Antebellum Reformers: Roots of Progressivism

By Douglas V. Gibbs

Good intentions and the role of government conflict when government is used as a tool to reform society. Making society better through governmental programs is a mainstay of liberalism, and much of those ideals were present, and may have even began, during the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries. During that time period the first efforts to help society progress to a more equitable system through reform emerged. These secular efforts sought to reinvigorate American ideals, and reinforce what they perceived to be America’s commitment to equality and social justice. They dared to fight for a better world, inspired by the Declaration of Independence, but were unable to recognize the potential for tyranny as they used government programs to reach their aims.

The antebellum reformers believed that deep inside our individual character resided the problem, and through religion and moral reform, members of society could be encouraged to internalize self-restraints, and be guided towards a utopian model. The intentions were sometimes based on Christian beliefs, and the desire for this nation to strengthen its Christian character. After all, shouldn’t we all be humanitarians? Through reform, guided by their efforts, and emerging government programs, the reformers believed they could stamp out human misery by creating institutions to deal with what they considered to be deviant groups. The reformer’s social control would build prisons, public schools, and asylums. They sought to rectify society’s problems by educating children, rehabilitating criminals, and providing refuges for society’s outcasts. By removing these underlying sources of sin and inequality, they believed, they could create a utopia, of sorts. Then, they could guarantee the existence of a righteous America, built firmly on a foundation of a perfect society.

Many of these reformers were involved in the abolitionist movement, and women’s rights movement. They sought to free Americans from various forms of bondage, and eradicate the relics of a barbaric past. They considered their movement one of progress, which in the long run would be for the betterment of society. But instead of creating a better society, these reformers were simply replacing physical coercion with psychological control and confinement.

Out of the antebellum reform movement emerged governmental paternalism, where social programs worked to control society. The government began to suppress the working class culture so as to insert instead a more civilized set of values championed by the elite. Public schools served to teach the children what was best for society, while prisons and reform schools sought to re-educate, or repress and isolate deviants. The reformers, and the government, grew their progressive experiment, and it all eventually became a “vast campaign to impose order on society by increasing the power of the state.”

As progressives worked to redeem, rehabilitate, shape, and regulate, in the hopes of creating an orderly and rational society, they also began to de-emphasize theology. Traditional customs, practices, and institutions were considered to be obstacles to progress. What society needed, the reformers believed, was self-discovery, social progress, and intellectual liberation from the chains of religion. Therefore, the reformers became more than just institution builders. They believed they must organize society through complex government bureaucracies that go beyond sectarian and local boundaries. The reformers believed that this was the only way to their utopian vision of communal compassion and responsibility. Their paternalistic programs that claimed to be moral and beneficial, however, became a hindrance that instead gave rise to government determining moral standards, and dictating those standards to the people.

Ultimately, the antebellum reformers, and the progressives that followed them, had an exaggerated faith in the abilities of government, and they had an exaggerated faith that utopia could be achieved through a combination of social engineering, moral uplift, professional expertise, and the reshaping of moral character. As Rousseau was quoted as saying, they wished to “force the people to be free.” Along the way, however, the precious notion of individuality has nearly been lost. Voluntary choice has been suppressed, and the exceptional uniqueness of America is being diluted so as to make our society an acceptable one to the liberal elites.

In the end, the antebellum reformer’s goals have not been met. Instead, the very things the reformers sought to eradicate, such as exploitation, poverty, violence, ignorance, and injustice, have not only not been eradicated, but continue to be social problems that have worsened. The high-minded idealists sought to improve the conditions of their society, and the nation as a whole, but their reforms became nothing more than social control, and a system of discipline against the poor and deviant. The social engineering has given way to class and race warfare. Their visions, it turns out, were not only impractical and unrealistic, but ended up increasing the very things they were working to eliminate. The drive for progress through social reform, however, continues today, as a tool used by today’s American liberal. And as during the antebellum period, progressivism has proven to be a failure.

-- Political Pistachio Conservative News and Commentary

Steven Mintz, Moralists & Modernizers; Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1995.