“Rip Van Winkle Years” of NC

Warm Up

• Analyze the charts on the next slide to determine how NC grew compared to the U.S. as a whole between 1790-1860.

• When did NC grow the fastest? The slowest?

Rip Van Winkle Years

• Early 1800s• Nickname based on a Washington Irvin short

story in 1819 about a lazy man who sleeps for twenty years while the world around him develops.

• NC seemed to be asleep, going backwards economically compared to other states. – Ex: Virginia and SC had more productive agriculture

Problems in NC in the 1800s

• poor transportation, • no public education, • and little economic opportunity,– Result was thousands of North Carolinians left the

state each year seeking a brighter future elsewhere.

Causes of Problems

• State leaders opposed spending tax money on schools, roads, agricultural reforms, or any other form of economic advancement. (favored states rights, power over federal power)

• Without good roads to get crops to market, farmers could not make profits. Without progressive leadership in agricultural reforms, farmers did not learn about the importance of crop rotation.

Outward Migration

• North Carolina was the third most populous state in the Union in 1790, but by 1860 it had dropped to twelfth in population.

• Hundreds of thousands of White North Carolinians fled the state during those years, seeking cheap, fertile land in other states.

• Thirty percent of North Carolina’s native-born population, amounting to more than four hundred thousand persons, was living outside of the state in 1860.

The Progressive Whig Movement in NC 1800s

Archibald Murphey (1777-1832)

• Attorney, judge, and legislator in NC• His comprehensive plan for the state urged the

establishment of a public education system, construction of canals and turnpike roads, as well as a general public welfare system.

• Although most of his projects did not come to fruition during his lifetime, many served as models for the next generation.

In Archibald’s words:

• “I had no Idea that we had such a poor, ignorant, squalid Population, as I have seen. Who that sees these People, and those of the Centre and the West, can wonder that we wish to have a Convention? In the Towns are found, decent and well informed Men in Matters of Business, Men who look well and live well. But the Mass of the Common People in the Country are lazy, sickly, poor, dirty and ignorant. Yet this is a Section of the State, upon which the Hand of Industry would soon impress a fine Character.”

1835 NC Constitution Convention

• By the 1830s, demands for reform came primarily from three quarters:

• 1.westerners (at the time primarily from the Piedmont), who wanted equitable geographic representation in the General Assembly;

• 2.Whig politicians, who disliked Democratic domination of state politics and favored internal improvements

• 3.and economic planners, who wanted to build internal improvements that easterners had prevented

1835 Constitution passes

• NC becomes more democratic:– the poll tax (or head tax) was equalized, – All Christians, not just Protestants, could hold

office– property requirements for voting and holding

office were reduced, (increases western representation in assembly)• BUT

– the free black vote was eliminated