AHIS 100
Market Revolutions
Dr. Kane
mkane2@albany.edu
Office Hrs: W 10:30-11:30 & F 11:30-12:30
Social Science 60S
maevekane.net/ahis100/lecture-slides
October 21
coming up
- no paper until October 30!
- make sure to check syllabus bc we're skipping a chapter
- section attendance and participation is 20% of your final grade
last time
- War of 1812 resolves lingering problems of American Revolution
- transportation infrastructure fosters economic growth
- Northern economic growth tied directly to cheap products produced by slavery
- balance of political and economic power shifts to South
today
- women's work in the home
- race & economic panic
- economic changes & industrialization
- women's work outside the home
Republican motherhood
- who is part of this nation?
- men do not own their wives!
- husband and wife are legally the same person--therefore only one vote per household
- if voting is for all men, how are men educated?
- mothers' education is necessary to educate sons
Catholic immigration
- problem - US is Protestant (commercial, maritime and free)!
- cheap land and growing industrial jobs
- anti-black racism is a way to claim the privileges of whiteness
- (Monday's abolition image)
How did Catholic immigration affect labor politics in the 1830s and 1840s?
(more than one right answer)
- A. Anti-Catholicism forced many new immigrants into low-wage jobs, where they unionized to protect their rights
- B. Fear of Catholic immigration made anti-labor-union political parties like the Know Nothing Party popular in the North
- C. New labor unions organized to keep Catholic immigrants from competing for scarce jobs
- D. Anti-Catholic employers created Òclosed shopsÓ to discourage the unionization of Catholic workers
Panic of 1837 - causes
- slavery ultra profitable
- Van Buren dissolves Bank of United States to win Southern vote
- federal taxation concentrates business in a few large firms
- purchasing of land in western areas (Georgia, Alabama, Mississippi) on credit in hopes of selling for plantations
- mortgaging of enslaved people to pay for more enslaved people
- international credit restriction 1836
Panic of 1837 - effects
- 25-40% unemployment 1837 Ð 1844
- collapse of shop system
- wild racism, anti-catholicism, anti-semitism
- rise of formal, modern police forces
- new international tarriffs--protect US manufacturing
- re-establishment of Bank of United States
- rise of modern corporations--disperse risk to shareholders
Why did employers find wage work more attractive than the shop system?
(more than one right answer)
- A. Employers no longer had obligations to provide workers with food, shelter, or health care
- B. It allowed many more workers to be trained in important skills, resulting in better products
- C. Unskilled workers who performed small parts of a task didn't need to be paid or trained as much as skilled workers
- D. Wage work allowed employers to attract more skilled male workers as federal taxes incentivized centralization of business
Why did workers find wage work more attractive than the shop system?
(more than one right answer)
- A. Hourly work offered more social freedom than living with a shop owner
- B. Hourly work offered a higher rate of pay than apprenticeship
- C. Hourly work was supposed to be temporary to allow workers to establish their own independent households and businesses
- D. Hourly work allowed workers to move up the pay scale and eventually own their own businesses
Women's role in labor organizing
- educated white middle class women as guardians of morals
- push against child labor
- push for mandatory free public education
- intersectionality - where are women of color?
- what is public and what is private?
Women's role in labor organizing
- reproductive labor: making food, cleaning, taking care of people
- push for family wage
- women as temporary workers at Lowell
- 10 hour day movement