Jefferson vs Hamilton

Alexander Hamilton created a proposed Federalist system. The federalist system was a system that focused entirely on government control. Basically no one in the Federalist program had a say in what the government should be like. Only the "rich and well educated" people had a say in what to do in the government. On the other hand people in the Republican party had a voice in how the government should run. Jefferson's republican party listened to the citizens and considered their ideas throughly

Battle of SHiloh

The Battle of Shiloh was a union victory. This battle was the bloodiest battle in american history and had over 23,000 casualties. This started when over 40,000 confederate soldiers struck the union forces. The union forces were unprepared for this attack. However the Confederate commander was injured and pulled out. The fighting continued after dark. Eventually this led to a union led victory.

Why Shiloh was extremely crucial to the war?

It's said to be the bloodiest battle in the civil war. Essentially as a result of Shiloh the confederates were defeated in the very next battle, ultimately allowing the Northerners to seize the Mississippi River and therefore breaking the South into two. This battle opened the eyes of Northern generals, in that they quickly realized that, regardless of the multitude of troops lost in a single battle, the war would be grueling and strenuous and it would take a while to determine which side ultimately triumphed over the other. Because of this battle, the North's progress of the western front became monumental and they eventually took over Tennessee. 

And the War Came

We learned a bit about the beginning of the Civil War. During the Civil War, President Abraham Lincoln did not want to make the first move against the South. He refused to be seen as the "aggressor". He purposely forced the South to make the first move so that they would be seen as the "aggressors". Fort Sumter, a place where a couple of battles were fought, was surrounded by Confederate forces and occupied with Northern troops. As soon as South Carolina found out that Abraham Lincoln was going to be President, they immediately backed out. They wanted nothing to do with Lincoln. Lincoln thought of many strategic ways to avoid firing the first shot. Both the Confederate President Davis and Abraham Lincoln agreed to not fire at each others ships when they arrived. Obviously, something had to go wrong and that lead to Davis firing the first shot. Abraham Lincoln sent in a ship that was ONLY carrying water and food for the troops. The ship did not carry any ammunition or any weapons. General Lee was a very tactical general. He focused more on winning the battles and he handled the troops in front of his opponents. On the other hand, General Grant wanted to quickly win the battles that he fought. One thing that both General Lee and General Grant had in common was that they were both willing to take risks and both of them weren't afraid of failure. General McClellan was AFRAID of failure. But just because he was afraid of failure, that didn't mean he was a "horrible" general. General McClellan was an intelligent and very strategic general. Although, Lincoln did in fact get mad because McClellan would not attack and that meant Lincoln couldn't win the war. In order to accept success, one has to accept failure first.

The Panic of 1857

The Panic of 1857 was a international economic crash and financial panic. For the United States, the panic was due to over-expansion of the national economy while the world-wide economy was declining. This was the first world-wide economic crisis. It was caused by the interconnectedness of the economies between countries. The economies where so connected in the 1850s that when one started to fall the others would follow. The Panic caused the values of stocks and bonds held in American Banks to be lowered. However, while the majority of the world was in an economic crisis, the Southern United States had an increase in cotton sales. This made many people in the South believe that they were superior to others and that that they did not need help from the government. 

9/11/15

Today we watched another part of the "God In America" series, which focused on religion during the era of the Civil War.

It explained how even before the Civil War, religion was splitting the North and South, strictly on the basis of slavery. Both sides believed that God was on their side, and that caused the anti-Slave North and the pro-Slave South to grow apart.

The Methodists, which was the biggest Religion at the time (thanks to Revivals being so popular during the Manifest Destiny) was one of the first to be conflicted during this time. The Abolitionist wanted the current Bishop of the time to step down because he had owned a slave. On the other end of the spectrum the pro-slave church members threatened to leave the Church. After holding a vote, the anti-Slave members prevailed and had the Bishop step down. Because of this, the Southern pro-slave supporters left and many Religious groups followed down the same path soon after.

Andrew Jackson

9/9/2015
Andrew Jackson was a very controversial president, with several appealing aspects to the people at the time, but also with several problems.
On the plus Andrew Jackson was:

• Very appealing to the common man. He spoke and talked about things that common people could relate to. This is the biggest one. He related to the people that matters the most in the election, a strategy in democracy that is still used today.
• A strong and stand out leader. He did not back down to another man and made sure he was heard.
• Had a strong military background.
• Was a very firm leader, which caused some problems when he had bad ideas, but also allowed for a lot less arguing and internal fraction.

However, most people would consider he had a lot more worse aspects than positive ones. These included but were not limited to:

• Violence. Andrew Jackson was just in general a violent man, suspected of several killings in duels and other all around brutish incidents.
• Possibly most famously, made several choices surrounding the Native Americans that would be considered very wrong and not accepted in modern times.
• Because he was so firm in his choices, and because he was a very self centered man, it led to a lot of bad choices being made by the government only because he insisted them to be made.
• Let personal feud get in the way of governing the country properly.

In the end most people would look back at Jackson's presidency and could reasonably claim he wasn't the best president by any means, but you can't argue against the fact that he did his share in shaping America.