American Demographic Development and the American Revolution

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American Demographic Development and the American
Revolution
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American Demographic Development

• To 1700 Vorzeit, Unstable settlement
• 1700-1870 Frontier/Rural Settlement
• rapid population growth, large families, rural
  society (30-35 per decade)
• 1870-1920 Great Conjuncture Urbanization takes
  hold but rural areas still growing

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American Demographic Development

• 1920 - present Metropolitan Settlement
• slower population growth, urban society, smaller
  families

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Growth of the U.S. Population
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1890 Population Density Closing of the Frontier
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American Demographic Change
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Thinking About Population Growth
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17th Century American Colonial Development

• Massachusetts
• Family based communities
• Settled by towns
• Religious communities of interest (Puritans)

• Virginia
• Adventurers hoping to get rich quick
• Plantation based societies
• Searching for an efficient and pliable workforce

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The American Revolution and Family and Sex Roles

• The United States was founded during a revolution
  in the late 18th century 1763-87
• The colonists asserted
• The right to liberty and to rebel against
  tyranny
• The truth of human equality
• The right to political self determination

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Meanwhile.

• The economy of Virginia and other southern
  colonies was supported by slave labor
• Northern colonists maintained hierarchies based
  upon property and social standing
• Women were governed by the rules of coverture

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The Paradox

• A moderate revolution
• A legacy for further claims.
• Slavery ended in most northern states
• Slavery curtailed by 1808 in Constitution
• The first claims for democracy for adult white
  males
• A challenge to deference

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Continuing forms of inequality and subjection

• Coverture (governing the relationships of wives
  and husbands)
• Slavery (governing masters and slaves)
• Indentured Servitude (governing masters and
  servants)
• Wage Labor..

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Elements of Coverture

• Husband is the Lord or Baron with authority over
  his wife. She is a femme couvert. The are
  one person in law. All her property, including
  any income or wages she earns, is under the
  control of her husband and he can manage it as he
  pleases.
• He is responsible for her debts, her crimes in
  some situations, and her chastisement. He is
  obligated to support her.
• She is obligated to obey her lord, to provide
  him with domestic and sexual services.
• 4. Neither can testify against the other because
  they are one person in law.
• A single woman is a feme sole and can manage
  her own affairs and property.

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Elements of Slavery

• Slaves are alienated from claims of birth, that
  is, lineage, property, naming, and serve their
  masters for life.
• Masters control the labor and the personhood of
  the slave, including sexual access and offspring.
  Masters provide support for the slaves.
• Slaves do not have freedom of movement, speech,
  the right to education, training, political
  expression.

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Elements of Slavery, Continued.

• EXCEPTION Freedom of religion??
• Slaves thus have no rights to marry, bear
  legitimate children, and pass on claims of
  lineage across generations.