YR - National Infrastructure Lesson

National Infrastructure

View east of eastbound Lockport on the Erie Canal by W.H. Bartlett, 1839

30 THE AMERICAN SYSTEM A scheme designed by Henry Clay in the 1820s. Clay sought to form a coalition of Eastern and Western interests in Congress. In return for Western support of protective tariffs that would benefit Eastern manufacturers, the Easterners would vote for bills providing federal expenditures on roads and canals.In this period, many families moved west of the Appalachian Mountains to claim land in the new American territories stretching to the Mississippi River. Their travel was difficult, taking a week to cross the distance a car might drive today in a few hours. In response, private companies built the young nation's roads and waterways. These roads were often turnpikes, or toll roads, which travelers paid a fee to use. In turn, these fees were used to pay for upkeep of the new roads. Where roads could not be built, barges were used on rivers to carry people and goods as long as the rivers flowed in the same direction as the settlers and merchants wanted to travel. Soon a new invention, the steamboat, enabled people to buy a ticket from private companies that operated the boats and travel upstream as easily as downstream. Lastly, in the wilderness where rivers did not run and roads could not be built, government leaders joined businesspeople to build canals - artificial rivers. These shallow waterways were for barges, not steamboats, and had pathways alongside where horses or mules pulled them.

Erie Canal

The most famous canal built in this era was the Erie Canal, which connected the Great Lakes to the Atlantic Ocean. It was opened in 1825 after eight years of digging by thousands of laborers, mostly immigrants. It stretches 363 miles from Lake Erie to the Hudson River, which flows into the Atlantic Ocean at New York City. The Erie Canal served as a turnpike for barges where a road could not easily be built, and greatly lowered transportation costs. This not only opened up western New York and regions further west to increased settlement, but also helped unite new regions with the Atlantic states.

Rise of New York City

Until 1790, New York City was the capital of the United States. In the early 1800s, civic development turned this colonial town into a great economic center established on a grid of city blocks. By 1835, the population had grown so large that New York City outpaced Philadelphia as the largest U.S. city. Trade grew when the Erie Canal made the city's harbors the link between European merchants and the great agricultural markets across the Appalachians from New York City. The city was home to the biggest gathering of artisans and crafts workers in the United States, and its banking and commercial activities would soon make it the leading city in all of North America.

70 The American continents, by the free and independent condition which they have assumed and maintained, are henceforth not to be considered as subjects for future colonization by any European powers.” (James Monroe enunciating the Monroe Doctrine in his annual message to Congress, 1823.)Monroe Doctrine

In 1823, President James Monroe warned the nations of Europe not to meddle in the politics of North and South America. When a group of European countries planned to help each other recapture American colonies that had gained independence, Monroe announced that the United States would prevent European nations from interfering with independent American countries. Further, Monroe said the United States would remain neutral in wars between European nations and their American colonies, but, if battles took place in the New World, the United States would view such battles as hostile actions against the United States. In summary, the Monroe Doctrine defined an aspect of U.S. foreign policy to which America still holds today.

 

RESOURCES IN THIS MODULE ARE OPEN EDUCATIONAL RESOURCES (OER) OR CREATED BY GAVS UNLESS OTHERWISE NOTED. SOME IMAGES USED UNDER SUBSCRIPTION.