The Challenge of Economic and Social Change

The Challenge of Economic and Social Change

The Abolition of Slavery-In most of the new nations, rhetorical assertion of the universal ideals of freedom and citizenship contrasted sharply with the reality of slavery. Slavery survived in much of the Western Hemisphere until the 1850s--it was strongest in those areas where the export of plantation products was most important. In the early nineteenth century slavery was weakened by abolition in some of the northern states of the United States, by the termination of the African slave trade to the United States (1808), and by the freeing of tens of thousands of slaves who joined the revolutionary armies in the Spanish American republics. But at the same time, increased international demand for plantation products in the first half of the nineteenth century led to increased imports of slaves to Brazil and Cuba. In the United States, abolitionists made moral and religious arguments against slavery. Two groups denied full citizenship rights under the Constitution, women and free African-Americans, played important roles in the abolition movement.The Emancipation Proclamation ended slavery in the rebel states not occupied by the Union army, while final abolition was accomplished with the passage of the Thirteenth Amendment to the Constitution in 1865. In Brazil, progress toward the abolition of slavery was slower and depended on pressure from the British. The heroism of former slaves who joined the Brazilian army in the war against Paraguay helped to feed abolitionist sentiment that led to the abolition in 1888. In the Caribbean colonies there was little support for abolition among whites or among free blacks. Abolition in the British Caribbean colonies was the result of government decisions made in the context of the declining profitability of the sugar plantations of the British West Indies, while abolition in the French colonies followed the over throw of the government of Louis Philippe. Slavery was abolished in Puerto Rico in 1873 and in Cuba in 1886.

Immigration-As the slave trade ended, immigration from Europe and Asia increased. During the nineteenth century Europe provided the majority of immigrants to the Western Hemisphere, while Asian immigration increased after 1850. Immigration brought economic benefits, but hostility to immigration mounted in many nations. Asian immigrants faced discrimination and violence in the UnitedStates, Canada, Peru, Mexico, and Cuba; immigrants from European countries also faced prejudice and discrimination. The desire to sustain a common citizenship inspired a number of policies that aimed to compel immigrants to assimilate. Schools in particular were used to inculcate language, cultural values, and patriotic feelings in an attempt to create homogeneous national cultures.

American Cultures- Despite discrimination, immigrants altered the politics of many of the hemisphere's nations as they sought to influence