they are from the colonial era. The facade of the house was painted, and they went even further and painted the symbol of the family or of the proprietary lineage. The beams were also carved.

Each settlement had an indeterminate number of houses. In front and behind existed a useful space and an area for public activities. Among the Haida it was customary to construct a small house in the style of a rubbish heap in the area behind. All the houses had an alignment with respect to that of the chief.

Technology: the importance of wood

Their technology was based on wood, especially cedar, although they also had many other trees with distinct uses. The shape of their adzes was always of the same style. The entrance of iron totally changed the material culture. All the men were consummate carpenters. The trunk was excavated with patience, organization, and stone. The trunks were separated with wedges in order to take out planks. They made wooden boxes, as they knew neither glass nor ceramics. The joints were different and sealed, they were made by bending planks and they were able to make cases, backpacks, buckets, oil cans, etc...

The cedar, the tree of life

From the red cedar fibers from the bark were also taken. All of the women were weavers and basket makers. From this interior bark they extracted the necessary threads. They were packed, folded, moved, and softened by means of bark crushers, and finally the soft fibers were used for almost everything that could be imagined, so much so that it was used for napkins, and as toilet paper. From each strip of bark, three smaller strips were taken. The looms did not stretch the fibers. Over the strips the woman wove, achieving cloaks and dresses, which were the only clothing, although some tribes like the Tlingit also used hides. They did not use stockings nor moccasins. Blankets could be painted, and the women wore skirts in addition. With the bark they made objects and ceremonial coverings, masks, hats... There were also baskets braided from wide strips, or of dyed fibers, bedding, table linens, and interwoven baskets with a stronger body, based on stronger roots. There was an enormous variety in types of fabric stitching.

Social Organization of the Pacific Northwest Tribes

Hierarchical organization

The peoples of the Northwest Coast maintained a complex social organization, based on the privileges of the nobility.

The noble lineages had rights to the exploitation of resources, and in ceremonies they carried out more important roles.

A second-class nobility also existed, of free citizens, and a group of plebeians, who were free people who could not exploit resources and acted as the workforce. They sold cheap to the chiefs, but if they were not in agreement with them, they could always leave with another, sharing the house.

One last rank existed, that of the slaves, people who were the property of the chiefs. They could only marry other slaves, and their children were also slaves. They tended to be prisoners of war, although a slave trade existed and they could come from very far away. It was up to the tribe to attempt to rescue the prisoners within one year. Among the Tlingit, up to one third were slaves. It was a symbol of power, and their sacrifice in ceremonies was permitted, to demonstrate the power of the master. They could also be liberated, and they lived in the house of the chief.

There was a very rigid control of social mobility, which could only change by means of war.

Sociopolitical organization

The tribes were divided into five principal families: Haida, Tlingit, the Tlingit clans, Tsimshian-Gitksan and Tsimshian-Niska.

The Haida had two subdivisions or halves: Eagle - "Got" and Raven - "Hoya."

The Tlingit in two halves were composed of Raven - "Yehl" and Wolf - "Goch" (or Eagle - "Chak").

The twelve Tlingit clans were the Frog, the Goose, the Owl, the Raven, the Salmon, the Sea Lion, the Razorbill, the Bear, the Eagle, the Dogfish, the Orca, and the Wolf.

The Tsimshian- Gitksan were divided in four clans: Frog, Eagle, Wolf, and Fireweed.

The central and southern Tsimshian-Niska were divided in the same way into Raven, Eagle, Wolf, and Salmon.

Systems of affiliation and kinship

Descent was matrilineal. The system only functioned among the noble families, with the idea of avoiding the dispersal of resources, according to the attached diagram of kinship.

The sisters of the mother are equally considered mothers, and are referred to thus, like the brothers of the father are fathers. The sons of these fathers and mothers (2ºs) are brothers and sisters of ego.

Ego should marry the oldest daughter of the maternal uncle in order to be chief, as she is of a different lineage. And his brother marries the second daughter of the maternal uncle, etc. If this has happened in all the generations, the system makes a zigzag in which the resources of both lineages are maintained. In this way it is matrilineal and matrilocal. In other tribes, some chiefs were bilateral in lineages, giving equally to the son and the nephew.

The noble women had deformations in the lips, made by means of inserted plates. The powerful chiefs wore tattoos. Some took people with them who were spokesmen.

War was very common between these tribes, from small scale incursions to the extermination of certain groups. They kept heads, and made palisades in their territories. The Eyak, for example, were destroyed by the Tlingit. They were by no means peaceful, and used distinct types of defensive armament- armor made of splints over thick leather shirts, helmets and neck guards- and offensive- bows and daggers. Their aspect was impressive, as their shirts were made of moose leather, and their armor could be packed in boxes. Greaves, cuffs, and very thick wooden helms with painted and carved animal shapes, with hair and feathers, were very common. The most common hand to hand weapons were of hammer or pick type, very heavy and elaborate. They also used swords- whalebone clubs.

The motivations for war were varied. The most frequent excuses were revenges, returning offenses... but at the heart of it what was being looked for was lands or properties.

These tribes launched attacks against people from very far away. The Chinook very frequently attacked the coasts of Washington and Oregon. Hunger threatened all these tribes, and this was the basis for attacking another people, to get the necessary resources, or territories which would offer these resources.

Wars tended to be started by the secondary nobility, in order to progress. There were chiefs of second rank, dedicated solely to war, and to the armies, with professional soldiers.

War implied preparation and secret rituals on the part of the leader of the war, training of the soldiers, tactics, maneuvering... Surprise attacks at night were always preferred. Houses offered protection for those being attacked. The return implied the cutting off of heads in the settlements, and their exhibition.

System of Beliefs on the Pacific Northwest

The base for the beliefs of these tribes was animism, the idea that everything has a vital component or soul. In this way, the animistic idea is that which was dominant.

They conceived of the earth as a platform over which there is a vault, from which the stars hang. Those who had a clearer vision were the Haida. According to them, two earths existed: Haida Weii and the rest of the lands. The Earth was supported on a supernatural being, being a copper box from which an enormous post rises, which is linked with a cosmic tree, and by means of mythical cords, is linked to the posts of the families. When the post moves, earthquakes are produced.

It was an extremely simple vision of the world, although there was a preoccupation with the order of things.

- The sacred mineral was copper.

- The sacred plant was the red cedar.

- Among the animals, they conceived of a life parallel to humans, with their chiefs and settlements, which once a year dress themselves with their furs, making themselves available to be hunted. In the sea, the chief is the orca; on the ground it is the grizzly bear, and in the air the chief is the eagle. The chiefs control the movement of the other species, and man should thank these chiefs for their work.

There existed a complex of necessity for a protector or guardian being. Their search was realized by means of a vision obtained through suffering, as they were not familiar with hallucinogens. Through suffering the supernatural beings are searched for, who belong to a series of lineages.

There existed more abstract and in-concrete personifications: of the Moon, the Sun, the Thunderbird (which produces lightning and thunder when it bats its wings) and of other mythological animals.

General myths and "private" myths

In these tribes there were two types of myths. On one hand, those which explained things, and on the other those which were the property of a concrete lineage, private myths which were limited in their knowledge. The representations could be static, and they were narrated.

The Raven is the most important supernatural being (Raven/Crow). It is called the transformer, the trickster, as it transforms and changes the world. It is a being which acts in an inadvertent manner.

In the beginning of time, there was no light, as an old man had it closed up in several boxes. The Raven, eager to see the light, came up with a plan. The old man had a son who took water from the river. The Raven, transformed into water, is drunk by the woman, who became pregnant. In this way the Raven entered the house of the old man.

Among the private myths, one of the most known revolves around the mother bear. The Thunderbird, which feeds on whales, is, among these, the principal chief.

General rites

In all of the northwest coast the role of shamans existed; they were healers who cured sicknesses such as the loss of the soul. They wore a bone carved in the shape of the "hunter of souls" hung around the neck. They were charged with restoring order. Especially powerful shamans existed, who were at the side of some chiefs and really produced a great deal of fear. They did not cut their hair, and had to maintain a sexual abstinence and fast. There were various degrees among the shamans; there were the simple healers, but those who provided for the hunt and changed the weather were the most distinguished.

Hunting had an important magical and mystical component.

Rites were generally a representation or dramatization of a myth.

The first catches in gathering, fishing, and hunting were ritually celebrated. The first specimen captured was treated with solemnity, and was surrounded by ceremony. Its supernatural part would pass on that it had been treated with respect. It was taken to the settlement, cooked, and eaten by all.

Birth was a dangerous occurrence. Father and mother were shut in with fresh food. The umbilical cord was dried and kept. Once the child abandoned the cradle, the cord was burned or hidden in a place where it could not be misused.

The rites among the monarchy or of the first menstruation were more extensive. The higher the rank of the girl in the nobility, the longer it took. It was associated with impurity, and she was shut it and could not touch anything, nor wash, or be touched; she was taught in the labors of her rank. When the rite was finished, purification was made, accompanied by a great feast.

Funerary rites

When someone died it was considered that they entered another plane, which would end in the new reincarnation. In the the settlement of the beyond they would be warmed by the fire of their cremation, and would be nourished by the food of the pyre. This idea was important, to such a point that the funerary pyre and the cradle were referred to in the same way. The underworld had, like the earth, social hierarchies, and one's own ancestors legitimized the lineage, and one had to regard them with an attitude of respect. Only the men had the right to be buried. The mortuary rites were carried out to stop the cadaver from returning. Half of their clan was dedicated solely to the task of grieving, and the other half nourished and prepared the cadaver. The body was exhibited with its objects. The cadaver was taken out through a side wall, it was burned and the remains were put into a box, placed in a monument or totem. The Haida put the body in a box, and this in a garbage dump in the rear of the house of the lineage to which the deceased belonged. The feast of incineration was very important. The rites and ceremonies were carried out inside the house itself.

Secret societies and the Winter Ceremonial

The Winter Ceremonial is that over which the greatest number of rituals were applied, generally linked to secret societies, which varied from people to people, even in number. On the hierarchical scale, the chief could visit the rest of the ceremonies, but his days were exclusive.

The potlatch: Critical vision

A Potlatch (from Chinook for "gift," "give"), was a ceremonial distribution in which a person who occupied a prestigious position offered certain obsequies to their rival. The potlatch was practiced by some indigenous American peoples of the cultural region of the Northwest Coast of the Pacific in the United States, like the Kwakiutl and the Nootka. The ceremony of the potlatch was celebrated on occasions like weddings or the occurrence of a death in the family of the host. The ritual was initiated with a dance, the banquet, and speeches. Then the host distributed the gifts, in general in the form of blankets of fur or beaten and woven cedar bark, and later would proceed to demonstrate before their guests their economic and social superiority. For the Kwakiutl, the highest value of the gifts were the "coppers," which replaced a determined number of blankets. A greater the number of blankets and coppers accumulated was a symbol of greater prestige and power. Those invited who had received gifts were obligated to later celebrate an analogous feast and to offer these same goods but multiplied, with the purpose of showing their superiority. The possessor of a position who disdained his rivals by breaking a copper or throwing it into the sea, would get an even greater and irrefutable prestige.

The problem is that the first studies were based on proceedings from the 19th Century, and not even the word is the traditional one. Its basic function was to validate the prestige of the one who gave. One could inherit, but without the ceremony it was not socially accepted. One could only turn to the ceremonial invitation to make public the prerogatives of the lineage. In the same ceremony there were various donors, but the plebeians were excluded from the system. Able artisans or slaves could even negotiate their prestige. In societies with strong dispersion, they had in addition an important component as a reunion to meet relatives. The gifts always exceeded the necessities of the one who received it. On occasions they were understood as a payment of services. After the appearance of trade with the westerners in the 19th Century, demands for new rights took place, already influenced by the colonials.

During the ceremony elaborate hats were worn, and dress was based on cloaks. The accompaniment was only made by hitting planks or small tambourines or drums which ring to the sound of the dance of the characters.

The Heraldic Art of the Pacific Northwest

Anything in traditional life was susceptible to being represented. The emblematic art represented the family shields, and symbols with which the families identified.

The structuring of traditional art. The artists

The majority of the emblems are animals, whether real or invented. They utilize three types of representation in their visions:

Distortion of figures

Adaptation of the lineage to the support: the animal should adapt itself anatomically to the post or element.

The emblems are distributed over the length of the object.

By means of drawing the following are also expressed:

The primary, with reticle, united, with thickening and spacing of the lines, of curvilinear shape.

The secondary is red.

The tertiary is colored in blue-green.

The quaternary is made to the rabbet, and is normally left unpainted.

It is a series of preestablished designs which are in play. In addition, templates are used. These works are nearly exclusive to the north.

Within the iconography, drawings, engravings, and masks are made.

The Orca is represented considerably in the present, and the Orca of the Vancouver Museum is famous.

The osprey (also the falcon and the thunderbird with an enormous beak) can be represented double-headed on blankets. They also use buttons.

The raven as a supernatural being is represented with the sun on its head or in its mouth, capping off posts, in stone mortars, and raven masks.

The wolf (above all in the south-central zone) is the most important in this area, represented by masks.

The Thunderbird is represented with an enormous beak and a spiral on the head.

Sisiutl is a monstrous being with one body and two heads, which floats in the water and on its body has another head of a dragon. It is represented on all kinds of objects.

The beaver is easily identified by its incisor teeth, the tail, and a pole or stick, represented on masks, posts, bowls, engravings, paintings, crates, trunks, and on cold coppers used for relative value in potlatches.

The feature of the totem (better said "heraldic post") can make up true forests of posts. It is not an aboriginal object, but one that appeared in the 19th Century, when they gained access to iron objects and immediately could make them larger and larger. The idea of a "funerary post" also existed. In the present loads of them are made, in gardens of houses, on the old access posts, on beams... On the heraldic posts, always free-standing, they are a symbol of emblems and privileges, myths, claims for titles... and they have undergone a great technical improvement with iron. Now they are a tourist attraction. These poles are a series of sculptures- vertical emblems starting with a tree, being symmetrical figures. They were painted and when they were made, they had feasts for raising poles, which, once erected, were not touched nor restored. The most repeated emblems are bears, orcas, beavers, frog-men, woodpeckers...

Art and social organization

At later dates poles are raised in more central zones. The post was imagined in order to be forgotten, and that it should rot in the forest (this is its end). Now even banks, indigenous institutions, cemeteries, deconsecrated churches, and parks have poles. The different chiefs compete among themselves for who can raise the tallest pole, copying the originals.

Processes of Change on the Pacific Northwest

Spain was the country which sent the first expeditions which could return (the Russians arrived first, but did not return). In 1774 contact was established with the Haida in the archipelago of Queen Charlotte. James Cook also arrived in 1778.

The period of acculturation

From 1774 until 1848 can be considered this period, during the time of the fur trade. In the beginning trading was done only from boats, and later a series of trading posts was established. In general the relationships were symmetrical, as the natives chose trade and cultural changes. The principal exchange was that of furs for iron instruments, and later weapons and alcohol. A technological improvement was also produced in relation to steel instruments. This produced a social change. Some peoples became intermediaries, changing their political organization, beginning federations, unions of settlements... (politically, networks are created). Otters quickly die out, and the tribes had to look for other things: in 1825, the Haida begin to cultivate potatoes in order to supply the explorers, when they had never done it before. They also made schools, and a growth in the quantity and quality of potlatches was produced.

The period of ethnocide

Diseases razed the coasts. In 1835 only a third of the aboriginal population was left, for three primary reasons: diseases, alcohol, and firearms.

During 70 years there would be no active colonization (until 1850). In 1848, after the war between the U.S. and Mexico and with the Treaty of Guadalupe-Hidalgo, the southern border of the U.S. was established, and the trading posts in the arctic closed.

From 1850 onward, active colonization happened, with the intention of staying there to life: The native becomes something uncomfortable and annoying, which should disappear. Thus began the period of ethnocide.

In 1858, British Columbia achieved political ownership without any treaty with the Indians. In the United States, in Washington and Oregon it did not take much to erase the natives, deceiving them with accords and treaties.

In 1871 British Columbia became a part of Canada and the Indians would come to depend on the federal and provincial government. Canada would maintain the relationship with Great Britain, and this legal tradition would be positive for the Indians. The metropolises were consistent with the natives, in opposition to independence. The Indians of the northwest coast refused to sign treaties, and the legality of the ownership of the lands was questioned from England.

The current stage

Due to diseases, alcohol, weapons, bombardments, and hunger, only 4% of the natives survived. The policy of Reservations and Internment produced an enormous acculturation. The native culture was prohibited, and they were pressured in all senses of the word. In 1922 the aboriginal culture touched bottom. At the last potlatch, in which 400 Indians participated, 84 people were detained, 22 of whom were jailed. Legal assistance for the Indians was prohibited.

But they did not disappear; in the present they are organized and are legally defending themselves. Their population is growing, and now they are the same in number as they were before the arrival of the westerners.

In 1947 they were permitted to move, and they began to use legal weapons; in 1951 the anti-cultural law was suspended. In 1960 there were 14 native organizations.

The first demands were their lands, since 1987 the seized pieces are being returned to the native cultural centers.

The current situation is very hopeful, as a change for the better is being produced through the law, anthropology, and art.

During the years of the 50s multiple museums and universities began to work with artists, carvers, and anthropologists together with the bands. However, they continue to be in the background, and in some cases languages and cultures have been lost.

Ancient Civilizations of the Plains

Definition of the area

The area of the plains comprehends a cultural region in the prairies which carpet the central plains of North America. It includes in this way from Saskatchewan in Canada to the north of Mexico.

The typical model will be the western, of hunters. The most striking and rapid change which occurred was the introduction of the horse, which radically changed the way of life, based on agriculture, to the model of full-time bison hunters. This also modified the culture, social organization, system of beliefs, etc.

Environment and resources

This area is characterized by an enormous extension of flat or undulating land, over which in the era of the traditional inhabitants, an herbaceous pasture extended like a green ocean. It is found crisscrossed by a vast fluvial system whose most important courses are the Mississippi, Missouri, Ohio, Tennessee, and Illinois. The masses of hot air from the Gulf of Mexico and those of cool air coming from Canada join in a violent way, provoking tornadoes. Precipitation is abundant, reducing in equal measure as we move towards the north and the west. The temperature is high in summer, and the winters are rigorous, as a consequent of the continental nature.

The area of the plains comprehends a vast quantity of animals which make use of the grasses: horses, bison, prairie dogs, rabbits, hares, partridges and other steppe birds, polecats, wolves, and a wide gamut of insects among which termites and ants stand out.

It is a place where different cultures have lived, there being classical antecedents who tell us of two differentiated cultural areas: the prairies and the plains, with a similar but not equal ecology.

The area of the plains is the most extensive, flat and without mountainous barriers, where the only vegetation are forests called Gallery forests. The leafiness of these forests varies depending on the latitude.

The area of the prairies knew developed agriculture since the traditional era; in the zones farther to the west, hunting predominated.

Prehistory of the area

The area was inhabited since around 14,000 years ago. The PaleoIndians were tribes of hunters which attacked the enormous animals which lived there: elephants, bison, and other representatives of the megafauna of the time. For this they made use of natural hunting grounds, cliffs, and probably an ancestral knowledge of the fauna. Sites have been found with leptolithic industry and there are very old cultural traces. These Pleistocene hunters lived in the meridional areas, as there was ice in the northern areas. With the arrival of the glacial period their ways of life change. From 5500 B.C. until the Christian era an archaic period is spoken of, characterized by an adaptation to a greater variety of resources and diversification of the economy. This economy changed into a mixed type. Diverse types of adaptations to the environment existed as a function of the regional differences; it is the case of the eastern plains, with a smoother climate, and the western plains, with a very accused index of continental nature.

The original inhabitants of the plains

After the prehistoric inhabitants we can consider the period which goes from the beginning of the Christian era until the year 1000. We may denominate it "Eastern Forests in the prairies." The cultural influence of the inhabitants of the forest had repercussions on the eastern prairies, making the base of the peoples agricultural-sedentary. Their mixed hunting-gathering-agriculture economy permitted them to adapt to this new environment. Three diagnostic cultural features would appear: burial in tombs, the manufacture of ceramics (which appears for the first time), and the intensive agriculture of corn and beans.

Beginning in 1000-1850 the period of the settlements of the prairies is spoken of, a model of settlement and subsistence based on houses made of earth in fortified settlements on the banks of rivers. These defenses were made by means of palisades of tree trunks, and were owing to the warlike character of their neighbors. Their model of life would last until the arrival of French traders. With the arrival of the horse they began to intensively hunt bison.

1- The peoples who were always bison hunters (Bison bison bison - Bison bison athabascae) were family groups who met together to trade in "fairs." The Blackfeet, Sarcee, Assiniboine, and Cree were of the plains. Upon finding themselves far apart, the peoples of the north were not all destroyed. With the arrival of the horse, their life experienced an important advance. Hunting bison in the winter was done in search of furs to wear, and in the summer to get meat.

2- The hunters with an agricultural past were found to the west, and were pushed by civilization. The Lakota Sioux and the Cheyennes saw how in only two generations their way of life went from cultivation to hunting, abandoning the settlements and formal leaders; they even changed their beliefs and ideology. For example, the Black Hills were sacred to them, but did not have a direct historical relation with these peoples.

3- The peripheral farmers cultivated potatoes, corn, sunflowers and beans. They were the Mandan, Hidatsa, and Arikara. They continued to be agricultural peoples until their destruction by the white man. In the case of the Cheyennes, their history is very well known; it regards northeastern Algonquins of the plains, auto-denominated Tsitsistas. Their place of origin is the western zone of the Great Lakes where they lived in small settlements of Elm wood. They cultivated wild rice from canoes, a basic food which complimented game of all kinds. In 1650 they were pushed out from there by other peoples. In 1700 they found themselves in the plains, until they settled near the Cheyenne River. Settled in the northern plains, and near other agricultural peoples, they assimilated to these. By 1780 they had horses, although they had not changed their traditional cultural way of life. The Sioux attacked them and the epidemics of smallpox decimated them in their unhygienic houses. The Cheyennes of 1820 were already nomadic horsemen dedicated to the intensive hunting of bison. But the traditional agricultural peoples did not change their way of life, as commerce in their sedentary towns was the basis of their life (they were the Mandan, Hidatsa and Arikara).

Linguistic divisions

All the tribes included in a linguistic family spoke related languages which were structurally similar among themselves, but they were not at all intelligible between them. However, the sub-tribes or bands which made up each tribe spoke dialects which were mutually comprehensible.

Algonquins: North and South Cheyenne, Suhtai, Arapaho, Gros Ventre (Atsina), Blackfoot, Cree of the plains and of the north, Ojibwa of the plains, Piegan, and Blood.

Siouan: "Sioux," Assiniboine, Teton, Crow, Santee and Yankton.

Athabaskan: Sarcee, Kiowa-Apache.

Uto-Aztecan: Shoshone, Comanche, Wind River and Northern.

Kiowan: only includes the Kiowa.

The agricultural tribes, whose civilization in the prairies was at least contemporary if not earlier than that of the pedestrian hunters, lived in settlements along the tributaries of the Missouri river, and were members of the Siouan or Caddoan language families.

Siouan: Mandan, Hidatsa, Iowa, Otoe, Missouria, Kansa, Winnebago, Omaha, Ponca, Osage y Quapaw.

Caddoan: Arikara, Wichita, Pawnee and Kitsai tribes.

The Farmers of the Prairies

Settlements and villages

The horsemen of the prairies were also part-time farmers. The model of settlement in a fortified village is characteristic of farmers. They were found situated near the forests, but with fields for cultivation near a river. They had palisades of tree trunks and a trench. Some settlements could have 120 houses with 30 people per house. These houses could be called earthen. They were made up of 4 poles crossed by another 4, with more surrounding them. Inside the house lived different related families, in addition to the horses.

Technology and art

These tribes were familiar with ceramic: it was very crude, made by hand, and it was used for water or grain. The production of these ceramics was the work of the women. They always decorated them by means of impressions in the clay. Their dress was of leather and bison skins, with high leggings connected to the loincloth for riding.

They had a strict division of labor. The men were warriors and hunters, and the women were in charge of the vegetables, the skins, and the offspring. They cultivated short cycle corn, of rapid growth, blue red, purple, multi-color, etc. The women were the owners of the farming lands, and those who arranged the harvest: squash, beans, corn... in addition to ceremonial tobacco.

Social organization

They were organized in matrilineal and matrilocal clans as the basic unit of work. They had, in addition, a complex socio-ceremonial organization, with something much like social classes. Those who possessed the lands also had access to the political and religious offices. Also, the offices as well as the lands were hereditary, although validated by means of gifts.

The system of beliefs of the hunting, gathering, and farming peoples of the plains was based on animism. For them the shadow was the reflection of the soul in communion with the Sun. Dreams had a great symbolic significance, as they formed part of the intentions of the soul of the dreamer. The personality was the soul reflected in the person. If death caught them by surprise inside their earthen house, these three slats joined and formed the ghost. The realization of death ceremonies during four days had as its object the expulsion of this ghost. The deceased was placed in different ways; in the open air, buried, or encased in a tree.

They myths of origin are alike between tribes, giving different names to the same protagonists. They are forces of nature personified which give answers to facts that were not understood otherwise.

All the peoples had a "sacred bundle," where one's well being rested. It was a skin filled with a series of objects. It was cared for by a group of men, who preserved it all year. On a special date the bundle was opened, its interior rearranged and restored, and everything was exhibited in the settlement, for the tranquility of the settlement. In its interior there were disparate things, like corn cobs, desiccated animals, bones... these packets were called "mothers," indicating the reverential sense which they had. The horse peoples also had these bundles, although filled with arrows and amulets. The majority of ceremonies were personal, although there were those which were spectacular and flashy like nothing else. The most known is the ceremony of the Sun dance. It's antecedent must be looked for in the Mandan Okipe. It could last 12 days. It consisted of a self-torture by means of hanging in the communal house. It regarded an offering of pain and blood, very prestigious for the dancer, which would benefit the tribe. The pectorals pierced with a peg for each one, this peg was tied to a cord, and this to the ceiling. They danced until from the pulling or from the hanging, the flesh surrendered and the dancer fell to the floor. These ceremonies of self-torture were a way of reaching a "vision," for lack of other drugs.

The Historic Horsemen of the Plains

The common features of all the historic horsemen were:

1- Bison-horse pairing. From the bison they used everything necessary to live; in fact the bison was represented as a white buffalo calf mother. Firearms were only repeaters, as those which were breech-loading or muzzle-loading were difficult to manage on horseback, and very slow. Each hunter recognized their kill by the arrows, but shared the meat among all of them. The value of sharing was at the base of the ethics of the plains, along with valor, pain, and resistance.

2- Division of labor. The men hunted everything, collected eggs, fish, etc. The women also collected food on the plains, and medicinal plants. The basic diet was salted or boiled meat, or in any case, dried. The Indian jerky was pemmican, dried meat, ground and mixed with berries and fat; it was put in cases and pouches, and it was very nutritious. The women made clothes and sewed the tents.

3- The tepee of bison leather. It was wider than it was long, made with four poles and a raised center. The upper flaps were used to open or close the chimney. Its cover could be painted with the owner's exploits in war and the hunt. The tepee was the property of the woman, who made and assembled it.

The introduction of the horse and other western features

The riding horse was introduced by the Spanish in 1542; in 1603 the Spanish colonized the Bravo River, situating ranches along its course. The first horses were stolen from these haciendas, and called by the indigenous people "dog of the gods" or "large dog." Later horses were traded, and the Indians spread them among the tribes, conscious of their utility. There were two routes penetrable by horses; the first directed towards the Rockies, and the second and more important, towards the plains.

At the end of the 18th Century there were already fairs for trading horses. In 750 all the peoples of the plains had adopted the horse. The bison were thus easier to hunt, and they could be followed in their migration. They could carry cargo,- and not like the dogs used until then-, a lot of cargo. The Indians also used horses as beasts of burden to move their houses. For this they installed a travois or sled - two poles joined at the end and set over the horse's back - and they could thus carry the largest tents and food. Certain peripheral peoples also abandoned their farmlands (Dakota and Cheyenne).

Clothing changed with the arrival of the horse, as the leggings had to be adapted to riding.

Technology and art

Clothing on the plains was based on buffalo or antelope hides, very decorated, with strips, sleeves, and claws. Also, leggings adapted to riding horseback, leg coverings up to the groin, also decorated. The loincloth was a simple affair. The woman wore a long hide tunic, cured and cut (before), with a bodice from which the skins hung; short leggings in the case of the woman. All garments were decorated by their owners with all manner of objects, of the most diverse kinds. Dolls with clothes were made so that the girls would learn to care for babies. The moccasins were basic, and varied from one people to another. They were of leather, but each tribe used different types depending on where they habitually walked. An Indian was not naked as long as he was wearing his loincloth and his moccasins.

The bison was hunted on foot, by means of cliffs or corrals, until the arrival of the horse.

Tent made of animal skins in conical form used as a dwelling by the peoples of the Great Plains in the center of North America. The tepee was made of a frame composed of three large wooden poles in the form of a tripod, covered with buffalo hide (see Bison) -sometimes they used as many as 20 specimens - which were cured, sewed, and stretched to form a closed circular space. The exteriors could be decorated with geometric designs. The tepees tended to measure 3m high by 4.5m in diameter. Its access was realized in the form of an opening situated in the lower part, covered by a hanging flap. On the earthen floor pieces of hide are placed to keep out the cold, and the upper extreme, specifically the space where the poles extended, was used to regulate the exit of smoke from their fires.

Easy to fold and transport, the tepee was the ideal dwelling for the nomadic tribes which depended on buffalo hunting to survive, like the Sioux, Apache, Comanche, or Crow.

War. Political Structure

The political structure of the Sioux nation and the fires of the seven councils.

The Great Lakota group arrived at the prairies as a nation or political group call The Fires of the Seven Councils, and was made up of sub-tribes or divisions: the western groups or Teton Sioux, whose dialect was Lakota, the eastern division or Santee, who spoke Dakota, and the northern group or Yankton, who spoke an equal mix of Nakota and Dakota dialects. This powerful tribe underwent a dramatic social and cultural transformation. The structure of clans and elected chiefs gave way to groupings of bands consisting of "tiyospaye" or communities of extended families of bilateral descent. All trace of unilateral descent disappeared while they transformed towards the bilateral system of the nomadic hunters. The chiefs of the old times lost their influence and the distinguished warriors assumed the roles of leadership. Around 1730 the Sioux chiefs had been deposed of their authority and were no more than the heads of groups of relatives.

The seven fires of the Council were:

Western- Teton Lakota. One representative.

Eastern- Santee Dakota. Four representatives: Sisseton, Mdewakanton, Wahpeton, Wakpekute.

Northern- Yankton Nakota. Two representatives: Yankton and Yanktonai.

The Religion of the Hunters of the Plains

The Indians of the plains had little conviction in the gods, which were represented as something very vague and far-off. There was personification of supernatural beings, and of natural phenomena.

The Sun was the most important being whom they invoked and prayed to. The ancestors were taken heavily into account and respected. Thunder, Venus as the star of the morning, and other planets and phenomena like tornadoes were very feared and were personified.

Wakan Tanka in Lakota was the supreme and primary spirit. Among the Cheyenne it was known as Manitú. The Power (Wakan) or supernatural being over all that exists. It can be considered a kind of animism, in which Wakan is present in everything which seems strange or outside of the normal. All beings share in Wakan, but some have it very present, as may be the case of a child which speaks or walks early, or the best hunter.

The imploring of a vision

Among them the search for a vision had enormous importance. Their entreaty became something compulsive, by means of dreams, pain, or unconsciousness. It was searched for through withdrawal or by remaining standing without moving for days. Reiterated visions are had as protection, in the style of a guardian angel. Thus the Wakan beings of each person could be from a bear or raven, to a mosquito; these beings protect and care for the person. The interpretation was made by holy men and women, who guided and mentored those who searched for visions. Sitting Bull was one of these mentors, a sacred leader. The protector spirit or guardian angel was found in direct relation to the person, instigating them to make their own sacred pouch. This pouch contained the objects which seemed fitting to them, from skins to small bones, stones... It was worn on them at all times, considered to be a powerful amulet inspired by the protector spirit, who in addition taught them a song and dance by means of which they could be contacted.

The importance of the ritual

The individual ritual was prepared and directed for nearly every action which was to be completed.

The number four had a sacred nature in all of North America. There were four primary beings: Sun, Earth, Fire, and Water; there were also four ages in people: Baby, Child, Man, Elder. Prayers were made facing the four cardinal points. The circle also had a sacred nature, represented in the shape of the tepee and of the camps.

The sacred pipe was a portable altar. Smoking and offering smoke was a ritual previous to any other. The bowl was made of Catlinite, red rock which is found in a rocky area of Minnesota. There any member of any tribe could go without being bothered. It was a place of refuge for the Indians of the prairies. The mouthpieces were different, and the pipes were long and decorated. They smoked tobacco and other herbs. Tobacco was considered sacred, and it was traded with from very far away. According the their beliefs, the White Buffalo Calf Woman taught them to smoke the pipe. The was offered to all those present at a ritual.

Particular ceremonies

The ceremony of Purification in the Sauna-Cabin (a widespread custom on the other hand) was a therapeutic ritual which was used for the elimination of toxins from the body. The cabin had 12-16 poles with skins, and the heat was obtained by means of hot stones put into water. The women did it alone after the first menstruation and after marrying. During joint ceremonies, all who could fit entered. The exit was oriented to the east. Inside the cabin were the four basic elements.

After death, the ghost was to be driven away by means of mourning. In some peoples the elders requested how they wanted their body and belongings to be treated. Among the Comanches, an invalid was abandoned to their fate because evil spirits were very present- thus there was one less mouth to feed-. The mourning ceremonies lasted four days and were very striking; they cried, pulled their hair cut their fingers, wounded themselves... The cadavers were washed, perfumed, dressed, and covered with furs. If the death had occurred in the interior of a house, the exit was not shown to the ghost, but instead the body was taken out the other side. The cadaver could be put in trees, in fissures, in palls, under ground, covered with stones, etc. The favorite horse was sacrificed, and the weapons were left to the men, and the sewing boxes to the women. The great leaders were buried with their entire tepee. T

The great "tribal" ceremonies

The "Holy Men" like Sitting Bull were shamans, doctors, diviners, guides in visions, religious specialists. The basic characteristics of all the tribes of the plains were the horse-buffalo pairing, the tepee, the warrior society, and the Sun Dance. This dance was the most important ceremony for the plains. The Sun Dance basically consists of an offering of of pain and blood to the Sun. It was done in the summer, at a time in which all the tribes met, being the most important social event; it gave identity to the whole nation. All the bands of the same language met together. It regarded a sacrifice and test of valor, but it was done for the prosperity of all. Its origin is not known. During four days the pavilion was prepared, and during another four the ritual was done, in which the ceremony of blood was done at the culmination. The last ceremony was the perforation of the chest. The whole ritual had a sponsor who designated the roles and how everything should be developed. Among the Cheyenne it was a prayer or renovation for the well being of the whole nation.

The ceremony of the "erect horns" was the first and the mythical origin is recorded as the time when there were not yet any buffalo. The myth of origin is represented by means of the raising of a pavilion on the part of the warriors of the tribe of the sponsor. The warriors "hunted" a large tree, and they ceremonially placed it as the base of the pavilion. The structure was covered with hides provided by the chiefs, and hundreds of sacred objects were placed inside. The idea was to unite the world with the Sun. The dance was done around the post and on occasions the perforated the chest, dancing while tethered; if it was desired, it ended by hanging, until the flesh gave out. They also hung up buffalo skulls, pieces of wood, etc. The dance was accompanied by whistles of eagle bone and drums.

Another ceremony persistent among the Cheyenne was that of the sacred arrows, which alternated every two years with that of the Sun. These four arrows in the sacred pouch, whose ritualization came from their agricultural past, were bound to attack and defense. The ceremony was done in three tepees; one for the dance, another to keep the arrows, and another to keep the offerings of the tribe. The arrows were exhibited for the peace of mind of the tribe.

The Natives of the Plains in the Present

The period of forced assimilation

Beginning in 1850 the whites began to enter the plains in a very important way, and their colonization was a thing of few years. The process was very rough and bloody, as the plains were very attractive for cultivation by the colonists. In ten years, the Lakota went from being the masters of the plains to staying on reservations or being in poverty. This cultural collapse was perpetrated by the policy of the U.S. to create reservations where they had the indigenous nomads under control. With the reservations treaties were made that were never fulfilled. These treaties, some made by means of executive orders, went against the nomadic life of the plains, which was based on the search for buffalo. Colonization was produced by way of laws, colonies, and the army. The conquest of the west looks alike in Argentina (in this case towards the south). The Indian problem pitted the nomadic tribes against the colonists regarding territory. The system of Reservations which impassable borders was applied. The treaties were systematically violated. The Indian Agents on the Reservations were the mediators between the army and the natives. The system of private property was impressed upon them. In 1887 the Act of Possession was created, by which the Reservations were split up and delivered to Indian families. As this was foreign to the native culture, and the Indians did not farm nor make use of the delivered lands, the government appropriated them and sold them to the whites.

Between 1850 and 1900 the entire culture of the plains had been erased.

The laws of forceful assimilation were the provision of the government on the reservations, in the style of democratic and representative constitutions. Until the 70s they were directed by governments foreign to the traditional native governments; there was corruption, bribery, assassination...

At the beginning of 1950 the reserves tried to stay with state governments and not the federals as these were subjective and worse. The policies of relocation were to bring social improvements by sending the Indians to cities to avoid alcohol and unemployment. The opposite effect was produced, although later the movements of revitalization would appear in the cities.

The "spirit dance.

The dance of the spirit-ghost-specter was a religious activity of a millenarian messianic nature, which arose with the destruction of the plains Indians. A preacher announced the return of the bison to the plains in 1889, the resurrection of the fallen warriors, the end of injustice with the Indians and the disappearance of the white man during the spring of 1890. The shaman Wovoka, following the doctrine began in 1870 in the plains, had a vision. After a sickness which nearly cost him his life, God himself explained the Ghost Dance to him, through which all the Indians, living and dead, would be reunited in Paradise, with the bison and without whites. It was a peaceful movement whose doctrine went on adjusting. In the dance, all the members dance. It regarded a religious reunification which scared the politicians, as it offered the Indians something in common with which to unite. During an attempt to do this dance the massacre at Wounded Knee took place. A military detachment attacked a convoy of Lakota Indian families with cannons as they headed away from their reservation. For four days the tens of corpses were left in the snow. Later they were put on a train and buried in a large group grave; children, women, and elders died. The police on the reservation believed that the chief Sitting Bull was the instigator of an imminent rebellion, and they killed him when he resisted being detained. His followers fled to the camp of chief Big Foot. The 7th Cavalry followed the Sioux and took them to a camp situated near Wounded Knee. On the 29th of December, 1890, a shot sounded inside the camp and the Army began to shoot. The soldiers killed some 200 Sioux, among them women, children, and unarmed men. Those who tried to escape the massacre were followed and murdered.

A second incident began on February 27, 1973, when armed followers belonging to the American Indian Movement (AIM) took Wounded Knee, demanding that the United States government look over the 371 treaties accorded in the past with Indian tribes. Federal Agents were sent to the place and during the gunfire two Indians were killed and people from both sides were wounded. The siege ended 70 days later, when they promised the Indians that they would study their complaints. After the encounter with representatives from the White House, the promise was forgotten.

The "Native American Church."

Beginning in 1870 the religious appear on the reservations. By means of interns and schools, they had great acceptance. The conversions to Christianity were massive. The Native American Church, or cult of Peyote is based on the communion of peyote at meetings. Some Indians learned the use of peyote from Mexican Indians. They hated alcohol gambling, and debauchery. They had a familial and ethnic feeling; accommodated to the situation a syncretic ritualism was successfully produced. Peyote is taken dry or in an infusion. There is an organizer, and elements like water, fire, earth, and air are employed. It is very reminiscent of Christian communion, and it is carried out with songs, drums, and dances. The cult did not disappear, and in 1934 it was legalized, finding itself very widespread in the present.

Towards revitalization

At the end of the 19th Century there was total lack of control and disorganization of the Plains Indians. In the 60s and 70s the revitalizing movements began. In 1968 Nixon put an end to dependence, putting the most important services, education and health, under the control of the reservations. Religious liberty for the Indians was also given, permitting, for example, the use of feathers from protected sacred birds. The Act for the Well Being of Indian Children was also proclaimed, which put an end to the adoptions which the whites carried out in the reservation schools with hardly any paperwork.

The natives of the plains today

In spite of everything, the peoples of the prairies still continue to fight against injustices. They continue to be the lowest rung of the ladder in the U.S.

Indian demands are now made through AIM, the American Indian Movement, founded in Minneapolis in 1968. It is an activist organization with very striking operations, raising awareness through the communications media. In 1973 they closed themselves in at Wounded Knee, and the army sent tanks. The public then realized that they continue to exist. In the present day the natives have a wide fan of traditional cultural implication. Some are assimilated, although in the Northwest they still live in a very traditional manner. The reservations have been maintained by the Indians themselves for economic development. The capital comes from the federal government. They live in poverty, although some have incomes derived from renting their lands. The Reserves tend to be far away from areas of trade and employment. There are Reserves, like in Nebraska, where they put private businesses, stores, caravans, shoe stores- moccasins- and the tourism of Indians playing Indian.

Life on the Reserves continues. The Pow-Wow and the Giveaway are two feasts and social events, where traditional songs and dances mix, in the stile of celebrations with costumes. The Giveaway is a socio-religious event restricted to families, which consists of giving things to neighbors similar to a Potlatch. Today it is done for a birth, a wedding, and academic graduation... anything of importance in which gifts are given to people withing the circle of family and friends.

The destruction and recuperation of the native cultures of North America.

When America was discovered, little could the new colonists suspect the results of their arrival. The diseases which came from Europe razed the coasts in a short time, destroying the North American natives. The new diseases were typhus, smallpox, the different types of influenza, sexually transmitted diseases, and many others which spread rapidly among people who did not have defenses against the same. They hygienic conditions of the camps permitted the massive contagion on the local scale; nomadism and flight transmitted the plagues through the continent. Some tribes disappeared 15 years after the arrival of the white man.

After the diseases, the wars came. First among the generally weak indigenous resistance; later for the control of lands on the part of cities. Thousands of Indians fell in wars for which they never took a side. Later came extermination. The Indian was a problem, and was to be eliminated. Alcohol, for which they never had an adequate tolerance, made and still makes damages among them. Confinement and humiliation, trickery and avarice made them lose everything. The destruction of their way of life led them to a lamentable state, a genocide from which they will never recover.

In 1835 only a third of the aboriginal population remained, for three primary causes: diseases, alcohol, and firearms.

From 1850 onward, active colonization towards the plains occurs, with the intention of staying there to live: The native became something uncomfortable and annoying, which should disappear. Thus began the period of ethnocide. The process was very rough and bloody, as the plains were very attractive for farming by the colonists. In ten years, the Lakota went from being the lords of the plains to being on reservations or in poverty. This cultural collapse was perpetrated by the policy of the U.S. of creating reservations where they could have the indigenous nomads under control. With the reservations the treaties that were never fulfilled were made. These treaties, some made by means of executive orders, went against the nomadic life of the plains, which was based on the search for bison and nomadism. Colonization was produced by way of laws, colonists, and the army. The conquest of the west closely resembles the conquest of Southern Argentina. The Indian problem pitted the nomadic tribes against the colonists over lands. The system of Reserves with borders which could not be crossed was applied. The treaties were systematically violated. The Indian Agents of the the reservations were the mediators between the army and the natives. The system of private property was impressed on them. Everything possible was done to make them disappear, and lamentably, it was almost achieved.

Between 1850 and 1900 all of the culture of the plains had been erased.

The laws of forceful assimilation were the provision of the government on the reserves, in the style of democratic and representative constitutions. Until the 70s they were directed by governments foreign to the traditional native governments; there was corruption, bribery, assassinations...

At the beginning of 1950 the reservations tried to stay with state governments in stead of the federals as these were subjective and worse. The policies of relocation tried to bring social improvements through sending Indians to cities, in order to avoid alcohol and unemployment. The opposite effect was produced, although later the movements for revitalization would appear in the cities.

At the end of the 19th Century there was a total lack of control and disorganization among the Indians of the plains. In the 60s and 70s the revitalizing movements began. In 1968 Nixon put an end to dependence, putting the most important services, education and health under the charge of the reservations. Religious liberty for the Indians was also given, permitting, for example, the use of feathers from sacred protected birds. The Act for the Well Being of Indian Children was also proclaimed, which put an end to the adoptions which the whites carried out in the reservation schools with hardly any paperwork.

In the Central Arctic the Inuit have introduced themselves into Canada. They have resisted intrusion, maintaining a large part of their culture and hardly assimilating themselves. It is a nearly unique case in North America, although it cannot be taken as the counterpart of the other regions of the subcontinent.

But they have changed: they are Canadians, and they are Inuit. They have developed as an ethnicity and have their own territory and laws. Recuperation has occurred since 1950, they are now some 150,000 individuals, much more than in the past. The Inuit have carried out a process of becoming sedentary in towns. In the 50s they established themselves in small coastal towns, and in the 80s as much as 70% lived in permanent settlements of at least 50 inhabitants. Their houses are in the western style, with schools, outpatient clinics, law and order. The Inuit suffer in their body the establishment of western foods and customs: they are fatter, they have cavities and diabetes, and heart diseases previously unknown to their people. They utilize western technological elements, but also harpoons, sleds, snowmobiles, airplanes, seaplanes, motorboats... They have a high level of unemployment, with a social assistance which especially covers children- which makes the birth rate grow- and the state offers them temporary jobs. Among these the cooperatives of commercial art have great success, stone sculptures and engravings which are sold far from the Arctic constitute an important source of income. These cooperatives maintain "denominations of origin." The majority are made up of part time artists, and when they have money available, they go out to hunt. There are also known artists who can earn a great deal of money.

The Inuit do not have intermediaries to speak with the Canadian government, and they do it directly. In addition the climate which reigns in the Northwest Territories helps their isolation. In the Canadian provinces (Alberta, British Columbia...) the natives are a minority, not so in the Arctic, where some 80% are indigenous and the whites are scarce and live in cities.

In the 60s they did not have representation in Parliament, but little by little they organized themselves into electoral districts, gaining representatives in the parliament of Ottawa. This has been possible because of the homogenization of the Inuktitut language, which has become a link of identity. They have 22 native representatives. In the 70s the Inuit Tapirisat was organized, the conference in which the reconfiguration of the Northwest Territories into two: the Northwest Territory itself and Nunavut (our land) was proposed, desired by some 85% of the northerners. However, it was rejected in the provinces. Nunavut is a territory in which rights would be recognized for the peoples of the Arctic: that they are different peoples, with nations and institutions, with preferential rights to lands and the resources of fishing, hunting, and exploitation of soil. In 1992 a referendum was made. Since 1999, Canada has three Nunavut territories, granting to their inhabitants powers and rights, although for the Inuit it is not a territory (for example, they lack their own justice system).

The Inuit are the people who have best achieved relating themselves without assimilating to the western world, owing to two key factors: the use of a common language and the rigorous nature of the climate in which they live.

In spite of everything, the native North American peoples continue to be the lowest rung of the ladder in the U.S.

The Indian demands in the U.S. are now made through AIM, the American Indian Movement, founded in Minneapolis in 1968. It is an activist organization with very striking actions, which raises awareness through the communications media. In 1973 they shut themselves in at Wounded Knee, and the army sent tanks, killing several in an action during the "sequestration" of the place. The people then realized that the Indians in North America still exist.

In the present day the natives have a wide fan of cultural traditional implication. Some are assimilated, although in the Northwest they still live in a very traditional way. The Reservations are maintained by the Indians themselves for economic development. A great number live in poverty, although some have incomes derived from renting out their lands. The Reservations tend to be far from areas with commerce and employment, which makes their economic take-off difficult. There are Reserves, as in Nebraska, where private businesses, stores, caravans, and shoe stores selling moccasins have been established. To this it must be added that there are incomes derived from the tourism of "Indians playing Indian."

Life on the Reservations continues. The Pow-Wow and the Giveaway are two feasts and social events, where traditional songs and dances mix, in the style of a costume party.

The natives continue on their lands, and a new "Ghost Dance" may revitalize the cultural complex which was nearly left wiped out in such a short time.

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Ancient Civilizations of North America - Ancient Civilizations World

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The geographical-cultural regions of North America: General perspective. Inuit; in Alaska, northern Canada and the ice floes, and Greenland. The coasts of Alaska (A1), the Canadian coasts in the north (A2) and the island of Greenland, considered to be part of America (A3) fit within the boundaries of this cultural area.

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The Renaissance: Was it a Thing? - Crash Course World History #22

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First Migration: https://www.nps.gov/bela/learn/historyculture/the-bering-land-bridge-theory.htm
Early NA society: https://ancientcivilizationsworld.com/north-america/
Native American Indian culture areas : http://www.native-languages.org/culture-areas.htm
The European renaissance: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vufba_ZcoR0

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The Vikings Discover the New World

The first attempt by Europeans to colonize the New World occurred around1000 A.D. when the Vikings sailed from the British Isles to Greenland, established a colony and then moved on to Labrador, the Baffin Islands and finally Newfoundland. There they established a colony named Vineland (meaning fertile region) and from that base sailed along the coast of North America, observing the flora, fauna and native peoples. Inexplicably, Vineland was abandoned after only a few years.

Did you know? Explorer Henry Hudson died when his crew mutinied and left Hudson, his son and seven crewmembers adrift in a small open boat in the Hudson Bay.

Although the Vikings never returned to America, other Europeans came to know of their accomplishments. Europe, however, was made up of many small principalities whose concerns were mainly local. Europeans may have been intrigued by the stories of the feared Vikings' discovery of a "new world," but they lacked the resources or the will to follow their path of exploration. Trade continued to revolve around the Mediterranean Sea, as it had for hundreds of years.

The Reformation, the Renaissance and New Trade Routes

Between 1000 and 1650, a series of interconnected developments occurred in Europe that provided the impetus for the exploration and subsequent colonization of America. These developments included the Protestant Reformation and the subsequent Catholic Counter-Reformation, the Renaissance, the unification of small states into larger ones with centralized political power, the emergence of new technology in navigation and shipbuilding and the establishment of overland trade with the East and the accompanying transformation of the medieval economy.

The Protestant Reformation and the Catholic Church's response in the Counter-Reformation marked the end of several centuries of gradual erosion of the power of the Catholic Church as well as the climax of internal attempts to reform the Church. Protestantism emphasized a personal relationship between each individual and God without the need for intercession by the institutional church.

In the Renaissance, artists and writers such as Galileo, Machiavelli and Michelangelo adopted a view of life that stressed humans' ability to change and control the world. Thus, the rise of Protestantism and the Counter-Reformation, along with the Renaissance, helped foster individualism and create a climate favorable to exploration.

At the same time, political centralization ended much of the squabbling and fighting among rival noble families and regions that had characterized the Middle Ages. With the decline of the political power and wealth of the Catholic Church, a few rulers gradually solidified their power. Portugal, Spain, France and England were transformed from small territories into nation-states with centralized authority in the hands of monarchs who were able to direct and finance overseas exploration.

As these religious and political changes were occurring, technological innovations in navigation set the stage for exploration. Bigger, faster ships and the invention of navigational devices such as the astrolabe and sextant made extended voyages possible.

A Faster Route to the East

But the most powerful inducement to exploration was trade. Marco Polo's famous journey to Cathay signaled Europe's "discovery" of Chinese and Islamic civilizations. The Orient became a magnet to traders, and exotic products and wealth flowed into Europe. Those who benefited most were merchants who sat astride the great overland trade routes, especially the merchants of the Italian city-states of Genoa, Venice and Florence.

The newly unified states of the Atlantic-France, Spain, England and Portugal-and their ambitious monarchs were envious of the merchants and princes who dominated the land routes to the East. Moreover, in the latter half of the fifteenth century, war between European states and the Ottoman Empire greatly hampered Europe's trade with the Orient. The desire to supplant the trade moguls, especially the Italians, and fear of the Ottoman Empire forced the Atlantic nations to search for a new route to the East.

Portugal: Bartolomeu Dias, Vasco de Gama and Pedro Álvares Cabral

Portugal led the others into exploration. Encouraged by Prince Henry the Navigator, Portuguese seamen sailed southward along the African coast, seeking a water route to the East. They were also looking for a legendary king named Prester John who had supposedly built a Christian stronghold somewhere in northwestern Africa. Henry hoped to form an alliance with Prester John to fight the Muslims.

During Henry's lifetime the Portuguese learned much about the African coastal area. His school developed the quadrant, the cross-staff and the compass, made advances in cartography and designed and built highly maneuverable little ships known as caravels.

After Henry's death, Portuguese interest in long-distance trade and expansion waned until King John II commissioned Bartolomeu Dias to find a water route to India in 1487. Dias sailed around the tip of Africa and into the Indian Ocean before his frightened crew forced him to give up the quest. A year later, Vasco da Gama succeeded in reaching India and returned to Portugal laden with jewels and spices.

In 1500, Pedro Álvares Cabral discovered and claimed Brazil for Portugal, and other Portuguese captains established trading posts in the South China Sea, the Bay of Bengal, and the Arabian Sea. These water routes to the East undercut the power of the Italian city-states, and Lisbon became Europe's new trade capital.

Spain and Christopher Columbus

Christopher Columbus launched Spain's imperial ambitions. Born in Genoa, Italy, around 1451, Columbus learned the art of navigation on voyages in the Mediterranean and the Atlantic. At some point he probably read Cardinal Pierre d'Ailly's early fifteenth-century work, Imago mundi, which argued that the East could be found by sailing west of the Azores for a few days.

Columbus, hoping to make such a voyage, spent years seeking a sponsor and finally found one in Ferdinand and Isabella of Spain after they defeated the Moors and could turn their attention to other projects.

In August 1492, Columbus sailed west with his now famous ships, Niña, Pinta and Santa María. After ten weeks he sighted an island in the Bahamas, which he named San Salvador. Thinking he had found islands near Japan, he sailed on until he reached Cuba (which he thought was mainland China) and later Haiti.

Columbus returned to Spain with many products unknown to Europe-coconuts, tobacco, sweet corn, potatoes-and with tales of dark-skinned native peoples whom he called "Indians" because he assumed he had been sailing in the Indian Ocean.

Although Columbus found no gold or silver, he was hailed by Spain and much of Europe as the discoverer of d'Ailly's western route to the East. John II of Portugal, however, believed Columbus had discovered islands in the Atlantic already claimed by Portugal and took the matter to Pope Alexander II.

Twice the pope issued decrees supporting Spain's claim to Columbus's discoveries. But the territorial disputes between Portugal and Spain were not resolved until 1494 when they signed the Treaty of Tordesillas, which drew a line 370 leagues west of the Azores as the demarcation between the two empires.

Despite the treaty, controversy continued over what Columbus had found. He made three more voyages to America between 1494 and 1502, during which he explored Puerto Rico, the Virgin Islands, Jamaica, and Trinidad. Each time he returned more certain that he had reached the East.

Subsequent explorations by others, however, persuaded most Europeans that Columbus had discovered a "New World." Ironically, that New World was named for someone else. A German geographer, Martin Waldseemüller, accepted the claim of Amerigo Vespucci that he had landed on the American mainland before Columbus. In 1507 Waldseemüller published a book in which he named the new land "America."

Spanish Explorers After Columbus

More Spanish expeditions followed. Juan Ponce de León explored the coasts of Florida in 1513. Vasco Núñez de Balboa crossed the Isthmus of Panama and discovered the Pacific Ocean in the same year.

Ferdinand Magellan's expedition (in the course of which he put down a mutiny and was later killed) sailed around the tip of South America, across the Pacific to the Philippines, through the Indian Ocean and back to Europe around the southern tip of Africa between 1519 and 1522.

Two expeditions led directly to Spain's emergence as sixteenth-century Europe's wealthiest and most powerful nation. The first was headed by Hernán Cortés, who in 1519 led a small army of Spanish and Native Americans against the Aztec Empire of Mexico. Completing the conquest in 1521, Cortés took control of the Aztecs' fabulous gold and silver mines.

Ten years later, an expedition under Francisco Pizarro overwhelmed the Inca Empire of Peru, securing for the Spaniards the great Inca silver mines of Potosí.

In 1535 and 1536, Pedro de Mendoza went as far as present-day Buenos Aires in Argentina, where he founded a colony. At the same time, Cabeza de Vaca explored the North American Southwest, adding that region to Spain's New World empire.

A few years later (1539-1542), Francisco Vásquez de Coronado discovered the Grand Canyon and journeyed through much of the Southwest looking for gold and the legendary Seven Cities of Cíbola. About the same time, Hernando de Soto explored southeastern North America from Florida to the Mississippi River. By 1650, Spain's empire was complete and fleets of ships were carrying the plunder back to Spain.

Religious Motivations

As European powers conquered the territories of the New World, they justified wars against Native Americans and the destruction of their cultures as a fulfillment of the European secular and religious vision of the New World. The idea of "America" antedated America's discovery and even Viking exploration.

That idea had two parts: one paradisiacal and utopian, the other savage and dangerous. Ancient tales described distant civilizations, usually to the west, where European-like peoples lived simple, virtuous lives without war, famine, disease or poverty. Such utopian visions were reinforced by religious notions. Early Christian Europeans had inherited from the Jews a powerful prophetic tradition that drew upon apocalyptic biblical texts in the books of Daniel, Isaiah and Revelations. They connected the Christianization of the world with the second coming of Christ. Such ideas led many Europeans (including Columbus) to believe it was God's plan for Christians to convert pagans wherever they were found.

If secular and religious traditions evoked utopian visions of the New World, they also induced nightmares. The ancients described wonderful civilizations, but barbaric, evil ones as well. Moreover, late medieval Christianity inherited a rich tradition of hatred for non-Christians derived in part from the Crusaders' struggle to free the Holy Land and from warfare against the Moors.

European encounters with the New World were viewed in light of these preconceived notions. To plunder the New World of its treasures was acceptable because it was populated by pagans. To Christianize the pagans was necessary because it was part of God's plan; to kill them was right because they were Satan's warriors.

France: Giovanni da Verrazano, Jacques Cartier and Samuel de Champlain

While Spain was building its New World empire, France was also exploring the Americas. In 1524, Giovanni da Verrazzano was commissioned to locate a northwest passage around North America to India. He was followed in 1534 by Jacques Cartier, who explored the St. Lawrence River as far as present-day Montreal.

In 1562, Jean Ribault headed an expedition that explored the St. Johns River area in Florida. His efforts were followed two years later by a second venture headed by René Goulaine de Laudonnière. But the Spanish soon pushed the French out of Florida, and thereafter, the French directed their efforts north and west. In 1608 Samuel de Champlain built a fort at Quebec and explored the area north to Port Royal and Nova Scotia and south to Cape Cod.

Unlike Spain's empire, "New France" produced no caches of gold and silver. Instead, the French traded with inland tribes for furs and fished off the coast of Newfoundland. New France was sparsely populated by trappers and missionaries and dotted with military forts and trading posts. Although the French sought to colonize the area, the growth of settlements was stifled by inconsistent policies.

Initially, France encouraged colonization by granting charters to fur-trading companies. Then, under Cardinal Richelieu, control of the empire was put in the hands of the government-sponsored Company of New France. The company, however, was not successful, and in 1663 the king took direct control of New France. Although more prosperous under this administration, the French empire failed to match the wealth of New Spain or the growth of neighboring British colonies.

The Netherlands: Henry Hudson Leads the Dutch

The Dutch were also engaged in the exploration of America. Formerly a Protestant province of Spain, the Netherlands was determined to become a commercial power and saw exploration as a means to that end.

In 1609, Henry Hudson led an expedition to America for the Dutch East India Company and laid claim to the area along the Hudson River as far as present-day Albany. In 1614 the newly formed New Netherland Company obtained a grant from the Dutch government for the territory between New France and Virginia. About ten years later another trading company, the West India Company, settled groups of colonists on Manhattan Island and at Fort Orange. The Dutch also planted trading colonies in the West Indies.

England: John Cabot and Sir Walter Raleigh

In 1497 Henry VII of England sponsored an expedition to the New World headed by John Cabot, who explored a part of Newfoundland and reported an abundance of fish. But until Queen Elizabeth's reign, the English showed little interest in exploration, being preoccupied with their European trade and establishing control over the British Isles.

By the mid-sixteenth century, however, England had recognized the advantages of trade with the East, and in 1560 English merchants enlisted Martin Frobisher to search for a northwest passage to India. Between 1576 and 1578 Frobisher as well as John Davis explored along the Atlantic coast.

Thereafter, Queen Elizabeth granted charters to Sir Humphrey Gilbert and Sir Walter Raleigh to colonize America. Gilbert headed two trips to the New World. He landed on Newfoundland but was unable to carry out his intention of establishing military posts. A year later, Raleigh sent a company to explore territory he named Virginia after Elizabeth, the "Virgin Queen," and in 1585, he sponsored a second voyage, this time to explore the Chesapeake Bay region. By the seventeenth century, the English had taken the lead in colonizing North America, establishing settlements all along the Atlantic coast and in the West Indies.

Sweden and Denmark

Sweden and Denmark also succumbed to the attractions of America, although to a lesser extent. In 1638, the Swedish West India Company established a settlement on the Delaware River near present-day Wilmington called Fort Christina. This colony was short-lived, however, and was taken over by the Dutch in 1655. The king of Denmark chartered the Danish West India Company in 1671, and the Danes established colonies in St. Croix and other islands in the cluster of the Virgin Islands.

Sources

Samuel Eliot Morison, The European Discovery of America: The Northern Voyages, a.d. 500-1600 (1971); John H. Parry, The Spanish Seaborne Empire (1966; 2nd ed., 1980); David B. Quinn, England and the Discovery of America, 1481-1620, from the Bristol Voyages of the Fifteenth Century to the Pilgrim Settlement at Plymouth: The Exploration, Exploitation, and Trial-and-Error Colonization of North America by the English (1974).

Fact Check

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The first attempt by Europeans to colonize the New World occurred around1000 A.D. when the Vikings sailed from the British Isles to Greenland, established a colony and then moved on to Labrador, the Baffin Islands and finally Newfoundland.

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NA exploration:  https://www.history.com/topics/exploration/exploration-of-north-america
Voyage of Christopher Columbus: https://www.britannica.com/biography/Christopher-Columbus/The-first-voyage
Spanish Empire in North America: https://www.khanacademy.org/humanities/us-history/precontact-and-early-colonial-era/spanish-colonization/v/spanish-colonization
Empires in North America: https://www.khanacademy.org/humanities/us-history/precontact-and-early-colonial-era/spanish-colonization/v/spanish-colonization.

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The ships for the first voyage-the , , and Santa María-were fitted out at Palos, on the Tinto River in Spain. Consortia put together by a royal treasury official and composed mainly of Genoese and Florentine bankers in Sevilla (Seville) provided at least 1,140,000 maravedis to outfit the expedition, and Columbus supplied more than a third of the sum contributed by the king and queen. Queen Isabella did not, then, have to pawn her jewels (a myth first put about by Bartolomé de Las Casas in the 16th century).

The little fleet left on August 3, 1492. The admiral's navigational genius showed itself immediately, for they sailed southward to the Canary Islands, off the northwest African mainland, rather than sailing due west to the islands of the Azores. The westerlies prevailing in the Azores had defeated previous attempts to sail to the west, but in the Canaries the three ships could pick up the northeast trade winds; supposedly, they could trust to the westerlies for their return. After nearly a month in the Canaries the ships set out from San Sebastián de la Gomera on September 6.

On several occasions in September and early October, sailors spotted floating vegetation and various types of birds-all taken as signs that land was nearby. But by October 10 the crew had begun to lose patience, complaining that with their failure to make landfall, contrary winds and a shortage of provisions would keep them from returning home. Columbus allayed their fears, at least temporarily, and on October 12 land was sighted from the Pinta (though Columbus, on the Niña, later claimed the privilege for himself). The place of the first Caribbean landfall, called Guanahani, is hotly disputed, but San Salvador (Watlings) Island in the Bahamas is generally preferred to other Bahamian islands ( Samana Cay, Rum Cay, or the Plana Cays) or to the Turks and Caicos Islands. Beyond planting the royal banner, however, Columbus spent little time there, being anxious to press on to Cipango, or Cipangu ( Japan). He thought that he had found it in Cuba, where he landed on October 28, but he convinced himself by November 1 that Cuba was the Cathay mainland itself, though he had yet to see evidence of great cities. Thus, on December 5, he turned back southeastward to search for the fabled city of Zaiton ( Quanzhou, China), missing through this decision his sole chance of setting foot on Florida soil.

Adverse winds carried the fleet to an island called Ayti ( Haiti) by its Taino inhabitants; on December 6 Columbus renamed it La Isla Española, or Hispaniola. He seems to have thought that Hispaniola might be Cipango or, if not Cipango, then perhaps one of the legendarily rich isles from which King Solomon's triennial fleet brought back gold, gems, and spices to Jerusalem (1 Kings 10:11, 22); alternatively, he reasoned that the island could be related to the biblical kingdom of Sheba ( Sabaʾ). There Columbus found at least enough gold and prosperity to save him from ridicule on his return to Spain. With the help of a Taino cacique, or Indian chief, named Guacanagarí, he set up a stockade on the northern coast of the island, named it La Navidad, and posted 39 men to guard it until his return. The accidental running aground of the Santa María on December 25, 1492, provided additional planks and provisions for the garrison.

On January 16, 1493, Columbus left with his remaining two ships for Spain. The journey back was a nightmare. The westerlies did indeed direct them homeward, but in mid-February a terrible storm engulfed the fleet. The Niña was driven to seek harbour at Santa Maria in the Azores, where Columbus led a pilgrimage of thanksgiving to the shrine of the Virgin; however, hostile Portuguese authorities temporarily imprisoned the group. After securing their freedom Columbus sailed on, stormbound, and the damaged ship limped to port in Lisbon. There he was obliged to interview with King John II. These events left Columbus under the suspicion of collaborating with Spain's enemies and cast a shadow on his return to Palos on March 15.

On this first voyage many tensions built up that were to remain through all of Columbus's succeeding efforts. First and perhaps most damaging of all, the admiral's apparently high religious and even mystical aspirations were incompatible with the realities of trading, competition, and colonization. Columbus never openly acknowledged this gulf and so was quite incapable of bridging it. The admiral also adopted a mode of sanctification and autocratic leadership that made him many enemies. Moreover, Columbus was determined to take back both material and human cargo to his sovereigns and for himself, and this could be accomplished only if his sailors carried on looting, kidnapping, and other violent acts, especially on Hispaniola. Although he did control some of his men's excesses, these developments blunted his ability to retain the high moral ground and the claim in particular that his "discoveries" were divinely ordained. Further, the Spanish court revived its latent doubts about the foreigner Columbus's loyalty to Spain, and some of Columbus's companions set themselves against him. Captain Martín Pinzón had disputed the route as the fleet reached the Bahamas; he had later sailed the Pinta away from Cuba, and Columbus, on November 21, failing to rejoin him until January 6. The Pinta made port at Bayona on its homeward journey, separately from Columbus and the Niña. Had Pinzón not died so soon after his return, Columbus's command of the second voyage might have been less than assured. As it was, the Pinzón family became his rivals for reward.

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Christopher Columbus - Explorer, Voyages, New World

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Christopher Columbus - Explorer, Voyages, New World: The ships for the first voyage-the Niña, Pinta, and Santa María-were fitted out at Palos, on the Tinto River in Spain. Consortia put together by a royal treasury official and composed mainly of Genoese and Florentine bankers in Sevilla (Seville) provided at least 1,140,000 maravedis to outfit the expedition, and Columbus supplied more than a third of the sum contributed by the king and queen.

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Spanish colonization (video) | Khan Academy

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Learn for free about math, art, computer programming, economics, physics, chemistry, biology, medicine, finance, history, and more. Khan Academy is a nonprofit with the mission of providing a free, world-class education for anyone, anywhere.

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Colonial Life In America - Learn the hardships settlers faced as they learned to hunt for game and plant crops on this new soil.

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Colonist affected by great awakening and enlightenment 

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Colonist affected by great awakening and enlightenment 

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the great awakening and the enlightenment in the colonies

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The Great Awakening and the Enlightenment in the Colonies - ppt video online download

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The Enlightenment Science and mathematics begin to overthrow ideas of religion and miracles. Earth is not the center of the universe as expected. WHAT DOES THIS MEAN? Rejection of religion These ideas traveled from Europe to the Colonies BEN FRANKLIN- Obtain truth through experimentation and reason Lightning Experiment!

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Colonist response to Boston massacre and Boston tea act 

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Colonist response to Boston massacre and Boston tea act 

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The Navigation Acts were trade rules that governed commerce between Britain and its colonies. The first of the Navigation Acts existed for almost two centuries and was repealed in 1849. The laws were designed to protect British economic interests in colonial trade and to protect its industry against the rapidly growing Dutch navigation trade.

The purpose of the Molasses Act was to protect British West Indies exports to the American colonies from the more fertile French and Spanish islands of Martinique and Santo Domingo. It was not designed to raise revenue but it was used as a trade barrier. The duty was set at 6p per gallon of imported foreign molasses, corruption became endemic and illegal trade was widespread. In its first year it collected £330 sterling and during the period of 1738-1741 it collected £76 a year. Not until 1763 was the collection of the duty enforced when the duty was lowered to 2d a gallon and in 1764 it was replaced by the Sugar Act.

The Currency Act of 1751 prohibited the issue of new bills of credit by New England colonies: Rhode Island, Massachusetts Bay, New Hampshire and Connecticut. Parliament decided to enact the Currency Act of 1751 to control currency depreciation against silver and sterling and to ensure its value for payments of debt to British merchants. A subsequent Currency Act enacted in 1764 extended the policy to all British colonies in the Americas increasing more tension between Britain and America.

It amended the existing 1733 Molasses Act. The Act increased the duty of molasses from 2d to 3d of gallon of imported molasses. It enforced the Navigation Acts by prohibiting vessels to directly transport cargo to the colonies. Vessels had to unload its cargo in Britain, pay duties and reload its cargo before sailing to the colonies. The Sugar Act imposed a £7 a ton on wine imported from Madeira, the Azores and Canary Islands. It added hides, skins, potash and other products to the list of commodities that could be legally exported. The act was strictly enforced through the Vice-Admiralty Courts.

The Stamp Act intended to raise revenue by requiring the purchase of stamps to be placed on public documents, there were 55 documents subject to the duty. Violators were to be prosecuted in the vice-admiralty courts. For the first time the British had levied an explicit tax on the colonist for the purpose of raising revenue, previous taxes were seen as trade taxes and tolerated by colonial residents. Opposition to the tax was widespread as it represented an infringement on their rights. Opposition groups such as the Sons of Liberty sprung everywhere. The Act was nullified in March 1766.

The act required colonial assemblies to provide housing, food and drink to British troops stationed in their towns with the purpose of improving living conditions and decreasing the cost to the crown. Soldiers were to be housed in barracks or empty public buildings and not in private residences. It was the duty of local legislatures to fund the expenses. In 1766 the New York assembly refused to raise the money and in 1767 Parliament passed the New York Suspending Act on July 1767 which suspended the assembly until they complied with the new law.

The Declaratory Act was passed on March 18, 1766, at the same time as the repeal of the 1765 Stamp Act. The act was used as a justification for the repeal of the Stamp Act and as a face saving action. The 1766 Declaratory Act stated that the colonies are subordinate and dependent on the Imperial Crown and Parliament of Britain and that Parliament had the authority to pass laws.

The Act imposed import duties on 72 items including paint, tea, glass and paper. The revenue raised from it was to provide for the salaries of colonial officers and its administration. It also authorized the Supreme Court to issue writs of assistance for violators, established the American Customs Board and expanded Admiralty Courts. Protests against the Townshend Acts led to the Boston Massacre.

The Tea Act of 1773 granted the East India Company exclusive license to import and distribute tea to the American colonies. Tea was sold in America at 10s per pound, half its previous price and less than the cost of smuggled tea. Despite the economic benefit to end consumers of tea, the law damaged the position of independent shippers, smugglers and local shopkeepers. On December 1773 Bostonians dumped 342 chests of tea into the Boston Harbor in an event known as the Boston Tea Party.

As retaliation for the Boston Tea Party, Britain imposed the Coercive Acts in 1774. The Coercive Acts were a package of five laws: Boston Port Act, Massachusetts Government act, Administration of Justice Act, Quartering Act and Quebec Act.

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The Navigation Acts were trade rules that governed commerce between Britain and its colonies. The first of the Navigation Acts existed for almost two centuries and was repealed in 1849. The laws were designed to protect British economic interests in colonial trade and to protect its industry against the rapidly growing Dutch navigation trade.

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Life in the colonies: https://www.allabouthistory.org/colonial-life-in-america.htm
Colonist affected by the great awakening and enlightenment : https://slideplayer.com/slide/8422598/
Acts against colonist: http://www.stamp-act-history.com/british-taxation-colonial-america/list-of-british-acts/
Colonist response to Boston massacre: https://www.khanacademy.org/humanities/us-history/road-to-revolution/the-american-revolution/a/the-boston-tea-party

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Paul Revere's ride/ Lexington and Concord

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Paul Revere's ride/ Lexington and Concord

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Lead-Up to the Battles of Lexington and Concord

Starting in 1764, Great Britain enacted a series of measures aimed at raising revenue from its 13 American colonies. Many of those measures, including the Sugar Act, Stamp Act and Townshend Acts, generated fierce resentment among the colonists, who protested against "taxation without representation." Boston, the site of the 1770 Boston Massacre and the 1773 Boston Tea Party, was one of the main points of resistance. King George III of Britain ramped up the military presence there, and in June 1774 he shut down the city's harbor until colonists paid for tea dumped overboard the previous year. Soon after, the British Parliament declared that Massachusetts was in open rebellion.
Did you know? Paul Revere never shouted the legendary phrase later attributed to him ("The British are coming!") as he passed from town to town during his midnight ride on April 18, 1775. The operation was meant to be conducted as discreetly as possible since scores of British troops were hiding out in the Massachusetts countryside. Furthermore, colonial Americans at that time still considered themselves British.
On April 18, 1775, Joseph Warren, a physician and member of the Sons of Liberty, learned from a source inside the British high command that Redcoat troops would march that night on Concord. Warren dispatched two couriers, silversmith Paul Revere and tanner William Dawes, to alert residents of the news.

They went by separate routes in case one of them was captured. Revere crossed the Charles River by boat to get to Charlestown, where fellow patriots were waiting for a signal about the movement of British troops. The patriots had been instructed to look at the steeple of Boston's Old North Church, which was visible to them because it was the highest point in the city.

If there was one lantern hanging in the steeple, the British were arriving by land. If there were two, the British were coming by sea. Two lanterns were set out, and the covert signal was memorialized in American poet Henry Wadsworth Longfellow's poem, "Paul Revere's Ride," in which he wrote:

As Revere carried out his mission in Charlestown, Dawes left Boston and traveled along the Boston Neck peninsula. The two met up in Lexington, a few miles east of Concord, where revolutionary leaders Samuel Adams and John Hancock had temporarily holed up. Having persuaded those two to flee, a weary Revere and Dawes then set out again. On the road, they met a third rider, Samuel Prescott, who alone made it all the way to Concord. Revere was captured by a British patrol, while Dawes was thrown from his horse and forced to proceed back to Lexington on foot.

Fighting Breaks Out in Lexington and Concord

At dawn on April 19, some 700 British troops arrived in Lexington and came upon 77 militiamen gathered on the town green. A British major yelled, "Throw down your arms! Ye villains, ye rebels."

The heavily outnumbered militiamen had just been ordered by their commander to disperse when a shot rang out. To this day, no one knows which side fired first. Several British volleys were subsequently unleashed before order could be restored. When the smoke cleared, eight militiamen lay dead and nine were wounded, while only one Redcoat was injured.

The British then continued into Concord to search for arms, not realizing that the vast majority had already been relocated. They decided to burn what little they found, and the fire got slightly out of control. Hundreds of militiamen occupying the high ground outside of Concord incorrectly thought the whole town would be torched. The militiamen hustled to Concord's North Bridge, which was being defended by a contingent of British soldiers. The British fired first but fell back when the colonists returned the volley.

This was the "shot heard 'round the world" later immortalized by poet Ralph Waldo Emerson. (Emerson was not the only artist moved to depict the battle; painter Amos Doolittle, known as "The Revere of Connecticut," created four celebrated engravings of the Battles of Lexington and Concord.)

After searching Concord for about four hours, the British prepared to return to Boston, located 18 miles away. By that time, almost 2,000 militiamen-known as minutemen for their ability to be ready on a moment's notice-had descended to the area, and more were constantly arriving.

At first, the militiamen simply followed the British column. Fighting started again soon after, however, with the militiamen firing at the British from behind trees, stone walls, houses and sheds. Before long, British troops were abandoning weapons, clothing and equipment in order to retreat faster.

When the British column reached Lexington, it ran into an entire brigade of fresh Redcoats that had answered a call for reinforcements. But that did not stop the colonists from resuming their attack all the way through Menotomy (now Arlington) and Cambridge.

The British, for their part, tried to keep the colonists at bay with flanking parties and canon fire. In the evening a contingent of newly arrived minutemen from Salem and Marblehead, Massachusetts, purportedly had a chance to cut off the Redcoats and perhaps finish them off. Instead, their commander ordered them not to attack, and the British were able to reach the safety of Charlestown Neck, where they had naval support.

Effects of Lexington and Concord

The colonists did not show great marksmanship that day. As many as 3,500 militiamen firing constantly for 18 miles only killed or wounded roughly 250 Redcoats, compared to about 90 killed and wounded on their side.

The relatively low casualties of the Battles of Lexington and Concord proved they could stand up to one of the most powerful armies in the world. News of the battle quickly spread, reaching London on May 28. A few months later, the British narrowly defeated the Americans in Battle of Bunker Hill on June 17, 1775, the low number of casualties once again showing the strength of patriot forces. By the following summer, a full-scale war of independence had broken out, paving the way for the creation of the United States of America.

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Battles of Lexington and Concord - Winner, Date, Summary | HISTORY

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The Battles of Lexington and Concord, fought between colonial militiamen and British Redcoats on April 19, 1775, kicked off the American Revolutionary War.

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Yorktown and the Treaty of Paris [ushistory.org]

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Paul Revere's ride/ Lexington and Concord: https://www.history.com/topics/american-revolution/battles-of-lexington-and-concord
The Deceleration Of Independence: http://www.trbimg.com/img-5b3be1bb/turbine/mc-declaration-jpg-20180703/450/253x450
Battle of Saratoga: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cZNpbSP6Glo
Battle Of Yorktown / The treaty of Paris: http://www.ushistory.org/us/11i.asp

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From the beginning of the American Revolution, Congress felt the need for a stronger union and a government powerful enough to defeat Great Britain. During the early years of the war this desire became a belief that the new nation must have a constitutional order appropriate to its republican character.

A fear of central authority inhibited the creation of such a government, and widely shared political theory held that a republic could not adequately serve a large nation such as the United States. The legislators of a large republic would be unable to remain in touch with the people they represented, and the republic would inevitably degenerate into a tyranny.

To many Americans, their union seemed to be simply a league of confederated states, and their Congress a diplomatic assemblage representing 13 independent polities. The impetus for an effective central government lay in wartime urgency, the need for foreign recognition and aid and the growth of national feeling.

Who Wrote the Articles of Confederation?

Altogether, six drafts of the Articles were prepared before Congress settled on a final version in 1777. Benjamin Franklin wrote the first and presented it to Congress in July 1775. It was never formally considered. Later in the year Silas Deane, a delegate from Connecticut, offered one of his own, which was followed still later by a draft from the Connecticut delegation, probably a revision of Deane's.

None of these drafts contributed significantly to the fourth version written by John Dickinson of Pennsylvania, the text that after much revision provided the basis for the Articles approved by Congress. Dickinson prepared his draft in June 1776; it was revised by a committee of Congress and discussed in late July and August. The result, the third version of Dickinson's original, was printed to enable Congress to consider it further. In November 1777 the final Articles, much altered by this long deliberative process, were approved for submission to the states.

Ratification of the Articles of Confederation

By 1779 all the states had approved the Articles of Confederation except Maryland, but the prospects for acceptance looked bleak because claims to western lands by other states set Maryland in inflexible opposition. Virginia, the Carolinas, Georgia, Connecticut and Massachusetts claimed by their charters to extend to the "South Sea" or the Mississippi River.

The charters of Maryland, Pennsylvania, New Jersey, Delaware and Rhode Island confined those states to a few hundred miles of the Atlantic. Land speculators in Maryland and these other "landless states" insisted that the West belonged to the United States, and they urged Congress to honor their claims to western lands. Maryland also supported the demands because nearby Virginia would clearly dominate its neighbor should its claims be accepted.

Eventually Thomas Jefferson persuaded his state to yield its claims to the West, provided that the speculators' demands were rejected and the West was divided into new states, which would be admitted into the Union on the basis of equality with the old. Virginia's action persuaded Maryland to ratify the Articles, which went into effect on March 1, 1781.

Weaknesses of the Articles of Confederation

The weakness of the Articles of Confederation was that Congress was not strong enough to enforce laws or raise taxes, making it difficult for the new nation to repay their debts from the Revolutionary War. There was no executive and no judiciary, two of the three branches of government we have today to act as a system of checks and balances. Additionally, there were several issues between states that were not settled with ratification: A disagreement over the appointment of taxes forecast the division over slavery in the Constitutional Convention.

Dickinson's draft required the states to provide money to Congress in proportion to the number of their inhabitants, black and white, except Indians not paying taxes. With large numbers of slaves, the southern states opposed this requirement, arguing that taxes should be based on the number of white inhabitants. This failed to pass, but eventually the southerners had their way as Congress decided that each state's contribution should rest on the value of its lands and improvements. In the middle of the war, Congress had little time and less desire to take action on such matters as the slave trade and fugitive slaves, both issues receiving much attention in the Constitutional Convention.

Article III described the confederation as "a firm league of friendship" of states "for their common defense, the security of their liberties and their mutual and general welfare." This league would have a unicameral congress as the central institution of government; as in the past, each state had one vote, and delegates were elected by state legislatures. Under the Articles, each state retained its "sovereignty, freedom and independence." The old weakness of the First and Second Continental Congresses remained: the new Congress could not levy taxes, nor could it regulate commerce. Its revenue would come from the states, each contributing according to the value of privately owned land within its borders.

But Congress would exercise considerable powers: it was given jurisdiction over foreign relations with the authority to make treaties and alliances; it could make war and peace, maintain an army and navy, coin money, establish a postal service and manage Indian affairs; it could establish admiralty courts and it would serve as the last resort on appeal of disputes between the states. Decisions on certain specified matters-making war, entering treaties, regulating coinage, for example-required the assent of nine states in Congress, and all others required a majority.

Although the states remained sovereign and independent, no state was to impose restrictions on the trade or the movement of citizens of another state not imposed on its own. The Articles also required each state to extend "full faith and credit" to the judicial proceedings of the others. And the free inhabitants of each state were to enjoy the "privileges and immunities of free citizens" of the others. Movement across state lines was not to be restricted.

To amend the Articles, the legislatures of all thirteen states would have to agree. This provision, like many in the Articles, indicated that powerful provincial loyalties and suspicions of central authority persisted. In the 1780s-the so-called Critical Period-state actions powerfully affected politics and economic life.

For the most part, business prospered and the economy grew. Expansion into the West proceeded and population increased. National problems persisted, however, as American merchants were barred from the British West Indies and the British army continued to hold posts in the Old Northwest, which was named American territory under the Treaty of Paris.

These circumstances contributed to a sense that constitutional revision was imperative. Still, national feeling grew slowly in the 1780s, although major efforts to amend the Articles in order to give Congress the power to tax failed in 1781 and 1786. The year after the failure of 1786, the Constitutional Convention met in Philadelphia and effectively closed the history of government under the Articles of Confederation.

The Articles of Confederation Text
Preamble:
To all to whom these Presents shall come, we the undersigned Delegates of the States affixed to our Names send greeting.

Whereas the Delegates of the United States of America in Congress assembled did on the fifteenth day of November in the Year of our Lord One Thousand Seven Hundred and Seventy seven, and in the Second Year of the Independence of America, agree to certain articles of Confederation and perpetual Union between the States of New Hampshire, Massachusetts-bay, Rhode Island and Providence Plantations, Connecticut, New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Delaware, Maryland, Virginia, North Carolina, South Carolina and Georgia, in the words following, viz:

Articles of Confederation and perpetual Union between the States of New Hampshire, Massachusetts-bay, Rhode Island and Providence Plantations, Connecticut, New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Delaware, Maryland, Virginia, North Carolina, South Carolina and Georgia.
Thirteen Articles: Article I.
The Stile of this confederacy shall be "The United States of America."
Article II.
Each state retains its sovereignty, freedom and independence, and every Power, Jurisdiction and right, which is not by this confederation expressly delegated to the United States, in Congress assembled.
Article III.
The said states hereby severally enter into a firm league of friendship with each other, for their common defence, the security of their Liberties and their mutual and general welfare, binding themselves to assist each other, against all force offered to, or attacks made upon them, or any of them, on account of religion, sovereignty, trade, or any other pretence whatever.
Article IV.
The better to secure and perpetuate mutual friendship and intercourse among the people of the different states in this union, the free inhabitants of each of these states, paupers, vagabonds and fugitives from justice excepted, shall be entitled to all privileges and immunities of free citizens in the several states; and the people of each state shall have free ingress and regress to and from any other state, and shall enjoy therein all the privileges of trade and commerce, subject to the same duties impositions and restrictions as the inhabitants thereof respectively, provided that such restriction shall not extend so far as to prevent the removal of property imported into any state, to any other state, of which the Owner is an inhabitant; provided also that no imposition, duties or restriction shall be laid by any state, on the property of the united states, or either of them. If any Person guilty of, or charged with treason, felony, - or other high misdemeanor in any state, shall flee from Justice, and be found in any of the united states, he shall, upon demand of the Governor or executive power, of the state from which he fled, be delivered up and removed to the state having jurisdiction of his offense. Full faith and credit shall be given in each of these states to the records, acts and judicial proceedings of the courts and magistrates of every other state.
Article V.
For the more convenient management of the general interests of the united states, delegates shall be annually appointed in such manner as the legislature of each state shall direct, to meet in Congress on the first Monday in November, in every year, with a power reserved to each state, to recal its delegates, or any of them, at any time within the year, and to send others in their stead, for the remainder of the Year.

No state shall be represented in Congress by less than two, nor by more than seven Members; and no person shall be capable of being a delegate for more than three years in any term of six years; nor shall any person, being a delegate, be capable of holding any office under the united states, for which he, or another for his benefit receives any salary, fees or emolument of any kind.

Each state shall maintain its own delegates in a meeting of the states, and while they act as members of the committee of the states. In determining questions in the united states in Congress assembled, each state shall have one vote.

Freedom of speech and debate in Congress shall not be impeached or questioned in any Court, or place out of Congress, and the members of congress shall be protected in their persons from arrests and imprisonments, during the time of their going to and from, and attendance on congress, except for treason, felony, or breach of the peace.
Article VI.
No state, without the Consent of the united states in congress assembled, shall send any embassy to, or receive any embassy from, or enter into any conference agreement, alliance or treaty with any King prince or state; nor shall any person holding any office of profit or trust under the united states, or any of them, accept of any present, emolument, office or title of any kind whatever from any king, prince or foreign state; nor shall the united states in congress assembled, or any of them, grant any title of nobility.

No two or more states shall enter into any treaty, confederation or alliance whatever between them, without the consent of the united states in congress assembled, specifying accurately the purposes for which the same is to be entered into, and how long it shall continue.

No state shall lay any imposts or duties, which may interfere with any stipulations in treaties, entered into by the united states in congress assembled, with any king, prince or state, in pursuance of any treaties already proposed by congress, to the courts of France and Spain.

No vessels of war shall be kept up in time of peace by any state, except such number only, as shall be deemed necessary by the united states in congress assembled, for the defence of such state, or its trade; nor shall any body of forces be kept up by any state, in time of peace, except such number only, as in the judgment of the united states, in congress assembled, shall be deemed requisite to garrison the forts necessary for the defence of such state; but every state shall always keep up a well regulated and disciplined militia, sufficiently armed and accoutered, and shall provide and constantly have ready for use, in public stores, a due number of field pieces and tents, and a proper quantity of arms, ammunition and camp equipage. No state shall engage in any war without the consent of the united states in congress assembled, unless such state be actually invaded by enemies, or shall have received certain advice of a resolution being formed by some nation of Indians to invade such state, and the danger is so imminent as not to admit of a delay till the united states in congress assembled can be consulted: nor shall any state grant commissions to any ships or vessels of war, nor letters of marque or reprisal, except it be after a declaration of war by the united states in congress assembled, and then only against the kingdom or state and the subjects thereof, against which war has been so declared, and under such regulations as shall be established by the united states in congress assembled, unless such state be infested by pirates, in which case vessels of war may be fitted out for that occasion, and kept so long as the danger shall continue, or until the united states in congress assembled, shall determine otherwise.
Article VII.
When land-forces are raised by any state for the common defence, all officers of or under the rank of colonel, shall be appointed by the legislature of each state respectively, by whom such forces shall be raised, or in such manner as such state shall direct, and all vacancies shall be filled up by the State which first made the appointment.
Article VIII.
All charges of war, and all other expences that shall be incurred for the common defence or general welfare, and allowed by the united states in congress assembled, shall be defrayed out of a common treasury, which shall be supplied by the several states in proportion to the value of all land within each state, granted to or surveyed for any Person, as such land and the buildings and improvements thereon shall be estimated according to such mode as the united states in congress assembled, shall from time to time direct and appoint.

The taxes for paying that proportion shall be laid and levied by the authority and direction of the legislatures of the several states within the time agreed upon by the united states in congress assembled.
Article IX.
The united states in congress assembled, shall have the sole and exclusive right and power of determining on peace and war, except in the cases mentioned in the sixth article - of sending and receiving ambassadors - entering into treaties and alliances, provided that no treaty of commerce shall be made whereby the legislative power of the respective states shall be restrained from imposing such imposts and duties on foreigners as their own people are subjected to, or from prohibiting the exportation or importation of any species of goods or commodities, whatsoever - of establishing rules for deciding in all cases, what captures on land or water shall be legal, and in what manner prizes taken by land or naval forces in the service of the united states shall be divided or appropriated - of granting letters of marque and reprisal in times of peace - appointing courts for the trial of piracies and felonies committed on the high seas and establishing courts for receiving and determining finally appeals in all cases of captures, provided that no member of congress shall be appointed a judge of any of the said courts.

The united states in congress assembled shall also be the last resort on appeal in all disputes and differences now subsisting or that hereafter may arise between two or more states concerning boundary, jurisdiction or any other cause whatever; which authority shall always be exercised in the manner following. Whenever the legislative or executive authority or lawful agent of any state in controversy with another shall present a petition to congress stating the matter in question and praying for a hearing, notice thereof shall be given by order of congress to the legislative or executive authority of the other state in controversy, and a day assigned for the appearance of the parties by their lawful agents, who shall then be directed to appoint by joint consent, commissioners or judges to constitute a court for hearing and determining the matter in question: but if they cannot agree, congress shall name three persons out of each of the united states, and from the list of such persons each party shall alternately strike out one, the petitioners beginning, until the number shall be reduced to thirteen; and from that number not less than seven, nor more than nine names as congress shall direct, shall in the presence of congress be drawn out by lot, and the persons whose names shall be so drawn or any five of them, shall be commissioners or judges, to hear and finally determine the controversy, so always as a major part of the judges who shall hear the cause shall agree in the determination: and if either party shall neglect to attend at the day appointed, without showing reasons, which congress shall judge sufficient, or being present shall refuse to strike, the congress shall proceed to nominate three persons out of each state, and the secretary of congress shall strike in behalf of such party absent or refusing; and the judgment and sentence of the court to be appointed, in the manner before prescribed, shall be final and conclusive; and if any of the parties shall refuse to submit to the authority of such court, or to appear or defend their claim or cause, the court shall nevertheless proceed to pronounce sentence, or judgment, which shall in like manner be final and decisive, the judgment or sentence and other proceedings being in either case transmitted to congress, and lodged among the acts of congress for the security of the parties concerned: provided that every commissioner, before he sits in judgment, shall take an oath to be administered by one of the judges of the supreme or superior court of the state, where the cause shall be tried, "well and truly to hear and determine the matter in question, according to the best of his judgment, without favour, affection or hope of reward:" provided also, that no state shall be deprived of territory for the benefit of the united states.

All controversies concerning the private right of soil claimed under different grants of two or more states, whose jurisdictions as they may respect such lands, and the states which passed such grants are adjusted, the said grants or either of them being at the same time claimed to have originated antecedent to such settlement of jurisdiction, shall on the petition of either party to the congress of the united states, be finally determined as near as may be in the same manner as is before prescribed for deciding disputes respecting territorial jurisdiction between different states.

The united states in congress assembled shall also have the sole and exclusive right and power of regulating the alloy and value of coin struck by their own authority, or by that of the respective states - fixing the standard of weights and measures throughout the united states - regulating the trade and managing all affairs with the Indians, not members of any of the states, provided that the legislative right of any state within its own limits be not infringed or violated - establishing or regulating post offices from one state to another, throughout all the united states, and exacting such postage on the papers passing thro' the same as may be requisite to defray the expences of the said office - appointing all officers of the land forces, in the service of the united states, excepting regimental officers - appointing all the officers of the naval forces, and commissioning all officers whatever in the service of the united states - making rules for the government and regulation of the said land and naval forces, and directing their operations.

The united states in congress assembled shall have authority to appoint a committee, to sit in the recess of congress, to be denominated "A Committee of the States," and to consist of one delegate from each state; and to appoint such other committees and civil officers as may be necessary for managing the general affairs of the united states under their direction - to appoint one of their number to preside, provided that no person be allowed to serve in the office of president more than one year in any term of three years; to ascertain the necessary sums of money to be raised for the service of the united states, and to appropriate and apply the same for defraying the public expences to borrow money, or emit bills on the credit of the united states, transmitting every half year to the respective states an account of the sums of money so borrowed or emitted, - to build and equip a navy - to agree upon the number of land forces, and to make requisitions from each state for its quota, in proportion to the number of white inhabitants in such state; which requisition shall be binding, and thereupon the legislature of each state shall appoint the regimental officers, raise the men and cloth, arm and equip them in a soldier like manner, at the expence of the united states; and the officers and men so cloathed, armed and quipped shall march to the place appointed, and within the time agreed on by the united states in congress assembled: But if the united states in congress assembled shall, on consideration of circumstances judge proper that any state should not raise men, or should raise a smaller number than its quota, and that any other state should raise a greater number of men than the quota thereof, such extra number shall be raised, officered, cloathed, armed and equipped in the same manner as the quota of such state, unless the legislature of such sta te shall judge that such extra number cannot be safely spared out of the same, in which case they shall raise officer, cloath, arm and equip as many of such extra number as they judge can be safely spared. And the officers and men so cloathed, armed and equipped, shall march to the place appointed, and within the time agreed on by the united states in congress assembled.

The united states in congress assembled shall never engage in a war, nor grant letters of marque and reprisal in time of peace, nor enter into any treaties or alliances, nor coin money, nor regulate the value thereof, nor ascertain the sums and expences necessary for the defence and welfare of the united states, or any of them, nor emit bills, nor borrow money on the credit of the united states, nor appropriate money, nor agree upon the number of vessels of war, to be built or purchased, or the number of land or sea forces to be raised, nor appoint a commander in chief of the army or navy, unless nine states assent to the same: nor shall a question on any other point, except for adjourning from day to day be determined, unless by the votes of a majority of the united states in congress assembled.

The congress of the united states shall have power to adjourn to any time within the year, and to any place within the united states, so that no period of adjournment be for a longer duration than the space of six Months, and shall publish the Journal of their proceedings monthly, except such parts thereof relating to treaties, alliances or military operations, as in their judgment require secrecy; and the yeas and nays of the delegates of each state on any question shall be entered on the Journal, when it is desired by any delegate; and the delegates of a state, or any of them, at his or their request shall be furnished with a transcript of the said Journal, except such parts as are above excepted, to lay before the legislatures of the several states.
Article X.
The committee of the states, or any nine of them, shall be authorized to execute, in the recess of congress, such of the powers of congress as the united states in congress assembled, by the consent of nine states, shall from time to time think expedient to vest them with; provided that no power be delegated to the said committee, for the exercise of which, by the articles of confederation, the voice of nine states in the congress of the united states assembled is requisite.
Article XI.
Canada acceding to this confederation, and joining in the measures of the united states, shall be admitted into, and entitled to all the advantages of this union: but no other colony shall be admitted into the same, unless such admission be agreed to by nine states.
Article XII.
All bills of credit emitted, monies borrowed and debts contracted by, or under the authority of congress, before the assembling of the united states, in pursuance of the present confederation, shall be deemed and considered as a charge against the united states, for payment and satisfaction whereof the said united states, and the public faith are hereby solemnly pledged.
Article XIII.
Every state shall abide by the determinations of the united states in congress assembled, on all questions which by this confederation are submitted to them. And the Articles of this confederation shall be inviolably observed by every state, and the union shall be perpetual; nor shall any alteration at any time hereafter be made in any of them; unless such alteration be agreed to in a congress of the united states, and be afterwards confirmed by the legislatures of every state.
Conclusion:
And Whereas it hath pleased the Great Governor of the World to incline the hearts of the legislatures we respectively represent in congress, to approve of, and to authorize us to ratify the said articles of confederation and perpetual union. Know Ye that we the undersigned delegates, by virtue of the power and authority to us given for that pur pose, do by these presents, in the name and in behalf of our respective constituents, fully and entirely ratify and confirm each and every of the said articles of confederation and perpetual union, and all and singular the matters and things therein contained: And we do further solemnly plight and engage the faith of our respective constituents, that they shall abide by the determinations of the united states in congress assembled, on all questions, which by the said confederation are submitted to them. And that the articles thereof shall be inviolably observed by the states we respectively represent, and that the union shall be perpetual.

In Witness whereof we have hereunto set our hands in Congress. Done at Philadelphia in the state of Pennsylvania the ninth day of July in the Year of our Lord one Thousand seven Hundred and Seventy-eight, and in the third year of the independence of America.

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From the beginning of the American Revolution, Congress felt the need for a stronger union and a government powerful enough to defeat Great Britain. During the early years of the war this desire became a belief that the new nation must have a constitutional order appropriate to its republican character.

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July 16, 1787

July 16, 1987, began with a light breeze, a cloudless sky, and a spirit of celebration. On that day, 200 senators and representatives boarded a special train for a journey to Philadelphia to celebrate a singular congressional anniversary.

Exactly 200 years earlier, the framers of the U.S. Constitution, meeting at Independence Hall, had reached a supremely important agreement. Their so-called Great Compromise (or Connecticut Compromise in honor of its architects, Connecticut delegates Roger Sherman and Oliver Ellsworth) provided a dual system of congressional representation. In the House of Representatives each state would be assigned a number of seats in proportion to its population. In the Senate, all states would have the same number of seats. Today, we take this arrangement for granted; in the wilting-hot summer of 1787, it was a new idea.

In the weeks before July 16, 1787, the framers had made several important decisions about the Senate's structure. They turned aside a proposal to have the House of Representatives elect senators from lists submitted by the individual state legislatures and agreed that those legislatures should elect their own senators.

By July 16, the convention had already set the minimum age for senators at 30 and the term length at six years, as opposed to 25 for House members, with two-year terms. James Madison explained that these distinctions, based on "the nature of the senatorial trust, which requires greater extent of information and stability of character," would allow the Senate "to proceed with more coolness, with more system, and with more wisdom than the popular[ly elected] branch."

The issue of representation, however, threatened to destroy the seven-week-old convention. Delegates from the large states believed that because their states contributed proportionally more to the nation's financial and defensive resources, they should enjoy proportionally greater representation in the Senate as well as in the House. Small-state delegates demanded, with comparable intensity, that all states be equally represented in both houses. When Sherman proposed the compromise, Benjamin Franklin agreed that each state should have an equal vote in the Senate in all matters-except those involving money.

Over the Fourth of July holiday, delegates worked out a compromise plan that sidetracked Franklin's proposal. On July 16, the convention adopted the Great Compromise by a heart-stopping margin of one vote. As the 1987 celebrants duly noted, without that vote, there would likely have been no Constitution.

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July 16, 1787 July 16, 1987, began with a light breeze, a cloudless sky, and a spirit of celebration. On that day, 200 senators and representatives boarded a special train for a journey to Philadelphia to celebrate a singular congressional anniversary. Exactly 200 years earlier, the framers of the U.S.

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federalism, mode of political organization that unites separate states or other polities within an overarching political system in a way that allows each to maintain its own integrity. Federal systems do this by requiring that basic policies be made and implemented through negotiation in some form, so that all the members can share in making and executing decisions. The political principles that animate federal systems emphasize the primacy of bargaining and negotiated coordination among several power centres; they stress the virtues of dispersed power centres as a means for safeguarding individual and local liberties.

The various political systems that call themselves federal differ in many ways. Certain characteristics and principles, however, are common to all truly federal systems.

Written constitution

First, the federal relationship must be established or confirmed through a perpetual covenant of union, usually embodied in a written constitution that outlines the terms by which power is divided or shared; the constitution can be altered only by extraordinary procedures. These constitutions are distinctive in being not simply compacts between rulers and ruled but involving the people, the general government, and the states constituting the federal union. The constituent states, moreover, often retain constitution-making rights of their own.

Elements maintaining union

Modern federal systems generally provide direct lines of communication between the citizenry and all the governments that serve them. The people may and usually do elect representatives to all the governments, and all of them may and usually do administer programs that directly serve the individual citizen.

The existence of those direct lines of communication is one of the features distinguishing federations from leagues or confederations. It is usually based on a sense of common nationality binding the constituent polities and people together. In some countries this sense of nationality has been inherited, as in Germany, while in the United States, Argentina, and Australia it had to be at least partly invented. Canada and Switzerland have had to evolve this sense in order to hold together strongly divergent nationality groups.

Geographic necessity has played a part in promoting the maintenance of union within federal systems. The Mississippi Valley in the United States, the Alps in Switzerland, the island character of the Australian continent, and the mountains and jungles surrounding Brazil have all been influences promoting unity; so have the pressures for Canadian union arising from that country's situation on the border of the United States and the pressures upon the German states generated by their neighbours to the east and west. In this connection, the necessity for a common defense against common enemies has stimulated federal union in the first place and acted to maintain it.

Elements maintaining noncentralization

The constituent polities in a federal system must be fairly equal in population and wealth or else balanced geographically or numerically in their inequalities. In the United States, each geographic section has included both great and small states. In Canada, the ethnic differences between the two largest and richest provinces have prevented them from combining against the others. Swiss federalism has been supported by the existence of groups of cantons of different sizes and religio-linguistic backgrounds. Similar distributions exist in every other successful federal system.

A major reason for the failure of federal systems has often been a lack of balance among the constituent polities. In the German federal empire of the late 19th century, Prussia was so dominant that the other states had little opportunity to provide national leadership or even a reasonably strong alternative to the policy of the king and government. During the Soviet era (1917-90/91), the existence of the Russian Soviet Federated Socialist Republic-occupying three-fourths of the area and containing three-fifths of the population-severely limited the possibility of authentic federal relationships in that country even if the communist system had not.

Successful federal systems have also been characterized by the permanence of their internal boundaries. Boundary changes may occur, but such changes are made only with the consent of the polities involved and are avoided except in extreme situations.

In a few very important cases, noncentralization is given support through the constitutionally guaranteed existence of different systems of law in the constituent polities. In the United States, each state's legal system stems directly and to a certain extent uniquely from English (and, in one case, French) law, while federal law occupies only an interstitial position binding the systems of the 50 states together. The resulting mixture of laws keeps the administration of justice substantially noncentralized, even in federal courts. In Canada, the existence of common-law and civil-law systems side by side has contributed to French-Canadian cultural survival. Federal systems more often provide for modification of national legal codes by the subnational governments to meet special local needs, as in Switzerland.

The point has often been made that in a truly federal system the constituent polities must have substantial influence over the formal or informal constitutional-amending process. Since constitutional changes are often made without formal constitutional amendment, the position of the constituent polities must be such that serious changes in the political order can be made only by the decision of dispersed majorities that reflect the areal division of powers. Federal theorists have argued that this is important for popular government as well as for federalism.

Noncentralization is also strengthened by giving the constituent polities guaranteed representation in the national legislature and often by giving them a guaranteed role in the national political process. The latter is guaranteed in the written constitutions of the United States and Switzerland. In other systems, such as those of Canada and Latin America, the constituent polities have acquired certain powers of participation, and these have become part of the unwritten constitution.

Perhaps the most important single element in the maintenance of federal noncentralization is the existence of a noncentralized party system. Noncentralized parties initially develop out of the constitutional arrangements of the federal compact, but once they have come into existence they tend to be self-perpetuating and to function as decentralizing forces in their own right. The United States and Canada provide examples of the forms that a noncentralized party system may take. In the two-party system of the United States, the parties are actually coalitions of the state parties (which may in turn be dominated by specific local party organizations) and generally function as national units only for the quadrennial presidential elections or for purposes of organizing the national Congress.

In Canada, on the other hand, the parliamentary form of government, with its requirements of party responsibility, means that on the national plane considerably more party cohesiveness must be maintained simply in order to gain and hold power. There has been a fragmentation of the parties along regional or provincial lines. The party victorious in national elections is likely to be the one able to expand its provincial electoral bases temporarily to national proportions.

Federal nations with less-developed party systems frequently gain some of the same decentralizing effects through what has been called caudillismo-in which power is diffused among strong local leaders operating in the constituent polities. Caudillistic noncentralization has apparently existed also in Nigeria and Malaysia.

Elements maintaining the federal principle

Several devices found in federal systems serve to maintain the federal principle itself. Two of these are of particular importance.

The maintenance of federalism requires that the central government and the constituent polities each have substantially complete governing institutions of their own, with the right to modify those institutions unilaterally within limits set by the compact. Both separate legislative and separate administrative institutions are necessary.

The contractual sharing of public responsibilities by all governments in the system appears to be a fundamental characteristic of federalism. Sharing, broadly conceived, includes common involvement in policy making, financing, and administration. Sharing may be formal or informal; in federal systems, it is usually contractual. The contract is used as a legal device to enable governments to engage in joint action while remaining independent entities. Even where there is no formal arrangement, the spirit of federalism tends to infuse a sense of contractual obligation.

Federal systems or systems strongly influenced by federal principles have been among the most stable and long-lasting of polities. But the successful operation of federal systems requires a particular kind of political environment, one that is conducive to popular government and has the requisite traditions of political cooperation and self-restraint. Beyond this, federal systems operate best in societies with sufficient homogeneity of fundamental interests to allow a great deal of latitude to local government and to permit reliance upon voluntary collaboration. The use of force to maintain domestic order is even more inimical to the successful maintenance of federal patterns of government than to other forms of popular government. Federal systems are most successful in societies that have the human resources to fill many public offices competently and the material resources to afford a measure of economic waste as part of the price of liberty.
The Editors of Encyclopaedia Britannica

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Federalism | Definition, History, Characteristics, & Facts

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Federalism, mode of political organization that unites separate states or other polities within an overarching political system in a way that allows each to maintain its own integrity. Learn more about the history and characteristics of federalism in this article.

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Separation of Powers and Checks and Balances

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The Bill of Rights for Kids | U.S. Constitution Amendments

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Articles of Confederation: https://www.history.com/topics/early-us/articles-of-confederation

The great compromise: https://www.senate.gov/artandhistory/history/minute/A_Great_Compromise.htm

Federalism: https://www.britannica.com/topic/federalism

separation of power: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=APcKEHAPYEg#action=share

The Constitution: https://slideplayer.com/slide/4920693/16/images/2/Outline+of+the+Constitution+%28p.+758%29.jpg

The bill of rights: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7dSyMG8OJcY

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Rise of Political Parties

- Characteristics of each party

The National Bank was also a semiofficial institution. Although it is used to store federal money and bolster the nation's economy - you can also invest in the Bank by purchasing stock in the Bank - so you have speculators (generally wealthy individuals) who have invested in the national bank. Republicans saw this as groundwork for corruption.

Jefferson and the Republicans opposed the bank because they thought the government shouldn't be tied to business practices for the country. Also thought the government had no authority to establish a national bank because this hadn't been a provision of the Constitution. Republicans wanted a strict interpretation of the U.S. Constitution. Thomas Jefferson is one of the main proponents of strict interpretation (a fact which will cause some embarrassment with his upcoming purchase of the Louisiana Territory...)

Hamilton & the Federalists replied that the bank was constitutional because the federal govt. had the power to regulate trade and control taxes. Federalists promoted a loose interpretation of the Constitution so the federal government had the power to set economic policy.

The upshot - the bank was quite successful; it encouraged foreign investment in the Bank and boosted the country's cash reserves. It will also come in handy for Jefferson when he needs to finance the Louisiana Purchase.

The election of 1796 points out one of the flaws in the electoral college system (as envisioned in the constitution). Remember how I emphasized the point that there were no political parties at the time the college was created? Well, just ten years later there were parties (Federalists and Republicans).

According to the Electoral system, electors selected two candidates and their votes were tallied to determine who won the presidency and who would become vice-president. Thus, in the election of 1796 John Adams won the presidency and his political rival, Thomas Jefferson, became Vice- resident (see your Berkin text for a more detailed explanation of the political maneuvering here, p. 147).

The upcoming Election of 1800 will provide further impetus to address this problem with the Electoral College - we'll discuss this in the next lecture...

Just as Americans were trying to sort out and define their political system, the nations of Britain and France were resuming hostilities in Europe. Since the United States had ties to both countries, American had a difficult time trying to maintain neutrality.

Americans had initially supported the French Revolution and its laudable goals which mirrored the American Revolution. However, as the French Revolution degenerated into the Reign of Terror, many Americans wanted to distance themselves from the horrors of the revolution which ran contrary to Americans' notions of social order, human rights, and property rights. Although Americans supported a more democratic form of government in France, they didn't support the chaos which ensued in the Reign of Terror (1792-3). To completely short-circuit a needless lecture on the French Revolution just keep this in mind - Napoleon will emerge as the de facto leader of France in 1799!

The French Revolution is important to Americans because the United States will find itself caught in the middle of the two main contestants - by 1792 Britain and France were again at war. The French wanted to extend the revolution and Britain wanted to contain it.

The British still occupied forts along the western frontier (in Ohio Valley and around the Great Lakes). They also blockaded the French West Indies to American trade and seized American ships which traveled there for trade. (ex. between 1793-94, Brits seized the cargoes of 250 American ships)

The Spanish (allied with the French) occupied Florida and controlled New Orleans -effectively controlling traffic on the Mississippi (if they chose to).

Washington managed (with some difficulty) to maintain a policy of neutrality during his two administrations - he didn't want to drag the new nation into a costly, deadly, and probably "unwinnable" war.

Adams considered himself the "heir apparent" to President Washington, having languished in the vice presidency (which he described as "the most insignificant office that ever the invention of man contrived or his imagination conceived") for eight years, awaiting his turn to be President. Adams had served his country well - you should recall that he was a key player in the years preceding the American Revolution and that he advanced the careers of both Washington and Jefferson at the Second Continental Congress in 1775. He also served as an ambassador to Britain after the war and, like many Federalists, Adams supported a continued economic partnership with Great Britain.

Still, Adams was a "reluctant Federalist." Although he believed in the need for a strong central government, he didn't feel compelled to protect the interests of the wealthy as Hamilton did. He was also ticked because Hamilton had so much power and influence, even after he was no longer Secretary of the Treasury. The rivalry between Adams and Hamilton helped to mitigate the influence of the Federalist party.

Alien and Sedition Acts - (1798) See Berkin for more information!

Passed by Congress (Jefferson and his fellow Republicans tend to pin this legislation solely upon Adams - remember it has to be passed by a majority in Congress, though the Federalists control Congress at this point) and promoted/approved by Adams. The Alien act wasn't used much but was designed to arrest and deport "aliens" (immigrants) suspected of treason. Also passed a Naturalization Act which increased the # of years of residency required to become a naturalized citizen (from 5 to 14).

The Sedition act was much more problematic. Established fines and imprisonment for those accused of writing, speaking, or publishing anything considered treasonous to the government. Critics will argue that this contradicts the 1 st Amendment guarantee of freedom of the press. The Federalists were trying to curb free speech but specifically they wanted to reduce the influence of Republicans who were railing against the Federalist government!

The Alien & Sedition Acts backfired for Adams because they angered most Americans. The Sedition Act also prompted Jefferson (authored Kentucky) and Madison (Va.) to compose the Virginia and Kentucky Resolutions which reasserted the states had a right to intercede in governmental affairs if they felt the federal government had exceeded its authority.

These resolutions are important because southerners will later draw upon them, claiming that they establish the principles of nullification.

The Alien and Sedition Acts expired about the time that Adams was leaving office in 1800.

By now you should be able to trace the evolution of the Federalists and Republicans and understand their stances on major issues associated with the first political party system.

For a "refresher" keep the following points in mind:

Led by Hamilton and J. Adams

Want a strong central (national) government

generally favor a wealthy aristocracy of the elite and enjoy the support of the commercial classes

don't really trust the "common" (i.e. Jefferson's farmers, artisans, and members of the lower classes) people to make wise economic and political decisions

supporters tend to be from urban areas, especially in the North

emphasize economic policy of strong commercial growth

want a flexible or loose interpretation of the U.S. Constitution (remember the Bank debate)

want to maintain a close trade relationship with Great Britain

declined in significance after the election of 1800

Republicans (a.k.a. Democrat Republicans or Jeffersonian Republicans)

Led by Thomas Jefferson and James Madison

want to retain state power and rely on a decentralized form of republican government

believe that "the people" should be in charge of the government

supporters tend to be small planters, artisans, and semi-subsistence farmers in rural areas of the North and South

believe in an agrarian republic of property-owners

call for a strict interpretation of the U.S. Constitution

want to maintain a close relationship with France (within reason - remember the Revolution!)

became the dominant party after the election of 1800

Remember, political parties are good things! Keep the following points in mind....

Parties originally started out at the federal level then spread to the state and local levels as politicians consolidated power among constituents. Parties will eventually develop national and local newspapers to promote their agendas

although the parties proved to have a divisive influence in politics, both parties remained loyal to the constitutional system of a republican government. They did not form coups to seize governmental power, instead they relied on democratic elections.

each political party helps to mitigate the radical elements of the other. Plus there is a greater tendency to avoid political extremes if both sides realize that they must ultimately compromise in order to ensure passage of legislation

Return to Class Schedule

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Rise of Political Parties - Characteristics of each party The National Bank was also a semiofficial institution. Although it is used to store federal money and bolster the nation's economy - you can also invest in the Bank by purchasing stock in the Bank - so you have speculators (generally wealthy individuals) who have invested in the national bank.

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EdGate Correlation Services - Home | EdGate Correlation Services

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EdGate Correlation Services is the Publishers Choice for Curriculum Alignment to Standards. Our highly skilled team is dedicated to the success of our ever-growing client list.

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To print the story please do so via the link in the story toolbar.

Read through the timeline and answer the questions in your notebook.

Henry Clay, a representative from Kentucky, was a strong nationalist. He presented a plan to President Madison to strengthen the country and unify its different regions. The plan was to help the country prosper and grow by itself, without foreign products.

The plan, known as the American System, included 3 main actions:

1. Establish a protective tariff - a tax on imported goods. It made European goods more expensive than American goods. It encouraged Americans to buy cheaper American-made products.

2. Establish a national bank - This would promote a single currency, making trade easier. In 1816, Congress set up the Second Bank of the United States.

3. Improve the country's transportation systems - Poor roads made transportation slow and costly.

Water transportation improved as well. The period of 1825-1850 is often called the Age of Canals. Completed in 1825 was the massive Erie Canal. This canal created a water route between New York City and Buffalo, New York. The canal opened the upper Ohio Valley and the Great Lakes region to settlement and trade. It also helped nationalism by bringing these two sections of the country together.

Trade stimulated by the canal helped New York City become the nation's largest city.

The nationalist spirit also made U.S. leaders want to expand the country's borders. To get this done, they would have to reach agreements with Britain and Spain.

One agreement with Britain, set the 49th parallel as the U.S.-Canadian border as far west as the Rocky Mountains.

U.S. relations with Spain were tense. The two nations disagreed on the boundaries of the Louisiana Purchase and who owned West Florida. In 1817, President Monroe ordered General Andrew Jackson to stop Seminole raids on white settlements in Georgia, but do not confront the Spanish. Jackson followed the Seminoles into Spanish territory and claimed Florida for the U.S.

Monroe then ordered Jackson to withdraw but gave Spain a choice. They could police Florida or turn it over to the U.S. Spain decided to hand Florida over to the U.S. and also gave up claims to the Oregon Country.

Sectionalism became a major issue when Missouri applied for statehood in 1817. People living in Missouri wanted to allow slavery in their state. At the time, the U.S. had 11 slave states and 11 free states. Adding Missouri would upset the balance of power in Congress.

For months the country argued over admitting Missouri as a slave state or free state. At the same time, Maine, which had been part of Massachusetts, also wanted statehood.

Henry Clay suggested that Missouri be admitted as a slave state and Maine as a free state. Congress passed Clay's plan, known as the Missouri Compromise. It kept the balance of power in Senate between slave and free states. It also called for slavery to be banned from the Louisiana Territory north of the parallel 36/30, Missouri's southern border.

The nation felt threatened not only by sectionalism, but be events elsewhere in the Americas. Latin America had won their independence from Spain and Portugal. Some European monarchies planned to help Spain and Portugal regain their colonies. U.S. leaders feared that if this happened, their own government would be in danger.

In December 1823, President Monroe issued a statement that became known as the Monroe Doctrine. Monroe said that the Americas were closed to further colonization. He also warned that European efforts to reestablish colonies would be considered "dangerous to our peace and safety." Finally, he promised that the U.S. would stay out of European affairs.

The Monroe Doctrine showed that the U.S. saw itself as a world power and a protector of Latin America.

Henry Clay, a representative from Kentucky, was a strong nationalist. He presented a plan to President Madison to strengthen the country and unify its different regions. The plan was to help the country prosper and grow by itself, without foreign products.

The plan, known as the American System, included 3 main actions:

1. Establish a protective tariff - a tax on imported goods. It made European goods more expensive than American goods. It encouraged Americans to buy cheaper American-made products.

2. Establish a national bank - This would promote a single currency, making trade easier. In 1816, Congress set up the Second Bank of the United States.

3. Improve the country's transportation systems - Poor roads made transportation slow and costly.

Water transportation improved as well. The period of 1825-1850 is often called the Age of Canals. Completed in 1825 was the massive Erie Canal. This canal created a water route between New York City and Buffalo, New York. The canal opened the upper Ohio Valley and the Great Lakes region to settlement and trade. It also helped nationalism by bringing these two sections of the country together.

Trade stimulated by the canal helped New York City become the nation's largest city.

The nationalist spirit also made U.S. leaders want to expand the country's borders. To get this done, they would have to reach agreements with Britain and Spain.

One agreement with Britain, set the 49th parallel as the U.S.-Canadian border as far west as the Rocky Mountains.

U.S. relations with Spain were tense. The two nations disagreed on the boundaries of the Louisiana Purchase and who owned West Florida. In 1817, President Monroe ordered General Andrew Jackson to stop Seminole raids on white settlements in Georgia, but do not confront the Spanish. Jackson followed the Seminoles into Spanish territory and claimed Florida for the U.S.

Monroe then ordered Jackson to withdraw but gave Spain a choice. They could police Florida or turn it over to the U.S. Spain decided to hand Florida over to the U.S. and also gave up claims to the Oregon Country.

Sectionalism became a major issue when Missouri applied for statehood in 1817. People living in Missouri wanted to allow slavery in their state. At the time, the U.S. had 11 slave states and 11 free states. Adding Missouri would upset the balance of power in Congress.

For months the country argued over admitting Missouri as a slave state or free state. At the same time, Maine, which had been part of Massachusetts, also wanted statehood.

Henry Clay suggested that Missouri be admitted as a slave state and Maine as a free state. Congress passed Clay's plan, known as the Missouri Compromise. It kept the balance of power in Senate between slave and free states. It also called for slavery to be banned from the Louisiana Territory north of the parallel 36/30, Missouri's southern border.

The nation felt threatened not only by sectionalism, but be events elsewhere in the Americas. Latin America had won their independence from Spain and Portugal. Some European monarchies planned to help Spain and Portugal regain their colonies. U.S. leaders feared that if this happened, their own government would be in danger.

In December 1823, President Monroe issued a statement that became known as the Monroe Doctrine. Monroe said that the Americas were closed to further colonization. He also warned that European efforts to reestablish colonies would be considered "dangerous to our peace and safety." Finally, he promised that the U.S. would stay out of European affairs.

The Monroe Doctrine showed that the U.S. saw itself as a world power and a protector of Latin America.

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Read through the timeline and answer the questions in your notebook. Question #4: what was the main message of the Monroe Doctrine and who was it directed towards? Question #3: Why was it so important to Southerners to admit Missouri as a slave state? Sectionalism became a major issue when Missouri applied for statehood in 1817.

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The rise of political parties: https://www.radford.edu/~rvshelton/Parties.htm
The Louisiana purchase: https://www.history.com/topics/westward-expansion/louisiana-purchase
the corps discovery: http://www.edgate.com/lewisandclark/expedition.html
The war  of 1812: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WS7uz-CnK4Q&list=WL&index=9&t=0s
The Monroe doctrine: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Woh4gwIFpic
Nationalism vs Sectionalism: https://www.sutori.com/story/nationalism-and-sectionalism--S6cvMqKbbDnb3hJ7d6mumxS5

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An ambiguous, controversial concept, Jacksonian Democracy in the strictest sense refers simply to the ascendancy of Andrew Jackson and the Democratic party after 1828. More loosely, it alludes to the entire range of democratic reforms that proceeded alongside the Jacksonians' triumph-from expanding the suffrage to restructuring federal institutions. From another angle, however, Jacksonianism appears as a political impulse tied to slavery, the subjugation of Native Americans, and the celebration of white supremacy-so much so that some scholars have dismissed the phrase "Jacksonian Democracy" as a contradiction in terms.

Such tendentious revisionism may provide a useful corrective to older enthusiastic assessments, but it fails to capture a larger historical tragedy: Jacksonian Democracy was an authentic democratic movement, dedicated to powerful, at times radical, egalitarian ideals-but mainly for white men.

Socially and intellectually, the Jacksonian movement represented not the insurgency of a specific class or region but a diverse, sometimes testy national coalition. Its origins stretch back to the democratic stirrings of the American Revolution, the Antifederalists of the 1780s and 1790s, and the Jeffersonian Democratic Republicans. More directly, it arose out of the profound social and economic changes of the early nineteenth century.

Recent historians have analyzed these changes in terms of a market revolution. In the Northeast and Old Northwest, rapid transportation improvements and immigration hastened the collapse of an older yeoman and artisan economy and its replacement by cash-crop agriculture and capitalist manufacturing. In the South, the cotton boom revived a flagging plantation slave economy, which spread to occupy the best lands of the region. In the West, the seizure of lands from Native Americans and mixed-blood Hispanics opened up fresh areas for white settlement and cultivation-and for speculation.

Not everyone benefited equally from the market revolution, least of all those nonwhites for whom it was an unmitigated disaster. Jacksonianism, however, would grow directly from the tensions it generated within white society. Mortgaged farmers and an emerging proletariat in the Northeast, nonslaveholders in the South, tenants and would-be yeomen in the West-all had reasons to think that the spread of commerce and capitalism would bring not boundless opportunities but new forms of dependence. And in all sections of the country, some of the rising entrepreneurs of the market revolution suspected that older elites would block their way and shape economic development to suit themselves.

By the 1820s, these tensions fed into a many-sided crisis of political faith. To the frustration of both self-made men and plebeians, certain eighteenth-century elitist republican assumptions remained strong, especially in the seaboard states, mandating that government be left to a natural aristocracy of virtuous, propertied gentlemen. Simultaneously, some of the looming shapes of nineteenth-century capitalism-chartered corporations, commercial banks, and other private institutions-presaged the consolidation of a new kind of moneyed aristocracy. And increasingly after the War of 1812, government policy seemed to combine the worst of both old and new, favoring the kinds of centralized, broad constructionist, top-down forms of economic development that many thought would aid men of established means while deepening inequalities among whites. Numerous events during and after the misnamed Era of Good Feelings-among them the neo-Federalist rulings of John Marshall's Supreme Court, the devastating effects of the panic of 1819, the launching of John Quincy Adams's and Henry Clay's American System-confirmed a growing impression that power was steadily flowing into the hands of a small, self-confident minority.

Proposed cures for this sickness included more democracy and a redirection of economic policy. In the older states, reformers fought to lower or abolish property requirements for voting and officeholding, and to equalize representation. A new generation of politicians broke with the old republican animus against mass political parties. Urban workers formed labor movements and demanded political reforms. Southerners sought low tariffs, greater respect for states' rights, and a return to strict constructionism. Westerners clamored for more and cheaper land and for relief from creditors, speculators, and bankers (above all, the hated Second Bank of the United States).

It has confounded some scholars that so much of this ferment eventually coalesced behind Andrew Jackson-a one-time land speculator, opponent of debtor relief, and fervent wartime nationalist. By the 1820s, however, Jackson's personal business experiences had long since altered his opinions about speculation and paper money, leaving him eternally suspicious of the credit system in general and banks in particular. His career as an Indian fighter and conqueror of the British made him a popular hero, especially among land-hungry settlers. His enthusiasm for nationalist programs had diminished after 1815, as foreign threats receded and economic difficulties multiplied. Above all, Jackson, with his own hardscrabble origins, epitomized contempt for the old republican elitism, with its hierarchical deference and its wariness of popular democracy.

After losing the "corrupt bargain" presidential election of 1824, Jackson expanded upon his political base in the lower and mid-South, pulling together many strands of disaffection from around the country. But in successfully challenging President John Quincy Adams in 1828, Jackson's supporters played mainly on his image as a manly warrior, framing the contest as one between Adams who could write and Jackson who could fight. Only after taking power did the Jacksonian Democracy refine its politics and ideology. Out of that self-definition came a fundamental shift in the terms of national political debate.

The Jacksonians' basic policy thrust, both in Washington and in the states, was to rid government of class biases and dismantle the top-down, credit-driven engines of the market revolution. The war on the Second Bank of the United States and subsequent hard-money initiatives set the tone-an unyielding effort to remove the hands of a few wealthy, unelected private bankers from the levers of the nation's economy. Under the Jacksonians, government-sponsored internal improvements generally fell into disfavor, on the grounds that they were unnecessary expansions of centralized power, beneficial mainly to men with connections. The Jacksonians defended rotation in office as a solvent to entrenched elitism. To aid hard-pressed farmers and planters, they pursued an unrelenting (some say unconstitutional) program of Indian removal, while backing cheap land prices and settlers' preemption rights.

Around these policies, Jacksonian leaders built a democratic ideology aimed primarily at voters who felt injured by or cut off from the market revolution. Updating the more democratic pieces of the republican legacy, they posited that no republic could long survive without a citizenry of economically independent men. Unfortunately, they claimed, that state of republican independence was exceedingly fragile. According to the Jacksonians, all of human history had involved a struggle between the few and the many, instigated by a greedy minority of wealth and privilege that hoped to exploit the vast majority. And this struggle, they declared, lay behind the major problems of the day, as the "associated wealth" of America sought to augment its domination.

The people's best weapons were equal rights and limited government-ensuring that the already wealthy and favored classes would not enrich themselves further by commandeering, enlarging, and then plundering public institutions. More broadly, the Jacksonians proclaimed a political culture predicated on white male equality, contrasting themselves with other self-styled reform movements. Nativism, for example, struck them as a hateful manifestation of elitist puritanism. Sabbatarians, temperance advocates, and other would-be moral uplifters, they insisted, should not impose righteousness on others. Beyond position-taking, the Jacksonians propounded a social vision in which any white man would have the chance to secure his economic independence, would be free to live as he saw fit, under a system of laws and representative government utterly cleansed of privilege.

As Jacksonian leaders developed these arguments, they roused a noisy opposition-some of it coming from elements of the coalition that originally elected Jackson president. Reactionary southern planters, centered in South Carolina, worried that the Jacksonians' egalitarianism might endanger their own prerogatives-and perhaps the institution of slavery-if southern nonslaveholders carried them too far. They also feared that Jackson, their supposed champion, lacked sufficient vigilance in protecting their interests-fears that provoked the nullification crisis in 1832-1833 and Jackson's crushing of extremist threats to federal authority. A broader southern opposition emerged in the late 1830s, mainly among wealthy planters alienated by the disastrous panic of 1837 and suspicious of Jackson's successor, the Yankee Martin Van Buren. In the rest of the country, meanwhile, the Jacksonian leadership's continuing hard-money, antibank campaigns offended more conservative men-the so-called Bank Democrats-who, whatever their displeasure with the Second Bank of the United States, did not want to see the entire paper money credit system dramatically curtailed.

The oppositionist core, however, came from a cross-class coalition, strongest in rapidly commercializing areas, that viewed the market revolution as the embodiment of civilized progress. Far from pitting the few against the many, oppositionists argued, carefully guided economic growth would provide more for everyone. Government encouragement-in the form of tariffs, internal improvements, a strong national bank, and aid to a wide range of benevolent institutions-was essential to that growth. Powerfully influenced by the evangelical Second Great Awakening, core oppositionists saw in moral reform not a threat to individual independence but an idealistic cooperative effort to relieve human degradation and further expand the store of national wealth. Eager to build up the country as it already existed, they were cool to territorial expansion. Angered by Jackson's large claims for presidential power and rotation in office, they charged that the Jacksonians had brought corruption and executive tyranny, not democracy. Above all, they believed that personal rectitude and industriousness, not alleged political inequalities, dictated men's failures or successes. The Jacksonians, with their spurious class rhetoric, menaced that natural harmony of interests between rich and poor which, if only left alone, would eventually bring widespread prosperity.

By 1840, both the Jacksonian Democracy and its opposite (now organized as the Whig party) had built formidable national followings and had turned politics into a debate over the market revolution itself. Yet less than a decade later, sectional contests linked to slavery promised to drown out that debate and fracture both major parties. In large measure, that turnabout derived from the racial exclusiveness of the Jacksonians' democratic vision.

The Jacksonian mainstream, so insistent on the equality of white men, took racism for granted. To be sure, there were key radical exceptions-people like Frances Wright and Robert Dale Owen-who were drawn to the Democracy's cause. North and South, the democratic reforms achieved by plebeian whites-especially those respecting voting and representation-came at the direct expense of free blacks. Although informed by constitutional principles and genuine paternalist concern, the Jacksonian rationale for territorial expansion assumed that Indians (and, in some areas, Hispanics) were lesser peoples. As for slavery, the Jacksonians were determined, on both practical and ideological grounds, to keep the issue out of national affairs. Few mainstream Jacksonians had moral qualms about black enslavement or any desire to meddle with it where it existed. More important, they believed that the mounting antislavery agitation would distract attention from the artificial inequalities among white men and upset the party's delicate intersectional alliances. Deep down, many suspected that the slavery issue was but a smokescreen thrown up by disgruntled elitists looking to regain the initiative from the real people's cause.

Through the 1830s and 1840s, the mainstream Jacksonian leadership, correctly confident that their views matched those of the white majority, fought to keep the United States a democracy free from the slavery question-condemning abolitionists as fomenters of rebellion, curtailing abolitionist mail campaigns, enforcing the congressional gag rule that squelched debate on abolitionist petitions, while fending off the more extremist proslavery southerners. In all of this fighting, however, the Jacksonians also began to run afoul of their professions about white egalitarianism. Opposing antislavery was one thing; silencing the heretics with gag rules amounted to tampering with white people's equal rights. More important, Jacksonian proexpansionism-what one friendly periodical, the Democratic Review boosted as "manifest destiny"-only intensified sectional rifts. Slaveholders, quite naturally, thought they were entitled to see as much new territory as legally possible opened up to slavery. But that prospect appalled northern whites who had hoped to settle in lily white areas, untroubled by that peculiar institution whose presence (they believed) would degrade the status of white free labor.

It would take until the 1850s before these contradictions fully unraveled the Jacksonian coalition. But as early as the mid-1840s, during the debates over Texas annexation, the Mexican War, and the Wilmot Proviso, sectional cleavages had grown ominous. The presidential candidacy of Martin Van Buren on the Free-Soil ticket in 1848-a protest against growing southern power within the Democracy-amply symbolized northern Democratic alienation. Southern slaveholder Democrats, for their part, began to wonder if anything short of positive federal protection for slavery would spell doom for their class-and the white man's republic. In the middle remained a battered Jacksonian mainstream, ever hopeful that by raising the old issues, avoiding slavery, and resorting to the language of popular sovereignty, the party and the nation might be held together. Led by men like Stephen A. Douglas, these mainstream compromisers held sway into the mid-1850s, but at the cost of constant appeasement of southern concerns, further exacerbating sectional turmoil. Jacksonian Democracy was buried at Fort Sumter, but it had died many years earlier.

There was a grim, ironic justice to the Jacksonians' fate. Having tapped into the disaffection of the 1820s and 1830s and molded it into an effective national party, they advanced the democratization of American politics. By denouncing the moneyed aristocracy and proclaiming the common man, they also helped politicize American life, broadening electoral participation to include an overwhelming majority of the electorate. Yet this very politicization would ultimately prove the Jacksonian Democracy's undoing. Once the slavery issue entered the concerns of even a small portion of the electorate, it proved impossible to remove without trampling on some of the very egalitarian principles the Jacksonians were pledged to uphold.

None of this, however, should be a source of self-satisfaction to modern Americans. Although the Jacksonian Democracy died in the 1850s, it left a powerful legacy, entwining egalitarian aspirations and class justice with the presumptions of white supremacy. Over the decades after the Civil War, that legacy remained a bulwark of a new Democratic party, allying debt-ridden farmers and immigrant workers with the Solid South. The Second Reconstruction of the 1950s and 1960s forced Democrats to reckon with the party's past-only to see party schismatics and Republicans pick up the theme. And at the close of the twentieth century, the tragic mix of egalitarianism and racial prejudice so central to the Jacksonian Democracy still infected American politics, poisoning some of its best impulses with some of its worst.

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Jacksonian Democracy - Definition, Summary & Significance

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Jacksonian Democracy refers to the ascendancy of President Andrew Jackson (in office 1829 -1837)and the Democratic party after the election of 1828. More loosely, it alludes to the entire range of democratic reforms that proceeded during Jacksons' tenure-from expanding suffrage to restructuring federal institutions, but also slavery, the subjugation of Native Americans, and the celebration of white supremacy.

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Migration from the original Cherokee Nation began in the early 1800's. Some Cherokees, wary of white encroachment, moved west on their own and settled in other areas of the country. A group known as the Old Settlers previously had voluntarily moved in 1817 to lands given them in Arkansas where they established a government and a peaceful way of life. Later, however, they were forced to migrate to Indian Territory.

White resentment of the Cherokee had been building and reached a pinnacle following the discovery of gold in northern Georgia. This discovery was made just after the the creation and passage of the original Cherokee Nation constitution and establishment of a Cherokee Supreme Court. Possessed by "gold fever" and a thirst for expansion, many white communities turned on their Cherokee neighbors. The U.S. government ultimately decided it was time for the Cherokees to be "removed"; leaving behind their farms, their land and their homes.

President Andrew Jackson's military command and almost certainly his life were saved thanks to the aid of 500 Cherokee allies at the Battle of Horseshoe Bend in 1814. Unbelievably, it was Jackson who authorized the Indian Removal Act of 1830 following the recommendation of President James Monroe in his final address to Congress in 1825. Jackson, as president, sanctioned an attitude that had persisted for many years among many white immigrants. Even Thomas Jefferson, who often cited the Great Law of Peace of the Iroquois Confederacy as the model for the U.S. Constitution, supported Indian Removal as early as 1802.

The displacement of native people was not wanting for eloquent opposition. Senators Daniel Webster and Henry Clay spoke out against removal. The Reverend Samuel Worcester, missionary to the Cherokees, challenged Georgia's attempt to estinguish Indian title to land in the state, actually winning his case before the Supreme Court.

Worcester vs. Georgia, 1832 and Cherokee Nation vs. Georgia, 1831 are considered the two most influential legal decisions in Indian law. The U.S. Supreme Court ruled for Georgia in the 1831 case, but in Worcester vs. Georgia, the court affirmed Cherokee sovereignty. President Andrew Jackson arrogantly defied the decision of the court and ordered the removal, an act that established the U.S. government's precedent for the future removal of many Native Americans from their ancestral homelands.

The U.S. government used the Treaty of New Echota in 1835 to justify the removal. The treaty, signed by about 100 Cherokees known as the Treaty Party, relinquished all lands east of the Mississippi River in exchange for land in Indian Territory and the promise of money, livestock, various provisions, tools and other benefits.

When these pro-removal Cherokee leaders signed the Treaty of New Echota, they also signed their own death warrants, since the Cherokee Nation Council had earlier passed a law calling for the death of anyone agreeing to give up tribal land. The signing and the removal led to bitter factionalism and ultimately to the deaths of most of the Treaty Party leaders once the Cherokee arrived in Indian Territory.

Opposition to the removal was led by Chief John Ross, a mixed-blood of Scottish and one-eighth Cherokee descent. The Ross party and most Cherokees opposed the New Echota Treaty, but Georgia and the U.S. government prevailed and used it as justification to force almost all of the 17,000 Cherokees from their southeastern homeland.

Under orders from President Jackson the U.S. Army began enforcement of the Removal Act. The Cherokee were rounded up in the summer of 1838 and loaded onto boats that traveled the Tennessee, Ohio, Mississippi and Arkansas Rivers into Indian Territory. Many were held in prison camps awaiting their fate.

An estimated 4,000 died from hunger, exposure and disease. The journey became a cultural memory as the "trail where they cried" for the Cherokees and other removed tribes. Today it is widely remembered by the general public as the "Trail of Tears". The Oklahoma chapter of the Trail of Tears Association has begun the task of marking the graves of Trail survivors with bronze memorials.

This Information is provided by the Cherokee Nation Cultural Resource Center. For information regarding culture and language, please contact: cultural@cherokee.org.

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Migration from the original Cherokee Nation began in the early 1800's. Some Cherokees, wary of white encroachment, moved west on their own and settled in other areas of the country. A group known as the Old Settlers previously had voluntarily moved in 1817 to lands given them in Arkansas where they established a government and a peaceful way of life.

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Jacksonian Democracy: https://www.history.com/topics/19th-century/jacksonian-democracy
The trail of tears: https://cherokee.org/About-The-Nation/History/Trail-of-Tears/A-Brief-History-of-the-Trail-of-Tears
Oregon and Santa Fe trail: http://ninanhistory.weebly.com/western-trails.html
Texas becomes a nation: https://www.khanacademy.org/humanities/us-history/the-early-republic/age-of-jackson/a/annexing-texas
Manifest Destiny: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C5SWDeIgNpE&list=WL&index=15&t=0s
Mexican American War: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E7AXuxcUleY

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Quickly following Texan independence, the United States admitted Texas into the republic as a slave state.

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International Stock Food Factory, between 1900 and 1910
Detroit Publishing Company

In the decades following the Civil War, the United States emerged as an industrial giant. Old industries expanded and many new ones, including petroleum refining, steel manufacturing, and electrical power, emerged. Railroads expanded significantly, bringing even remote parts of the country into a national market economy.

Industrial growth transformed American society. It produced a new class of wealthy industrialists and a prosperous middle class. It also produced a vastly expanded blue collar working class. The labor force that made industrialization possible was made up of millions of newly arrived immigrants and even larger numbers of migrants from rural areas. American society became more diverse than ever before.

Not everyone shared in the economic prosperity of this period. Many workers were typically unemployed at least part of the year, and their wages were relatively low when they did work. This situation led many workers to support and join labor unions. Meanwhile, farmers also faced hard times as technology and increasing production led to more competition and falling prices for farm products. Hard times on farms led many young people to move to the city in search of better job opportunities.

Americans who were born in the 1840s and 1850s would experience enormous changes in their lifetimes. Some of these changes resulted from a sweeping technological revolution. Their major source of light, for example, would change from candles, to kerosene lamps, and then to electric light bulbs. They would see their transportation evolve from walking and horse power to steam-powered locomotives, to electric trolley cars, to gasoline-powered automobiles. Born into a society in which the vast majority of people were involved in agriculture, they experienced an industrial revolution that radically changed the ways millions of people worked and where they lived. They would experience the migration of millions of people from rural America to the nation's rapidly growing cities.

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Overview | Rise of Industrial America, 1876-1900 | U.S. History Primary Source Timeline | Classroom Materials at the Library of Congress | Library of Congress

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In the decades following the Civil War, the United States emerged as an industrial giant. Old industries expanded and many new ones, including petroleum refining, steel manufacturing, and electrical power, emerged. Railroads expanded significantly, bringing even remote parts of the country into a national market economy. Industrial growth transformed American society.

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Second Great Awakening, Protestant religious revival in the United States from about 1795 to 1835. During this revival, meetings were held in small towns and large cities throughout the country, and the unique frontier institution known as the camp meeting began. Many churches experienced a great increase in membership, particularly among Methodist and Baptist churches. The Second Great Awakening made soul-winning the primary function of ministry and stimulated several moral and philanthropic reforms, including temperance and the emancipation of women. Generally considered less emotional than the Great Awakening of the early 18th century, the second wave of evangelical revivalism led to the founding of numerous colleges and seminaries and to the organization of mission societies across the country.

The Second Great Awakening can be divided into three phases. The first phase (1795-1810) was associated with frontier camp meetings conducted by American preachers James McGready, John McGee, and Barton W. Stone in Kentucky and Tennessee. The second and more conservative phase of the awakening (1810-25) centred in the Congregational churches of New England under the leadership of theologians Timothy Dwight, Lyman Beecher, Nathaniel W. Taylor, and Asahel Nettleton. The third and final phase (1825-35) stemmed from the activities of evangelist Charles Grandison Finney, who began his revivalism in small towns in western New York in the 1820s but eventually conducted revival meetings in the largest cities in the United States and Britain.

During the Second Great Awakening revivalistic theology in many denominations shifted from Calvinism to a practical Arminianism as preachers emphasized the ability of sinners to make an immediate decision for their salvation; theological differences almost disappeared among evangelical churches. Moreover, under Finney's aegis a rationale for carefully contrived revival techniques evolved. After 1835 an irregular corps of professional revival experts traveled through the towns and cities of America and Britain organizing annual revival meetings at the invitation of local pastors who wanted to reinvigorate their churches. Although many American Protestants lost interest in revivalism in the first half of the 20th century, tent revivals as well as annual revivals in churches in the South and Midwest continued to be an important feature of Protestant church life.

The Editors of Encyclopaedia Britannica Melissa Petruzzello.

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Second Great Awakening | Description, History, & Key Figures

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Second Great Awakening, Protestant religious revival in the United States from about 1795 to 1835. Many churches experienced a great increase in membership, and the revival stimulated moral reforms, such as the temperance movement. Learn more about the Second Great Awakening and its impact on American Protestantism.

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Coal, Steam, and The Industrial Revolution: Crash Course World History #32

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Before the Industrial Revolution, there was no standardization for producing machine parts. This made maintaining machines very difficult, as each was unique and any replacements...

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The typical factory worker in the late nineteenth century worked ten hours a day, six days a week. Unskilled workers were paid between $1.00 and $1.50 a day; skilled workers might make twice as much, while women (who became a significant percentage of the labor force after the Civil War), children, and African‐Americans were paid considerably less. Workplace accidents were common, and the idea of compensating workers injured on the job was unheard of at the time. To help each other through illness, injury, and deaths, workers formed mutual benefit societies (often organized along ethnic lines), but the assistance these groups provided was minimal. The most serious problem for factory workers was unemployment. It was common for a worker, particularly an unskilled one, to be out of a job at least part of the year.

Early labor unions. Skilled workers, such as cigarmakers, iron molders, and hat finishers formed the first labor unions before the Civil War. Several of these craft unions (so named because they organized workers within specific craft industries) joined together to form the National Labor Union (NLU) in 1866. Although the organization advocated an eight‐hour workday, it did not support strikes to achieve that goal. The NLU was also concerned with social reform, including equal rights for women, establishing worker cooperatives, and temperance. The union, along with organized labor in general, declined sharply in the wake of the depression of 1873 but not before influencing Congress to enact the eight‐hour day for federal employees (1868).

The Knights of Labor, organized in 1869, is considered to be the first industrial union, open to skilled and unskilled workers, women, and African‐Americans. This inclusive policy contributed to its growth, and the union boasted more than 700,000 members by the mid‐1880s. The program of the Knights of Labor was a combination of reform ideas and specific worker demands. Along with setting up cooperative workshops and calling for the regulation of the railroads, the union wanted an eight‐hour workday, legislation protecting the health and safety of workers, and an end to child labor (for children under the age of 14). To achieve these goals, political action and arbitration between employers and labor representatives were preferred over strikes. The decline of the Knights of Labor after 1886 was due to several factors: the failure of several unauthorized strikes, the growing dissatisfaction of craftsmen who felt the union favored the interests of unskilled workers, and the public perception in the wake of the Haymarket Square Riot (1886) that the Knights supported violence.

On May 4, 1886, a mass meeting of workers was called in Chicago's Haymarket Square to protest the death of a striker at the McCormick Harvester plant. When the police tried to disperse the crowd, someone threw a bomb that killed seven policemen and injured several more. The riot that followed resulted in additional deaths on both sides. Although it was one of the three unions on strike at McCormick, the Knights of Labor had nothing to do with the events in Haymarket Square. This fact did not prevent the union from becoming a victim of the antilabor sentiment that swept the country, and its membership declined rapidly over the next four years.

The American Federation of Labor. Founded in 1886 by Samuel Gompers, the American Federation of Labor (AFL) was a federation of skilled workers in national craft unions that maintained their autonomy while working together to promote labor legislation and support strikes. In contrast to its predecessors, the new union focused exclusively on basic labor issues - the eight‐hour workday, higher wages, better working conditions (particularly plant safety), and the right of workers to organize. To Gompers, who began his career in the cigarmakers union, only craftsmen that could not be easily replaced had the leverage necessary to either bargain effectively with employers or go on strike. The AFL had little more than disdain for unskilled workers or blacks, skilled or not, and did not seriously try to organize women. Although he was an immigrant himself, as were many local union men, Gompers nevertheless strongly supported restrictions on immigration to prevent new arrivals from competing with American workers for jobs. Even though it excluded most of the working class, the AFL became the largest single labor organization in the country by 1900 with over one million members.

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The typical factory worker in the late nineteenth century worked ten hours a day, six days a week. Unskilled workers were paid between $1.00 and $1.50 a day; skilled workers might make twice as much, while women (who became a significant percentage of the labor force after the Civil War), children, and African‐Americans were paid considerably less.

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Transportation Revolution (Steamboat, Railroad) 

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Transportation Revolution (Steamboat, Railroad) 

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Before the Industrial Revolution, there was a time lag in almost everything that took place in the United States. It took weeks and sometimes months just to send a letter or pass information. It took...

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Interpretation of Slave Quarter, Carter's Grove Plantation, Williamsburg

Slave life varied greatly depending on many factors.

Life on the fields meant working sunup to sundown six days a week and having food sometimes not suitable for an animal to eat. Plantation slaves lived in small shacks with a dirt floor and little or no furniture. Life on large plantations with a cruel overseer was oftentimes the worst. However, work for a small farm owner who was not doing well could mean not being fed.

The stories about cruel overseers were certainly true in some cases. The overseer was paid to get the most work out of the slaves; therefore, overseers often resorted to whatever means was necessary. Sometimes the slaves would drive the overseer off the plantation in desperation. When slaves complained that they were being unfairly treated, slaveholders would most often be very protective of their "property" and would release the overseer.

Slaves who worked inside the plantation homes often had better living and working conditions than slaves who worked in the fields.

In some cases, a driver was used rather than an overseer. The difference between the overseer and the driver was simple: drivers were slaves themselves. A driver might be convinced by a master to manage the slaves for better privileges. Drivers were usually hated by the rest of the slaves. These feelings often led to violence.

Large plantations often required some slaves to work in the plantation home. These slaves enjoyed far better circumstances. Domestic slaves lived in better quarters and received better food. They sometimes were able to travel with the owner's family. In many cases, a class system developed within the slave community. Domestic slaves did not often associate themselves with plantation slaves. They often aspired to arrange courtships for their children with other domestic slaves.

This Slave Code booklet for Washington D.C., was published in 1862, only one month before Lincoln abolished slavery in the nation's capitol. More lenient than most states' slave codes, the District's code allowed slaves to hire themselves out and live apart from their masters.

As the Peculiar Institution spread across the South, many states passed "slave codes," which outlined the rights of slaves and the acceptable treatment and rules regarding slaves. Slave codes varied from state to state, but there were many common threads. One could not do business with a slave without the prior consent of the owner. Slaves could be awarded as prizes in raffles, wagered in gambling, offered as security for loans, and transferred as gifts from one person to another.

A slave was not permitted to keep a gun. If caught carrying a gun, the slave received 39 lashes and forfeited the gun. Blacks were held incompetent as witnesses in legal cases involving whites. The education of slaves was prohibited. Anyone operating a school or teaching reading and writing to any African-American in Missouri could be punished by a fine of not less than $500 and up to six months in jail. Slaves could not assemble without a white person present. Marriages between slaves were not considered legally binding. Therefore, owners were free to split up families through sale.

Any slave found guilty of arson, rape of a white woman, or conspiracy to rebel was put to death. However, since the slave woman was chattel, a white man who raped her was guilty only of a trespass on the master's property. Rape was common on the plantation, and very few cases were ever reported.

Virginia's Slave Code of 1705
Virginia's slave code of 1705 was designed to settle the questions about the status of non-Christian servants... they were all made slaves. The law served as a model for codes in other colonies. This webpage from PBS provides a brief overview and links to related topics.

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Antebellum Slavery
What happens when an ardent abolitionist marries a member of one of the largest slaveholders in the South? A disastrous marriage - and a moving epic of slavery in the South. Read excerpts from the account, which includes physical and mental abuse as well as the story of the largest sale of human beings in the history of the United States. Links to other moving stories surrounding antebellum (before the war) slavery abound as well.

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Virginia's slave codes
If any slave resist his master ... correcting such slave, and shall happen to be killed in such correction ... the master shall be free of all punishment ... as if such accident never happened. Read more about the 1705 slave code which served as a model for future laws.

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Few slaves wrote letters or diaries because they weren't allowed to read or write, but some broke the rules and wrote down their stories.
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Slave Life and Slave Codes [ushistory.org]

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Facts, information and articles about Abolitionist Movement, one of the causes of the civil war

Abolitionist Movement summary: The Abolitionist movement in the United States of America was an effort to end slavery in a nation that valued personal freedom and believed "all men are created equal." Over time, abolitionists grew more strident in their demands, and slave owners entrenched in response, fueling regional divisiveness that ultimately led to the American Civil War.

Slavery Comes To The New World

African slavery began in North America in 1619 at Jamestown, Virginia. The first American-built slave ship, Desire, launched from Massachusetts in 1636, beginning the slave trade between Britain's American colonies and Africa. From the beginning, some white colonists were uncomfortable with the notion of slavery. At the time of the American Revolution against the English Crown, Delaware (1776) and Virginia (1778) prohibited importation of African slaves; Vermont became the first of the 13 colonies to abolish slavery (1777); Rhode Island prohibited taking slaves from the colony (1778); and Pennsylvania began gradual emancipation in 1780.

The Maryland Society for Promoting the Abolition of Slavery and the Relief of Free Negroes and Others Unlawfully Held in Bondage was founded in 1789, the same year the former colonies replaced their Articles of Confederation with the new Constitution, "in order to form a more perfect union."

When the U.S. Constitution was written, it made no specific mention of slavery, but it provided for the return of fugitives (which encompassed criminals, indentured servants and slaves). It allowed each slave within a state to be counted as three-fifths of a person for the purpose of determining population and representation in the House of Representatives (Article I, Section 3, says representation and direct taxation will be determined based on the number of "free persons, including those bound to service for a term of years, and excluding Indians not taxed, three-fifths of all other persons.")

The Constitution prohibited importation of slaves, to begin in 1808, but again managed to do so without using the words "slave" or "slavery." Slave trading became a capital offense in 1819. There existed a general feeling that slavery would gradually pass away. Improvements in technology-the cotton gin and sewing machine-increased the demand for slave labor, however, in order to produce more cotton in Southern states. By the 1830s, many Southerners had shifted from, "Slavery is a necessary evil," to "Slavery is a positive good." The institution existed because it was "God's will," a Christian duty to lift the African out of barbarism while still exerting control over his "animal passions."

Learn More About Slavery In America

The Missouri Compromise And Dred Scott

Missouri's appeal for statehood brought a confrontation between free and slave states in Congress in 1820; each feared the other would gain the upper hand. The Missouri Compromise of 1820 set a policy of admitting states in pairs, one slave, one free. (Maine came in at the same time as Missouri.) The compromise prohibited slavery above parallel 36 degrees, 30 minutes in the lands of the Louisiana Purchase, and it included a national Fugitive Slave Law requiring all Americans to return runaway slaves to their owners. The Fugitive Slave Law was upheld in Prigg v. Pennsylvania, 1842, but the Missouri Compromise's prohibitions on the spread of slavery would be found unconstitutional in the 1857 Dred Scott decision.

Learn more about Dred Scott

The Abolitionism Movement Spreads

Although many New Englanders had grown wealthy in the slave trade before the importation of slaves was outlawed, that area of the country became the hotbed of abolitionist sentiment. Abolitionist newspapers and pamphlets sprang into existence. These were numerous enough by 1820 that South Carolina instituted penalties for anyone bringing written anti-slavery material into the state.

These publications argued against slavery as a social and moral evil and often used examples of African American writings and other achievements to demonstrate that Africans and their descendents were as capable of learning as were Europeans and their descendents in America, given the freedom to do so. To prove their case that one person owning another one was morally wrong, they first had to convince many, in all sections of the country, that Negroes, the term used for the race at the time, were human. Yet, even many people among the abolitionists did not believe the two races were equal.

In 1829, David Walker, a freeman of color originally from the South, published An Appeal to the Colored Citizens of the World in Boston, Massachusetts. It was a new benchmark, pushing abolitionists toward extreme militancy. He called for slaves to rise up against their masters and to defend themselves: "It is no more harm for you to kill a man who is trying to kill you, than it is for you to take a drink of water when thirsty." As early as 1800, a Virginia slave known as Gabriel Prosser had attempted an uprising there, but it failed when two slaves betrayed the plan to their masters.

Walker's publication was too extreme even for most abolition leaders, including one of the most renowned, William Lloyd Garrison. In 1831, Garrison founded The Liberator, which would become the most famous and influential of abolitionist newspapers. That same year, Virginia debated emancipation, marking the last movement for abolition in the South prior to the Civil War. Instead, that year the Southampton Slave Riot, also called Nat Turner's Rebellion, resulted in Virginia passing new regulations against slaves. Fears of slave revolts like the bloody Haitian Revolution of 1791-1803 were never far from Southerners' minds. Publications like An Appeal to the Colored Citizens of the World led white Southerners to conclude Northern abolitionists intended to commit genocide against them.

In 1833 in Philadelphia, the first American Anti-Slavery Society Convention convened. In a backlash, anti-abolition riots broke out in many northeastern cities, including New York and Philadelphia, during 1834-35. Several Southern states, beginning with the Carolinas, made formal requests to other states to suppress abolition groups and their literature. In Illinois, the legislature voted to condemn abolition societies and their agitation; Delegate Abraham Lincoln voted with the majority, then immediately co-sponsored a bill to mitigate some of the language of the earlier one. The U.S. House of Representatives adopted a gag rule, automatically tabling abolitionist proposals.

The first national Anti-Slavery Convention was held in New York City in 1837, and the following year the second Anti-Slavery Convention of American Women met in Philadelphia; the latter resulted in pro-slavery riots. The Liberty Party, a political action group, held its first national convention, at Albany, N.Y., in 1839. That same year, Africans mutinied aboard the Spanish slave ship Amistad and asked New York courts to grant them freedom. Their plea was answered affirmatively by the U.S. Supreme Court in 1841.

Frederick Douglass: A Black Abolitionist

Frederick Douglass-a former slave who had been known as Frederick Bailey while in slavery and who was the most famous black man among the abolitionists-broke with William Lloyd Garrison's newspaper, The Liberator, after returning from a visit to Great Britain, and founded a black abolitionist paper, The North Star. The title was a reference to the directions given to runaway slaves trying to reach the Northern states and Canada: Follow the North Star. Garrison had earlier convinced the Massachusetts Anti-Slavery Society to hire Douglass as an agent, touring with Garrison and telling audiences about his experiences in slavery. In England, however, Douglass had experienced a level of independence he'd never known in America and likely wanted greater independece for his actions here.

Working with Douglass on The North Star was another black man, Martin R. Delaney, who gave up publishing his own paper, The Mystery, to join with Douglass. Born to a free mother in Virginia (in what is now the eastern panhandle of West Virginia), Delaney had never been a slave, but he had traveled extensively in the South. After Uncle Tom's Cabin became a bestseller, he attempted to achieve similar success for himself by penning a semi-fictional account of his travels, Blake: The Huts of America. In 1850, he was one of three black men accepted into Harvard Medical School, but white students successfully petitioned to have them removed. No longer believing that merit and reason could allow members of his race to have an equal opportunity in white society, he became an ardent black nationalist. In 1859, he traveled to Africa and negotiated with eight tribal chiefs in Abbeokuta for land, on which he planned to establish a colony for skilled and educated African Americans. The agreement fell apart, and he returned to America where, near the end of the Civil War, he became the first black officer on a general's staff in the history of the U.S. Army.

The Seneca Falls Convention

In 1848, the first Women's Rights convention was held, in Seneca Falls, N.Y. Outside of the Society of Friends ("Quakers"), women were often denied the opportunity to speak at abolitionist meetings. The women's rights movement produced many outspoken opponents of slavery, including Elizabeth Cody Stanton and Susan B. Anthony. In fact, women's equality and abolition became inextricably linked in the minds of many Southerners. In the 20th century, that lingering animosity nearly defeated the constitutional amendment giving women the right to vote.

Although Delaney's planned African colony failed, in 1849 Great Britain recognized the African colony of Liberia as a sovereign state. It had been founded in 1822 as a colony for free-born blacks, freed slaves and mulattoes (mixed race) from the United States. A number of Americans who opposed slavery (including Abraham Lincoln for a time and the aforementioned Delany) felt that the two races could never live successfully together, and the best hope for Negroes was to return them to freedom in Africa. However, the slave trade between Africa and the Western Hemisphere (the Caribbean and South America) had never ended, and many American ship owners and captains were enjoying something of a golden era of slave-trading while the U.S. and Europe looked the other way. Even if freed slaves had been sent to Africa, many would have wound up back in slavery south of the United States. Only in the late 1850s did Britain step up its anti-slavery enforcement on the high seas, leading America to increase its efforts somewhat.

When the federal government passed a second, even more stringent fugitive slave act in 1850, several states responded by passing personal liberty laws. The following year, Sojourner Truth (Isabella Baumfree) gave a now-famous speech, "Ain't I a Woman," at the Women's Rights convention in Akron, Ohio. Born a slave in New York, she walked away from her owner after she felt she had contributed enough to him. In the late 1840s, she dictated a memoir, The Narrative of Sojourner Truth: A Northern Slave, published by Garrison in 1850. She began to tour, speaking against slavery and in favor of women's rights.

Learn more about the Seneca Falls Convention

Harriet Tubman and The Underground Railroad

While Sojourner Truth, Douglass, Delaney and others wrote and spoke to end slavery, a former slave named Harriet Tubman, nee Harriet Ross, was actively leading slaves to freedom. After escaping from bondage herself, she made repeated trips into Dixie to help others. Believed to have helped some 300 slaves to escape, she was noted for warning those she was assisting that she would shoot any of them who turned back, because they would endanger herself and others she was assisting.

Tubman was an agent of the Underground Railroad, a system of "safe houses" and way stations that secretly helped runaways. The trip might begin by hiding in the home, barn or other location owned by a Southerner opposed to slavery, and continuing from place to place until reaching safe haven in a free state or Canada. Those who reached Canada did not have to fear being returned under the Fugitive Slave Act. Several communities and individuals claim to have created the term "Underground Railroad." In the southern section of states on the north bank of the Ohio River, a "reverse underground railroad" operated; blacks in those states were kidnapped, whether they had ever been slaves or not, and taken South to sell through a series of clandestine locations.

Learn more about Harriet Tubman
Learn more about the Underground Railroad

Harriet Beecher Stowe: Abolitionist and Author

In 1852, what may have been the seminal event of the abolition movement occurred. Harriet Beecher Stowe, an abolitionist who had come to know a number of escaped slaves while she was living in Cincinnati, authored the novel Uncle Tom's Cabin. It presented a scathing view of Southern slavery, filled with melodramatic scenes such as that of the slave Eliza escaping with her baby across the icy Ohio River:

The huge green fragment of ice on which she alighted pitched and creaked as her weight came on it but she stayed there not a moment. With wild cries and desperate energy she leaped to another and still another cake;-stumbling,-leaping,-slipping-springing upwards again! Her shoes are-gone her stockings cut from her feet-while blood marked every step; but she saw nothing, felt nothing, till dimly, as in a dream, she saw the Ohio side and a man helping her up the bank.

Critics pointed out that Stowe had never been to the South, but her novel became a bestseller in the North (banned in the South) and the most effective bit of propaganda to come out of the abolitionist movement. It galvanized many who had been sitting on the sidelines. Reportedly, when President Abraham Lincoln met Stowe during the Civil War he said to her, "So you're the little woman who started this big war."
Harriet Beecher Stowe
Abolitionists Invoke A Higher Law

Abolitionists became increasingly strident in their condemnations of slave owners and "the peculiar institution of slavery." Often, at Fourth of July gatherings of abolition societies, they reportedly used the occasion to denounce the U.S. Constitution as a "covenant with death, and an agreement with hell." Many of them came to believe in "higher law," that a moral commitment to ending slavery took precedent over observing those parts of the Constitution that protected slavery and, in particular, they refused to obey the Fugitive Slave Act. Slave owners or their representatives traveling north to reclaim captured runaways were sometimes set upon on abolitionists mobs; even local lawmen were sometimes attacked. In the South, this fueled the belief that the North expected the South to obey all federal laws but the North could pick and choose, further driving the two regions apart.

Abolitionism, Politics and the Election Of Abraham Lincoln

The abolition movement became an important element of political parties. Although the Native American Party (derisively called the Know-Nothing Party because when member were asked about the secretive group they claimed to "know nothing") opposed immigrants, they also opposed slavery. So did many Whigs and the Free Soil Party. In 1856, these coalesced into the Republican Party. Four years later, its candidate, Abraham Lincoln, captured the presidency of the United States.

John Brown: Abolitionism's Fiery Crusader

The Kansas-Nebraska Act of 1854 allowed the citizens of those territories to determine for themselves whether the state would be slave or free. Proponents of both factions poured into the Kansas Territory, with each side trying to gain supremacy, often through violence. After pro-slavery groups attacked the town of Lawrence in 1856, a radical abolitionist named John Brown led his followers in retaliation, killing five pro-slavery settlers. The territory became known as "Bleeding Kansas."

Learn more about John Brown

Dred Scott V. Sanford

The 1857 decision of the U.S. Supreme Court in Dred Scott v. Sanford denied citizenship to anyone of African blood and held the Missouri Compromise of 1820 to be unconstitutional. While Southern states had been passing laws prohibiting "Negro citizenship" and further restricting the rights even of freemen of color (Virginia in 1857 prohibited slaves from smoking and from standing on sidewalks, among other restrictions), one Northern state after another had been passing laws granting citizenship to their black residents. The Court's findings upended that, and the ruling outraged many Northerners. Abraham Lincoln revived his personal political career, coming out of a self-imposed semi-retirement to speak out against the Dred Scott decision.

The year 1859 saw two events that were milestones in the history of slavery and abolition in America. The ship Clotilde landed in Mobile, Alabama. Though the importation of slaves had been illegal in America since 1808, Clotilde carried 110 to 160 African slaves. The last slave ship ever to land in the United States, it clearly demonstrated how lax the enforcement of the anti-importation laws was.

Learn more about the Dred Scott Decision

John Brown's Raid On Harpers Ferry

Nearly 1,000 miles northeast of Mobile, on the night of October 16, 1859, John Brown-the radical abolitionist who had killed proslavery settlers in Kansas-led 21 men in a raid to capture the U.S. arsenal at Harpers Ferry, Virginia (now West Virginia). Though Brown denied it, his plan was to use the arsenal's weapons to arm a slave uprising. He and his followers, 16 white men and five black ones, holed up in the arsenal after they were discovered, and were captured there by a group of U.S. Marines commanded by an Army lieutenant colonel, Robert E. Lee. Convicted of treason against Virginia, Brown was hanged December 2.

Initial reaction in the South was that this was the work of a small group of fanatics, but when Northern newspapers, authors and legislators began praising him as a martyr-a poem by John Greenleaf Whittier eulogizing Brown was published in the New York Herald Tribune less than a month after the execution-their actions were taken as further proof that Northern abolitionists wished to carry out genocide of white Southerners. The flames were fanned higher as information came out that Brown had talked other abolitionists, including Frederick Douglass, about his plans and received financial assistance from some of them.
Learn more about John Brown's Raid On Harpers Ferry

Abraham Lincoln: Abolitionist President

Following Abraham Lincoln's election to the presidency in 1860, Southern states began seceding from the Union. Though personally opposed to slavery and convinced the United States was going to have to be all free or all slave states-"a house divided against itself cannot stand"-he repeatedly said he would not interfere with slavery where it existed. But he adamantly opposed its expansion into territories where it did not exist, and slave owners were determined that they had to be free to take their human property with them if they chose to move into those territories.

Less than two years into the civil war that began over Southern secession, Lincoln issued the Emancipation Proclamation. It freed all slaves residing in areas of the nation currently in rebellion. Often ridiculed, both then and now, because it only freed slaves in areas that did not recognize Lincoln's authority, it meant that Union Army officers no longer had to return runaway slaves to their owners because, as the armies advanced, slaves in the newly captured areas were considered free. It also effectively prohibited European nations that had long since renounced slavery from entering the war on the side of the South.

Learn more about Abraham Lincoln
Learn more about the Emancipation Proclamation

The 13th Amendment: The Abolitionism Movement Triumphs

The 13th Amendment to the Constitution, declared ratified on December 18, 1865, ended slavery in the United States-at least in name. During the Reconstruction Era, Southern states found ways to "hire" black workers under terms that were slavery in all but name, even pursuing any who ran off, just as they had in the days of the Underground Railroad.

Abolition had been achieved, but the lessons learned by those in the abolition movement would be applied to other social concerns in the decades to come, notably the temperance and woman's suffrage movements.

Articles Featuring The Abolitionist Movement From History Net Magazines

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Abolitionist Movement summary: The Abolitionist movement in the United States of America was an effort to end slavery in a nation that valued personal freedom and believed "all men are created equal." Over time, abolitionists grew more strident in their demands, and slave owners entrenched in response, fueling regional divisiveness that ultimately led to the American Civil War.

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The Compromise of 1850 Explained: US History Review

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The History Place - Abraham Lincoln: Kansas-Nebraska Act

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Sound Smart: The Lincoln-Douglass Debates | History

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Industrial Revolution:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zhL5DCizj5c
Interchangeable parts:
https://nvaughn.weebly.com/interchangeable-parts.html
The rise of Organized labor:
https://www.cliffsnotes.com/study-guides/history/us-history-ii/industrial-america/the-rise-of-organized-labor
Transportation Revolution:
https://firstindustrialrevolution.weebly.com/transportation-revolution.html
Eli Whitney cotton gin:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gzAK65N4ruc
life as a slave:
http://www.ushistory.org/us/27b.asp

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Immigration in the  1800s: http://www.loc.gov/teachers/classroommaterials/presentationsandactivities/presentations/timeline/riseind/immgnts/

Second great awakening:
https://www.britannica.com/topic/Second-Great-Awakening
Abolitionist movement:
https://www.historynet.com/abolitionist-movement
Women right movement of the 1800s:
https://www.achp.gov/sites/default/files/news/2018-05/women-suffrage2.png
Compromise of 1850:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uvlUqV1vwTc
Kansas Nebraska act
http://www.historyplace.com/lincoln/kansas.htm
Lincoln Douglass Debates:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LljCzkPasuk
Election of 1860:
https://cdn.britannica.com/15/73715-050-DBCA1C08/election-Results-American-Votes-Candidate-Sources-Abraham-1860.jpg

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The attack on Fort Sumter marked the official beginning of the American Civil War-a war that lasted four years, cost the lives of more than 620,000 Americans, and freed 3.9 million enslaved people from bondage.

How it ended

Confederate victory. With supplies nearly exhausted and his troops outnumbered, Union major Robert Anderson surrendered Fort Sumter to Brig. Gen. P.G.T Beauregard's Confederate forces. Major Anderson and his men were allowed to strike their colors, fire a 100-gun salute, and board a ship bound for New York, where they were greeted as heroes. Both the North and South immediately called for volunteers to mobilize for war.

In context

By 1861, the country had already experienced decades of short-lived but ultimately failed compromises concerning the expansion of slavery in the United States and its territories. The election of Abraham Lincoln as president of the United States in 1860-a man who declared "I believe this government cannot endure permanently half slave and half free"-threatened the culture and economy of southern slave states and served as a catalyst for secession. On December 20, 1860, South Carolina seceded from the United States, and by February 2, 1861, six more states followed suit. Southern delegates met on February 4, 1861, in Montgomery, AL., and established the Confederate States of America, with Mississippi senator Jefferson Davis elected as its provisional president. Confederate militia forces began seizing United States forts and property throughout the south. With a lame-duck president in office, and a controversial president-elect poised to succeed him, the crisis approached a boiling point and exploded at Fort Sumter.

Before the Battle

In Charleston, the birthplace of secession, tempers are on edge. A delegation from the state goes to Washington, D.C., demanding the surrender of the Federal military installations in the new "independent republic of South Carolina." President James Buchanan refuses to comply. Charleston is the Confederacy's most important port on the Southeast coast. The harbor is defended by three federal forts: Sumter; Castle Pinckney, one mile off the city's Battery; and heavily armed Fort Moultrie, on Sullivan's Island. Major Anderson's command is based at Fort Moultrie, but with its guns pointed out to sea, it cannot defend a land attack. On December 26, Charlestonians awake to discover that Anderson and his tiny garrison of 90 men have slipped away from Fort Moultrie to the more defensible Fort Sumter. For secessionists, Anderson's move is, as one Charlestonian wrote to a friend, "like casting a spark into a magazine,"

Adding to the major's concern is his dangerously dwindling store of supplies. On January 5, 1861, the Star of the West departs from New York with some 200 reinforcements and provisions for the Sumter garrison. As the ship approaches Charleston Harbor on January 9, cadets from the Citadel fire, forcing the crew to abandon its mission. On March 1, Jefferson Davis orders Brig. Gen P.G.T. Beauregard to take command of the growing southern forces in Charleston. On April 4, Lincoln informs southern delegates that he intends to attempt to resupply Fort Sumter, as its garrison is now critically in need. To South Carolinians, any attempt to reinforce Sumter means war. "Now the issue of battle is to be forced upon us," declared the Charleston Mercury. "We will meet the invader, and the God of Battles must decide the issue between the hostile hirelings of Abolition hate and Northern tyranny."

On April 9, Davis and the Confederate cabinet decide to "strike a blow!" Davis orders Beauregard to take Fort Sumter. The next day, three of Beauregard's aides sail to the fort and courteously demand the garrison's surrender. Anderson is equally courteous, but refuses: "I have the honor to acknowledge the receipt of your communication demanding the evacuation of this fort, and to say, in reply thereto, that it is a demand with which I regret that my sense of honor, and of my obligations to my Government, prevent my compliance." He also informs the delegation that the garrison's supplies will only last until April 15.

During the Battle

April 12. At 4:30 a.m., a flaming mortar shot arcs into the air and explodes over Fort Sumter. On this signal, Confederate guns from fortifications and floating batteries around Charleston Harbor roar to life. Outmanned, outgunned, undersupplied, and nearly surrounded by enemy batteries, Anderson waits until around 7:00 a.m. to respond. Captain Abner Doubleday volunteers to fire the first cannon at the Confederates, a 32-pound shot that bounces off the roof of the Iron Battery on Cummings Point.

For nearly 36 hours the two sides keep up this unequal contest. A shell strikes the flagpole of Fort Sumter, and the American colors fall to the earth, only to be hoisted back up the hastily repaired pole. Confederates fire hotshot from Fort Moultrie into Fort Sumter. Buildings begin to burn within the fort. With no more resources, Anderson surrenders Fort Sumter to Confederate forces.

April 13. At 2:30 p.m., Maj. Anderson and his men strike their colors and prepare to leave the fort. Sadly, the only casualties at Fort Sumter come during the 100-gun salute, when a round explodes prematurely, killing Pvt. Daniel Hough and mortally wounding another soldier. The attack is over, but the war had just begun.

Aftermath

Following the evacuation of Major Robert Anderson and his Federal garrison on the afternoon of April 14, 1861, Fort Sumter is occupied initially by Confederate troops of Company B of the First South Carolina Artillery Battalion and a volunteer company of the Palmetto Guard, a local militia unit. The fort remains in Confederate hands for the next four years until all Confederate forces evacuate Charleston on the evening of February 17, 1865.

Despite having surrendered, Anderson and his men are greeted as heroes when they disembark in New York. Capt. Abner Doubleday notes later that "all the passing steamers saluted us with their steam-whistles and bells, and cheer after cheer went up from the ferry boats and vessels in the harbor." Anderson's valor during the attack and commitment to duty are praised by the Union. Beauregard is also hailed for this first Confederate victory. He is later ordered to direct the troops at Bull Run.

Fort Sumter: Featured Resources

Related Battles

Charleston Harbor, SC | April 12, 1861

Result: Confederate Victory

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Early in the morning of April 12, 1861, Confederate guns around Charleston Harbor opened fire on Fort Sumter. The American Civil War was officially upon both the North and the South. A war that lasted four years and cost the lives of more than 620,000 Americans.

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The fall of ft. Sumter:
https://www.battlefields.org/learn/civil-war/battles/fort-sumter
The Emancipation Proclamation: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fYXqj_UPsXg
Clara Barton and the American red cross: https://www.redcross.org/about-us/who-we-are/history/clara-barton.html
The battle of Gettysburg: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7ALyq3seK2g
Battle of Vicksburg: https://www.thoughtco.com/siege-of-vicksburg-p2-104523
Southern Surrender at Appomattox courthouse: http://www.eyewitnesstohistory.com/appomatx.htm

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Emancipation Proclamation | The Civil War era (1844-1877) | US History | Khan Academy

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Kim and Sal talk about the Emancipation Proclamation. Watch the next lesson: https://www.khanacademy.org/humanities/us-history/the-gilded-age/gilded-age/v/the-gilded-age-part-1?utm_source=YT&utm_medium=Desc&utm_campaign=UShistory Missed the previous lesson? https://www.khanacademy.org/humanities/us-history/civil-war-era/slavery-and-the-civil-war/v/early-phases-of-civil-war-and-antietam?utm_source=YT&utm_medium=Desc&utm_campaign=UShistory US history on Khan Academy: From a mosquito-ridden backwater to the world's last remaining superpower, the United States of America is a nation with a rich history and a noble goal: government of the people, by the people, for the people.

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Clara Barton and the American red cross 

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Clara Barton and the American red cross 

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Learn about Clara Barton, the founder of the American Red Cross who led the organization for 23 years.

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The Battle of Gettysburg: The Civil War in Four Minutes

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Southern Surrender at Appomattox courthouse

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Southern Surrender at Appomattox courthouse

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Eyewitness account of the surrender that led to the end of the Civil War.

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The 13 amendment: https://guides.loc.gov/13th-amendment
The 14 amendment:
https://www.history.com/topics/black-history/fourteenth-amendment
15 amendment: https://www.ourdocuments.gov/doc.php?flash=false&doc=44
Election of 1876:
https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/7/77/ElectoralCollege1876.svg/1200px-ElectoralCollege1876.svg.png
Plessy V. Ferguson:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ldd0PLPG3E0

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The 13th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution declared that "Neither slavery nor involuntary servitude, except as a punishment for crime whereof the party shall have been duly convicted, shall exist within the United States, or any place subject to their jurisdiction." Formally abolishing slavery in the United States, the 13th Amendment was passed by Congress on January 31, 1865, and ratified by the states on December 6, 1865.

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Research Guides: 13th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution: Primary Documents in American History: Introduction

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Digital materials at the Library of Congress related to the 13th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, as well as links to external websites, and a selected print bibliography. Digital materials at the Library of Congress related to the 13th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution.

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14th Amendment: Simplified Summary, Text & Impact

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The 14th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, ratified in 1868, granted citizenship to all persons born or naturalized in the United States—including former slaves—and guaranteed all citizens “equal protection of the laws.”

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Our Documents - 15th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution: Voting Rights (1870)

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OurDocuments.gov. Featuring 100 milestone documents of American history from the National Archives. Includes images of original primary source documents, lesson plans, teacher and student competitions, and educational resources.

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The possibility of railroads connecting the Atlantic and Pacific coasts was discussed in the Congress even before the treaty with England which settled the question of the Oregon boundary in 1846.[8] Chief promoter of a transcontinental railroad was Asa Whitney, a New York merchant active in the China trade who was obsessed with the idea of a railroad to the Pacific. In January 1845 he petitioned Congress for a charter and grant of a sixty-mile strip through the public domain to help finance construction.[9]

A large-scale grant map dated 1893, showing the alternate sections of public land granted to the Little Rock & Fort Smith Railway. Such maps were used by land speculators to advertise railroad lands for sale to the public.

Whitney suggested the use of Irish and German immigrant labor, which was in great abundance at the time. Wages were to be paid in land, thus ensuring that there would be settlers along the route to supply produce to and become patrons of the completed line. The failure of Congress to act on Whitney's proposal was mainly due to the vigorous opposition of Sen. Thomas Hart Benton of Missouri, who favored a western route originating at St. Louis.

In 1849 Whitney published a booklet to promote his scheme entitled Project for a Railroad to the Pacific. It was accompanied by an outline map of North America which shows the route of his railroad from Prairie du Chien, Wisconsin, across the Rocky Mountains north of South Pass. An alternate route to the south of the pass joined the main line at the Salmon River and continued to Puget Sound. Proposed lines also extended from St. Louis to San Francisco and from Independence, Missouri, to New Mexico and the Arkansas River. This is one of the earliest promotional maps submitted to Congress and was, according to its author, conceived as early as 1830[10].

Although Congress failed to sanction his plan, Whitney made the Pacific railroad one of the great public issues of the day. The acquisition of California following the Mexican War opened the way for other routes to the coast. The discovery of gold, the settlement of the frontier, and the success of the eastern railroads increased interest in building a railroad to the Pacific.[11]

Railroads were also needed in the West to provide better postal service, as had been developed in the East, by designating railroad lines "post roads" in 1838. Strengthened by other proposals such as those of Hartwell Carver in 1849 and of Edwin F. Johnson in 1853, such leading statesmen as John C. Calhoun, Stephen A. Douglas, and Jefferson Davis declared their support for linking the country by rails. The lawmakers, however, could not agree on an eastern terminus, and they did not see the merits of the several routes west. To resolve the debate, money was appropriated in 1853 for the Army Topographic Corps "to ascertain the most practicable and economical route for a railroad from the Mississippi River to the Pacific Ocean."

Under the provisions of the Army Appropriation Act of March 1853, Secretary of War Jefferson Davis was directed to survey possible routes to the Pacific. Four east to west routes, roughly following specific parallels, were to be surveyed by parties under the supervision of the Topographical Corps. The most northerly survey, between the 47th and 49th parallels, was under the direction of Isaac Ingalls Stevens, governor of Washington Territory. This route closely approximated that proposed by Asa Whitney.

The ill-fated party under Capt. John W. Gunnison was to explore the route along the 38th and 39th parallels, or the Cochetopoa Pass route, which was advocated by Missouri Senator Thomas Hart Benton. After Gunnison's death at the hands of hostile Indians, Lt. Edward G. Beckwith continued the survey along the 41st parallel. Capt. Amiel W. Whipple, assistant astronomer of the Mexican Boundary Survey, and Lt. Joseph Christmas Ives surveyed the route along the 35th parallel westward to southern California. This line was favored by Jefferson Davis and was essentially the route traversed by Josiah Gregg in 1839 and later surveyed by Col. John J. Abert. The most southerly survey, which followed the 32d parallel, was surveyed by Lt. John G. Parke from California along the Gila River to the Pima villages and the Rio Grande. Capt. John Pope mapped the eastern portion of the route from Dona Ana, New Mexico, to the Red River.

A fifth survey, following a north-south orientation, was conducted under the direction of Lt. Robert S. Williamson. This party reconducted topographical surveys to locate passes through the Sierra Nevadas and the Coast Range in California in order to determine a route that would connect California, Oregon, and Washington were made under the direction of Lt. Robert S. Williamson[12].

These surveys showed that a railroad could follow any one of the routes, and that the 32nd parallel route was the least expensive. The Southern Pacific Railroad was subsequently built along this parallel. The southern routes were objectionable to northern politicians and the northern routes were objectionable to the southern politicians, but the surveys could not, of course, resolve these sectional issues.

While sectional issues and disagreements were debated in the late 1850s, no decision was forthcoming from Congress on the Pacific railroad question. Theodore D. Judah, the engineer of the Sacramento Valley Railroad, became obsessed with the desire to build a transcontinental railroad. In 1860 he approached Leland Stanford, Collis P. Huntington, Mark Hopkins, and Charles Crocker, leading Sacramento merchants, and soon convinced them that building a transcontinental line would make them rich and famous. The prospect of tapping the wealth of the Nevada mining towns and forthcoming legislation for federal aid to railroads stimulated them to incorporate the Central Pacific Railroad Company of California. This line later merged with the Southern Pacific. It was through Judah's efforts and the support of Abraham Lincoln, who saw military benefits in the lines as well as the bonding of the Pacific Coast to the Union, that the Pacific Railroad finally became a reality.

The Railroad Act of 1862 put government support behind the transcontinental railroad and helped create the Union Pacific Railroad, which subsequently joined with the Central Pacific at Promontory, Utah, on May 10, 1869, and signaled the linking of the continent.

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The Transcontinental Railroad | History of Railroads and Maps | Articles and Essays | Railroad Maps, 1828-1900 | Digital Collections | Library of Congress

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The possibility of railroads connecting the Atlantic and Pacific coasts was discussed in the Congress even before the treaty with England which settled the question of the Oregon boundary in 1846.[8] Chief promoter of a transcontinental railroad was Asa Whitney, a New York merchant active in the China trade who was obsessed with the idea of a railroad to the Pacific.

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American Indian Activist Russell Means Powerful Speech

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Dawes General Allotment Act | History, Significance, & Facts

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Dawes General Allotment Act, U.S. law providing for the distribution of Indian reservation land among individual Native Americans, with the aim of creating farmers in the white man's image. It was sponsored several times by Senator Henry L. Dawes of Massachusetts and finally was enacted in February 1887.

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The transcontinental railroad: https://www.loc.gov/collections/railroad-maps-1828-to-1900/articles-and-essays/history-of-railroads-and-maps/the-transcontinental-railroad/

Massacre at wounded knee:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dc7fZonjD1M

Dawes General Allotment act 1887: https://www.britannica.com/topic/Dawes-General-Allotment-Act

Homestead and Morril act: https://bycommonconsent.files.wordpress.com/2017/09/homestead.jpg

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Bessemer process, the first method discovered for mass-producing steel. Though named after Sir Henry Bessemer of England, the process evolved from the contributions of many investigators before it could be used on a broad commercial basis. It was apparently conceived independently and almost concurrently by Bessemer and by William Kelly of the United States. As early as 1847, Kelly, a businessman-scientist of Pittsburgh, began experiments aimed at developing a revolutionary means of removing impurities from pig iron by an air blast. Kelly theorized that not only would the air, injected into the molten iron, supply oxygen to react with the impurities, converting them into oxides separable as slag, but that the heat evolved in these reactions would increase the temperature of the mass, keeping it from solidifying during the operation. After several failures, he succeeded in proving his theory and rapidly producing steel ingots.

In 1856 Bessemer, working independently in Sheffield, developed and patented the same process. Whereas Kelly had been unable to perfect the process owing to a lack of financial resources, Bessemer was able to develop it into a commercial success. Another Englishman, Robert Forester Mushet, found that adding an alloy of carbon, manganese, and iron after the air-blowing was complete restored the carbon content of the steel while neutralizing the effect of remaining impurities, notably sulfur. A Swedish ironmaster, Goran Goransson, redesigned the Bessemer furnace, or converter, making it reliable in performance. The end result was a means of mass-producing steel. The resultant volume of low-cost steel in Britain and the United States soon revolutionized building construction and provided steel to replace iron in railroad rails and many other uses.

The Bessemer converter is a cylindrical steel pot approximately 6 metres (20 feet) high, originally lined with a siliceous refractory. Air is blown in through openings (tuyeres) near the bottom, creating oxides of silicon and manganese, which become part of the slag, and of carbon, which are carried out in the stream of air. Within a few minutes an ingot of steel can be produced, ready for the forge or rolling mill.

The original Bessemer converter was not effective in removing the phosphorus present in sizable amounts in most British and European iron ore. The invention in England, by Sidney Gilchrist Thomas, of what is now called the Thomas-Gilchrist converter, which was lined with a basic material such as burned limestone rather than an (acid) siliceous material, overcame this problem. Another drawback to Bessemer steel, its retention of a small percentage of nitrogen from the air blow, was not corrected until the 1950s. The open-hearth process, which was developed in the 1860s, did not suffer from this difficulty, and it eventually outstripped the Bessemer process to become the dominant steelmaking process until the mid-20th century. The open-hearth process was in turn replaced by the basic oxygen process, which is actually an extension and refinement of the Bessemer process.

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Bessemer process | Dates, Definition, & Facts

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Bessemer process, the first method discovered for mass-producing steel. Though named after Sir Henry Bessemer of England, the process evolved from the contributions of many investigators before it could be used on a broad commercial basis. It was apparently conceived independently and almost concurrently by Bessemer and by William Kelly of the United States.

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After the Civil War, the United States rapidly transformed into an industrial, urbanized nation. Technological innovation, economic growth, development of large-scale agriculture, and the expansion of the federal government characterized the era, as did the social tensions brought about by immigration, financial turmoil, federal Indian policy, and increasing demands for rights by workers, women, and minorities.

This group of objects highlights innovation and industrialization in the late 1800s, and the benefits as well as detriments of becoming an economic and industrial power.

Century Vase, 1876

Made by Union Porcelain Works, Greenpoint, New York

The American Industrial Revolution transformed the nation from a scattering of isolated communities into an economic and industrial giant, in part due to the country’s wealth of natural resources. Forests, minerals, waterways, and huge tracts of arable land for farming and ranching provided the raw materials that fueled growth and development, often at the expense of the environment.

This vase celebrates 100 years of American progress and depicts now-vanished icons of the American landscape such as bison, a wooden reaper, and a steamship.

Railroad Spike, 1869

Commemorative of the final spike that completed the transcontinental railroad

Railroads were the basis of the nation’s industrial economy in the late 1800s, creating new markets, carrying billions of tons of freight to every corner of the country, and opening up the West for development. Thanks in part to the railroad providing access to new land for farming, agricultural production doubled in the 1870s, which in turn increased railroad traffic.

Gift of Union Pacific Railroad, Mr. A. E. Stoddard, President

Stock Ticker, about 1900

Made by the Western Union Telegraph Company

The U.S. economy grew rapidly after the Civil War, fueled by an astounding rise in wealth, wages, production, and corporate mergers, along with limited government regulation. The volume of stocks traded rose sharply with corporations’ need for investment capital and the development of new technologies. The 1867 invention of the stock ticker, transmitting up-to-the-minute share prices over telegraph lines, modernized the stock exchange.

Gift of Western Union Corporation

Incandescent Lamp, about 1891

Made by Edison General Electric Company

Many inventions in the late 1880s helped speed urban growth, allowing for taller buildings, more efficient factories, and better transportation. One of the most dramatic improvements occurred in artificial lighting. Thomas Edison’s development of an electric lamp that did not rely on open flames made lighting more practical for factories, offices, and homes, and transformed city life.

Gift of General Electric Lighting Company, through Terry K. McGowan

Tinfoil Phonograph, 1878

Invented by Thomas Alva Edison

Thomas Edison helped usher in an age of organized research in support of commerce and industry that reshaped American life. Vowing to turn out inventions on a regular basis, Edison and his team of scientists, engineers, draftsmen, and laborers developed or improved over 1,000 patents, from huge electric generators to this early phonograph.

Gift of American Telephone and Telegraph Company

Alexander Graham Bell's Big Box Telephone, 1876

One of the first commercially available telephones

Telegraph lines could carry only one coded message per wire at a time, which became a hindrance as the volume of communication increased. To overcome this problem, Alexander Bell used his knowledge of acoustics to devise a method of sending multiple tonal messages over a wire. This led to the telephone, and a communication revolution that transformed business and daily life.

Gift of American Telephone and Telegraph Company

Cross, 1875–99

Made by a Hispanic Catholic in New Mexico

New Mexico has experienced many cultural encounters since the arrival of the Spanish in the early 1500s. Following the United States’ 1848 annexation of the area at the end of war with Mexico, the population of the territory boomed, bringing together Catholics of Spanish descent, indigenous tribes, Protestant missionaries, and Anglo American settlers. Though often in conflict, these communities forged a distinctive regional identity that survives to the present.

Silver Presentation Cup, about 1900

Presented to Susan B. Anthony on her eightieth birthday

Although American women fought for black suffrage, they were unable to vote in federal elections themselves until 1920. As suffragists moved out of the parlor and into the streets, they challenged the notion that a woman’s place was solely in the home. Susan B. Anthony shocked the nation when she was jailed in 1872 for illegally trying to vote.

Gift of National American Woman Suffrage Association

Print, 1870s

Black politicians during Reconstruction

With the end of the Civil War, hard-won constitutional amendments abolished slavery and established citizenship and voting rights for black Americans. But during and after Reconstruction, blacks were often treated as second-class citizens. Southern states continued to restrict black voting, and the rise of the Ku Klux Klan led to decades of violence.

From the Ralph E. Becker Collection of Political Americana

Statue, late 1800s

Made by the Union Porcelain Works, Greenpoint, New York

In the late 1800s, black Americans gained citizenship and the vote, while immigrants from Europe and Asia came to the country in record numbers. As these minorities strove for economic prosperity and social justice, some white Americans reacted to the rapidly changing social order with apprehension and hostility. The relationship of the three figures in this statue captures this tension.

Gift of Mrs. Franklin Chace

Singer Sewing Machine Patent Model, 1889

Factory machine for making buttonholes

American goods were increasingly made in factories as companies adopted large-scale, standardized production methods in the late 1800s. Specialized machines took the place of manual tasks—such as sewing buttonholes for ready-made clothing—speeding up the work to meet the growing demands of a nation of consumers. The advent of more simply constructed women’s apparel in the 1890s gave a further boost to the clothing industry.

Sholes & Glidden Typewriter, 1873

Made by E. Remington & Sons

The development of corporations after the Civil War led to the creation of multiple layers of office management. The vast demand for professional managers and clerical staff encouraged education and the growth of the middle class. The introduction of the typewriter gave women the opportunity to enter the corporate workplace.

Gift of Wyckoff, Seamans & Benedict

John Brown Lennon's Delegate Badge, 1893

From the Journeymen Tailors’ Union convention

Rapid industrial development in the late 1800s changed where and how Americans worked. By 1900, U.S. factories employed 4.5 million people, most working long hours for low wages in often unhealthful conditions. Workers organized local and national unions in response, leading to an intense period of political activity, strikes, and sometimes violent clashes in the fight for labor rights.

Gift of D. E. Lennon

Jeans, 1873-96

Made by Levi Strauss & Co., San Franscisco

Between 1870 and 1900 over 430 million acres were settled in the United States, most of them in the West. Mining, ranching, and farming drew waves of settlers, and cities and commerce followed. In 1873 San Francisco merchant LeviStrauss and tailor Jacob Davis patented a designfor rugged workers’ pants for western wear—the first jeans, advertised at right in 1875.

Gift of Walter Haas Jr.

Winchester Rifle, 1881

Captured from Sioux when Chief Low Dog surrendered in Montana Territory

Through most of the 1800s, Americans viewed the nation’s westward expansion as a symbol of its providence as a land of wealth and progress. But Indian tribes resisted the encroachment of settlers in their territories, setting off decades of violence. The federal government gradually pushed the tribes to more isolated areas, offering U.S. citizenship, but few opportunities, to those who agreed to accept allotments of land on reservations.

Man's Gown, about 1896

Ordered from China by Lee B. Lok in 1896

With the completion of the transcontinental railroad in 1869, thousands of Chinese laborers were left jobless in the western United States. Unwelcome in California, where it was feared they competed for low-paying jobs, many moved to the East Coast. Lee Lok emigrated from China to San Francisco in 1881 and then moved to New York City’s Chinatown where he worked in a general store. Although he could not become a U.S. citizen, his children could, and did.

Gift of James Edgar Mead and Virginia Lee Mead

The objects below are no longer on view

Harvester and Self-Raking Reaper Patent Model, 1877

Patented by William Whiteley

Increasingly mechanized farming meant fewer laborers were needed on farms, releasing them to work in urban industrial jobs. As the cities grew, demand increased for agricultural goods in turn. Inventors looked for new ways for farming to be more efficient and profitable, including making improvements to existing technology such as the mechanical reaper first developed by Cyrus McCormick in 1834.

Creeping Baby Doll, 1870s

Patented by Robert J. Clay

In the 1870s, changing notions of childhood meant that Anglo American parents had only recently accepted crawling, or creeping, as a natural stage in a baby’s development rather than a bad habit.  Prior to this, generations of American children had been prevented from crawling on all fours, an activity then associated with animals and the insane.

Child's Dress, 1876

Made from fabric purchased at the Philadelphia Centennial Exhibition

Celebrating innovations in industry and the arts, the international Philadelphia Centennial Exhibition commemorated the hundredth anniversary of the American Revolution, embodied Americans’ confidence in the future, and revealed the country’s potential to the rest of the world. Among the crowds attending the centennial was Henry Fletcher, who purchased the patriotic fabric his wife used to make this dress for their first child, born in 1876.

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After the Civil War, the United States rapidly transformed into an industrial, urbanized nation. Technological innovation, economic growth, development of large-scale agriculture, and the expansion of the federal government characterized the era, as did the social tensions brought about by immigrati…

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The late nineteenth century saw the rise of "big business" in important areas of economic activity. ("Big" is never defined precisely, but the quantitative term is popularly used to connote something important.) Big business firms were institutions that used management to control economic activity. Big business firms broke themselves into different functions, or "departments," and used managers to coordinate the work of departments, and "middle managers" to coordinate work among departments.

Railroads were the first "big businesses" in the United States. After railroad companies began to operate on tracks that stretched for fifty and more miles, their owners soon realized that they had to divide responsibilities among different managers, with coordination of the various functions of the company--from soliciting business, to operating trains, to maintaining facilities, to financing everything. By the 1850s railroad executives were perfecting systems of managerial control over their ever more complex firms.

After the railroads pioneered the formation of "big business," big businesses appeared in manufacturing and distribution.

Big city department stores were a form of "big business." They combined many different retail operations in one organization, and placed them together in one building. By 1912 department stores were principal features of the downtown districts of every city.

Still other big businesses, mail order firms such as Sears, Roebuck, were by 1912 serving rural areas and small towns.

Thus when Americans shopped in 1912, they were likely to encounter a "big business." In their stores, moreover, they were likely to find products manufactured by "big businesses."

The "big business" form of organization spread rapidly in manufacturing industries after about 1870.

In some lines of manufacturing, there were advantages to have a single organization control raw materials, transportation, fabrication, and distribution. When he sold his steel company in 1901, for example, Andrew Carnegie was the most efficient--and the wealthiest--steel maker in the world. Carnegie steel had control over sources of coal, coke, and iron ore. Carnegie steel exercised control over ships and railroads that brought raw materials to its mills in the Pittsburgh district. Carnegie insisted on his mill remaining the most advanced of their day. Not only did Carnegie Steel manufacture steel, the company also produced finished products like railroad rails and bridge girders. All of these operations were in a single managerial organization. Managers controlled the flow of materials. Carnegie Steel was so efficient that it could undercut all of its competitors and still make large profits.

Meatpacking was another industry that witnessed the rise and perfection of "big business" forms. After 1870, several Chicago meatpackers built huge, complex organizations for purchasing animals, butchering them, and distributing meat to markets all across the nation. Their companies used all of the byproducts of the animals they slaughtered. Skins went into leather goods, hoofs into glue, bones into fertilizer, and fat into soap. One wag commented that the only part of the hog the Chicago packers did not use and sell was the squeal!

By the end of the nineteenth century, Standard Oil, led by John D. Rockefeller, dominated the refining and distribution of petroleum products in the United States, and extended its reach well beyond the nation's borders.

When an entrepreneur like Carnegie was successful in building an efficient organization to control manufacturing processes, he drove competitors out of business. A steel maker either had to compete by mimicking Carnegie's managerial techniques, or go into a niche, or specialized, market that the big steel companies did not enter. In the case of meatpacking, by 1900 thousands of local butchers found themselves squeezed, because they were less efficient than the Chicago packers. Small shopkeepers sometimes faced ruin from large department store competitors. These businesses following older, more traditional practices sometimes fueled popular sentiment to "bust" the trusts.

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The late nineteenth century saw the rise of "big business" in important areas of economic activity. ("Big" is never defined precisely, but the quantitative term is popularly used to connote something important.) Big business firms were institutions that used management to control economic activity.

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The Sherman Anti-Trust Act Explained: US History Review

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Bessemer process: https://www.britannica.com/technology/Bessemer-process
Growth of invention: https://americanhistory.si.edu/american-stories/1870-1900-industrial-development
The rise of big businesses:https://ehistory.osu.edu/exhibitions/1912/trusts/RiseBigBusiness
Antitrust movement: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_DSN0uUNLOw
Labor movement:https://i.kinja-img.com/gawker-media/image/upload/c_fill,f_auto,fl_progressive,g_center,h_675,pg_1,q_80,w_1200/ms6hik3ia0xqkrex0y2m.jpg

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International Stock Food Factory, between 1900 and 1910
Detroit Publishing Company

In the decades following the Civil War, the United States emerged as an industrial giant. Old industries expanded and many new ones, including petroleum refining, steel manufacturing, and electrical power, emerged. Railroads expanded significantly, bringing even remote parts of the country into a national market economy.

Industrial growth transformed American society. It produced a new class of wealthy industrialists and a prosperous middle class. It also produced a vastly expanded blue collar working class. The labor force that made industrialization possible was made up of millions of newly arrived immigrants and even larger numbers of migrants from rural areas. American society became more diverse than ever before.

Not everyone shared in the economic prosperity of this period. Many workers were typically unemployed at least part of the year, and their wages were relatively low when they did work. This situation led many workers to support and join labor unions. Meanwhile, farmers also faced hard times as technology and increasing production led to more competition and falling prices for farm products. Hard times on farms led many young people to move to the city in search of better job opportunities.

Americans who were born in the 1840s and 1850s would experience enormous changes in their lifetimes. Some of these changes resulted from a sweeping technological revolution. Their major source of light, for example, would change from candles, to kerosene lamps, and then to electric light bulbs. They would see their transportation evolve from walking and horse power to steam-powered locomotives, to electric trolley cars, to gasoline-powered automobiles. Born into a society in which the vast majority of people were involved in agriculture, they experienced an industrial revolution that radically changed the ways millions of people worked and where they lived. They would experience the migration of millions of people from rural America to the nation's rapidly growing cities.

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Overview | Rise of Industrial America, 1876-1900 | U.S. History Primary Source Timeline | Classroom Materials at the Library of Congress | Library of Congress

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In the decades following the Civil War, the United States emerged as an industrial giant. Old industries expanded and many new ones, including petroleum refining, steel manufacturing, and electrical power, emerged. Railroads expanded significantly, bringing even remote parts of the country into a national market economy. Industrial growth transformed American society.

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Urbanization and the future of cities - Vance Kite

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The Growth of Mass Communication- late 1800s 

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The Growth of Mass Communication- late 1800s 

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Societies have long had a desire to find effective ways to report environmental dangers and opportunities; circulate opinions, facts, and ideas; pass along knowledge, heritage, and lore; communicate expectations to new members; entertain in an expansive manner; and broaden commerce and trade (Schramm). The primary challenge has been to find ways to communicate messages to as many people as possible. Our need-to-know prompted innovative ways to get messages to the masses.

Before writing, humans relied on oral traditions to pass on information. "It was only in the 1920s-according to the Oxford English Dictionary-that people began to speak of 'the media' and a generation later, in the 1950s, of a 'communication revolution', but a concern with the means of communication is very much older than that" (Briggs & Burke 1). Oral and written communication played a major role in ancient cultures. These oral cultures used stories to document the past and impart cultural standards, traditions, and knowledge. With the development of alphabets around the world over 5000 years ago, written language with ideogrammatic (picture-based) alphabets like hieroglyphics started to change how cultures communicated.

Still, written communication remained ambiguous and did not reach the masses until the Greeks and Romans resolved this by establishing a syllable alphabet representing sounds. But, without something to write on, written language was inefficient. Eventually, paper making processes were perfected in China, which spread throughout Europe via trade routes (Baran). Mass communication was not quick, but it was far-reaching (Briggs & Burke). This forever altered how cultures saved and transmitted cultural knowledge and values. Any political or social movement throughout the ages can be traced to the development and impact of the printing press and movable metal type (Steinberg). With his technique, Guttenberg could print more than a single page of specific text. By making written communication more available to larger numbers of people, mass printing became responsible for giving voice to the masses and making information available to common folks (McLuhan & Fiore). McLuhan argued that Gutenberg's evolution of the printing press as a form of mass communication had profound and lasting effects on culture, perhaps the most significant invention in human history.

Mass Communication Study Then

In 1949, Carl I. Hovland, Arthur A. Lumsdaine, and Fred D. Sheffield wrote the book Experiments on Mass Communication. They looked at two kinds of films the Army used to train soldiers. First, they examined orientation and training films such as the "Why We Fight" that were intended to teach facts to the soldiers, as well as generate a positive response from them for going to war. The studies determined that significant learning did take place by the soldiers from the films, but primarily with factual items. The Army was disappointed with the results that showed that the orientation films did not do an effective job in generating the kind of positive responses they desired from the soldiers. Imagine, people were not excited about going to war.

With the transition to the industrial age in the 18th century, large populations headed to urban areas, creating mass audiences of all economic classes seeking information and entertainment. Printing technology was at the heart of modernization WHICH led to magazines, newspapers, the telegraph, and the telephone. At the turn of the century (1900), pioneers like Thomas Edison, Theodore Puskas, and Nikola Tesla literally electrified the world and mass communication. With the addition of motion pictures and radio in the early 1900s, and television in the 40s and 50s, the world increasingly embraced the foundations of today's mass communication. In the 1970s cable started challenging over-the-air broadcasting and traditional program distribution making the United States a wired nation. In 2014, there was an estimated 116.3 million homes in America that own a TV (Nielson, 2014 Advance National TV Household Universe Estimate). While traditionally these televisions would display only the programs that are chosen to be broadcast by cable providers, more and more households have chosen to become more conscious media consumers and actively choose what they watch through alternative viewing options like streaming video.

Today, smart T.V.'s and streaming devices have taken over the market and they are expected to be in 43% of households by 2016. These new forms of broadcasting have created a digital revolution. Thanks to Netflix and other streaming services we are no longer subjected to advertisements during our shows. Similarly, streaming services like Hulu provide the most recent episodes as they appear on cable that viewers can watch any time. These services provide instant access to entire seasons of shows (which can result in binge watching).

The Information Age eventually began to replace the ideals of the industrial age. In 1983 Time Magazine named the PC the first "Machine of the Year." Just over a decade later, PCs outsold televisions. Then, in 2006, Time Magazine named "you" as the person of the year for your use of technology to broaden communication. "You" took advantage of changes in global media. Chances are that you, your friends, and family spend hours engaged in data-mediated communication such as emailing, texting, or participating in various form of social media. Romero points out that, "The Net has transformed the way we work, the way we get in contact with others, our access to information, our levels of privacy and indeed notions as basic and deeply rooted in our culture as those of time and space" (88). Social media has also had a large impact in social movements across the globe in recent years by providing the average person with the tools to reach wide audiences around the world for the first time history.

If you're reading this for a college class, you may belong to the millennial generation. Free wifi, apps, alternative news sources, Facebook, and Twitter have become a way of life. Can you imagine a world without communication technology? How would you find out the name of that song stuck in your head? If you wanted to spontaneously meet up with a friend for lunch, how would you let them know? Mass communication has become such an integral part of our daily lives, most people probably could not function through the day without it. What started as email quickly progressed to chat rooms and basic blogs, such as LiveJournal. From there, we saw the rise and fall of the first widely used social media platform, Myspace. Though now just a shadow of the social media powerhouse it once was, Myspace paved the way for social media to enter the mainstream in forms of websites such as Facebook, Twitter, Tumblr, Snapchat, and Instagram. Facebook has evolved into a global social media site. It's available in 37 languages and has over 500 million users. Mark Zuckerberg created Facebook in 2005 while studying at Harvard University, and it has universally changed the way we communicate, interact, and share our lives with friends, family, and acquaintances. Many people argue about the good and bad qualities of having a Facebook profile, it can be looked at as your "digital footprint" in social media. Profiles log status updates, timelines photos and videos, and archives messages between members. Here's a short YouTube video from rapper/poet Prince Ea about Facebook and the effects of social media on society.

Another example of mainstream social media is Twitter. Twitter allows for quick 140 character or less status updates (called tweets) for registered users. Tweets can be sent from any device with access to internet in a fast simple way and connects with a number of people, whether they be family, friends or followers. Twitter's microblogging format allows for people to share their daily thoughts and experiences on a broad and sometimes public stage. The simplicity of Twitter allows it to be used as a tool for entertainment and blogging, but also as a way of organizing social movements and sharing breaking news.

Snapchat is a newer social media platform used by more and more people every day. The function of Snapchat allows the user to send a photo (with the option of text) that expires after a few seconds. It can be looked at like a digital self-destructing note you would see in an old spy movie. Unlike its competitors, Snapchat is used in a less professional manner, emphasizing humor and spontaneity over information efficiency. Contrary to Facebook, there is no pressure to pose, or display your life. Rather, it is more spontaneous. It's like the stranger you wink at in the street or a hilarious conversation with a best friend.

Mass Communication Study Now

With new forms of communication emerging rapidly, it is important to note the corresponding changes to formal language and slang terms. UrbanDictionary.com is a famous site that can introduce any newbie to the slang world by presenting them various definitions for a term they don't recognize, describe its background, and provide examples for how it's used in context. For example, one of the most popular definitions claims that the word 'hella' is said to originate from the streets of San Francisco in the Hunters Point neighborhood. "It is commonly used in place of 'really' or 'very' when describing something."

In this age of information overload, multiple news sources, high-speed connections, and social networking, life seems unimaginable without mass communication. Can you relate to your parents' stories about writing letters to friends, family, or their significant others? Today, when trying to connect with someone we have a variety ways of contacting them; we can call, text, email, Facebook message, tweet, and/or Snapchat; the options are almost endless and ever-changing. Society today is in the midst of a technological revolution. Only a few years ago families were arguing over landline internet cable use and the constant disruptions from incoming phone calls. Now, we have the ability to browse the web anytime on smart phones. Since the printing press, mass communication has literally changed the ways we think and interact as humans. We take so much for granted as "new technologies are assimilated so rapidly in U.S. culture that historic perspectives are often lost in the process" (Fidler 1). With all of this talk and research about mass communication, what functions does it serve for us?

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Societies have long had a desire to find effective ways to report environmental dangers and opportunities; circulate opinions, facts, and ideas; pass along knowledge, heritage, and lore; communicate expectations to new members; entertain in an expansive manner; and broaden commerce and trade (Schramm).

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The Rise of Immigration: http://www.loc.gov/teachers/classroommaterials/presentationsandactivities/presentations/timeline/riseind/immgnts/
The Growth of Cities: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fKnAJCSGSdk
Tenement Life Cause and Effects:https://www.history.com/.image/ar_16:9%2Cc_fill%2Ccs_srgb%2Cfl_progressive%2Cg_faces:center%2Cq_auto:good%2Cw_768/MTU5Mzk0OTQ3NjIyMTE5MzM1/jacob-riis-tenements-514877094.jpg
The Growth of Mass Communication: https://courses.lumenlearning.com/suny-introductiontocommunication/chapter/evolution-of-mass-communication/

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political machine, in U.S. politics, a party organization, headed by a single boss or small autocratic group, that commands enough votes to maintain political and administrative control of a city, county, or state.

The rapid growth of American cities in the 19th century, a result of both immigration and migration from rural areas, created huge problems for city governments, which were often poorly structured and unable to provide services. In those conditions, political machines-such as Tammany Hall, run by boss William Magear Tweed (1823-73) in New York City -were able to build a loyal voter following, especially among immigrant groups, by performing such favours as providing jobs or housing.

Political machines are characterized by a disciplined and hierarchical organization, reaching down to neighbourhood and block organizers, that enables the machine to respond to the problems of individual neighbourhoods, or even families, in exchange for loyalty at the polls. The term refers to their ability to elect candidates or enact measures with mechanical efficiency and predictability.

Although the primary goal of a political machine is keeping itself in power rather than providing good government, machines have been responsible for restructuring city governments to centralize authority, improving facilities and services, helping to assimilate immigrant groups, and encouraging the growth of business and industry. Supporters of political machines say that they "work" and that consolidating power in the hands of a boss, like Mayor Richard J. Daley (1902-76) of Chicago, guarantees city governments the power and authority that they need to cope with urban problems effectively. However, because political machines in such cities as Boston, Philadelphia, New York, Pittsburgh, Chicago, and Kansas City have also been responsible for many abuses of power, the term carries a pejorative sense.

Organizers who "deliver" the votes are often rewarded with patronage jobs. However, patronage can result in poorer service to the citizens because appointees may be neither qualified for their jobs nor interested in performing them. Control of both elective and appointed posts also gives a machine control of government salaries and revenues, which can be used to enrich the party at the public's expense. For example, the machine may accept donations or kickbacks from businesses in return for such favours as tax or zoning concessions or the award of lucrative public-works contracts. In some cities, machine business dealings have included accepting money from organized-crime syndicates in exchange for protection from legal interference.

In cities whose neighbourhoods are divided along ethnic or racial lines, machine patronage may aggravate hostilities by awarding most jobs and services to those people of the same background as the city's power elite. In practice, this made machine politics the last defense of white neighbourhoods against growing black populations, while black politicians who anticipated power viewed their constituents as merely the latest in a series of ethnic or racial groups that had benefited from the machine.

Since the 19th-century heyday of machine politics, civil service reforms limiting the number of patronage jobs, the institution of direct primaries rather than party nomination of candidates, the municipal operation of public utilities, and judicial review by state and federal courts have all reduced the power of political machines. The steady exodus of city residents to the suburbs since World War II and a more mobile population with fewer ties to particular neighbourhoods have also weakened the social base that once made political machines synonymous with city government.

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Political machine | Definition, History, & Facts

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political machine, in U.S. politics, a party organization, headed by a single boss or small autocratic group, that commands enough votes to maintain political and administrative control of a city, county, or state.

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Rise of political machines: https://www.britannica.com/topic/political-machine
Progressive Reform: https://www2.gwu.edu/~erpapers/teachinger/glossary/progressive-era.cfm
rise of labor organizations: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ewu-v36szlE
Election of 1912: https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/a/a9/ElectoralCollege1912.svg/1200px-ElectoralCollege1912.svg.png
Isolation vs Imperialism: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a2vs6_06Mzk

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The Eleanor Roosevelt Papers Project is a university-chartered research center associated with the Department of History of The George Washington University

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The Labor Movement in the United States | History

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The assassination of archduke Franz Ferdinand 

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The assassination of archduke Franz Ferdinand 

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Deeply in love, Ferdinand chose to marry Sophie Chotek in 1900 despite the opposition of his uncle, Austro-Hungarian Emperor Franz Josef, who refused to attend their wedding. Though not exactly a commoner, Sophie came from a family of obscure Czech nobles and not from a reigning or formerly reigning dynasty of Europe. As a result, her and Ferdinand's children were declared ineligible for the throne. Sophie also became the victim of countless petty slights. At imperial banquets, for example, she entered each room last, without an escort, and was then seated far away from her husband at the dinner table.

His marriage notwithstanding, Ferdinand remained Franz Josef's heir and inspector general of the army. In that capacity, he agreed to attend a series of June 1914 military exercises in Bosnia-Herzegovina. Austria-Hungary had just annexed these provinces a few years earlier against the wishes of neighboring Serbia, which likewise coveted them. Ferdinand believed the Serbs to be "pigs," "thieves," "murderers" and "scoundrels." Yet he had opposed annexation for fear that it would make an already turbulent political situation even worse. Formerly controlled by the Ottoman Empire, Bosnia-Herzegovina's population was roughly 40 percent Serb, 30 percent Muslim and 20 percent Croat, with various other ethnicities making up the remainder.

Upon learning of Ferdinand's upcoming visit, the Young Bosnians, a secret revolutionary society of peasant students, began plotting to assassinate him. In May, Gavrilo Princip, Trifko Grabez and Nedeljko Cabrinovic traveled to the Serbian capital of Belgrade, where they received six handheld bombs, four semi-automatic pistols and cyanide suicide capsules from members of the so-called Black Hand, a terrorist group with close ties to the Serbian army. After practicing with their pistols in a Belgrade park, the three men journeyed back to Bosnia-Herzegovina, receiving help from Black Hand associates to smuggle their weapons across the border. To this day, it remains unclear whether the Serbian government participated in the scheme.

Ferdinand and Sophie departed their estate for Bosnia-Herzegovina on June 23. Having received multiple warnings to cancel the trip, the archduke knew that danger potentially awaited them. "Our journey starts with an extremely promising omen," he purportedly said when the axles on his car overheated. "Here our car burns, and down there they will throw bombs at us." After arriving at a spa town a few miles outside of Sarajevo, Bosnia-Herzegovina's capital, Ferdinand attended two days of military exercises while Sophie visited schools and orphanages. On a whim, the couple drove in one evening to check out Sarajevo's bazaars. While there, they attracted a crowd of onlookers, including Princip, but were apparently treated with warmth and politeness.

Following a banquet with religious and political leaders, only one day of events remained before Ferdinand and Sophie were to return home. That morning, June 28, the archduke sent a telegram to his eldest son congratulating him on his latest exam results. He and Sophie then boarded a train for the short ride into Sarajevo. For once, Sophie was permitted to walk alongside Ferdinand during a brief troop inspection, after which the couple got in an open-topped car for a motorcade ride to city hall. The car in front of them was supposed to carry six specially trained officers but instead had only one, plus three local policemen. In fact, throughout the trip, Austro-Hungarian officials allegedly focused more attention on dinner menus than security details.

Meanwhile, seven Young Bosnians had fanned out along the Appel Quay, a main avenue in Sarajevo running parallel to the Miljacka River. When the motorcade passed by, its route having been published in advance, Cabrinovic asked which car carried the archduke. He then hurled his bomb at the car, only to watch it bounce off the folded-up roof and roll underneath the wrong vehicle. The subsequent explosion wounded two army officers and several bystanders but left Ferdinand and Sophie essentially unharmed. Cabrinovic jumped into the mostly dry riverbed and made a half-hearted attempt to kill himself before being apprehended. "I am a Serbian hero," he purportedly shouted as the police led him away. At least two other Young Bosnians also had good looks at the archduke but apparently lost the nerve to attempt an assassination.

Rather than immediately flee Sarajevo, Ferdinand decided to continue on to the planned event at city hall. Upon finishing that up, he insisted on visiting the wounded officers in the hospital. In order to dissuade any other bomb throwers, the motorcade zipped down the Appel Quay at high speeds. By mistake, however, the first three cars turned onto a side street right where Princip happened to be standing. As the cars attempted to reverse back onto the Appel Quay, Princip whipped out his pistol and fired two shots at the archduke from point-blank range, piercing him in the neck and also striking Sophie's abdomen. "Sophie, Sophie, don't die-stay alive for our children," Ferdinand murmured. Within minutes, though, both had passed away. Princip, a slender, 19-year-old Serbian army reject, later admitted to killing Ferdinand but said he had not meant to hit Sophie. Three weeks too young for the death penalty, Princip was given a 20-year sentence, but contracted tuberculosis and died in jail in April 1918, at the age of just 23.

With tensions already running high among Europe's powers, the assassination precipitated a rapid descent into World War I. First, Austria-Hungary gained German support for punitive action against Serbia. It then sent Serbia an ultimatum, worded in a way that made acceptance unlikely. Serbia proposed arbitration to resolve the dispute, but Austria-Hungary instead declared war on July 28, 1914, exactly a month after Ferdinand's death. By the following week, Germany, Russia, France, Belgium, Montenegro and Great Britain had all been drawn into the conflict, and other countries like the United States would enter later. Overall, more than 9 million soldiers and nearly that many civilians would die in fighting that lasted until 1918.

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The Assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand, 100 Years Ago

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Deeply in love, Ferdinand chose to marry Sophie Chotek in 1900 despite the opposition of his uncle, Austro-Hungarian Emperor Franz Josef, who refused to attend their wedding. Though not exactly a commoner, Sophie came from a family of obscure Czech nobles and not from a reigning or formerly reigning dynasty of Europe.

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Tech Developments of World War I | History

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President Woodrow Wilson's Fourteen Points

8 January, 1918:
President Woodrow Wilson's Fourteen Points

It will be our wish and purpose that the processes of peace, when they are begun, shall be absolutely open and that they shall involve and permit henceforth no secret understandings of any kind. The day of conquest and aggrandizement is gone by; so is also the day of secret covenants entered into in the interest of particular governments and likely at some unlooked-for moment to upset the peace of the world. It is this happy fact, now clear to the view of every public man whose thoughts do not still linger in an age that is dead and gone, which makes it possible for every nation whose purposes are consistent with justice and the peace of the world to avow nor or at any other time the objects it has in view.

We entered this war because violations of right had occurred which touched us to the quick and made the life of our own people impossible unless they were corrected and the world secure once for all against their recurrence. What we demand in this war, therefore, is nothing peculiar to ourselves. It is that the world be made fit and safe to live in; and particularly that it be made safe for every peace-loving nation which, like our own, wishes to live its own life, determine its own institutions, be assured of justice and fair dealing by the other peoples of the world as against force and selfish aggression. All the peoples of the world are in effect partners in this interest, and for our own part we see very clearly that unless justice be done to others it will not be done to us. The programme of the world's peace, therefore, is our programme; and that programme, the only possible programme, as we see it, is this:

I. Open covenants of peace, openly arrived at, after which there shall be no private international understandings of any kind but diplomacy shall proceed always frankly and in the public view.

II. Absolute freedom of navigation upon the seas, outside territorial waters, alike in peace and in war, except as the seas may be closed in whole or in part by international action for the enforcement of international covenants.

III. The removal, so far as possible, of all economic barriers and the establishment of an equality of trade conditions among all the nations consenting to the peace and associating themselves for its maintenance.

IV. Adequate guarantees given and taken that national armaments will be reduced to the lowest point consistent with domestic safety.

V. A free, open-minded, and absolutely impartial adjustment of all colonial claims, based upon a strict observance of the principle that in determining all such questions of sovereignty the interests of the populations concerned must have equal weight with the equitable claims of the government whose title is to be determined.

VI. The evacuation of all Russian territory and such a settlement of all questions affecting Russia as will secure the best and freest cooperation of the other nations of the world in obtaining for her an unhampered and unembarrassed opportunity for the independent determination of her own political development and national policy and assure her of a sincere welcome into the society of free nations under institutions of her own choosing; and, more than a welcome, assistance also of every kind that she may need and may herself desire. The treatment accorded Russia by her sister nations in the months to come will be the acid test of their good will, of their comprehension of her needs as distinguished from their own interests, and of their intelligent and unselfish sympathy.

VII. Belgium, the whole world will agree, must be evacuated and restored, without any attempt to limit the sovereignty which she enjoys in common with all other free nations. No other single act will serve as this will serve to restore confidence among the nations in the laws which they have themselves set and determined for the government of their relations with one another. Without this healing act the whole structure and validity of international law is forever impaired.

VIII. All French territory should be freed and the invaded portions restored, and the wrong done to France by Prussia in 1871 in the matter of Alsace-Lorraine, which has unsettled the peace of the world for nearly fifty years, should be righted, in order that peace may once more be made secure in the interest of all.

IX. A readjustment of the frontiers of Italy should be effected along clearly recognizable lines of nationality.

X. The peoples of Austria-Hungary, whose place among the nations we wish to see safeguarded and assured, should be accorded the freest opportunity to autonomous development.

XI. Rumania, Serbia, and Montenegro should be evacuated; occupied territories restored; Serbia accorded free and secure access to the sea; and the relations of the several Balkan states to one another determined by friendly counsel along historically established lines of allegiance and nationality; and international guarantees of the political and economic independence and territorial integrity of the several Balkan states should be entered into.

XII. The turkish portion of the present Ottoman Empire should be assured a secure sovereignty, but the other nationalities which are now under Turkish rule should be assured an undoubted security of life and an absolutely unmolested opportunity of autonomous development, and the Dardanelles should be permanently opened as a free passage to the ships and commerce of all nations under international guarantees.

XIII. An independent Polish state should be erected which should include the territories inhabited by indisputably Polish populations, which should be assured a free and secure access to the sea, and whose political and economic independence and territorial integrity should be guaranteed by international covenant.

XIV. A general association of nations must be formed under specific covenants for the purpose of affording mutual guarantees of political independence and territorial integrity to great and small states alike.

In regard to these essential rectifications of wrong and assertions of right we feel ourselves to be intimate partners of all the governments and peoples associated together against the Imperialists. We cannot be separated in interest or divided in purpose. We stand together until the end.

For such arrangements and covenants we are willing to fight and to continue to fight until they are achieved; but only because we wish the right to prevail and desire a just and stable peace such as can be secured only by removing the chief provocations to war, which this programme does remove. We have no jealousy of German greatness, and there is nothing in this programme that impairs it. We grudge her no achievement or distinction of learning or of pacific enterprise such as have made her record very bright and very enviable. We do not wish to injure her or to block in any way her legitimate influence or power. We do not wish to fight her either with arms or with hostile arrangements of trade if she is willing to associate herself with us and the other peace- loving nations of the world in covenants of justice and law and fair dealing. We wish her only to accept a place of equality among the peoples of the world, -- the new world in which we now live, -- instead of a place of mastery.

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Avalon Project - President Woodrow Wilson's Fourteen Points

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President Woodrow Wilson's Fourteen Points 8 January, 1918: President Woodrow Wilson's Fourteen Points It will be our wish and purpose that the processes of peace, when they are begun, shall be absolutely open and that they shall involve and permit henceforth no secret understandings of any kind.

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the assassination of archduke Franz Ferdinand:https://www.history.com/news/the-assassination-of-archduke-franz-ferdinand-100-years-ago
New technology in WW1: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k7v3cq1ZJjM
president Wilson 14 points: https://avalon.law.yale.edu/20th_century/wilson14.asp
treaty of versatility: https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/b/b8/Treaty_of_Versailles%2C_English_version.jpg/300px-Treaty_of_Versailles%2C_English_version.jpg