De Tocqueville is frustrating

The first few chapters of Democracy in America by Alexis de Tocqueville were very frustrating to read. There are many contradictions and the writing, in general, is hard to follow. I think that the most frustrating thing for me are these few lines "freedom is not the chief and continual object of their desires; it is equality for which they feel an eternal love". To clarify, "they" refers to Americans. Taken by itself, this proposition makes sense - Americans strive for equality. What is so frustrating to me is that de Tocqueville suggests that "one cannot imagine that men should remain perpetually unequal in just one respect though equal in all others; within a certain time they are bound to become equal in all respects". I think this is absolutely incorrect and does not characterize American ideals and goals. De Tocqueville doesn't provide much evidence for his argument, which is also irritating. Hopefully he can better support his arguments in the rest of his work.

Perfectionism and Optimism

William G. McLoughlin defines American pietism as "the belief that every individual is himself responsible for deciding the rightness or wrongness of every issue (large or small) in terms of a higher moral law; that he must make this decision the moment he is confronted with any question in order to prevent any complicity with evil; and having made his decision, he must commit himself to act upon it at once". This definition is central to McLoughlin's article Pietism and the American Character. I have to agree that McLoughlin that this definition of pietism identifies with many Americans today. We, as American citizens, are constantly preoccupied with right and wrong, with perfectionism. We consider a higher moral law when we vote for our representatives, when we raise our children, and even when we choose how to spend our free time. McLoughlin suggests that America is not so much the land of the free, but rather the land of the perfectionists. We strive for equality and a society of intellectual individuals and punish any criminals that present themselves as obstacles to this greater goal, that break our moral code. Interestingly, American perfectionism does not consist in attention to detail, but rather a constant change and optimism for the future. We do not allow the "hardening of anything into custom" because they "retain too much of the imperfect present or past". This is strongly related to the ideas put forth by Walt Whitman in Democratic Vistas. Optimism is a universal characteristic of Americans and always will be.

Elites

During the American Revolution, churches were fundamental to the development of political movements. In reading Nathan Hatch's The Democratization of Christianity and the Character of American Politics, I noticed the recurring theme of "a refusal to recognize the cultural authority of elites". It seems as though there existed much animosity among middle class citizens towards church officials and the intellectual high class. In this sense, religious and social movements were connected during the American Revolution. Furthermore, there was a shift in Christianity in America from a collective congregation to the idea that "religion is a matter between God and individuals". Similarly, personal autonomy was realized to be essential in American democracy. Christians and Americans lost faith in their leaders and began to take control of their own lives and fates. The elites in America, both religious and political, lost their power. This welcomed change has forever changed the United States as everyday citizens are autonomous and can say so in God's name.

Universal Rapture

Amy Frykholm's Rapture Culture captivates the influence of dispensationalism among American Protestants. I am struck by the universal nature of rapture and it's applicability to many different beliefs and ideas. Frykholm describes that "most scholars of American religion agree that the rapture emerged in American Protestant culture at a moment when conservative Protestants felt a decline of cultural power". In this scenario, rapture is used as a sort of threat or perhaps just a pressing reminder that there is a division between the saved and the damned. In contrast, a text regarding rapture, Left Behind, "detaches itself from particular church institutions" and in that sense does not establish right and wrong or differentiate saved and unsaved. In other words, rapture is influential in many different, even contradicting, ways. Rapture can be used to promote traditional values but at the same time give credence to "the concerns of contemporary culture". In conclusion, rapture is ambiguous and can be used to legitimized a plethora of different practices and beliefs.

Impressive Women

After reading Mary Ryan's essay "A Women's Awakening", I couldn't help but notice the pressure put on women during the Second Great Awakening. The women monitored the finances of their families and at the same time instilled christian values into their children. The women essentially had two full-time jobs. The mothers "planted the families' religious roots" and the "involvement in religious benevolence filled the consequent vacuum in woman's everyday life" and on top of all that were often times required to be model accountants. Moreover, women were passionate about being involved outside of the home. They joined and formed organizations including the Female Missionary Society, the Maternal Association, and even published a magazine, The Mother's Magazine, which guided mothers in religiously upbringing their children. I did not realize the involvement of women amidst the Second Great Awakening and am rather impressed by their abilities and passions.

Focusing on the present

In reading Walt Whitman’s Democratic Vistas, I was particularly struck by his idea that we, as Americans, rely on the future. We assume that all of America’s problems will be solved in the future, that our predecessors will be more capable of righting wrongs and that, as current citizens, we have no obligation to protect, maintain, or improve the democracy that is America. Whitman argues that “what finally and only is to make our western world a nationality superior to any hither known, and out-topping the past, must be vigorous, yet unsuspected Literatures, perfect personalities and sociologies, original, transcendental, and expressing (what, in highest sense, are not yet express’d at all,) democracy and the modern”. Whitman argument is exceptional, but I have to wonder if we would even notice these Literatures if we read them. Because we are constantly looking to the future, we are unable to focus on the present and therefore are almost ignorant to what is happening right before us. In other words, we assume that these great Literatures will be produced in the years to come and are therefore blind to any such Literatures being produced currently. I think part of the problem is the feeling "I can't make a difference". We need to be encouraged and shown that we can ultimately cause a change. I think this will allow us to notice such Literatures. We will then focus on the present.

Slavery and Freedom

Edmund S. Morgan's conclusion in The Challenge of the American Revolution states "It was slavery, I suggest, more than any other single factor, that had made the difference, slavery that enabled Virginia to nourish representative government in a plantation society". This conclusion is important because it suggests that slavery was essential to the establishment of America as a country. At first, this proposal seems absolutely crazy, or at least I thought so. Isn't American slavery a giant contradiction? Edmund Morgan argues that although it is hypocritical, that America could not be a free country if it weren't for slavery. Slavery solved the problem of an excess of freemen without work. The aristocrats of the early New World were threatened by the growing number of liberated men (previously indentured servants) because they were hungry and had weapons. Enslaving Africans united the white men, the plantation owner and yeoman farmer, and allowed for the upper-class men to create an organized government. It is important to clarify that the men who enslaved the blacks were not racists, but they had no other population to enslave as it would have been impossible to enslave English-born laborers. I think that slavery expanded in a way that the first slave owners were unable to predict and would not have wanted. The origins of American slavery were not based on cruelty and racism, but on the necessity to calm the increase of free men without work.