Whigs and War (Ch. 10&11)

Texas Independence (1836) – over slavery, taxes Stephen Austin Alamo

Crockett and Bowie 186 versus 4,000 (lasted 13 days)

San Jacinto (Samuel Houston) Border dispute

Republic of Texas Seeks immediate admission to U.S. as slave state

Mexican- American War (1845)

President William Henry Harrison (1840) The ultimate victory of Whigs Dies after catching cold from his inaugural address

John Tyler becomes president Tyler is a former Jackson Democrat Clay's influence limited Impeachment move after tariff veto in 1842 Pushes Texas annexation, loses Senate treaty vote

1843 badly (short of majority, let alone 2/3 vote) Texas admitted to union 1845 by regular legislation

Spot resolutions

Mexican-American War

James Knox Polk (1844- Democrat) War with Mexico 1846-48 Gen.Winfield Scott lands at Veracruz and conquers

Mexico City John Fremont leads California to declare

independence Wilmot Proviso – No slavery in territories annexed

from Mexico

Opposition to War Whig Congressman Abraham Lincoln introduced the

“Spot” Resolution, seeking the spot where Americans were attacked by Mexicans

“In 1847-49 I saw that Lincoln would ruin himself about the Mexican War, and his opposition to it, and so, being his friend and not seeing the question as he did, I tried to prevent Lincoln's destruction. I wrote to him on the subject again and again and tried to induce him to silence, if nothing else; but his sense of justice and his courage made him speak, utter his thoughts, as to the war with Mexico. Lincoln and I had many hot disputes in our office, and yet those disputes were friendly ones. He was never insulting nor dictatorial to me. No politician in America can vote and live if he opposes war in which the spread eagle is concerned, America. When Lincoln returned home from Congress in 1849, he was a politically dead and buried man; he wanted to run for Congress again, but it was no use to try.”

- Lincoln's law partner William Herndon

Opposition to War, cont'd

Henry David Thoreau: Protests “poll” (head) tax, sent to jail, writes “Civil Disobedience” later

Poll tax was a local tax unconnected with war Thoreau was a naturalist as a result of his experience

on Walden Pond in Concord, Mass. Also a transcendentalist and friend of Ralph Waldo

Emerson, who allowed Thoreau to stay on his tree farm in Concord.

War Generals

Zachary Taylor (Northern Mexico): Becomes President in 1849 after running as Whig, died in office after only 16 months (Succeeded by Millard Fillmore)

Winfield Scott (Veracruz): Whig candidate for President 1852

John C. Fremont (California campaign): Becomes first Republican Party candidate for President in 1856

California

1848: Gold discovered at Sutter's Mill in Central California, creates “gold rush” in 1849

Massive immigration from around the world 1850: Statehood, as a free state under the

“Compromise of 1850” Conscript labor of Native Americans was

nevertheless continued, and massacres of natives accelerated as Anglo-American demand for land increased.

Gangs of New York (no, not the movie)

Dead Rabbits (Priest Valor) Bowery Boys (William Poole, aka “Bill the

Butcher”) July 4, 1857: Riot between Dead Rabbits (NYC

municipal police on their side) and Bowery Boys (With state-run metropolitan police): Bowery Boys victorious

Bowery Boys were local leaders of the Know Nothing movement, later aligned with the Republicans

Irish Potato Famine Absentee landlords pull rents of 6 million pounds

annually Ireland's population cut in half – 8 million to 4

million One million died from famine Queen Victoria refused help from Turkish sultan,

who offered 10,000 British pounds to Ireland, asking the Turks to send only 1000 pounds because the queen had only given 2000.

American Indians took up a collection and sent $700 Irish exported food during the famine

Irish, German immigration

“Rum, Romanism and Rebellion”: The fear that Irish and German Catholic immigrants would bring drunkenness, Catholic church dominance and revolution to Protestant America

Know Nothings: Secret Society centered in Massachusetts

American Party: Political fortunes lost in 1856

Religion in America 1836-50

Transcendentalist movementTranscendentalist movement

• Believed that God transcended human understanding or doctrine

• Believed in a God of sorts, but not necessarily a God the Father (Yahweh) or Son (Jesus)

• Believed man was “good” and a “reformer,” not necessarily sinful

• Famous Transendentalists

– Ralph Waldo Emerson

– Henry David Thoreau (Civil Disobedience)

American Culture 1836-50

• Public Schools begin in Massachusetts, as a reaction to Catholic immigration and Catholic schools (Horace Mann)

• Women's Rights movement begins at Seneca Falls, NY, 1848

– Started out of the abolitionist and temperance movements

– Leaders: Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Lucretia Mott, Sojourner Truth, Susan B. Anthony (and abolitionist newspaperman William Lloyd Garrison)

Origins of the Mormon Church

Joseph Smith: Sets up his own community in upstate New York

Official Name: Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints

Travels to Missouri, then Navoo, Illinois with Brigham Young as leader and other followers

Settle in Salt Lake plain in present day Utah 1850: President Fillmore appoints Brigham Young

as territorial governor, President Buchanan appoints new governor in 1857 and begins the bloodless “Mormon war” to install the new governor.

Origins of the Mormon Church

Joseph Smith: Sets up his own community in upstate New York

Official Name: Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints

Travels to Missouri, then Navoo, Illinois with Brigham Young as leader and other followers

Settle in Salt Lake plain in present day Utah 1850: President Fillmore appoints Brigham Young

as territorial governor, President Buchanan appoints new governor in 1857 and begins the bloodless “Mormon war” to install the new governor.

Mormon Religious beliefs

A new religious book: The Book of Mormon (“a new testament of Jesus Christ” and his exploits in pre-Colombian America)

Baptism of the dead: Belief the dead can be baptized Hierarchical church: Church guided infallibly by God, like

the Catholic Church's infallible doctrine but more prolific in “infallible” doctrine

Doctrine of “Exaltation”: The belief in progressive god-hood for those who believe in Jesus

Belief in missionary work for two years after high school

“American Islam”

Mormonism is sometimes called the “American Islam” because of its similarity to Islam on these three points:

Arianism: Denial of Christ's divinity, but belief he was the primary messiah

Polygamous (until 1890), as practiced by Joseph Smith and Brigham Young

Temperance: Alcohol, caffeine banned for Mormons

U.S. Economy in 1836-50

• Panic of 1837: Withdrawal of paper currency and tightening of credit by failing Second Bank of U.S. leads to severe, four-year economic recession.

• Industrialization continues, esp. in New England on the Merrimack River

• Canals built, especially to Great Lakes and Mississippi River

• Railroads throughout the nation, esp. in the North

• South: “King Cotton”

Communes in the 1840s

• Communities of Christians who wanted to own all property in common and abolish personal possessions.

– Hopedale, Mass (1842): Went bankrupt in 16 years.

– Oneida Community (1848): Bizarre cult that involved belief in the perfect-ability of man, led by John Humphrey Noyes (who coined the term “free love”). Children reared communally, not by parents. Ended in eugenics program (as well as old women having sex with young men and old men having sex with young women out-of-wedlock)