Americas (North and South) in the 1800s

Discuss the significance of regionalism throughout the Americas as regionalism became a factor in shaping Latin American nations as well as the US.

• Regionalism in Latin America was very divisive, often splitting nations into competing factions. – On a larger scale, it ensured the failure of all attempts at creating federations of

states. Students should identify – Bolívar’s failed at creating Gran Colombia – Within nations, the wealthy jealously guarded their positions and often instigated

civil wars or secession movements to safeguard them. – This caused more localized divisions, which threatened to split countries apart. – Dictators often arose in attempts to unify regions under stronger centralized

control. – By 1900, every Latin American country had undergone at least one dictatorship.

• On the other hand, the United States, with a longer British and colonial history of constitutional and representative government, never experienced a violent usurpation of power or rejection of an election.

• Still, the United States Constitution did specifically try to address regional problems and concerns, which included sanctioning slavery.

• The problems of regionalism and internal differences were significant enough that they led to the Civil War in 1861

What factors led to the alteration of the American environment in the 1800s? How was the environment altered?

• Population growth, economic expansion, new technologies, and the introduction of plants and animals to new regions dramatically altered the American environment.

• Many of Cuba’s forests were cut to expand sugar production. • The expansion of livestock-raising put a heavy burden on the fragile environments in

Argentina, Uruguay, southern Brazil, and the southwestern United States. • Commercial agriculture, such as increases in cotton production, led to soil exhaustion

and erosion. • The use of plows on the North American prairies and the Argentine pampa eliminated

many native grasses and increased the threat of soil erosion. • Coffee planters in Brazil exhausted soil fertility with a destructive cycle of

overplanting. • In addition, rapid urbanization put heavy pressure on the environment. New York,

Chicago, Rio de Janeiro, Buenos Aires, and Mexico City were among the fastest growing cities. Governments strained to keep up with the need for sewers, clean water, and garbage disposal.

• The rising demand for building materials led to the spread of the timber industry. • Mining also advanced into Nevada, Montana, and California after 1860 and erosion

and pollution resulted. • Also, efforts to meet increasing domestic demand for food and housing and to satisfy

foreign demands for exports led to environmental degradation but also contributed to the world economy and regional prosperity.

• By the end of the nineteenth century, small-scale conservation efforts were under way in many nations.

What impact does industrialization have on the Western Hemisphere?

• Industrialization affected the Western Hemisphere and the evolving world economy.

• While some Western Hemisphere countries industrialized, most did not, and this led them to greater dependence on the export of agricultural goods and minerals during the nineteenth century. Industrializing nations like the United States grew richer in comparison to the exporters of raw materials.

• The Western Hemisphere countries also became more vulnerable to the volatility of the international markets.

• The example of sugar production demonstrates the impact that world sugar competition had on the abolition of slavery in the Caribbean.

• There were significant differences between United States and Latin American development.

Compare the revolutionary movements in Venezuela, Mexico, and Brazil. • Venezuelan independence was initiated by creoles (colonial-born whites), who were large

landowners seeking to hold on to their power and wealth. – They wanted to retain slavery and keep power from the black and mixed-race populace. Their narrow

aims angered most Venezuelans, who broadened the movement, unifying behind Simón Bolívar. – Although defeated on many occasions, Bolívar successfully adapted his objectives and policies to

attract new allies and build coalitions. – Although initially opposed to the abolition of slavery, he agreed to support emancipation in order to draw

slaves and freemen to his cause and to gain supplies from Haiti. – Bolívar made astute adjustments in his goals both politically and militarily and won independence.

• Mexico was much more conservative and wealthier than other Spanish colonies, with a higher percentage of Spanish-born settlers as well.

– On hearing of Napoleon’s invasion of Spain, the wealthiest Spaniards in Mexico feared that the local viceroy would be too sympathetic to the creoles, and so they overthrew him.

– Establishing a precedent of undermining the colonial government, the revolution spread to the rural and urban poor.

– It was the news of a military revolt in Spain in 1820 that shattered the conservative coalition. – In 1821, Colonel Agustin de Iturbide and other loyalist commanders forged an alliance and declared

Mexico’s independence. However this transition to independence was conservative and highlighted by the decision to create a monarchial form of government and crown Iturbide emperor.

– In 1823, Mexico became a republic. • The situation in Brazil was different mainly because of its Portuguese affiliation.

– When Napoleon invaded Portugal, the Portuguese royal family fled into exile in Brazil. – Even after the French in Portugal were defeated, the royal family remained in America. – The king returned to Portugal only when a liberal revolt threatened the Iberian government. – His son Pedro declared Brazilian independence in 1822 and established a constitutional monarchy with

himself as its head.

What was the effect of independence and the end of colonialism on Amerindians? Consider former British, Spanish, and Portuguese colonies.

• Toward the end of the colonial era, European nations strove to control the expansion of their peoples in an effort to end the perpetual fighting with Amerindians.

• Independence removed that check on expansion, but at the same time the revolutionary struggles for freedom weakened newly independent peoples.

• Amerindians took advantage of that temporary weakness to push back Euro-American advances.

• Amerindians continued to resist expansion, adapting in unique ways to new technologies and opportunities, such as horses and firearms. Euro-American setbacks were only temporary, however.

• In places such as the United States, military efforts led by the national government forcibly removed Amerindians to more remote and less viable reservations.

• In Argentina, powerful Amerindian groups were kept at peace only through an elaborate system of gift giving and prisoner exchanges.

• Ultimately, however, Amerindians lost their land. Increases in population and new technologies enabled their opponents to overwhelm them.

Discuss the process of abolishing slavery in the Americas. Did the movement for abolition of slavery differ in the United States, Latin America, and the

Caribbean?• During the movements for independence in all three places there were

strong anti-slavery sentiments. • The ideas of the Enlightenment that provided an ideological foundation for

independence also addressed the evils of slavery as well. • In regions where plantation economies were most prevalent, abolition met

with the most resistance; however, slave revolts and resistance persisted in all of these areas.

• Both women and African-Americans were active in the abolitionist movement in the United States.

• In the United States as the debate over slavery in the new territories boiled over, the Confederacy seceded from the Union.

• In 1863, President Lincoln issued the Emancipation Proclamation, which ended slavery in the Union states, and the Thirteenth Amendment to the Constitution ended it for good in 1865. Slavery persisted for twenty years more in Brazil, where it was finally abolished in 1888.

• In the Caribbean, slave revolts and resistance weakened European imperial commitment to slavery, and the decrease in sugar plantation profitability convinced the British to push for the abolition of slavery there as well.

• The remaining Spanish colonies, Puerto Rico and Cuba, were the last to free the slaves.

Discuss the processes of development and underdevelopment.

• All western hemisphere economies grew between 1800 and 1900.

• The growth of markets, technology, and population caused increases in wealth; however, growing economic interdependence and increased competition also caused structural problems in some cases.

• Two distinct tracks of development evolved: development and underdevelopment. – These were divided post World War II into 1st World, 2nd World, and

3rd World countries– Today they are referred to as ECs or emerging economies instead of

underdeveloped (Developed countries and Developing Countries)• Development included industrial development and

prosperity, and underdevelopment included continued colonial dependence on exports of raw materials and low-wage industries.

What were the underlying reasons for the struggles for independence in Latin America in the early nineteenth century?

• Many of the causes were the same as those that helped spark the American and French Revolutions.

• Colonists chafed at the political power of colonial officials, the lack of representation, and the inability to shape their own institutions.

• Their subordinate position as suppliers of raw materials and consumers of goods manufactured in Europe stirred economic unrest, for colonists saw themselves as victims of high prices and state-supported monopolies.

• The same Enlightenment reasoning that affected the American and French Revolutions influenced Latin American radicals.

• The final event that triggered Latin American revolutions was Napoleon’s invasion of Spain and Portugal.

• The dislocation of authority and control resulting from those invasions was the final impetus toward a new revolutionary era.

What was the nature of immigration to the Americas in the nineteenth century? What were some of the problems and contributions of immigration?

• As the African slave trade came to an end, the nature, sources, and numbers of immigrants to the Americas changed dramatically.

• For instance, hundreds of thousands of Indian and Chinese emigrants came to North and South America.

• Still, most free immigrants came from Europe, particularly those emigrating to the United States, Canada, Argentina, and other nations of southern South America.

• This was due in part to discrimination against Asian immigrants in the United States, Canada, and other countries.

• While this influx of people contributed to the Industrial Revolution in the Americas, supplying the labor for new factories and agriculture, workers in the Americas viewed immigrants differently.

• To workers, immigrants were a threat—pawns used by capitalists to lower wages and degrade working conditions.

• Native-born Americans blamed the immigrants’ cultures for these immigration-related problems.

• However, aside from the previously mentioned economic benefits, immigrants made many significant contributions in food, music, literature, folklore, and other areas of their cultural heritage.

• Schools attempted to assimilate immigrants through acculturation. • Patriotic songs, symbols, and history lessons were used to this end.