In the 1840’s there was a wave of democratization created after Jackson’s presidency. It was created the value of the common man, and the importance of every person who was in the government. Of course, there were exceptions to this rule as there still certain groups like blacks or women that were viewed as inferior, but the majority of the population felt like they had worth. This led to series of reforms: hospitals for the mentally ill, schools for people with physical disabilities, the temperance movement, and labor unions. This movements fought a better society with better treatment even though there would be no economic incentives to do so. The Reform of mentally ill was led by Dorthea Dix, a teacher and activist for the treatment of …show more content…
Factories were paying far too little for someone to feed their whole family for that little, so many either would die or would turn to crime to survive; these laborers wanted equality. Men, women, and children were working and got employed in factories to work, and the dangerous and strenuous labor that children were put through to help the family expense caused many young children to die. Workers individually could not stop corporations, but collectively they could make an impact on their wages. The corporations eventually had to succumb to the pressure of labor supplies because the National Trade Union convinced the majority of the labor force to work from 12 hours a day to 10 hours. After the labor unions won, workers worked less, and they still had the same salary. However, the economic crises in 1837 collapsed the labor unions because of economic hard times, and with immigrants coming in surplus willing to work for cheap, regular people could not compete and thus had to work at the beckon of the factories. Labor unions worked when the economy was resilient, but when the economy was shocked, everyone was too afraid of demanding more when there were those willing to work for