Age of Expansion

Away, away with all these cobweb

tissues of the rights of discovery,
exploration, settlement The
American claim is by the right of
our manifest destiny to overspread
and to possess the whole of the
continent which Providence has
given us for the development of
the great experiment of liberty.
- John L. OSullivan, Democratic
Review, 1845

Young America
- Coined by Emerson to reflect the positive attitude toward
market economy and industrial growth
Great writers of the time:
Walt Whitmans Song of the Open Road
Herman Melvilles Moby Dick

Pushing the Borders

U.S. has interest in expanding
1. Southward into Texas (Mexican province)
2. Westward into Oregon (claimed by
Britain)
- 1818, agree to 10 years joint occupation
3. Adams-Ons Treaty Spain gives
America the rights to the Pacific Northwest
4. Canadian lumberjacks and Maine militia
fight over New Brunswick/Maine boundary

Territorial Expansion by the

Mid-Nineteenth Century

Texas
1821 Mexico wins its national independence
from Spain hopes to attract settlers
- Texas = Northern frontier province
Stephen Austin son of Missouri banker
- Given large land grant
- Brings 300 American families to Texas
1830 Americans (white farmers & black
slaves) outnumber Mexicans 3 to 1

Friction between Americans and Mexicans

1829 Mexico:
a.) outlaws slavery
b.) require immigrants to convert to Roman
Catholicism
- Settlers refuse to obey
- Mexico closes Texas
- Thousands of land-hungry Americans
ignore the closing

Revolt and Independence

1834 General Antonio Lopez de Santa Anna
makes himself dictator of Mexico
- Abolishes federal govt.
- Enforces Mexicos laws in Texas
March, 1836
- Sam Houston leads American settlers
- Declares Texas an independent republic

Santa Anna leads Mexican army

- Captures town of Goliad
- Attacks Alamo (San Antonio), kills all
defenders
- Battle of San Jacinto River, Sam Houston
captures Santa Anna
- Leader forced to sign treaty granting
independence and a republic north of Rio
Grande
- News reaches Mexico city Rejected!

Texas Revolution

Sam Houston

Santa Anna

Annexation Denied
Sam Houston first president of the Lone
Star Republic
- Applies to U.S. govt. for Texas to be
annexed as new state
- Jackson and Van Buren put off the request
- Northern opposition to possible 5 new
slave states
- John Tyler tries worried about British,
but Senate rejects

Boundary Dispute
in Maine (1840s)
Maine/ Canadian province of
New Brunswick
- Canada still under British rule
- Rival groups of lumbermen
fight
- Aroostook War
- Ends with Webster-Ashburton
Treaty of 1842
- Also settles a dispute over
Minnesota territory

Boundary Dispute in Oregon

Disputed

Boundary Dispute in Oregon

Vast territory on Pacific Coast was claimed by four
nations at one time
U.S., Britain, Spain, Russia
- Spain gives up with Adams-Onis (1819)
- Britain bases claim on prosperous fur trade with
Natives
- U.S. claim based on
1. Captain Robert Gray discovers Columbia River in
1792
2. Lewis and Clark
3. Fur trading post est. by John Jacob Astor (1811)
-

Russia scarcely occupied

Manifest Destiny
To take Oregon
To annex Republic of Texas
To convince Mexico to give up its West Coast
province California
- 1845: 7000 Spanish-Mexicans in CA
- Americans arriving to play the Texas game
expansion by white Americans across the
continent was inevitable and ordained by
God c. 1845

Agnew
- Hatchet man against
Vietnam War
- Resigns Oct. 1973
because of tax
evasion, accepting
bribes
- Nixon??
- 25th Amendment,
Nixon brings in Ford
(Michigan
congressman) as VP

Spiro Agnew

Young Gerald Ford

1Vice President Dick Cheney

2Speaker of the House of Representatives Nancy Pelosi
3President pro tempore of the Senate Robert Byrd
4Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice
5Secretary of the Treasury Henry M. Paulson, Jr.
6Secretary of Defense Robert Gates
7Attorney General Michael Mukasey
8Secretary of the Interior Dirk Kempthorne
9Secretary of Agriculture
10Secretary of Health and Human Services
Michael Leavitt
11Secretary of Housing and Urban Development
Alphonso Jackson
12Secretary of Transportation Mary Peters
13Secretary of Energy Samuel W. Bodman
14Secretary of Education Margaret Spellings
15Secretary of Veterans Affairs Jim Nicholson

John Tyler 4 Prez

VP for his accidency
States rights, pro-slavery Virginian
lawyer
Stubborn, uncooperative
Whig campaign objective keep
Harrison vague and Tyler quiet
Like Jackson, hated National Bank
vetoes twice
Whigs kick him out, talk of
impeachment
Democrats reject him, fails as
independent
Decides to back Dem. James Polk
Dies a Confederate in 1862

Tylers success
Settles border Maine
border dispute
Annexing of Texas
- Tyler pushes Manifest
Destiny & annexation
- Cannot get 2/3 Senate
approval of treaty
- Changes rules: gets
joint resolution passed
by both Houses
needs only a majority in
both Houses

Election of 1844
Polk Democrat 170
Clay Whig 105
Birney 0
Fifty four forty or fight
- Dem nominee Van Buren and Clay
disagree on annexation, slavery
- Dark horse James Polk appeals to
westerners and southerners with
commitment to Manifest Destiny

Election of 1844, Polk 4 Prez

Fifty four forty or fight
(Columbia District vs. Oregon Territory)
Henry Clay, Whig from KY, is against
annexation, then for it
Polk

Alienates NY voters who turn to Liberty

Party
NYs electoral votes prove important

Clay

Oregon
- Polk backs off slogan Fifty four forty
- Compromises with Britain
- Divide Oregon at 49th parallel
- Britain holds out then gets Vancouver
Island and right to use Columbia River
- Northerners angry at sell out of British
Columbia

Causes of Mexican War (18461848)

Mexico does not recognize the 1836
secession of Texas intends to take
back the rebel state
1845 U.S. annexation
of Texas

Tyler annexed Texas left Polk

to deal with Mexicos
reaction
On the Way to War with Mexico
Polk first sends John Slidell to
Mexico City
Goals:
1. Buy California and New
Mexico territories
2. Settle dispute on TexasMexico border
Nueces River or Rio Grande??

Immediate Causes
- Slidell waits for response
- Polk orders General Zachary Taylor toward Rio
Grande, across from Mexico
- Provokes Mexico
- 11 Americans killed(?)
- Pre-prepared war message
sent to Congress
- Whigs, including Lincoln, doubt
that American blood was shed
- Majority in houses approve war

Military Campaigns
Fought in Mexican
territory with small
American armies
General Stephen
Kearney
- Takes Santa Fe, New
Mexico, S. California
John C. Fremont (and
a few dozen others)
- Takes N. California in
June 1846

Taylor and 6000 men

- Drives Mexicans from
Texas
- Crosses Rio Grande
- Victory at Buena Vista
General Winfield Scott
- Selected by Polk to
invade central Mexico
- Capture Vera Cruz
and Mexico City in
1847

Results of Mexican War

Military disaster for Mexico
- Will not concede northern lands
- Agree to terms after fall of Mexico City
Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo (1848)
- Mexican Cession
- America sends diplomat, Nicholas Trist
1.) Mexico recognizes Rio Grande as Texas
southern border
2.) U.S. will pay $15 mil for NM and CA

Opposition to Treaty
Whigs

Southern Democrats

The war was an

immoral effort to
expand slavery

As expansionists, we
want the U.S. to take
all of Mexico

Treaty is still ratified

Wilmot Proviso
- 1846, PA congressman David Wilmot
proposes a bill to forbid slavery in new
territories
- Passes the House twice
- Defeated in Senate
Legacy of Mexican-American War
- Slavery debate
- Prelude to Civil War?

Renewed Sectionalism
- Tensions increase between North and
South
- Northerners view war w/ Mexico as a
southern plot to extend slavery
- Wilmot Proviso another escalation in
political tensions

Expansionism turns to
Internal Growth
Excitement of Young Americans, Ideas of
Manifest Destiny fade after Mexican War
- Improvements in manufacturing, agriculture
- New economic opportunities
- 1848, gold discovered in CA

Railroads
Transforms American
economy, 1840s, 1850s
Steam locomotive
technology brought from
England
1831 First Lines
Charleston and Hamburg
in SC
Baltimore and Ohio in MD

Railroads
Begin to compete with canals
- Faster
- Canals remain cheaper
1840s
- Extend to mid-Atlantic states
1850s
- 20,000 miles laid down
1860s
- All states east of Mississippi
- Cut into canal business

Europe
- Invests in U.S. railroads
- Provides iron rails
U.S.
- Domestic iron industry
begins
Americas largest industry
- Requires much capital and
labor
- First major U.S. corporations
- govt. oversees routes and
provides land grants
- Links western agriculture
with northern industry

Industrial Revolution
Period of rapid growth for industry
Factory system expands
- Wool cloth, iron, guns, clocks, sewing machines
The new mode of production
- Supervised workforce under one roof
- cash wages
- interchangeable parts
- Mass production, continuous process
(Specialized tasks not one worker/many jobs)

Transition to Mass Production

From small workshops to large factories
Ex. The cobbler is replaced by shoe
factories
New Technology
Pullman Car

Elias Howe

John Deer Steel Plow

Richard Hoe Rotary
Printing Press
Samuel Colt - 45

Samuel Morse Telegraph

Machine tools mid 19th century

- Sign of American industry, ingenuity
U.S. still NOT an industrial society
- Factory workers = small % of work force
- Agriculture supports life and the GNP
- Farming influences by technological
revolution
Ex. Deeres steel plow, McCormicks
mechanical reaper

Mass Immigration
Up North
- Drive for mechanization of industry and
labor
- Due to shortage of cheap labor
- Compared to Europe, U.S. is labor-scarce
- Women and children work because
Men will not work farms and factories for low
wages

Mass Immigration
1820-1840
- 700,000 immigrants
- Mostly British, German
1840-1860
- 4 million (added to 20 million)
- Mostly Ireland Germany
(also Swiss, Swedish, Norway)

1845-1855
3 million people arrive in this decade
Many Irish
Great potato famine

New Working Class

Many immigrants end up working in factories,
mines, or doing construction
Cheap labor fuels the Industrial Revolution
Immigrants displace native born workers in the
Northeast
Ex. Irish in Boston
(lower economic expectations.. more conservative
social values)
1860 immigrants = 60% of workforce
Men displace women in factories

Resistance to Factory Discipline

Rural people enter factory system
Protestant/ Immigrant clash
Tardiness, drunkenness, loafing on the job
Discontent and Cultural resistance
Industrialization + Immigration = New working
class of low wage labor
Land of opportunity??

Stephen Douglas
The Little Giant
Democrat
Fails to win nomination
despite reflecting
Young American ideas
Shows Americas unwillingness to compromise on
expansionist ideas