Age of Reform

Underground Railroad

• Working for the Underground Railroad was illegal.
• "Conductors" led fugitive slaves from one "Station" to the next.
• Stations were made up of peoples homes, churches, and caves.
• People that helped on the Underground Railroad supplied the slaves with resources they would need along the journey.
• They were also risking their lives by helping the escaping slaves.
• Harriet Tubman -
• Escaped slave
• Made 19 trips escorting an estimated 300 slaves to freedom
• Slave owners offered $40,000 for her capture (1.3 million in today's money)
• An estimated 50,000 slaves escaped to freedom on the underground railroad.

• Slave escape route to the North
• Not Underground & Not a railroad
• It was... A network of white and black Northerners and Southerners who secretly helped slaves reach freedom.

Opposing Abolition

• Many people in the North profited from slavery in the south
• Cotton from slave labor
• Workers in the North feared that slaves would take their jobs
• Georgia offered a $5,000 reward for the arrest of William Lloyd Garrison
• Mobs often attacked antislavery activist in the North and the South
• Southerners in congress won the "gag rule" making it illegal to discuss antislavery petitions.

The Fight Against Slavery

Improving society

• Benjamin Franklin & Alexander Hamilton opposed slavery
• They thought it violated "All men are created equal"
• 1780 - Pennsylvania passed a law that gradually eliminated slavery (1st state to do so)
• By 1804 congress outlawed slavery in the Northwest Territory

• By the 1830's many Americans were interested in social reform.
• President Andrew Jackson promoted social reform.
• Dropped property requirements for voting
• Better choices for presidents
• All men can hold office
• More rights for women
• Limited slavery

Temperance Movement

Opposition Movement

The Second Great Awakening

• The American Colonization Society (1817) thought that slaves should be freed gradually and transported to Liberia (West coast of Africa)
• It did not work, most slaves wanted to stay in America
• By the mid 1800's a growing number of people were abolitionists (reformers that wanted to end slavery) They wanted a complete and immediate end to slavery.
• William Lloyd Garrison - Reformer that fought for the complete end of slavery and full rights to African Americans

• Religious leaders challenged traditional views
• This sparked the second great awakening
• Predestination - God decides the fate of a persons soul prior to birth
• Leaders of the second great awakening said people decide their fate based on their actions.
• Utopian Communities or perfect communities were developed around the country.
• Robert Owen founded New Harmony in 1825, here there was common owenship of property. residents raised their own food and manufactured their own goods.
• It only lasted two years, residents begain to argue with each other.

• An organized effort to end alcohol abuse and problems caused by it.
• During this time alcohol abuse was very common, alcohol was cheap and often safer to drink than water.
• Mostly led by women
• Most wanted temperance or to limit the sale of alcohol but some wanted prohibition
• Prohibition - Total ban on the sale and consumption of alcohol
• Nine states banned the sale of alcohol

African American Abolitionists

• David Walker - Appeal: to the Coloured Citizens of the World
• Pamphlet that urged enslaved people to rebel to gain their freedom.

• Frederick Douglass - Born a slave, he broke the law by learning to read. He escaped to freedom in the North and risked being sent back into slavery by speaking to large audiences about ending slavery. Started The North Star (An antislavery slavery newspaper)

Education Reform

Public Education

• In the early 1800's Massachusetts was the only state that required public schools.
• In other states wealthy children attend privet schools and poor children worked.
• A large number of Americans could not read or write.
• Reformers argued that with more people voting there was a greater need for more people to be educated.
• This included immigrants because it would help them adapt to American culture

• Horace Mann - Led education reform in Massachusetts
• Created colleges to train teachers
• Raised salaries of teachers
• Extended the school year
• Other states in New England followed this model
• The South was not as quick to reform education
• Education for African Americans did not change much, slaves were not permitted to receive an education and in the North African Americans were not allowed to attend public schools.

Age of Reform