Territorial Expansion And National Unity From 1800-1850

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Territorial expansion and national unity from 1800-1850 involved many events. Western expansion boosted national unity at first, spurred the issue of slavery, and created extreme sectionalism between the north and the south.
There are many events that helped boost national unity like the Louisiana Purchase, Manifest Destiny, Era of Good Feelings, and the Monroe Doctrine. The United States needed more land in order to continue moving out West. Jefferson was concerned that no land would mean a disunion in the United States, which is why we bought Louisiana for $15 million. The Manifest Destiny was a phrase that was used to describe America’s westward expansion. The Louisiana Purchase kicked off the movement out West and that’s what we called …show more content…

Some of those events include the Second Great Awakening, Northwest Ordinance, “King Cotton”, and the north favoring tariff. The Second Great Awakening was a series of religious revivals based on Methodism and Baptism and mainly attracted women, blacks, and Native Americans. The Second Great Awakening was the cause of the radical abolitionism who were activists against slavery. This helped create the divide between the north and south. The Northwest Ordinance defined the process where new states could be admitted into the Union from the Northwest territory. The ordinance did forbid slavery, but allowed citizens of the new land vote on slavery once it was established land. This also helped greatly separate the two. King Cotton was a phrase that southern authors used to show the economic dominance of the southern cotton industry. Basically, the north needed the south’s cotton so they would say cotton is King. The Tariff of Abominations was created to protect American industry from cheaper British commodities. The south opposed this because increasing the taxes on british imports made it difficult for Britain to pay for the cotton they imported from the south. This then related to the making of the cotton gin which led to controversy over slavery. This provided sectionalism over the tariff and why the north wasn’t as taxed as the