Log Cabin Campaign

  • Whig William Henry Harrison vs Democrat Martin van Buren
  • Van Buren was weakened by the Panic of 1837
  • Log Cabin Campaign
    • Campaign Slogans: Tippecanoe and Tyler too
    • Branding: Harrison is a common man
    • Negative Campaigning: Van Ruin
    • Rallies
    • Songs
    • Women: Targetted women who they thought would influence thie rhusbands
  • Harrison won by a landslide and Whigs took control of Congress
  • Harrison died of pneumonia 32 days later and John Tyler became president.

Social and Cultural Change, 1830s-1850s

Human impulse to reform society and make it better, arises from:

  • Disruptions of industrial revolution

  • Some people left with idea that life can be made better

  • Empowerment from Jacksonian ideals

  • Second Great Awakening

    • Rejected predestination and celebrated human free will
    • If individuals reform, so will society
    • Sin is a choice and hurts all
    • Salvation can come from self improvement and the improvement of society
  • Romanticism

    • Expression of feeling in art and rise of individuality
    • Reaction to the greyness of the industrial revolution
    • Man vs nature and man vs himself, exploration of conflict
  • **Transcendentalism

    • Sought deeper insight into the mysteries of existence
    • Celebrated individualism and nature
    • Speak your truth, know thyself
    • Questioning of social norms
  • Nativism

    • Discrimination against immigration
    • Especially Irish people who immigrated in response to the Potato Famine
    • A real american is white, anglosaxon, protestant (WASP)
      • Irish are Catholic
      • Idea that catholics cannot be good Americans because of the christian power structure
        • Allegiance to pope over democracy
    • Led to rise of American “Know Nothing” Party
      • Sought to limit immigration and foreign influence