Expansion and Reform (1801-1861)

In the years before the Civil War, the United States experienced dramatic change. The concept of Manifest Destiny took hold in the 1840s, and American settlers moving westward were fueled by the belief that they carried a divine destiny to control land occupied by American Indians. This period also saw rapid economic growth and industrialization, immigration, the Mexican-America War, changes in the political system, and the growth of reform movements, as suffragists rallied at the first women’s rights convention in 1848.