American Dream Essay Research Paper A Lifetime — страница 2

important in England didn’t appreciate this system though, which would later lead to change. Your economic status depended on your money and you money on your importance. The same system as was used in England, there were Haves and Have nots, and like in England the Haves ruled. The government was a bit fairer that the one in England however. Everyone who owned land had a right to vote, so everyone had an equal say. They used ballots for voting purposes so that it was fair. However, it truly wasn’t fair because there were a great number of people who owned no land as a result of their land distribution method. However, in order to vote, you had to be a landowner and you had to attend church. So, as things went on, a change was needed, the people came to America so that they

could all be equal and everything would be fair. In the 1650’s Marlborough Massachusetts was formed. Here was where the big changes occurred that gave way to the American Dream. Firstly the land was divided into lots of individualized private property. Everyone farmed on their own, so people had to learn how to make a decision properly. However they were no longer controlled by their neighbors. The society of Marlborough was divided by the interest in the town, not in their previous status. Although this left 38 families with no land it was a whole lot fairer because the more that you do, the more that you get. By participating in the town affairs you got to a higher social class. Participation can include things like Town Meeting, Voting, roadwork, and volunteering for school

and church, along with other such things. Your land determines your economic status, because in the new society, as in the others, land is equal to wealth. There was no class for the Young, the low, or for the newcomers, but instead there was social and economic mobility. They worked under a free enterprise system where the more work you do, the more $ you get. As for politics in this new society the people now had rights. They could petition, assemble, speak and write whatever and whenever they wanted to. And they exercised their rights to do these things by participating in the town. By the 1850’s there was an American dream of sorts. America was a place where you could go if you were religiously persecuted against, if you were poor and couldn’t make anything of yourself in

England you could in America where everything was “fair”. If you made it to America you were home free, so to speak. America was like paradise to the downtrodden of England, and so started the American Dream.