Chapter in Perspective

The market revolution (Chapter 10) and the democratic revolution (Chapter 11) were accompanied by a third kind of transformation. The rise of democracy in the Jacksonian era was only one indication of a deeper impulse to improve American society. Equally important were the various reform movements of the period. These grew out of the religious changes that began on the frontier around the turn of the century and flowered in emerging market towns in the 1820s and 1830s. The revivalists' new methods of converting "sinners" --as well as reformers' more direct attempts to perfect society-- addressed many problems that were directly connected to the expansion of the economy and the dislocation experienced by many Americans during the market revolution. The mixture of religious revivalism and perfectionist reform added to the new democratic politics and an expanding commercial economy to create an unusual ferment in American society in the years after 1820.