Chapter 15: The Ferment of Reform and Culture – 1790 – 1860 Essential Question: To what extent were American antebellum religious, social, and artistic movements celebrating a “democratic” identity?

Task: Listen to the excerpts of the music from each of these composers. Identify differences in style, orchestration, and intended audience. Which one is American? Why?

Who are they?

Stephen Foster (1826-1864) (1813-1901)

Religious Camp Meeting, by J. Maze Burbank, 1839

Describe the image below. How does it embody Alexis de Tocqueville’s observation that there was “no country in the world where the Christian religion retains a greater influence over the souls of men than in America.”

Charles Grandison Finney (1792–1875), 1834

• Describe the role played by ministers like Thomas Grandison Finney in spurring social change in America.

•Which denominations are growing? Why?

•Identify factors that would have encouraged the growth of religious denominations between 1820 and 1860.

Aqueduct over the Mohawk River at Rexford, NY. Canal started in 1817, completed 1825. Cost: $7 million.

•How might the process of building the canal lead to the religious revivalism of the Second Great Awakening? •Why is it that Charles Grandison Finney referred to upstate New York as the “burned-over district”?

the church must take right ground in regard to politics. …the time has come that Christians must vote for honest men, and take consistent ground in politics, or the Lord will curse them… They must be honest men themselves, and instead of voting for a man because he belongs to their party, Bank or Anti-Bank, Jackson, or Anti-Jackson, they must find out whether he is honest and upright, and fit to be trusted… …the church will uphold no man in office, who is known to be a knave, or an adulterer, or a Sabbath-breaker, or a gambler…if he will give his vote only for honest men, the country will be obliged to have upright rulers…. …As on the subject of slavery and temperance, so on this subject, the church must act right or the country will be ruined. God cannot sustain this free and blessed country, which we love and pray for, unless the church will take right ground. Politics are a part of religion in such a country as this, and Christians must do their duty to the country as a part of their duty to God “Hindrances to Revivals” Charles Grandison Finney

•To what extent does Finney’s sermon establish a “democratic approach to religion? •What were the impacts of revivalists such as Finney on national church denominations such as the Methodists and Presbyterians?

Joseph Smith’s First Vision and the founding of Mormonism: •While living in Manchester, New York, Smith had a personal theophany and received a forgiveness of his sins from two “shining personages.”

•One of these beings—interpreted by Smith’s followers to be God and Jesus—instructed Smith not to join any existing churches because their doctrines were incorrect.

•Critics of Mormonism contended that the First Vision was fabricated or a hallucination.

“Your orders are, therefore, to hasten your operation with all possible speed. The Mormons must be treated as enemies, and must be exterminated or driven from the state if necessary for the public peace--their outrages are beyond all description. If you can increase your force, you are authorized to do so to any extent you may consider necessary.” —Missouri Executive Order 44 (or the “Mormon Exterminating Order”

c. 1868, Anti-Mormon Political Cartoon: "THE EMPTY PILLOW," "J. Kuppler"

Anti-Mormon Prejudice Lilburn Boggs, Governor of Missouri

(1796 –1860)

Joseph Smith, Jr. (1805 –1844)

Essential Question: To what extent were American antebellum religious, social, and artistic movements celebrating a “democratic” identity?

Summary

•Identify and describe factors that led to the religious revivalism of the Second Great Awakening.

•Analyze how geographic features and population growth supported the development of new forms of religious worship.

•To what extent was Mormonism “distinctly American,” yet so many Americans seemed to be anti-Mormon?

'Tis the gift to be simple, 'tis the gift to be free, 'Tis the gift to come down where we ought to be, And when we find ourselves in the place just right, 'Twill be in the valley of love and delight. When true simplicity is gain'd, To bow and to bend we shan't be asham'd, To turn, turn will be our delight 'Till by turning, turning we come round right.