Second Great Awakening Research Paper

The Second Great Awakening was an enormous religious revival that swept the
American nation in the beginning of the 19th century. A revival is defined by Webster’s
Dictionary as “the growth of something or an increase in the activity of something after a long period of no growth or activity.” This revival caused an unfathomable amount of permanent change to the United States. The Second Great Awakening converted millions of Americans, resulted in several new denominations of faith, changed the the way the American people viewed religion, caused a long period of reform, and connected democracy and religion.
Between years 1765 and 1815, an era called the American Enlightenment emphasised reason, education, liberty, and tolerance over any divine power. This Enlightenment, or Age of
Reason, brought the New World ideas from the Old World, such as John Locke’s social contract theory, ideas concerning democracy and liberty, and a vision of a strong government that protected its citizens; these radical new political ideas rejected monarchy and ultimately caused the American Revolution in 1776. The American Enlightenment also revolved around human control rather than spiritual control. For example Deism, a philosophy that God created the universe with set natural laws and then left it completely in humanity’s control, began to grow in the U.S. This caused the new nation to drift from religion. However, in the 1790’s The
Second Great Awakening ignited in Connecticut in order to counter the dominance of reason by emphasising the importance of religion. The revival began with Congregationalists (Puritan descendants), Anglicans (Episcopalians), and Quakers. Revivals were dominated by the educated, such as Yale president Timothy Dwight. As the revival continued to counter the
American Age of Reason, it spread to the frontier. When it arrived in states such as
Tennessee and Kentucky, it quickly evolved into a much different movement. The most successful revivalists ceased to be educated intellectuals and scholars, rather normal

1

farmers, artisans, etc. who had been converted themselves, such as the eccentric Lorenzo
Dow. The revival began to give way to camp meetings. These meetings were huge prolonged gatherings of hundreds of members of several denominations. Some meetings had attendance that reached five figures such as the popular camp meeting that occurred in Cane
Ridge, Kentucky, which reached 20,000. The meetings were conducted in open air camps and could last days. People were housed in tents and heated with campfires. Crowds sang, shouted, praised God, and listened to revivalists proclaim that the Second Coming of Jesus was approaching and society must be improved immediately. The meetings encouraged moral and social order that discouraged inappropriate behavior. Sometimes strange conversion activities would occur such as men and women barking like a dog, rolling around, and contorting their bodies. Critics of the revivals attacked the meetings for advocating desire.
Also preaching the gospel in the West were missionary groups such as the
American Home
Missionary Society, created in 1826. Many denominations grew as a result of the revivalists, especially Baptists and Methodists.
Methodists were undoubtedly the most successful religion of the Second Great Awakening concerning sheer numbers and popularity. In 1800,
Methodists possessed around 70,000 members, and in 1844 over 1,000,000. This is partly due to the utilization of circuit riders, such as Peter Cartwright, who preached of benevolence to all who would listen . Circuit riders were young men that rode around the nation spoke the word of the Methodist church. Another reason for Methodist success, was their appeal to the common man. Methodists emphasised the importance of emotion over intelligence, moral order, and a strong work ethic, which beguiled the common man with little education. The result of the growing Methodist church was a revival that was very emotional and encouraged social activism. Due to the immense success of the revival in the frontier it was inevitable that it would soon diffuse eastward.

2

This inevitable advance occurred in the 1820s in western New York. The area where revival was most popular was nicknamed “The Burned­Over District.” This region was situated near the new Erie Canal, which had attracted numerous people in search of wealth. This area was additionally home to many Americans of Puritan descent. A man by the name of Charles
G. Finney, better known as the “father of modern revivalism,” quit his studies to become a lawyer in 1821 after he underwent a religious conversion. He then became a Presbyterian minister and began preaching along the new canal, New York City, and Boston. Finney used new techniques to increase the rate of conversions. Such techniques include the “anxious seat” and the “protracted meeting.” These techniques were put into place at the city­wide revival of the canal city Rochester in 1830­31. This revival was Finney’s largest, and was a primary source of his reputation. Adding to Finney’s reputation was the cooperation among different denominations during his revivals. Finney’s utilization of the above distinguish him from other revivalists of his time, and those of the First Great Awakening before him. Also distinguishing Finney from First Great Awakening revivalists such as Jonathan Edwards was his view on revivals and sin. Finney believed revivals were human creation whereas Edwards would argue they were God’s creations. Furthermore, Finney believed humans chose to sin and had the power to never sin
. He also rejected the Calvinistic idea that God chooses who may enter heaven. Finney’s ideas were labeled as evangelical Protestantism. Said denomination focused on emotional conversions and the idea that humans are in control of their own destinies. This appealed to most Americans because this was the era of the factory worker. Factory workers had miniscule control over the economy or the direction of their lives so Finney’s promise of control that came with the Second Great Awakening encouraged them to participate in the revival. US citizens wanted to hear that they were in control and could make anything of themselves. The last thing that set Finney apart from other revivalists was

3

his use of women. This contributed to his success because women outnumbered men 2 to 1.
Finney often used men’s daughters and wives to convert them. For example, a wife of a
Rochester physician by the name of Melania Smith, was converted and convinced her religiously inactive husband to join a Presbyterian church. The American nation had exploded with religious activism.
Despite the popularity of the overwhelmingly Protestant Second Great Awakening, it drew many critics. Many critics disliked the lack of tradition and sheer amount of change that emerged from the revivals. One group of critics called the Unitarians believed that Jesus was not the son of God, but a perfect, yet human, role model that man should strive to imitate.
Unitarians, such as Unitarian leader William Channing, rejected the emotional encouragement of the Second Great Awakening and instead endorsed knowledge. Unitarians believed that character should be built over time and could not be received in a camp meeting over the course of a few days or less. The critics were also composed of mainly wealthy and educated citizens, which sharply contrasted the typical convert in the Second Great Awakening revivals.
Unitarians did however share the belief with the revivalists that society can be perfected by the hands of humanity. In addition to critics, the Second Great Awakening produced Utopia communities due to the spirit of perfectionism. Utopian communities separated from society and attempted to create a perfect community. One of the most famous and successful
Utopian communities was the Shaker community. Founded by English Mother Ann Lee, the
Shakers believed in close knit communities, a good work ethic, and celibacy. To expel temptations of sexual relations, Shakers often danced, hence their name. At their peak, they had over 6,000 members. Another new religion resulting from the Second Great Awakening was the Church of Latter­Day Saints or Mormons. Joseph Smith founded the religion in 1827, in New York. The Book of Mormon states Jesus actually arrived in the New World and was

4

forgotten by the time Columbus arrived. These radical ideas caused the persecution of
Mormons and eventually led to their journey west to Utah, where they could be free of persecution. Today, the Mormon faith continues to grow. Despite the importance of these
new religions, this was only one outcome of the Second Great Awakening.
Other effects of the the Second Great Awakening were vast and permanent. Religious participation grew as shown by the Methodists increase in number by 15 fold, the 20,000 member attendance at Cane Ridge and the 12,000 baptized solely by Peter Cartwright. God and religion became a bigger part of the common man’s life. The Second Great Awakening revolutionized the way the gospel was preached. Before the revivals, settled ministers in fixed parishes was the standard of religion in America. After the revivals, people traveled place to place searching for people to preach to.
The revivals resulted in several new denominations, such as the Mormons and the Shakers. The Second Great Awakening was also a significant cause of the Antebellum Reform, the period of social change that occurred throughout the
19th century. The Second Great Awakening not only directly preached the necessity of moral and social order, but also stated that the power of change is in humanity’s hands and it is humanity’s obligation to try and spiritually and morally perfect society. Men and women alike used religion to justify change to better their society. Complementing the Second Great
Awakening in its endeavor towards reform was a philosophy called Transcendentalism.
Transcendentalists, led by Ralph Waldo Emerson, stated all humans were born good and all wrong stemmed from society. This philosophy encouraged people that they could perfect the world by perfecting society. Together, the Second Great Awakening and Transcendentalism initiated reform in the 19th century. For example, the war on liquor, known by many as the temperance movement, ensued in the 1820s. In the movements beginning, reformers only spoke of moderation. At the time, annual alcohol consumption was relatively high; in 1825
it

5

was a staggering 7 gallons for an adult male, which is three and a half times greater than todays consumption. In 1825 Lyman Beecher abandoned moderation and denounced all use of alcohol beverages. In 1826 the American Temperance Society was created. This was a group that completely rejected the use of alcohol and in 1834 5000 other societies supported them. Temperance leaders stated drunkenness was a sin and God disapproved of the
“amazing evil.” In order to support their cause, temperance revivalists spoke of the sinfulness of domestic violence induced by alcohol. The religious revival also gave people the confidence to change the sobriety of their society. The temperance movement had great success. By 1840, alcohol consumption had dropped to less than half. Maine prohibited the manufacture and sale of alcohol in 1851 and factories in Massachusetts stopped selling liquor to workers. This reform set the foundation for the Prohibition Era in 1920, which links the
Second Great Awakening and the national ban on alcohol in the 20th century. Another reform resulting from the Second Great Awakening is abolition. Inspired by the feeling control over society and the moral obligation encouraged by the Second Great Awakening, men such as the white radical William Lloyd Garrison took a stand against slavery. Garrison viewed slavery as morally outrageous, even satanic. He once burned a copy of the U.S. Constitution saying it was a “pact with the devil.” Abolitionists used similar tactics as revivalists in the Second Great
Awakening, such as large public speeches or pamphleteering, in order to connect religion and abolition. With this connection, abolitionists conveyed the idea that slavery was a sin. After undergoing a massive religious revival, America depended more heavily on religion, therefore the message hit home on many Americans. However, not all Protestant reformers supported the abolition cause; Beecher himself attempted to suppress abolition activity in 1834 as the
Cincinnati’s Lane Theological Seminary’s president. As more and more northerners supported the emancipation of all slaves, tension between the North and South grew over the touchy

6

subject. By 1843, 100,000 northerners were part of the American Anti­Slavery Society. These tensions ultimately led to the civil war between the two halves of the U.S., which connects the
Second Great Awakening to the American Civil War. The final main reform inspired by the
Second Great Awakening was the Women’s Rights movement. Women’s participation in the revivals and the previously discussed reforms, eventually led to a reform of their own. During the Second Great Awakening women participation outnumbered men’s two to one. Finney and other revivalists spoke of empowerment and how one was in control of their own body and destiny. Women as a result were encouraged to participate in society. This is also the result of the social activism the Second Great Awakening caused. Both the American
Temperance Society, one third to one half women, and the American Anti­Slavery Society utilized substantial women participation. Women such as Angelina and Sarah Grimke lectured men and women alike all over New England about the abolition cause in 1837, and when they were criticized for their gender, they responded by creating two essential works of feminism.
These works were to explain the sisters’ desire for equal rights and are called
Letters on the
Condition of Women and the Equality of the Sexes and
Letters to Catherine E. Beecher.
Women became to become increasingly discontent lack of rights despite their participation in their community, encouraged by the Second Great Awakening, This movement resulted in the
Seneca Falls Convention, the first convention held concerning women’s rights, in New York and set the quest for woman suffrage that lasted until 1920 when the goal was accomplished.
Women owe much of their success to the Second Great Awakening.
On a political subject, the Second Great Awakening furthered America’s support of
Democracy. Since Finney repetitively and definitively established that humanity is in control of the world and not a divine power. Finney also rejected the idea of predestination, which stated
God predetermines who enters heaven. By stating that humanity is in control of the world, and

7

the individual is in control of its own destiny, the Second Great Awakening rejects Divine
Right, the right to rule given from God, and that the common man cannot govern himself. A
Frenchman by the name of Alexis de Tocqueville wrote
Democracy in America, and in it he describes the relationship between religion and democracy. He states the two work in tandem. Tocqueville states, “...in America I found that they [democracy and religion] were intimately united, and that they reigned in common over the same country.” This reinforcement of democracy caused the push for democratization in government in the first half of the 19th century and the “era of the common man.” Since religion supported the idea that the common man could govern directly, the government itself succumb to democratic influence. Vocal voting was replaced with written ballots, the need to own property in order to vote was removed in the West, formerly appointive offices became elective, and presidential electors were not chosen by the state, rather by the citizens in a direct election. Today, the effect of The Second Great Awakening’s support of the common man is still present. We are known as the “Land of Opportunity” because our country has a reputation for common man
“success stories.” This can be traced back to Finney’s revivals that stated a man can do what he pleases with his life.
The religious revivals labeled the Second Great Awakening marked an important era in American history. The revivals made America a religious country and brought about a great deal of change. The growth in religious activism caused the growth and creation of denominations, a long period of reform, and the affiliation of religion with democracy. Without the large scale religious movement, the United States would be a considerably different nation today. 8

Citations
Source: Boundless. “The Second Great Awakening.” Boundless U.S. History. Boundless, 02
Jul. 2014. Retrieved 02 Jan. 2015 from https://www.boundless.com/u­s­history/textbooks/298/religion­romanticism­and­cultura l­reform­1820­1860­14/the­second­great­awakening­113/the­second­great­awakening­
607­1690/
CrashCourse. (2013, May 1). 19th Century Reforms: Crash Course US History #15. Retrieved
January 3, 2015, from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t62fUZJvjOs
Lutz, A. (2015, January 1). The American Enlightenment. Retrieved January 6, 2015, from http://education­portal.com/academy/lesson/the­american­enlightenment­intellectual­a nd­social­revolution.html
United States History. (2014, January 1). The Second Great Awakening. Retrieved January 6,
2015, from http://www.u­s­history.com/pages/h1091.html 9