Jacksonian America Analysis

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As a scholar at the Society for Historians of the Early American Republic, I am faced with the act of making “Change: American Society from the Revolution to Jacksonian America” both cohesive and in-depth, while dealing with a limited amount of space; therefore, significant editing of history is going to be needed in order to construct a display that can edify and entertain the general public. The general floor plan of this author’s exhibit will be to divide each room into three equal sections for Native American, African American, and ex-colonial US American history. In some of the rooms, there will be a contrast; for example, one may see the Declaration of Independence on display in the same room as various broken treaties, as well as myriad …show more content…

During this time, due to the general defeat of Native American tribes as they were driven westward and collected on reservations, there was a dual tendency to, as mentioned above, assimilate through “Indian Schools,” as well as portray Native Americans as figures of entertainment in traveling shows. “Yet another assault on tribal identity came in the forms of new names. The policy of renaming students was motivated by several concerns… renaming students was part of a conscious government policy to give Indians surnames” (Adams, 2000). Resistance was still strong in areas, though, which will be reflected in the exhibit. In terms of African-Americans, during this time escaped slaves from some of the southern states joined a military campaign of the Florida Seminoles to keep their homeland, which can draw the two sections of the room together. The ex-colonial US history section of the room can also be linked to the African-American section through the Missouri Compromise. This last section of the room will also contain exhibits on the Monroe Doctrine, public railroads, populism, and Andrew Jackson. Jackson, a democrat reformer, was elected to two terms and was fairly popular in his day. He was one of the first politicians to speak out against Beltway interest groups. “Andrew Jackson's election in 1828 is described as The Revolution of 1828. It brought to power the first American President not rooted in the Eastern aristocracy. He was elected by the "common" man and acted within that mandate. Jackson's Presidency is the beginning of the modern Presidency, one in which the powers vested in the office of the President grew immensely” (Andrew,

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