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The Americas 3B
Lecture 1
In the 18th century, America existed of many distinctive regional cultures
(a Chesapeake culture, a New England culture, etc.), which had to
somehow converge into the basis of a state (the United States). In a
hundred years, a lot had happened:
- North America (no Mexico) in 1585 had existed of a few hundred
Europeans with a few outposts on the brink of collapse (Spanish
Florida, English Virginia, Roanoke). There were some 7 to 10 million
Indians living on the continent, so it was still very native American.
At the places where the Europeans had arrived, however, one could
already see colonisation impact.
- North America in 1685 had a European population of about 200.000,
of which 90% was English (roughly split in the northern and southern
with the Chesapeake and New England as the main centres), 10.000
in French Canada, a few hundred in Latin America, a few thousand in
Spanish Florida and New Mexico. There were only about 2 million
Indians left, so the effects of the epidemics were obvious. They still
held a slight majority east of the Mississippi River.
- North America in 1785 held 3.3 million Europeans and Euro-
Americans, living in the US, in British Canada, Louisiana, and
Spanish Florida, Texas, New Mexico and California. There were also
Russians living in Alaska. The African and African American
population was about 750.000 and the Indians existed of about
600.000, mainly in west-coast settlements. About 200.000 lived east
of the Mississippi River, where also the Europeans lived. Around the
mid-1700s there was a tipping point where the native population
had reached its low and started to recover, becoming less
susceptible for diseases. The European settlements were usually
planted right on top of where the natives had lived.
Benjamin Franklin wrote Observations Concerning the Increase of
Mankind, Peopling of Countries, etc. (1751) about how the population of
the Thirteen Colonies was doubling every 25 years. He himself lived in
Pennsylvania, a booming state due to immigration and natural growth. The
population of America was growing faster than that of Britain, so he
predicted that in a century “the greatest Number of Englishmen will be on
this Side of the Water”. He saw this as an increase in the power of
England. The key to this huge growth in population was land, something
that America had plenty and Europe had not. People had a lot of access to
land, which enabled people to establish households at an earlier age and
support larger families than in Europe (due to farming land). In 1750, the
British had enacted protectionist policies, limiting manufacturing in
America. Pennsylvania had become an iron manufacturer but the British
limit this. According to Franklin, Britain was cutting its nose to spite its
face, since the British profited from the economic growth in America. The
,bigger the population, the bigger the market for British manufactured
goods (consumer revolution). He thus argued against the protectionist
policies. Maybe the British worried that because the population growth
could continue because of the seemingly endless lands, there would be
more people in America than Britain, which could give America the power
to perhaps become an independent country.
The migration to the British colonies went as following:
- 1607-1700: ca. 400.000
o Half went to the West Indies
o 90% was English
o 12.000 were Africans
10.000 between 1676-1700
- 1700s
o Half was African (esp. between 1720 and 1775) which led to
diversity in America
o Other half: minority was English, a lot of Germans (the
‘Pennsylvania Dutch)
The Europeans coming to America were very diverse, such as Germans
and Scots, and they also had a diversity in status: servants, felons, free
people, etc.
Between 1500 and the late 1800s, about 10-12 million Africans were
forced to migrate. Not a lot of them were sent to North America. More
Africans than Europeans had come to America.
What was necessary to become one nation was colonial convergence. But
how do you get to convergence when there was so much cultural diversity
between the colonies and between the immigrants? The 18 th century saw
this process of convergence. At that time, there were 14 British colonies in
North America. They all had different forms of government, economy,
religion. They were more connected to England than to each other. But,
they were all becoming more alike (convergence). When you compare the
New England and Chesapeake colonies, you see differences in:
- Health conditions (worse in the Chesapeake than in New England)
- Geography
- Social and economic class divisions (more rich planters in the South)
- Family structure (New England supposedly invented grand parents)
- Racial unity and slavery (the south was a slave society)
When you went from North to South, you went from more order to less
order in society.
Convergence arose because of Anglicization, by becoming more like
England. Perhaps a better term for it is ‘Britonization’, since it’s not about
becoming English as such, but about becoming British (Britain is bigger
than just England). This Britonization happened as following:
- Imitating the mother country in institutions, values and culture.
- More political and economic control from the centre (limited, but
often successful).
, - More intense and frequent communication & culture.
All colonies had slavery; this was legal and expanding (not just in
plantation zones). There was thus a racial connection between colonies. In
1770, New York, Rhode Island, New Jersey and Pennsylvania had a higher
percentage of slaves than the Chesapeake did in 1700.
All colonies saw the growth of population and economy, a large family,
geographic expansion and economic growth tied to empire. There were
still distinctions in wealth between the colonies, but the gaps were
narrowing. Societies were becoming more developed (universities,
urbanization, professions).
Part of the convergence was The Great Awakening. Under historians
there’s still debate whether there was 1 awakening, or many. This is
because the Great Awakening happened in the North in the 1740s, but
only in the 1760s in the South. Jon Butler claims that the Great Awakening
was fabricated by historians. Contemporaries, however, saw connections
between the northern and southern awakenings and saw it as part of the
same process. The Great Awakening was a new way of constructing
religion in the colonies. Most colonies had had an established church
(except Pennsylvania) which was supported by the state and tax dollars.
The 1740s brought a challenge to this structure, by a conflict between
evangelicals and rationalists:
Evangelicals Rationalists
Spontaneous vs. formal Critical & empirical interpretation
vs. Revelation and emotional
experience
Critical of conventional church Laws of nature & God
leaders
“New Lights” “Old Lights”
Reason vs. enthusiasm
The Old Lights preferred the traditional, old-fashioned church, while the
New Lights were all for the changes in the church. The New Lights had
charismatic preachers and more openness about that people could change
themselves.
These sharp divisions because of religion in the colonies led to
convergence because of the religious conversations that followed. People
started reading about what happened in other colonies during the Great
Awakening. A common discussion about religion tied the colonies
together.
Seminar 1
Anglicization: what is British?
- Being free
- Having rights (protected by the Monarch)
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