Loading...

Messages

Proposals

Stuck in your homework and missing deadline? Get urgent help in $10/Page with 24 hours deadline

Get Urgent Writing Help In Your Essays, Assignments, Homeworks, Dissertation, Thesis Or Coursework & Achieve A+ Grades.

Privacy Guaranteed - 100% Plagiarism Free Writing - Free Turnitin Report - Professional And Experienced Writers - 24/7 Online Support

How did the declaration of independence embody enlightenment ideals

08/11/2021 Client: muhammad11 Deadline: 2 Day

Growth, Slavery S

__ and Conflict

)

CONTENTS Colonial America, 1 710-1763

3.1 Culture and Society in the Eighteenth Century p. 68 Life in the seventeenth-century American colonies, even for the wealthiest, was crude

and primitive. Beginning in the eighteenth century, however, a more cosmopolitan and refined culture began to emerge. Prosperous colonists sought out the latest British and European consumer goods, such as finely woven Turkish or English carpets, tea sets, and pattern books of English architectural and furniture styles.

Captain Archibald Macpheadris, a fur trader in Portsmouth, New Hampshire, built an elegant new house in 1716, complete with beautifully executed wall murals, signifying his wealth and refinement. One of the most striking murals depicted two Mohawk Indian chiefs. The unknown painter copied these images from an engrav¬ ing of a group of Indians who had traveled to London to meet with Queen Anne (r. 1703-1714). The engraver and the painter included authentic elements, such as the tomahawk wielded by the Indian on the right. Yet the image of the Indians also reflected the conventions of European painting: The position of the Mohawk "Indian Kings'" hands at their hip resembled a common aristocratic pose found in English portraits from this period.

Books, newspapers, and letters all were part of the expanding commerce of the Atlantic world. This economy included a lively exchange of ideas on a wide array of subjects, including architecture, fashion, politics, religion, science, and philosophy. One highly influential set of ideas was associated with the Enlightenment and its ideals of reason and social progress. These ideas fostered new social experiments, such as the founding of the colony of Georgia.

Religious ideas also crossed the Atlantic. The English evangelical minister George Whitefield crisscrossed the colonies from New Hampshire to Georgia. His tour helped spread the ideas of the religious revival movement known as the Great Awakening. Enlightenment ideals of liberty, human dignity, and progress and new

religious ideas led some Americans to question the institution of slavery, despite its

growing importance to the colonial economy. The stark contrast between the wealthy planters and wretchedly housed slaves was not the only divide in American life. As

the overall wealth of the colonies increased, so did the disparity between the wealthy and the poor.

Land itself became scarce by the mid-eighteenth century. Expansion westward was hampered by the Appalachian Mountains, and the French and a host of Indian

tribes controlled the rich lands of what is now America's Midwest. Ultimately the balance of power in North America was decided by the French and Indian War.

3.2 Enlightenment and Awakenings p. 74

3.3 African Americans in the Colonial Era p. 80

tgJWtl-7 *

> -1 3.4 Immigration, Regional

Economies, and Inequality p. 86

r. TilW,

3

is

3.5 War and the Contest for Empire p. 90

•: n

"In 1740, 1 don't remember [seeing] such a thing as a [Turkish] carpet in the country. . . . Now nothing are so common as [Turkish] or [English] Carpets,

the whole furniture of the Roomes Elegant & every appearance of opulence."

JOHN WAYLES, future father-in-law of Thomas Jefferson, 1766

.Til ii> ill \\

IJ///SSm’Hi ' 1 \

. i, t MSN ,-. J A?-

M miA :-

"i Wm , ,

If s ‘w ;I11 * itea : m mm

K *a . :I £ 7; i hi

XI Hlg.1 j i -r,7- la Af ;'

: i%

li* I: ;I ?.* s; I

I. *,1I M; ; i -i< !

\ '7fm -

\ % i.

r.

i Ml I *

*ffl f . f/ij

Am, A E -j£ÿAY 1

f1 ; mI *Vi iVt

$ PH!i '•IP ff 3— ; j . r#

v . II ItWpY IESSl

68 CHAPTER 3 GROWTH, SLAVERY, AND CONFLICT: COLONIAL AMERICA, 1710-1763

3. Culture and Society in the Eighteenth Century

As trade expanded with Britain, colonists strove to emulate the culture and sophistication of the mother country. New and grander houses, filled with the latest European-style furnishings, testified to the growing sophistication of the colonies. Yet while the colonies were striving to become more British, they were also developing their own distinctly American political culture

and institutions. A native-born elite emerged, an American gentry class whose wealth, confidence, and education inspired them to become leaders in the colonial assemblies. A distinctive American style of politics had begun to take shape.

3.1 The Refinement of America

eighteenth century. America became more fully integrated into the Atlantic economy, a huge triangle that stretched from Scotland to Africa to the interior of the British mainland colonies (3.2).

Trade in the Atlantic world involved a staggering array of goods. Scottish merchants purchased Virginia tobacco, which was sold throughout Europe. Another side of the triangle tied New England merchants to West Indian sugar planters. West Indian sugar was distilled into rum by New Englanders. Some of this alcohol was traded to Indians in the lucrative beaver trade in upstate New York. These beaver furs were often used in

hats and sometimes ended up in London or on the European continent.

By the early eighteenth century, expanding trade with the British Empire increased the number of wealthy colonists and brought a flood of new luxury goods into affluent American homes.

At the end of the seventeenth century even the homes of the most prosperous families in colonial America had few imported luxury goods. The sparse furnishings of the Hart Room (3.1), now in the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City, capture the primitive nature of late seventeenth-century American homes. Thomas Hart, a landowner in Ipswich, Massachusetts, built his house in 1639 and furnished it in the ensuing decades. This parlor, the best room in the house, usually served as both a bedroom and a communal living space. Information from probates, a list of goods assembled as part of a will, suggests that homeowners furnished even the best parlor rooms sparsely, with simple tables and cupboards. The furniture's simplicity and boxy look reflected prevailing styles and the scarcity of skilled craftsmen in the colonies at the time. The walls J were generally whitewashed, m with no ornamentation; the postM and beams used to support the 1 walls and the roof were clearly * visible.

Colonial culture began to change with the expansion of commerce at the start of the

*•

3.1 The Hart Room, Metropolitan Museum of Art The simple whitewashed walls and exposed beams in this

prosperous seventeenth-century room and the simple boxy style of its furniture were typical of the lack of ornamentation in this era.

3.1 CULTURE AND SOCIETY IN THE EIGHTEENTH CENTURY 69

? ,* &

Acquiring such goods allowed individuals and families to demonstrate that they were not

simple provincials; they were part of a wider cosmopolitan world. Rather than eat with simple earthenware ceramics, as their forebears had,

&

EUROPE

British Isles ;

T' NORTH

AMERICAthe wealthiest Americans now aspired to dine on fine porcelain imported from England or Holland. Refined taste was proof of gentility, a term that became synonymous with the attributes associated with wealth and sophistication. American society underwent a process of Anglicization as colonists emulated English society, including its tastes in furniture, foods,

clothing, and customs. Nothing better captured the rise of gentility

and the increasing Anglicization of colonial America than the rage for imported tea. As the consumption of tea increased dramatically between the end of the seventeenth century and the dawn of the eighteenth, the rituals of serving tea became more refined and complicated. Serving tea to one's guests became essential.

1

*0* 3- AFRICAjfÿATLANTIC0|

IÿOCEAW 0.1

;

:A % SOUTH

AMERICA PACIFIC

OCEAN J>

Verplank Room has painted wood paneling. The elegant card table in the Verplank Room is one of many specialized pieces of furniture likely to have adorned a prosperous home in the mid-eighteenth

3.2 The Triangle Trade

The Atlantic economy can be visualized as a triangle. Goods from Europe were sold or traded in America or Africa. Raw materials from the Americas were

sold in Europe. European goods were sold or traded

for African slaves who were then shipped to the Americas.

Although tea drinking started among the wealthy, it gradually spread to all levels of American society. By the mid-eighteenth century, tea drinking century. The Verplanks, Coldens, and other genteel had evolved from a luxury to a necessity, so much families would each have owned an imported china so that inmates in the Philadelphia poorhouse set and tea table as well. demanded that their meager rations include tea.

The Verplank Room (3.3) in the Metropolitan Museum of Art contains furniture from the New

Changes in furnishing provide insights into deeper changes in colonial society. The rising popularity of writing desks and drop-leaf bookcases

York City townhouse of Samuel Verplank and the with writing surfaces (see detail in 3.3) reflected the country house of Cadwallader Colden Jr. in Orange, expansion of trade networks in the British Empire. New York. In contrast to the simple whitewashed Merchants needed to keep better track of a variety walls of the seventeenth-century Hart Room, the of written documents as they broadened the range

|m • if

. — 3.3 The Verplank Room,Metropolitan Museum of Art The highly specialized furniture reflected the growing wealth of many colonists and the Anglicization of colonial culture. In the inset image of a secretary bookcase, note the drop-leaf writing surface and cubbyholes that made this piece of furniture well adapted to the needs of merchants.

' §1 \

...

i

70 CHAPTER 3 GROWTH, SLAVERY, AND CONFLICT: COLONIAL AMERICA, 1710-1763

of their correspondence on business and political It matters. An insight into the range of this far- l flung commerce comes from the extensive

correspondence of Charleston merchant Robert Pringle with business associates

L throughout the Atlantic world, from Lisbon, Portugal, to London and Barbados to Boston.

I The entrepreneurial Pringle experimented with A a variety of desirable agricultural imports, H including pistachios, Seville oranges, and

olives, hoping that they might be produced in the Carolinas. None of these imports took hold, but South Carolina did provide Europe with two important products, rice and indigo.

For wealthy colonists nothing was more effective at communicating one's

riches and gentility than a formal portrait in the latest English style. Following the conventions of European portraits, men and women struck standard aristocratic poses; elegant ladies dressed in flowing gowns, mimicking the style of their

export crop in the eighteenth century. She eagerly consumed British fashions and ideas, and aspired to create a lifestyle that a visitor from London would have easily recognized. She studied French, was conversant in the ideas of the English philosopher John Locke, and participated in the management of her family's plantation. Her social life was equally busy. She regularly attended teas, dances, and concerts. Eliza's beautiful gold silk dress (3.4) was woven from silk produced on her own plantation. After the silk was harvested, she sent it to England to be dyed and woven into a fabric suitable for a gown that might be worn to the most elegant party in either London or Charleston.

For women the new customs of gentility were a mixed blessing. A wealthy woman might have servants or slaves to help her entertain in a suitable style, but it took additional time and effort to supervise these activities. Most women did not enjoy the luxury of additional help and had to handle these new responsibilities themselves.

What was Anglicization?

1 w

*2 i\u.

,

3.4 Eliza Pinckney’s Dress Silk produced on Pinckney's plantation was sent to England to be spun into fine fabric, dyed, and sewn into monarch, Queen Anne. Men and even young boys a dress that reflected were painted wearing elegant outfits that reflected the latest London

fashions.

3.1.2 More English, Yet More American

their wealth, status, and power. The portrait of the young Henry Darnall III, one of the earliest done in the American South, testifies to the growing wealth and refinement of the colonial elite (see Images as History: A Portrait of Colonial Aspirations).

Eliza Lucas Pinckney, an affluent South Carolinian, exemplified the new ideal of refined female gentility. Born into a prosperous family of rice planters, Eliza helped introduce the profitable dye plant, indigo, into South Carolina (1738-1744), which became the colonies' second most important

The exteriors of American houses also underwent a process of Anglicization. English-style manor houses, such as William Byrd's Westover (1730-1734), (3.5), borrowed ideas from English pattern books (architectural guidebooks of the latest

styles) (3.6). The main entrance of this elegant red brick mansion took guests through an impressive doorway that Byrd imported from England. The model for the door and its frame came from a

London design. The classical columns and the swan¬ shaped broken pediment at the top of the doorframe include a carved pineapple. This exotic West Indian

fruit created a sensation among the wealthy on both sides of the Atlantic, as both a culinary delicacy and a symbol of affluent hospitality. The pineapple soon became a common architectural motif in the

mansions of wealthy Americans. Anglicization transformed

churches and public architecture as well. Some of the grandest

3.5 Westover Plantation

The doorway of Byrd's mansion was crafted in England and included the latest

architectural details. Note the carved pineapple above the door, • .

mg .

L HI

ill Us m i ill5!

_ I

lifliS " 1

IdiH u3le— k.:, mm

1 -

ismWBmp-hi*

T1 - 4 ;l :li!l

m• :

3.6 English Pattern Book

Byrd used this picture from an influential

London design book when selecting a style for his doorway.

>. .

imEn

3.1 CULTURE AND SOCIETY IN THE EIGHTEENTH CENTURY 71

Images as History A PORTRAIT OF COLONIAL ASPIRATIONS

nor the stone balcony would have existed anywhere in the colonies at the time. Kuhn's decision to include these imaginary elements in the background reflected the aspirations rather than the realities of life in the colonies.The picture symbolized the wealth, power, and gentility that the Darnalls sought to achieve, not their actual condition.

The work is also the first known painting of an African American in the colonies. DarnalTs slave wears a silver yoke around his neck, a symbol of his inferior status. Although much younger, Darnall towers over his slave.

Justus Engelhardt Kuhn's portrait of the young Henry Darnall III (1710) reveals how the aspirations of colonists continued to exceed the bounds of the possible. Although the Darnalls lived a life of luxury compared with most colonists, surrounding themselves with goods that earlier generations of colonists would have envied, they did not quite live up to the standards of the typical British aristocrat.

The scene behind Darnall is pure fantasy. An elegant stone balustrade overlooking an elaborate formal garden projects an image of wealth, refinement, and power. Yet neither the fancy garden

The imaginary garden in the background represents the Darnalls’ desires, but this level of grandeur was not yet attainable in the colonies.

}ÿ

Hiimi Y:

V r’W1 The classical column shown in the foreground demonstrates the wealth and taste of the Darnalls.

/

1 fim %

- j

i i U 'ÿ%

:i Darnall’s elegant \ suit testifies to his family’s wealth and cosmopolitan taste.

Mm

n Henry Darnall III as a Child by Justus Engelhardt Kuhn

72 CHAPTER 3 GROWTH, SLAVERY, AND CONFLICT: COLONIAL AMERICA, 1710-1763 M I' 1' WI—WiL

'

III

buildings erected in the colonies during the first half of the eighteenth century were public structures such as the Pennsylvania State House in Philadelphia, where Pennsylvania's assembly met. Constructed between 1732 and 1756, the State

House's two-and-half-story red brick structure dominated the Philadelphia skyline. Built in the Palladian style (also known as Georgian, in honor of the British monarch, King George I [r. 1714-1727]), the Pennsylvania State House captured two seemingly opposing trends in the evolution of American society in the eighteenth century. Its architecture testified to the powerful influence of Anglicization. With its beautiful windows and impressive red brick exterior, the State House visibly symbolized the colonists' esteem for and knowledge of the latest English architectural styles (3.7). The actions inside the State House, however, the debates and votes of the Pennsylvania assembly, were emblematic of the growing power and assertiveness of an American- born colonial elite. The building was later renamed Independence Hall, reflecting its close association with the signing of the Declaration of Independence and the drafting of the U.S. Constitution.

What does the design of the Pennsylvania i State House reveal about colonial society? I

3.1.3 Strong Assemblies and Weak Governors

The Pennsylvania State House was a potent visual reminder of the power of the colonial assembly. The assemblies had become the preeminent political institutions in the colonies. American ideas about legislative power drew support from seventeenth-century English Whig ideas that triumphed during England's Glorious Revolution in 1688 (see Chapter 2).

Several developments in American colonial history helped reinforce the growth of legislative power. Although voting in America remained restricted to adult white male landholders, the percentage of such individuals in the colonies was larger than it was in Britain. The larger voting population meant that a higher percentage of Americans were politically active than Britons. Additionally, none of the colonies had anything like an upper house comparable to Parliament's House of Lords. The governors' councils, the closest thing to a colonial upper house, had little power. America's native-born elites were not a titled British aristocracy, with a distinct legislative body, the House of Lords, to guard their privileges '

and powers. Ambitious young Americans from good families, like the young Thomas Jefferson, expected to enter politics by election to the lower house of the colonial assembly, not by inheriting a place in an aristocratic upper house.

3.7 Pennsylvania State House

The new Pennsylvania State House reflected the Anglicization of American tastes and the growing wealth of colonial

Pennsylvania.

t

I

im .

A,

1

IL <ÿ - i! A fflESEA A 5m11ÿ i !j -TTL-

- l iij SEVXaiPf

LI l, L.-Ha ift iml i iL X.

“T-. 4 -JiMMLgg

3.1 CULTURE AND SOCIETY IN THE EIGHTEENTH CENTURY 73

In part the actions of colonial assemblies filled a their plans. The royal governors' dependence

void that the structure of the empire had created. In on the assemblies for their salaries weakened an age in which a letter could take months to travel their position with regard to the legislature. from London to the colonies, it was imperative By controlling the power of the purse, colonial that local assemblies have the authority to deal assemblies were able to frustrate the plans of the with a host of governmental responsibilities, from most ambitious royal governors: If they wished organizing the militia to providing for the poor. to collect their salaries, the governors dared Although colonists had gained the right to legislate not anger the assemblies. Colonial assemblies on local matters, they were also part of the larger came to act like and think of themselves as mini- British Empire. Most colonies had agents who represented their interests in London and lobbied Parliament. Apart from these agents the colonies had no actual representation in Parliament: No member of Parliament was elected from the colonies or watched over their interests. In this regard the American colonies were no worse off than were other British colonies, including Barbados and Jamaica. Even within Britain newer cities such as Manchester and Birmingham had no representation in Parliament, and at least one town, Dunwich, continued to send two members to Parliament even though the town had literally crumbled into the North Sea. To cast their votes "legal residents" of Dunwich had to row out to the location of the former town hall, which was submerged.

According to traditional Whig political theory, members of Parliament were expected to represent the whole nation, not a particular locality. Rather than speak for any local interest, representatives were supposed to act in the larger public good. By the 1760s, the differences between American and British

practices had become so great that champions of parliamentary power developed a new theory to justify traditional practices. According to the theory of virtual representation, all Britons, including those in the colonies, were fully represented in Parliament, even if they had no actual representatives to guard their interests. Representatives did not serve any particular local interest, but were supposed to legislate on behalf of the good of the nation. As long as Parliament did not meddle much in colonial affairs, a policy of "salutary neglect," this theory caused few problems. When Parliament began to take a more active role in managing the empire and collecting greater revenues in the 1760s, the colonial

.ÿ—•ÿpractices and British theory collided. ' Royal governors repeatedly complained that the colonial assemblies had exercised authority that did not belong to them and frustrated

parliaments, with full legislative power over local matters. In 1728 the Massachusetts legislature reminded the governor that it was "the undoubted Right of all English men ... to raise and dispose of Moneys for the publick Service of their own free accord without any Compulsion."

"My Lord Combury has and dos still make use of an unfortunate Custom of dressing

himself in Womens Cloaths and of exposing himself in that Garb upon the Ramparts to the view of the public; in that dress he

draws a World of Spectators about him and consequently as many Censures."

Letter spreading rumors of Lord Combury's cross-dressing,1709

Colonial politics could be nasty, and most royal governors lacked the power to tame their legislatures. No governor was more ineffective and despised than Lord Cornbury, Royal Governor of New York and New Jersey (the two colonies shared the same royal governor until 1738). Enemies of Cornbury accused him of parading around the ramparts of New York's forts in women's clothing and used these rumors to undermine his authority, a strategy that was extremely effective. Sir Danvers Osborne, another New York governor, became so despondent over dealings with the colonial assembly that he hanged himself. To avoid the fate of Cornbury or Osborne, savvy royal governors understood the necessity of making strategic alliances with members of the assembly. The give- and-take between the governors and the assembly defined colonial politics for much of the eighteenth century.

Why were colonial governors so weak?

74 CHAPTER 3 GROWTH, SLAVERY, AND CONFLICT: COLONIAL AMERICA, 1710-1763

Enlightenment and Awakenings3.2 By mid-century a British traveler to Philadelphia, the largest city in America, would have been impressed by the fine houses, elegant coaches, and other signs of America's refinement and gentility. The visitor would also have been struck by the signs of Enlightenment in the city: a fine lending library, the American Philosophical Society, and a new college.

The city hosted scientists of international renown, such as Benjamin Franklin, the man who had tamed lightning. A visitor to the colonies might also have encountered the great evangelist George Whitefield on one of his tours. Even if one missed hearing the "peddler in divinity," one could read about his exploits in the expanding press. The religious revival movement known as the Great Awakening attacked traditional styles of worship in favor of a more emotional style of devotion. Communities across America were divided into those who favored the new style of religion and those opposed to it.

3.8 The Gaols Committee of the House of Commons In this image based on William Hogarth's painting, members of Parliament involved in prison reform, including

James Oglethorpe (second from the left), examine

a prisoner. His tattered clothes

and shackles reveal the inhumanity of Britain's prisons.

3.2.1 Georgia's Utopian Experiment

and the poor by transplanting them from England to a more wholesome environment in America.

James Oglethorpe, a spokesman in Parliament for humanitarian causes, secured parliamentary support for his plan to use colonization as an alternative to imprisonment. Georgia, named for

One of the most ambitious Enlightenment endeavors was the new colony of Georgia, founded as an experiment to reform criminals

Jgr- 'ÿ

*i(ii i[? r 4 * ifff § % If • 1,AA

/ iSg

* v4«r m m \ ;wft “ M:v §¥ Ik :JC

i-y,.

M A. 'ÿ>mm-'4 '

i :y

W y Wm ;y.

mM iiiisB* i

1 s .

:

mm

m

3.2 ENLIGHTENMENT AND AWAKENINGS 75 IS

King George II (r. 1727-1760), was strategically located as a buffer between the Carolinas and

Although Enlightenment ideals helped shape the early history of Georgia, defense was never far from Oglethorpe's mind. His plan for the city of Savannah

Life in British prisons in the eighteenth century drew on the ideals of Renaissance city planning that had inspired the design of many other towns in the Americas (see Chapter 1). Reflecting the city's

Spanish Florida.

was harsh. At least half of the prisoners were debtors, whose crime was failing to pay their bills. Oglethorpe became a leading champion for prison position on the frontier of Spanish America, the plan reform and was appointed to a parliamentary committee charged with investigating the nation's jails. The committee's work attracted the interest of artist and social critic William Hogarth. In this painting of Oglethorpe's committee, Hogarth presents a stark contrast between the elegantly dressed members of Parliament and a prisoner in

rags who was "clamped in irons," a painful form of physical restraint commonly used in British prisons (3.8).

For Oglethorpe, removing prisoners from debtors' prison and sending them to a colony in America meshed perfectly with his vision for dealing with crime and poverty in Britain. In America the poor would have a fresh opportunity to earn a living and avoid the impoverishment they faced in England. Oglethorpe's vision for Georgia reflected the views of Enlightenment thinkers such as John Locke, who rejected the notion that humans were born depraved and could not be rehabilitated if placed in a healthier environment.

The 1732 charter granted Oglethorpe and the trustees of the colony of Georgia enormous power. To prevent the colony from becoming just another slave society in which a few enjoyed great wealth and the majority were poor, the trustees banned slavery. To promote sobriety, the trustees also prohibited the

looked like a design for a military encampment, a model stretching back to ancient Rome (3.9). Oglethorpe had dreamed of using Georgia as the launching point for the conquest of Spanish America, but his attack on the Spanish town of St. Augustine in Florida in 1740 failed. Two years later when the Spanish retaliated, Oglethorpe repelled them. Georgia did not become a staging ground to root out the Spanish, but it was an effective barrier, protecting the colonies from Spanish attack.

How did the founding of Georgia reflect Enlightenment ideals?

3.2.2 American Champions of the Enlightenment

The Enlightenment championed the work of Sir Isaac Newton, the great English scientist and mathematician who explored the laws of motion, optics, and gravity. The Newtonian universe was radically different from the world that had produced the Salem witchcraft accusations (see Chapter 2). Rather than looking primarily to the invisible world of the supernatural, Newtonianism focused on the visible world of nature, which functioned according to the rules discerned by observation and interpreted by

3.9 Savannah, Georgia

The layout of Savannah resembled

a Roman military garrison, reflecting its strategic

importance as a frontier outpost protecting the British colonies from

Spanish America.

importation of rum. Oglethorpe and the trustees soon confronted

BFr the same types of problems that earlier proprietary colonies had

experienced (see Chapter 2). Settlers demanded a greater say in their affairs, including the right to import slaves. By 1738, the colony had abandoned much of its original vision, including its ban on importing both slaves and rum. Having begun as something of a utopian experiment, Georgia

-.ÿbecame another slave society in the lower South. (See Competing Visions: Georgia Settlers Battle James Oglethorpe over Slavery, on page 76.)

- :.g l ...' -a -Tr;

.: - ;J.r:~-

'

fmypib

KJL T

m

' r- A.

... J '

ffiw :\- •- Sjg

76 CHAPTER 3 GROWTH, SLAVERY, AND CONFLICT: COLONIAL AMERICA, 1710-1763

Competing Visions GEORGIA SETTLERS BATTLE JAMES OGLETHORPE OVER SLAVERY

James Oglethorpe viewed Georgia as an Enlightenment experiment that would demonstrate that the poor and debt-ridden of England could be rehabilitated if provided with the right environment. The desire of some colonists to import slaves threatened this vision. If Georgia turned to slave labor, it would become more like Carolina and Virginia. Escaped slaves might also trigger clashes with Spanish-held Florida to the south. The profit motive would lead to the creation of the same types of inequalities that had led to the impoverishment of the debtors who had been the colony's first settlers.

The Earl of Egmont, one of the leading trustees of the colony,

made the following observations about the debate over

introducing slavery into Georgia in his diary. In this first

selection, Egmont recounts the desires of colonists to import

slaves into the colony.

In this second extract from Egmont's diary, he details

Oglethorpe's response to the demand that slavery be introduced

into the colony.

Col. Oglethorpe wrote again to the Trustees, to show further

inconveniences arising from allowing the use of Negroes, viz. Wednesday, 3 [September 1735]. The Scots settled at

Joseph's Town having applied for the liberty of making use of negro slaves, we acquainted one of their number, who came over to solicit this and other requests made by them to us, that it could not be allowed, the King having passed an Act against it, of which we read

part to him. . . . Monday, 17 [November 1735], A letter was read from Mr.

Samuel Eveleigh that he had quitted his purpose of settling in

Georgia, and was returned to Carolina, because we allow not the use of negro slaves, without which he pretends our Colony will never prove considerable by reason the heat of the climate will not permit white men to labour as the negroes do, especially in raising rice, nor can they endure the wet season when rice is to be gathered in, . . ,

1 . That it is against the principles by which the Trustees associ¬ ated together, which was to relieve the distressed, whereas we should occasion the misery of thousands in Africa, by setting

Men upon using arts to buy and bring into perpetual slavery the

poor people, who now live free there.

2. Instead of strengthening, we should weaken the Frontiers of

America.

3. Give away to the Owners of slaves that land which was design'd

as a Refuge to persecuted Protestants.

4. Prevent all improvements of silk and wine.

5. And glut the Markets with more of the American Commodi¬ ties, which do already but too much interfere with the English

produce.

. ’ fi ir

L3

illAl

0-*C >ÿ* 1

3 v

Manacles used to bind slaves in the international slave trade

3.2 ENLIGHTENMENT AND AWAKENINGS 77

reason. Newtonianism was not antithetical to

.religion, but the God of the Newtonian universe was different from the traditional Christian

notion of God as a patriarch or king. In the Newtonian vision God was the great clockmaker who fashioned the universe to run according to predictable natural laws.

In contrast to Newton's grand theorizing, the Enlightenment in America took a distinctly practical approach. No figure in America more closely approximated this ideal than Benjamin Franklin. Printer, scientist, reformer, and statesman, Franklin became a symbol of the American Enlightenment on both sides of the Atlantic. His international fame derived from his scientific

•ft X

experiments with lightning and electricity, which he published in 1751. Franklin coined the terms positive and negative to describe the nature of electrical current and theorized the possibility of creating a battery to store an electrical charge. Franklin also demonstrated that lightning was a form of electrical discharge. This insight led the practical-minded Franklin to develop the lightning rod. The device was designed to attract lightning and then conduct the current safely away from a building. American homes were generally built of wood, a plentiful material in most parts of the colonies that was extremely susceptible to damage by lightning. In a tribute to Franklin, John Adams wrote, "Nothing, perhaps, that ever occurred upon this earth was so well calculated to give any man an extensive and universal celebrity as the discovery of . . . lightning rods." Franklin's close association with electricity in general and the lightning rod in particular was captured in this 1762 painting (3.10), which depicts Franklin at his desk with a lightning storm raging in the background and a lightning rod prominently positioned on a building visible through a window.

Franklin helped found the American Philosophical Society (1743), a learned society committed to the advancement of knowledge; the Publick Academy of Philadelphia (1751) (later the University of Pennsylvania); and the Library Company, a private lending library. In addition to

1 is

3.10 Benjamin

Franklin and Electricity

This contemporary painting of Franklin links him with his work on electricity. In the background, lightning destroys one building while another, to which

Franklin's lightning rod is attached, survives a strike.

came to regard slavery as a great evil and vigorously opposed it.

What was the Newtonian view of the universe?

3.2.3 Awakening, Revivalism, and American Society

From 1730 to 1770, the colonies experienced a series of religious revivals that historians group together as the Great Awakening. The resulting religious conflict divided families, split churches, and fragmented communities, forever altering the religious landscape of colonial America.

One of the early leaders of the revival these institutions that reflected the Enlightenment s movement, Gilbert Tennent, a New Jersey minister, emphasis on education and the spread of attacked ministers for preaching an empty, "dead

form of religion." Only by accepting the reality dedicated to improving the lives of Philadelphians, of sin and opening one's heart to grace could one including a fire company and the first public

knowledge, Franklin helped found organizations

hope to achieve salvation. Tennent also took aim at America's expanding consumer society and the "covetousness" that society had encouraged.

hospital in the colonies. Although Franklin owned slaves, as did many in Philadelphia, he eventually

78 CHAPTER 3 GROWTH, SLAVERY, AND CONFLICT: COLONIAL AMERICA, 1710-1763

The leading intellectual champion of the Awakening was New England minister Jonathan Edwards, who captured the spirit of this movement when he wrote that "Our people do not so much need to have their heads" filled, as much as "have their hearts touched." Edwards's fiery sermon, "Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God" (1741), offered his parishioners a vision of the eternal fires of hell that awaited the unconverted. To shake his parishioners out of their complacency and remind them of the necessity of grace for salvation, Edwards compared their fate to that of a spider dangling above the pit of eternal damnation, with only God's mercy preventing them from falling in.

In 1757, Edwards became the president of the College of New Jersey (which became Princeton University), one of several new colleges founded

him and other evangelical ministers as "Peddlers in Divinity." Whitefield attracted such large crowds that much of his preaching was outdoors because few churches were big enough to hold his audience.

The Great Awakening changed American society. The evangelical methods employed by gifted preachers implicitly challenged the hierarchical assumptions of colonial society about gender, race, and social status. Individuals exercised greater choice, many choosing to leave their own congregations and find one that better suited their spiritual needs. For some the Awakening provided opportunities to step forward as lay preachers. For the first time in American religious history, ordinary people were given a significant public voice. For those whose voices were seldom heard in public—women, blacks, artisans, or poor folk— the opportunity to testify about their spiritual life, often to mixed crowds that included people like themselves or even their social betters, challenged traditional ideas about hierarchy. Mary Cooper, a resident of Long Island, noted in her diary that she heard an astonishing assortment of individuals preach, including a Quaker woman, a "Black man," and even two Indian preachers. By giving a voice to many groups previously excluded from traditional preaching, the Great Awakening contributed to the growth of a more democratic culture.

In a few cases women touched by the spirit began preaching, an action that prompted their own ministers to denounce them for flouting the

accepted roles assigned to women in colonial society. Testifying to one's religious experiences was one thing, but assuming the role of preacher, a role traditionally reserved for men, was simply too radical. After Bathsheba Kingsley stole a horse and rode from community to community preaching the gospel, Jonathan Edwards denounced her for perverting the spirit of revival. Edwards, wed to

traditional ideas about women's roles, was horrified that Kingsley interpreted the Awakening's message as an invitation to become a gospel preacher.

Not all ministers approved of the ideas and methods of the revivalist preachers. Opponents of the revival, dubbed Old Lights, attacked the

revivalists, or New Lights, for their excessive emotionalism. Old Light ministers ridiculed the revivalists for telling their congregants that "they were damned! damned! damned!" Rather than adopt the new, more emotional style, Old Lights

continued to favor sermons based on learned

explications of biblical texts. In response to this

'The God that holds you over the pit of hell, much as one holds a spider, or some loathsome

insect, over the fire, abhors you, and is dreadfully provoked; his wrath towards you bums like fire;he looks upon you as worthy of nothing else, but to be cast into the fire/'

JONATHAN EDWARDS,1741

by supporters of the Awakening to train a new generation of ministers. Princeton, allied to the Presbyterian Church, also had close ties to Scottish universities that were leading centers of Enlightenment thought. Rhode Island College (Brown University) was founded by the Baptists in 1764; Queens College (later Rutgers), by the Dutch Reformed Church in 1766. Dartmouth College was founded by the Congregationalist Eleazar Wheelock in 1769, originally as an Indian mission school.

Edwards's account of his own Massachusetts revival inspired the English Anglican minister George Whitefield to take his evangelical crusade to the colonies. Whitefield's 1739-1740 tour was America's first genuinely intercolonial event. The energetic English preacher traversed most of the eastern seaboard from New Hampshire to Georgia. His tour took advantage of improved roads and

the expansion of intercolonial shipping routes. He traveled the same routes as the merchants who

hawked the latest English wares, and his gift for

selling the gospel prompted one critic to describe

3.2 ENLIGHTENMENT AND AWAKENINGS 79 M

backlash against the Awakening, Gilbert Tennent accused his opponents of lacking "the Courage, or Honesty, to thrust the Nail of Terror into sleeping Souls."

One New Light preacher, James Davenport, took the emphasis on emotionalism to an extreme, urging that books and sermons written

by Old Light ministers be burned. As congregations divided between New Lights and Old Lights, many communities were pulled apart.

What aspects of the Great Awakening encouraged democratization?

if]

*

1 __

3.2,4 Indian Revivals a?

The Great Awakening also spilled over into Indian country. Indians won over by evangelical efforts often served as cultural mediators between their communities and the colonists. The Moravians,

German-speaking evangelical Protestants, were particularly effective at evangelizing among Indian the endurance of pain and suffering. tribes. In 1740, many German Moravians migrated Although the Great Awakening touched a to Pennsylvania, where they settled in a town they small but influential group of Indians, a different named Bethlehem. Moravians also established communities in the Carolinas and Georgia.

Unlike the Calvinist faith of many English colonists, which shunned the use of images in their churches, the Moravians were Lutherans and embraced art as a means of promoting the

gospels (see Chapters1and 2). In particular Moravians focused on the redemptive power of Christ's suffering as the foundation for religious salvation. Their most renowned artist in America,

John Valentine Haidt, was well schooled in European styles of religious painting and used these championed the revival of traditional beliefs and techniques to translate the Moravians' Christian vision into visually rich images (3.11). The idea of Christ's suffering resonated with Indian converts, and the Moravians displayed images of the crucifixion to bring the gospel to the Indians. After viewing such pictures in the home of a Moravian

missionary, two visiting Indians commented on "how many wounds he has, how much blood flows preaching their message. Indian revivalists attacked forth!" For American Indians Moravian religious Indian involvement with and dependence on the imagery of Jesus suggested a brave spiritual warrior, world of trade and commerce with Europeans. an ideal that resonated in the minds of young male Indians, whose conception of masculinity was based interested in converting American Indians?

Homework is Completed By:

Writer Writer Name Amount Client Comments & Rating
Instant Homework Helper

ONLINE

Instant Homework Helper

$36

She helped me in last minute in a very reasonable price. She is a lifesaver, I got A+ grade in my homework, I will surely hire her again for my next assignments, Thumbs Up!

Order & Get This Solution Within 3 Hours in $25/Page

Custom Original Solution And Get A+ Grades

  • 100% Plagiarism Free
  • Proper APA/MLA/Harvard Referencing
  • Delivery in 3 Hours After Placing Order
  • Free Turnitin Report
  • Unlimited Revisions
  • Privacy Guaranteed

Order & Get This Solution Within 6 Hours in $20/Page

Custom Original Solution And Get A+ Grades

  • 100% Plagiarism Free
  • Proper APA/MLA/Harvard Referencing
  • Delivery in 6 Hours After Placing Order
  • Free Turnitin Report
  • Unlimited Revisions
  • Privacy Guaranteed

Order & Get This Solution Within 12 Hours in $15/Page

Custom Original Solution And Get A+ Grades

  • 100% Plagiarism Free
  • Proper APA/MLA/Harvard Referencing
  • Delivery in 12 Hours After Placing Order
  • Free Turnitin Report
  • Unlimited Revisions
  • Privacy Guaranteed

6 writers have sent their proposals to do this homework:

Top Class Engineers
Assignment Hut
Unique Academic Solutions
Top Quality Assignments
Innovative Writer
Engineering Help
Writer Writer Name Offer Chat
Top Class Engineers

ONLINE

Top Class Engineers

As per my knowledge I can assist you in writing a perfect Planning, Marketing Research, Business Pitches, Business Proposals, Business Feasibility Reports and Content within your given deadline and budget.

$31 Chat With Writer
Assignment Hut

ONLINE

Assignment Hut

I am a PhD writer with 10 years of experience. I will be delivering high-quality, plagiarism-free work to you in the minimum amount of time. Waiting for your message.

$35 Chat With Writer
Unique Academic Solutions

ONLINE

Unique Academic Solutions

Being a Ph.D. in the Business field, I have been doing academic writing for the past 7 years and have a good command over writing research papers, essay, dissertations and all kinds of academic writing and proofreading.

$46 Chat With Writer
Top Quality Assignments

ONLINE

Top Quality Assignments

This project is my strength and I can fulfill your requirements properly within your given deadline. I always give plagiarism-free work to my clients at very competitive prices.

$27 Chat With Writer
Innovative Writer

ONLINE

Innovative Writer

I am an experienced researcher here with master education. After reading your posting, I feel, you need an expert research writer to complete your project.Thank You

$21 Chat With Writer
Engineering Help

ONLINE

Engineering Help

I am an academic and research writer with having an MBA degree in business and finance. I have written many business reports on several topics and am well aware of all academic referencing styles.

$41 Chat With Writer

Let our expert academic writers to help you in achieving a+ grades in your homework, assignment, quiz or exam.

Similar Homework Questions

Where is love black eyed peas lyrics - Rainsford and zaroff character traits - Fun facts about respiratory system - Health Promotion & Disease Prevention in Older Adults - Principle of variety in sport - Health policy journal 2 - WK11 ASSIGN 6051 - The task of an organization is reflected in its - Iot based energy meter block diagram - 22454 n 21st ave phoenix az 85027 - Edit the mode.sngl formula in cell g3 - Importance of marketing channels pdf - Informative speech about dreams outline - Extron sme 211 price - Spreadsheet modeling and decision analysis solution manual pdf - Ch 112 applied chemistry past papers - Actril cold sterilant sds - Psychology: Person-Centered Coaching - Pos ch 1 - Keats and negative capability li ou - Critical Reflection Essays - Financial Research Report - Cross a heterozygous running - What is world literature david damrosch pdf - Hist289y - 12 point head screw - San francisco death records search - 4-5 page computer based criime - Love's executioner the wrong one died summary - Lithium carbonate and nitric acid - Rochester quadrajet throttle linkage - Mechanical vibrations rao 6th pdf - Experiment 1: neutralization of acids and bases - Why did the texas constitution establish a plural executive - Saf t pak shipper's declaration - 4076W9D1 - Meiotic division beads diagram with crossing over - Digital divide data case study ppt - Please answer all questions - The drawing shows three point charges fixed in place - Two roads diverged in a wood - Wilsons promontory accommodation booking - Passage analysis to kill a mockingbird - Celine dion company issued 600 000 - Journal Article Summaries - 2011 new belgium cruiser bike - Examples of short stories with conflict and resolution - Css ww3 - A long solenoid with 1000 turns per meter - ENC 1101 - English discussion 5 - The handsomest drowned man in the world questions and answers - Ancient greek social pyramid - How to withdraw negative feedback on ebay - Discussion 1 ,250 words,add references and citations by 08/11/2020 at 6: 00 pm - Acct questions - Mira spanish textbook answers - The tuft of flowers - AccountingMethodsForLeaders_Assessment3 - Fowler's stages of faith - Jerry seinfeld dad season 1 - Administrative services officer class 3 - Relationship between qualitative analysis and evidence based practice - Implementation Plan - Ranked URLs (month by month)Filter by: mcgraw hill accounting chapter 10 answers Something went wrong Try to reload widget. If the problem persists, please contact us at semrush-email@semrush.com is human capital the key to avoid being structurally unemployed - Calculate the full load rotor speed - Tragedy of the commons environmental science worksheet - Abbreviation tim winton summary - Ikea case study marketing management - 1600 word count between all questions 4 scholarly sources. With on the last question Locate one recent (last 7 years) scholarly and peer reviewed journal r - InfoTech in a Global Economy - Dynamics in nursing art and science of professional practice - Murgan salem al gohary - Flyfrontier custhelp com app reimburse - The work function of tungsten is 4.50 ev - 155 lb to kg - How would the accounting equation of boston company - Ann tayler children's centre - The world according to humphrey questions - Brewer and treyens research method - Outliers roseto mystery - What is the call to adventure in the odyssey - Module 07 Discussion - Brain Games - Bottle balloon lung model - Anastasia palecek qld premier - Royal children's hospital guidelines - David adler spray painting - Why is freedom of religion important yahoo answers - A ski lift begins at ground level 0.75 mile - Interpreting the tsi 2 - Use pareto analysis to investigate the following data - Natalie nairn dentist perth - What harvests energy from sunlight to rearrange molecules into sugar - Dante's Inferno Canto 25-30 Discussion Post - Marina warner from the beast to the blonde pdf - Time and the monuments eugene berman - In the united states, currency holdings per person average about - Security+ guide to network security fundamentals - Is kfc a public limited company - What are exclusive concurrent and residual powers