6 The Growing Nation The Land and People In 1809 the United States was almost 1 7 million square miles 4 4 square kilometers in area The United States acquired the territory of Florida from Spain in 1819 It did not become a state however until 1845 With the addition of this territory the nation grew to be about 1 75 million square miles 4 53 square kilometers in size In 1809 the United States consisted of 17 states Seven more states were admitted to the Union during the presidencies of James Madison James Monroe and John Quincy Adams They were Louisiana in 1812 Indiana in 1816 Mississippi in 1817 Illinois in 1818 Alabama in 1819 Maine in 1820 and Missouri in 1821 The population also grew rapidly In 1810 there were more than 7 2 million Americans and more than 1 million of them were slaves In each of the next two decades the total population increased by one third or more By 1830 there were nearly 13 million Americans and more than 2 million of them were slaves One thing that did not change during this period was that the vast majority of Americans continued to live on farms Even by 1830 only a few cities had populations of more than 25,000 people Sometime in the early 1800s New York City New York overtook Philadelphia Pennsylvania as the largest city in America One estimate is that in 1820 New York had about 124,000 people and Philadelphia had 113,000 Much smaller was Baltimore Maryland with 63,000 people and Boston Massachusetts with 43,000 people A United States map shows the 17 states that made up the country in 1809 Unclaimed Territory Disputed between Illinois Territory and Rupert’s Land England Disputed between Massachusetts and Colony of New Brunswick England Indiana Territory New Hampshire Vermont Rupert’s Land England Louisiana Territory Viceroyalty of New Spain Spain Illinois Territory Michigan Territory New York Indiana Territory Ohio Kentucky Tennessee Pennsylvania D C Virginia North Carolina South Carolina Disputed between United States and New Spain Mississippi Territory Georgia West Florida Spain East Florida Spain Orleans Territory Disputed between United States and West Florida Massachusetts Rhode Island Connecticut New Jersey Delaware Maryland States Territories Other countries Disputed areas
Economic Life Because most Americans lived on farms agriculture was their main economic activity In the South cotton and tobacco were the leading crops grown for sale The cultivations of cotton had received an enormous boost from the invention of the cotton gin by Eli Whitney in 1793 The cotton gin made it much easier and thus more profitable to separate the valuable cotton fiber from the worthless cotton seeds Wheat and corn were the leading crops in the North and West There was also a growing importance in raising cattle For a time Cincinnati Ohio was the leading meat-packing center in the country Foreign trade was very important to the U S economy in the period 1809 1829 The War of 1812 and problems before the war temporarily stopped foreign trade However it started again and even increased after the war ended in 1815 The nations of Europe especially Britain and France were America’s main trading partners Cotton tobacco and forest products were our country’s main exports to other nations Sugar coffee woolen and cotton manufactured goods and iron products were the leading imports brought to America Manufacturing was also becoming an important economic activity in the United States The interruption in foreign trade forced Americans to start making some The Growing Nation 7 foreign products that they had been importing from Europe As a result in the years between 1815 and 1820 textile manufacturing became a major industry in New England as did making the machines needed to manufacture textiles Laborers work as a team in the dyeing room of a textile mill Around the same time the iron industry began in the Pittsburgh area And in 1817 the first factory for making paper opened in Wilmington Delaware Craftspeople in small shops or at home still did most of the manufacturing Words to Know cotton gin KOT-uhn JIN A machine invented in 1793 by Eli Whitney that made it much easier to separate valuable cotton fiber from useless cotton seeds exports ek-SPORTS The goods or products that are sent out of the country or to send goods out
8 The Growing Nation Other features of a modern economy also emerged Printers in Boston went on strike in 1809 and in other cities in the following years to protest low wages and poor working conditions Workers devoted to improving their members work life organized and created America’s first labor unions The number of banks in America increased greatly in the early 1800s In 1791 Congress following Secretary of the Treasury Alexander Hamilton’s recommendation had created the Bank of the United States to handle the government’s financial transactions The Bank also lent money to private businesses Its success led to the creation of many state banks In 1791 there were only three banks in the whole United States By 1830 there were hundreds of banks Banks were essential to the financing of new business and to overall economic expansion But not all the new banks were well run Management of the Bank of the United States was so poor that Congress did not renew its charter in 1811 Congress soon realized its mistake and created the Second Bank of the United States in 1816 At first the Second Bank also ran poorly Its managers reckless policies helped create the Panic of 1819 during which many businesses failed and individuals went hopelessly into debt Along with the increase in the number of banks came an increase in the number of corporations A corporation is a form of business organization People who wish to invest money in a business can form a corporation The advantage to this is that should the business not succeed the most the investors can lose is the money they have contributed to the corporation Any other money or property they may have is protected Many of these new corporations engaged in building roads and canals Words to Know corporation kor-puh-RAY-shuhn A form of business organization that limits the losses that investors can suffer federal government FED-ur-uhl GUHV-urn-muhnt The national or central government of the United States labor unions LAY-bur YOON-yuhns Organization of workers devoted to improving the members wages and working conditions Secretary of the Treasury Alexander Hamilton
The Growing Nation 9 The Legacy of Chief Justice John Marshall President John Adams appointed John Marshall as chief justice of the Supreme Court in 1801 He continued to serve in that position until his death in 1835 Marshall’s work as chief justice had an enormous impact on American history Marshall so dominated the decisions of the Court that the other justices who served on the Court with him have been almost completely forgotten During the period from 1803 to 1829 Marshall made several decisions that significantly strengthened the power of the federal government and aided America’s economic growth Marshall’s ruling in the Dartmouth College case 1819 stated that the Chief Justice John Marshall Constitution protected a private contract from regulation by a state Although the court modified this decision many years later it stimulated the start of new businesses The case of McCulloch v Maryland 1819 is one of the most important ever decided In it Marshall affirmed Congress’s power to create a national bank a disputed point since the 1790s He also denied a state the right to tax an institution of the federal government such as the Bank of the United States The power to tax involves the power to destroy Marshall wrote holding that the federal government was superior to the states The case of Gibbons v Ogden in 1824 also involved the powers of the federal government versus those of the states The case concerned the regulation of steamboats on the Hudson River Here again Marshall sided with Congress He said that only the federal government acting through Congress not a state could make regulations that concerned commerce or trade between states Besides strengthening the federal government the decision had an immediate practical effect of increasing competition among steamboat companies and lowering their prices for shipping goods
