The early republic (1800-1848)

This course contains 3 segments:

Politics and society in the early nineteenth century

In the early nineteenth century, the United States began to experience partisan politics for the first time, as the Federalists battled with the Antifederalists over what kind of nation the country would be: centralized, urban, and cosmopolitan like its European forebears, or agrarian and republican as Thomas Jefferson imagined. Meanwhile, there was some unfinished business with Great Britain . . .

The age of Jackson

Andrew Jackson was such a force of nature that they named a whole era of American history after him. In the age of Jackson, the franchise was extended to all white men. Relentless westward expansion nearly doubled the size of the United States. But prosperity came at great cost for American Indians, who were forced to walk the Trail of Tears from their ancestral lands in the east.

Culture and reform in the early nineteenth century

The United States developed and expanded rapidly in the first half of the nineteenth century. There were new inventions, new markets, new religions, and new social movements. But not everything was changing for the better: during this time, plantation slavery became ever more entrenched, and white settlers pushed indigenous peoples ever farther west.