Era of American Revolution (1700s)

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Era of American Revolution (1700s)

• Trattner chapter 3

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Need for assistance

• Widespread poverty
• May have contributed to wish to break from
  British
• Changes in religious expression, along with
  increasing need among the people, led to discord

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Who needed help?

• Disabled veterans, their widows and orphans
• Survivors of those lost at sea
• Seasonally unemployed
• Children born out of wedlock
• Needy immigrants
• Refugees (Acadians)

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• Victims of economic downturns
• Fire victims
• Survivors of diseases and epidemics (dysentery,
  measles, smallpox, typhoid, malaria, scarlet
  fever)

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Substantial public response

• Boston spent 500 pounds in 1700 and 4000 by 1725
  on poor relief
• Estimated 25 of NYC population poor or near poor

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Growing private response

• Doing good became important for wealthy
• Noblesse oblige characteristic of southern
  landholders (Washington)
• Churches helped disease and disaster victims
  (Established state religion, headed by the Crown
  of England)
• Quakers important may have used humanitarianism
  to counter opposition from established state
  church and majority religious oppression

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• Voluntary help groups nationality, fraternal,
  social (e.g., Scots, Irish, Germans, French)
• Complementary roles of public and private aid
  characteristic of this period

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Social Phenomena Contributing to Social Welfare
Interest

• Great Awakening
• Enlightenment
• American Revolution

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Great Awakening

• Evangelical movement beginning in late 1720s
• Focused on born again experience
• Open air revivals, itinerant preachers, weakened
  authority of established church
• Characteristic of Presbyterians, Baptists and
  Methodists

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Great Awakening

• Stressed possibility of salvation for all (not
  just the elect)
• People became concerned with the salvation of
  others
• Encouraged humane attitudes and doing good
  among all social classes

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George Whitefield

• English preacher who made 7 visits to US
• Greatest impact during 1739-41
• 30,000 heard him speak in Boston
• Extraordinary fund raiser (Franklin)
• Assisted slaves by encouraging their learning to
  read to save their souls

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Enlightenment

• Grew out of writings of Newton and Locke
• Belief that progress always possible
• Every human can use reason, has the potential to
  be good and can improve society
• Poverty and other injustices can be eliminated
  social reform a consequence

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Religious freedom

• Enlightenment Great Awakening movements fueled
  the Revolution as much as political issues
• Freedom of conscience in all matters
• Established churches in many colonies placed
  severe restrictions on members of other faiths,
  including not only worship but also aid to the
  needy
• Struggles across the colonies to disestablish the
  state church and allow others to flourish met
  great opposition
• Roger Williams and Rhode Island

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Isaac Backus

• Baptist clergyman and church historian
• Mayflower descendent, born in CT
• Served as a parish clergy in MA
• Faced severe discrimination from the established
  (non-Baptist) church of the state
• Lobbied strongly and repeatedly for freedom of
  religion, as a protection from the state
• Nothing is more evident, in reason and the Holy
  Scriptures, than that religion is ever a matter
  between God and individuals, and, therefore, no
  man or men can impose any religious test without
  invading the essential prerogatives of our Lord
  Jesus Christ.

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American Revolution

• Declaration of Independence implies improving the
  lot of the common person
• New nation can overcome faults of European
  society
• Democracy inconsistent with illiteracy and
  poverty
• Separation of church and state, banning of
  slavery in north, attacks on debtors prisons

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Problems and Issues in the New Nation

• Displacement of people led to state
  responsibility (New York) for state poor
• In hard times localities cant handle
  responsibilities to poor
• Poor laws implemented in new territories
• With separation of church and state county (not
  town) took over welfare in south

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• Welfare not handled on a national basis (states
  rights and limited central government)
• Frontier emphasized individual responsibility,
  personal achievement, and self help
• As wealth grew, charity and philanthropy
  increasingly associated with social recognition
  and status