Nationalism And Sectionalism In The 1800's

During the early 1800’s, two ideologies dominated American society and politics, nationalism and sectionalism. Nationalism is when a person has strong feelings and pride in his country, while sectionalism is when a person only has pride in a particular region of the nation. While both of these ideologies were influential, but one of these ideologies would arise to become more popular and influence more political actions than the other. It can be argued that nationalism is the older of the two ideals. It influence the colonists to declare their independence from Great Britain, leading to the American Revolution and the creation of the United States of America. People began to feel proud of their new nation leading to people showing their respect for it. One example of this was Joseph Drake writing his poem, “The American Flag,” which showed his pride for America. A second example was Stephen Decatur’s toast given at Norfolk, Virginia, where he exclaimed “Our Country! In her intercourse with foreign nations may she always be in the right; but our country, right or wrong!” This shows that he had great hope and faith in his country and believed that our government would make the right decisions in foreign affairs. While nationalism became popular throughout America, a second …show more content…
One of the major causes of sectionalism was the issue with slavery in America. People in the North wanted to abolish slavery, while those in the South supported slavery and deemed it necessary to the survival of the economic status of America. This was because of the different ideals of the Northern and Southern states due to their economic and environmental differences. This led to the creation of documents such as the Missouri Compromise, which allowed Missouri to remain a slave state and Maine to become a slave free state. Both John Quincy Adams and Thomas Jefferson favored the Compromise, showing that sectionalism was prominent in