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AMERICAN SOCIETY IN

THE MAKINGChapter 2

The American Nation, 12e

Mark. C. CarnesJohn A. Garraty

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SPANISH SETTLEMENT

• Missions were established by Franciscan friars, backed by soldiers and royal financial support, among– Pueblo Indians of the upper reaches of the Rio Grande – northern Florida – coastal regions of present-day Georgia and South

Carolina

• Goal—Christianize the Indians

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SPANISH SETTLEMENT

• Friars baptized thousands of Indians and taught them – how to use European tools– grow European crops,– raise domesticated animals

• Expected the Indians, for little or no compensation,– to build & maintain the missions– till the fields– serve the needs of the friars

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17th CENTURY INDIAN PROBLEMS

• Variety of Indian rebellions, most easily repressed

• Pueblo Revolt of 1680 drove Spanish out of the American Southwest until the early 1690s– When they return they learn to

make accommodations– Protection needed against

Utes, Apaches and other Indians

• Florida settlements were attacked – by mistreated Indians– English colonists—enslaved

Christianized Indians and shipped to Barbados and other English colonies

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CHESAPEAKE COLONIES

• Southern part of English North America comprised three regions:

1. “tidewater”: Virginia and Maryland

2. “low country”: the Carolinas (and eventually Georgia)

3. “back country”: a vast territory that extended from the “fall line” of the foothills of the Appalachians to the farthest point of western settlement

• Late 18th century emergence of common features—export oriented agricultural economy, slavery, absence of towns—result in concept of “South” as one region

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CHESAPEAKE COLONIES• High death rate due to hot moist climate

– of the 9000 colonists who came to Virginia nearly half died leaving only 5,000 by the 1630s

– Well into the 1700s a white male of 20 could expect only 25 more years of life

• Result:– Frequent remarriage– Families with children from several different marriages

• Women easily found husbands (men outnumbered women three to two)

• Many men had to spend their lives alone or marry Indian women

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THE LURE OF LAND

• Life centered on agriculture– Grants of land were relied upon to attract

settlers– Labor to work land was vital

• Headright system: – any “head” entering the colony to take 50

acres of unused land which they claimed by marking its boundaries, planting a crop and constructing a habitation

– May have to pay small annual payment, quitrent, to grantor

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INDENTURED SERVANTS

• When could not afford passage came as indentured servants– agreed to work for a stated period (usually about 5

years) in return for their passage– during indenture subject to strict control (women

could not marry and time lost due to pregnancy was added to total time)

– received nothing beyond their keep (headright went to person who paid their passage)

• If survived, servant was free and usually entitled to an “outfit” (a suit of clothes, some farm tools, seed, perhaps a gun) and, in some colonies, land

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INDENTURED SERVANTS

• Over half the colonists came as servants and most servants became landowners

• Best land belonged to large planters

• Low tobacco prices and high local taxes kept most others in poverty

• Virginia society on the edge of class war by the 1670s due to conflict between squatters (often former servants) and wealthy land owners

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“SOLVING” THE LABOR SHORTAGE: SLAVERY

• First Africans arrived in Jamestown in 1619 aboard a Dutch ship—unknown how they were treated

• By 1640, some Africans were slaves• By the 1660s local statutes had firmly

established the institution of slavery in Virginia and Maryland

• Why treat as slaves?– Heathens– Skin color—blackness equated with dirt, the Devil,

danger and death– Spanish practices

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GROWTH OF SLAVERY• New Netherland:

– 1626 there were 11 slaves – 1664 there were 700 slaves in a population of

8000

• Virginia:– 1650: only 300 blacks– As late as 1670 no more than 2,000

• White servants were more highly prized:– not as alien – not as expensive

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AFRICAN SLAVE TRADE

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GROWTH OF SLAVERY• 1670s indentured servants decreased

– improving conditions in England– competition from other colonies

• 1672 Royal African Company made slaves more readily available

• 1689 war in Europe cut off the market for tobacco, causing prices to fall and making immigration less attractive

• Slavery became the “permanent” solution to the chronic labor shortage– Advantage: slaves and their offspring (who inherited their slave

status from their mother) were forever barred from competing with whites for land or political power

• By 1700 nearly 30,000 slaves lived in English colonies

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PROSPERITY IN A PIPE: TOBACCO

• Colonists had to find a market for products in the Old World in order to have the money to buy manufactured goods

• Answer was tobacco (originally brought from the West Indies by Spanish)

• English were originally leery of tobacco, which clearly contained some sort of habit forming drug

• By 1617, smokers drove the price of a pound of tobacco to 5 shillings

• At this point, the colonists were granted a monopoly and heavily encouraged

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TOBACCO• Required only semi-cleared

land and a hoe but lots of human labor

• A single laborer working two or three acres could produce as much as 1,200 pounds of cured tobacco which would result in a 200% profit in a good year

• As a result production went from 2,500 pounds in 1616 to 30 million pounds by the late 17th century (400 pounds per capita)

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TOBACCO• Increase in tobacco

production led to a drastic drop in tobacco prices

• Small farmers found it increasingly difficult to make a living

• Wealthy were accumulating more land which allowed them to maintain high yields by permitting some fields to lie fallow

• The only option for small farmers was new land—Indian land

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BACON’S REBELLION

• In 1676 conflict:– Governor William Berkeley and his “Green

Spring” faction vs. western planters led by Nathaniel Bacon.

• Planters wanted approval to attack nearby Indians; Governor refused

• Bacon had raised an army of 500 men

• Declared a traitor by Berkeley, Bacon and his followers murdered some peaceful Indians, marched on Jamestown and forced Berkeley to give him permission to kill more Indians

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BACON’S REBELLION

• In September, Bacon returned to Jamestown and burned it to the ground causing Berkeley to flee

• Bacon died of dysentery and a British fleet arrived to restore order

• RESULT: Virginia society became wedded to slavery as an answer to its labor problems—class divisions traded for racial ones

• 20 slaves + land = wealth

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THE CAROLINAS• English and, after 1700, Scots-

Irish settlers of the tidewater parts of Carolina also practiced agriculture: – tobacco in the future North

Carolina– rice (replacing furs and cereals in

1696) in what would become South Carolina

• Rice became a major cash crop– 65 million tons were produced by

eve of Revolution• In the 1740s Eliza Lucas

introduced indigo to South Carolina (did not compete for either land or labor with rice)

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TRADE

• Southern colonists bought manufactured goods by producing: tobacco, rice, indigo, furs, and forest products such as lumber, tar, and resin

• Factors, agents in England and Scotland, managed the sale of crops, bought the required manufactures, and extended credit– Small scale manufacturing did not emerge in

South as it did in the North

– Retarded development of urban life

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SOUTHERN SLAVERY

• Slave labor predominated on rice plantations of South Carolina– 1730: 3 out of every 10 people south of Pennsylvania

was black– In South Carolina blacks outnumbered whites 2 to 1

• Slave regulations increased in severity as size of the black population increased

• Blacks had no civil rights under the codes– for minor offenses, whippings were common – for serious crimes blacks could be hanged or burned to

death– for sexual offenses or constant running away they could

be castrated

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SLAVERY

• Acculturated slaves, those that could speak English, use European tools, perhaps practice a trade, were more valuable but also more likely to runaway or resist

• Field hands expressed dissatisfaction by pilferage, petty sabotage, laziness or feigned stupidity

• Slave rebellions were rare in the American South though fear of them was high

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HOME & FAMILY IN THE SOUTH

• Except for those of the most affluent, houses had one or two rooms, and were small, dark, and crowded

• Furniture and utensils were sparse and crudely made, chairs were rare, tables were boards, there was no plumbing and even chamber pots were out of reach of the poor

• Clothes were crude, people rarely washed but food was plentiful

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WOMEN & CHILDREN

• White women (free or indentured) rarely worked in the fields

• They were responsible for tending to farm animals, making butter and cheese, pickling and preserving, spinning and sewing, and caring for children

• Children were not usually as harshly disciplined as in New England

• Schools were rare and what learning occurred, was done at home

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WELL-TO-DO

• Maybe three rooms for a family of four or five, plus servants, and a greater variety of food

• Until the early 18th century, few achieved real wealth such as that held in 1732 by Robert Carter whose 1,000 slaves and 300,000 acres made him the richest man in America

• Men like Carter lived in solid, two-story houses of six or more rooms, furnished with English and other imported carpets, chairs, tables, wardrobes, chests, china, and silver and were able to send their children abroad for schooling

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WELL TO DO

• 1693: founding of the College of William and Mary– Mission was to train clergyman– Initially education was little above grammar

school level

• Political power and positions belonged to large planters because– of their wealth– they were generally responsible leaders who

understood the need for sociability

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ANGLICAN CHURCH

• Most southerners led isolated lives

• Churches were few and far between

• By mid-18th century the Anglican Church was the “established” religion– 1619 attendance at Anglican services became

mandatory in Virginia– 1654 Maryland repealed religious toleration– 1657 reenacted it – 1692 repealed it permanently and established

the Anglican Church

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SOCIABILITY

• Social events of any kind were great occasions accompanied by feasting and drinking

• Fishing, hunting, cockfighting, and horse racing were other forms of entertainment

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GEORGIA & THE BACK COUNTRY

• Back country– Great Valley of Virginia– The Piedmont

• Also part of back country was Georgia– founded by a group of London

philanthropists in 1733 to give a place of settlement for honest persons who had been imprisoned for debt

• England (who would transport 50,000 convicts during the colonial period) granted a charter for Georgia in 1732 after the philanthropists agreed to operate the colony without profit to themselves for 21 years

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GEORGIA

• In 1733, their leader, James Oglethorpe founded Savannah with a vision of creating a colony of sober, yeomen farmers– Land grants limited to 50 acres and made non-

transferable– alcohol was banned– so were slaves– Indian trade was strictly regulated

• Oglethorpe’s rules were quickly circumvented• The economy developed like South Carolina• In 1752, the proprietors gave up and Georgia

became a royal colony

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THE BACKCOUNTRY

• New settlers moved into the backcountry, mainly Scots-Irish and Germans

• By 1770 the back country had about 250,000 settlers, 10% of the population, yet often they felt underrepresented, which could result in conflict with the Low Country

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THE PURITAN FAMILY• Puritans lived longer than

southern colonists:– More healthful climate – Better initial preparation,

• Puritan society was ordered by a covenant to ensure everyone’s upright behavior

• At the center of society was the family which was nuclear and patriarchal

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THE PURITAN FAMILY• Responsibilities of the Father:

– providing for the physical welfare of the household, including servants

– making sure they all behaved properly

– transacting all economic dealings

• Responsibilities of the Wife:– keeping house– educating the children– improving “what is got by the

industry of man”

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PURITAN WOMEN & CHILDREN

• Women had as many as 12 to 14 children

• Any free time occupied with dealings with neighbors and relatives and involvement in church

• Childrearing took more than three decades of a woman’s life since most children survived

• Homemaking duties occupied all remaining time

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PURITAN FAMILY

• Puritan family was hierarchical, husbands ruled over wives and parents over children and obedience was expected

• Physical correction was common

• Girls worked around the house

• Boys worked outdoors

• When older they were sent to nearby families as servants

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POPULATION GROWTH

• The Great Migration ended in the 1640s with the outbreak of the English Civil War

• Thereafter, population increase was due to high birthrate (50 births for every 1,000 people—3x today’s rate) and low mortality rate (20 per 1,000)

• Population was more evenly distributed by age and sex than in the South

• Women married in early twenties rather than late teens

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VISIBLE PURITAN SAINTS & OTHERS

• Church membership was to be a joint decision between would-be member, who would relate why they believed they received God’s grace, and those already in the church

• Originally, those who could not “prove” salvation were excluded

• PROBLEMS:– Growing numbers of non-members could not be

compelled to go to church– It was harder to defend policy that taxpayers could not

vote if they were not church members– Nonmember parents whose children could not be

baptized worried for their souls

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HALF-WAY COVENANT

• To cope with the third generation who were neither baptized nor church members, in 1662, 80 ministers and laymen developed a limited form of membership for any applicant not known to be a sinner who was willing to accept the provisions of the church covenant

• They and their children could be baptized but they could not receive communion nor participate in church decisions

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DECLINE?

• The General Court of Massachusetts endorsed the covenant and two years later allowed halfway members to vote

• Opponents of the covenant said it reflected a slackening of religious fervor

• Historian Perry Miller suggests that the 1660s marked the beginning of religious decline yet there was a rise in church membership, ministers continued to be accorded prestige and there was a lessening of intra-church squabbling

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DEMOCRACIES WITHOUT DEMOCRATS

• Puritans believed government was both a civil covenant, entered into by all who came within its jurisdiction, and the principal mechanism for policing the institutions on which the maintenance of social order depended

• Massachusetts and Connecticut– Passed laws requiring church attendance, levying

taxes for support of the clergy, and banning Quakers from practicing their religion (when four were hanged, a royal decree was issued in 1662 prohibiting further executions)

– Provided the death penalty for adultery and blaspheming a parent

– Established the price a laborer might charge for his services or the amount of gold braid servants could wear on their jackets

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THE DOMINION OF NEW ENGLAND

• The most serious threat to Puritan control came in the 1680s during the Restoration governments of Charles II (1660-1685) and James II (1685-1688) when the government sought to bring the colonies under effective royal control

• In 1684, the Massachusetts charter was annulled, as were all charters north of Pennsylvania, and the colonies were combined to form the Dominion of New England

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THE DOMINION OF NEW ENGLAND

• In 1686 Edmund Andros, a professional soldier and administrator, arrived to make the colonies behave like colonies and not like sovereign powers– abolished popular assemblies– changed the land-grant system to give the king quitrents– enforced religious toleration

• 1689: Andros and the Dominion were overthrown in the wake of the 1688 Glorious Revolution that put William of Orange on the throne

• 1691: Massachusetts became a royal colony– included Plymouth and Maine– governor appointed by the king– General Court elected by property owners (who did not

have to be church members to vote)

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SALEM BEWITCHED

• In 1666 families living in the rural outback of the thriving town of Salem petitioned the General Court for the right to establish their own church

• When it was granted in 1672, the 600 inhabitants of the village were on their own politically as well

• In 1689 Samuel Parris became minister after having spent 20 years in the Caribbean as a merchant

• He arrived with his wife, his daughter Betty, a niece—Abigail, and a West Indian slave named Tituba who told fortunes and practiced magic on the side

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SALEM BEWITCHED

• When Parris was dismissed in 1692, his daughter, niece and a playmate began speaking in tongues and were declared bewitched

• The first three accused were Sarah Good, a pauper with a nasty tongue; Sarah Osborne, a bedridden widow; and Tituba

• When brought before the General Court, the Sarahs declared themselves innocent while Tituba confessed

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SALEM BEWITCHED

• By the end of April 1692, 24 more people had been charged

• The hunt spread to neighboring Andover

• By May, to Maine and Boston and up the social ladder to some of the colony’s most prominent citizens

• By June, when the governor convened a special court, more than 150 persons stood charged with witchcraft

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SALEM BEWITCHED

• In the next four months, the court convicted 28, most of them women– Five confessed and were spared– Several escaped– 19 were hanged– One, accused of wizardry, was crushed to

death under stones

• Finally, the governor adjourned the court and forbade any further executions

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SALEM BEWITCHED

• While everyone’s reputation suffered, ministers suffered the most– Increase Mather comes off best having urged the governor

to stop the trials– His son, Cotton, actively and enthusiastically participated in

the hunt

• The event shows the anxiety Puritans had about women since many of the accused were – widows of high status– older women who owned property– women who lived apart from the daily guidance of men

• All potentially subverted the patriarchal authorities of church and state

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HIGHER EDUCATION IN NEW ENGLAND

• With the Great Migration came some 150 university-trained colonists, mostly in divinity, who became the first ministers

• 1636: Massachusetts General Court appropriated money to establish an institution of higher learning to train ministers—Harvard University, which received its charter in 1650

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GRAMMAR SCHOOLS

• Below Harvard were the Grammar schools where boys spent 7 years learning Greek and Latin

• The first was established by Boston in 1636

• Massachusetts and Connecticut soon passed education acts that required all towns of any size to establish such schools (though not everyone did and not all of the schools were very good)

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LITERACY

• Mid-17th Century—majority of men in New England could read and a somewhat smaller percentage could also write

• Mid-18th century—male literacy was almost universal, a condition only matched by Scotland and Sweden

• Literacy among women also improved steadily

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LITERACY

• Many settlers brought impressive libraries with them and continued to import large numbers of books

• First printing press was established in Cambridge in 1638

• By 1700 Boston was producing an avalanche of printed matter, most by ministers though not exclusively on religious matters

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CHANGES• 1690s Harvard acquired a reputation for

encouraging religious tolerance• In 1701 several Connecticut ministers

founded Yale to uphold Puritan values• By 1722, they too appeared to have slipped• Even ministers were no longer the

unquestioned last word—attacks on Cotton Mather in 1721 for his suggestion of inoculation to combat an outbreak of smallpox

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PROSPERITY UNDERMINES PURITANISM

• Colonists grew barley (to make beer), rye, oats, green vegetables, potatoes, pumpkins, and corn (not only edible but drinkable)

• They grazed cattle, sheep, and hogs on common pastures or in the woods and hunted deer, turkey, and other game birds

• The Atlantic provided cod and other fish• BUT while colonists had plenty to eat they

had little surplus and no place to sell it

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PROSPERITY UNDERMINES PURITANISM

• Puritans were suspicious of prosperity– laws against usury and profiteering in scarce

commodities

• Early Puritan leaders resisted arguments that business was a socially useful calling

• They believed differences in wealth should be modest and should favor community leaders

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A MERCHANT’S WORLD

• New Englanders first tried to limit their reliance on European goods by producing their own

• When that failed, they tried to trade for them with beaver and other fur bearing animals

• By 1650, these had become less available and colonists had to turn to indirect trading schemes

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TRIANGULAR TRADE

• In 1643 five New England vessels packed their holds with fish which they sold in Spain and the Canary Islands, taking payment in sherry and madeira which were tradable in England (one took payment in slaves which they sold in West Indies)

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GROWING TOWNS

• As maritime trade became the driving force in New England, port towns like Portsmouth, Salem, Boston, New Port, and New Haven became larger and faster growing than interior towns

• 1720: Boston was the commercial hub of the region with a population of 10,000 making it the third largest city in the British Empire

• More than one quarter of Boston’s adult male population had either invested in shipbuilding or were directly employed in maritime commerce

• Ships captains and merchants held most public offices

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BOSTON

• Beneath the top layer of merchant elite lived a stratum of artisans and small shopkeepers

• Beneath them a substantial population of mariners, laborers and “unattached” people with little or no property

• 1670s: at least a dozen prostitutes worked in Boston

• 1720: crime and poverty serious problems– public relief rolls exceeded 200– dozens of criminals languished in jail

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THE MIDDLE COLONIES: Economic Basis

• The Middle Colonies consisted of New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, and Delaware– About 10% of the population was composed of slaves– Colonists produced crops for both consumption and

export (wheat)

• Colonists in the Hudson Valley and southeastern Pennsylvania lived spread out

• Substantial numbers lived in New York City and Philadelphia and in interior towns like Albany where they engaged in trades

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• Scandanavian and Dutch settlers outnumbered the English in New Jersey and Delaware

• Germans flocked to Pennsylvania and French Huguenots to New York

• Early 18th century: hordes of Scots-Irish settled in Pennsylvania, back country of Virginia, and North Carolina

THE MIDDLE COLONIES: An Intermingling of Peoples

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“THE BEST POOR MAN’S COUNTRY”

• Ethnic differences seldom caused conflict because they did not limit opportunity

• Pennsylvania gave 500 acres to families upon arrival with only a quitrent due to the proprietor every year

• New Jersey and Delaware had similar arrangements

• In New York the manorial system limited opportunity but land was available and tenants could get long term leases

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Ethnic Groups

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“THE BEST POOR MAN’S COUNTRY”

• Mixed farming offered main path to prosperity

• Inland communities offered comfortable living for artisans

• Cities had a variety of opportunities for the ambitious

• Philadelphia profited from this (and its inland waterways) and by the 1750s had a population of 15,000, surpassing Boston as America’s largest city

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THE POLITICS OF DIVERSITY

• Governments of Middle Colonies– Had popularly elected representatives

assemblies– Most white males could vote

• As in the South representatives were elected by counties but, unlike Southern voters, did not defer to landed gentry

• 1689: New York suffered a takeover by Jacob Leisler, a disgruntled merchant and militia captain– Only lasted two years but split NY politics until

1710

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NEW YORK POLITICS

• Political tranquility restored under Robert Hunter (1710-1719)

• 1730s: Governor William Cosby demanded back pay while chief justice Lewis Morris opposed him

• Morris and allies founded New York Weekly Journal run by John Peter Zenger

• Cosby objected to contents and shut down paper after two months, charging Zenger with seditious libel

• Jury acquitted Zenger after attorney argued that statements in paper were true and thus not libel

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PENNSYLVANIA POLITICS

• Two interest groups:– Proprietary party– Quaker party clustered around assembly

• Neither organized nor represent particular positions but did mean had to consider popular opinion

• Paxton Boys (Scots-Irish from Lancaster County):– Murdered peaceful Conestoga Indians in retaliation for

frontier Indian attacks– Marched on Philadelphia– Delegation, led by Benjamin Franklin, acknowledged

grievances and promised bounty on Indian scalps

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WEBSITES

• LVA Colonial Records Project—Index of Digital Facsimilies of Documents on Early Virginia

http://ajax.lva.lib.va.us/F/?func=file&file_name=find-b-clas27&local_base=CLAS27

• Anglicans, Puritans and Quakers in Colonial

Americahttp://www.mun.ca/rels/ang/texts • DSL Archives: Slave Movement During the

Eighteenth Centuries (Wisconsin)http://dpls.dacc.wisc.edu/slavedata/index.html • Witchcraft in Salem Villagehttp://etext.virginia.edu/salem/witchcraft

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WEBSITES

• Benjamin Franklin

http://sln.fi.edu/franklin/rotten.html

• Religion and the Founding of the American Republic

http://lcweb.loc.gov/exhibits/religion/religion.html

• DoHistory, Harvard University Film Center

http://www.dohistory.org