Assignment #4: Jacksonian Democracy and the Danger of a Single Story

HISTORICAL ANALYSIS · US HISTORY · HIST-1301

Assignment #4: Jacksonian Democracy and the Danger of a Single Story — How to Write It

Three primary sources, one textbook chapter, one conceptual framework, and a central question that most students answer too narrowly. Here is the full analytical strategy — what the assignment is actually testing and how to build an essay that satisfies every graded element.

20 min read Historical Analysis Strategy HIST-1301 · US History 2-Page Minimum Essay Guide

Custom University Papers Academic Writing Team

Specialist guidance on historical analysis essays across US history survey courses — grounded in what professors score when they evaluate primary source analysis, thesis construction, and the application of conceptual frameworks to historical evidence.

Assignment #4 has a deceptively simple central question: is it accurate to call the Jacksonian period an “Age of Democracy”? The answer almost every student’s first instinct produces — “yes, but also no for some groups” — is technically correct but analytically thin. It describes the contradiction without examining it. What the assignment is actually asking you to do is use Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie’s “danger of a single story” framework to show why that label is incomplete, which specific voices it silences, and what a more accurate historical label would need to account for. The three primary sources are not there to confirm what you already know — they are there to put specific historical actors in conflict with each other, and your essay earns its grade by making that conflict visible and analytically productive.

This guide does not write the essay for you. It gives you the analytical framework, the source-specific evidence strategy, and the paragraph-level structure to build an essay that satisfies all six graded elements listed in the assignment — including the one most students shortchange: the application of Adichie’s argument to a specific historical interpretation problem.

What This Guide Covers

What the Assignment Is Actually Testing Unpacking the Central Question How to Apply the Adichie Framework Each Primary Source: What It Argues and How to Use It The Textbook’s Role — Chapter 10, p. 314 Building a Thesis That Answers the Real Question Paragraph-by-Paragraph Structure How to Satisfy All Six Graded Elements What This Essay Is NOT — The Assignment’s Own Warning Mistakes That Lose Points on This Assignment Frequently Asked Questions

3 Primary sources — all required, each offering a conflicting perspective on democratic expansion

p.314 Specific textbook page — Chapter 10 “Suffrage Reform” must be cited with page number

2 pp Minimum length — meeting it requires substantive engagement with all sources, not padding

6 Graded elements — contextualisation, source analysis, textbook, evaluation, Adichie, and argument

What the Assignment Is Actually Testing

Before building any argument, understand the skill set the rubric is designed to evaluate. The assignment lists six skills: contextualisation, comparing primary sources, evaluating historical labels, identifying inclusion and exclusion in democratic systems, applying a conceptual framework (Adichie), and building a sustained analytical argument. Each of these corresponds to a section of the essay task. An essay that does well on contextualisation but neglects source comparison earns partial credit regardless of how well-written it is.

The most demanding skill on this list — and the one most students underweight — is applying the Adichie framework to a specific historical interpretation problem. This is not a philosophy exercise dropped into a history essay. It is the analytical lens that makes the entire assignment coherent. Adichie’s argument is that reducing a complex reality to a single narrative erases the perspectives that don’t fit. The assignment asks you to demonstrate that the label “Age of Democracy” does exactly that — and to name specifically whose perspectives it erases and why that erasure is historically significant.

The Assignment Tells You Directly What It Is NOT

The assignment sheet explicitly states this essay is not: a summary of Jackson’s presidency, a definition-only exercise on democracy, a paragraph response to each prompt, an opinion piece without evidence, or a discussion of modern politics without historical support. These are not gentle suggestions — they describe the exact patterns that produce low scores on this type of assignment. If your draft mostly summarises what Jackson did, you are not writing a historical analysis essay; you are writing a textbook chapter summary. The assignment is asking you to evaluate a historical label, not chronicle a presidency.

The practical implication: every paragraph should contain at least one primary source citation, one analytical claim about what that evidence means, and a connection to the central question about the label “Age of Democracy.” If a paragraph contains none of these, it is likely either contextualisation (which belongs in the introduction) or padding (which should be cut).

Unpacking the Central Question

The central question is: To what extent is it accurate to describe the Jacksonian period as an “Age of Democracy,” and how do multiple perspectives challenge that label?

There are two parts to this question, and both require an answer. “To what extent” asks for a qualified judgment — not a binary yes/no but a position with limits and conditions. “How do multiple perspectives challenge that label” asks for evidence-based analysis from at least two conflicting viewpoints drawn from the primary sources. An essay that answers only the first part (“it was somewhat democratic”) without the second (“and here is specifically how Rhode Islanders, Black Philadelphians, and Richmond’s non-freeholders each reveal a different dimension of that limit”) does not meet the assignment’s analytical requirement.

What a Sophisticated Answer to This Question Looks Like

The label “Age of Democracy” accurately describes a genuine expansion of suffrage for one category of citizen — propertyless white men — while simultaneously marking a period in which democratic participation was actively contracted for others. The three primary sources do not all tell the same story about democratic expansion; they tell competing stories that together expose the label’s dependence on a narrow definition of who counts as a citizen deserving of political voice. Rhode Island’s non-freeholders, Richmond’s landless workers, and Black Philadelphians all use the language of republican democracy to argue their inclusion — and the fact that these arguments had to be made at all, and that Black Philadelphians lost ground during the same period white men gained it, is precisely what Adichie’s framework identifies as the consequence of accepting a single story about democratic progress.

This is not the thesis of your essay — it is a model of the level of analytical complexity the question requires. Your thesis should take a position on the accuracy of the label and commit to the evidence-based argument that supports it.

How to Apply the Adichie Framework Without Forcing It

Adichie’s “Danger of a Single Story” argument is the conceptual framework required by the assignment. The framework holds that when a single narrative is used to describe a complex reality, the stories of those who don’t fit the dominant narrative are suppressed, distorted, or erased — with consequences for how people understand themselves and their history. The framework applies to this assignment in a specific and non-trivial way.

The “single story” in this assignment is the label “Jacksonian Democracy” / “Age of Democracy” — the dominant historical narrative that frames the 1820s–1840s primarily as a period of expanding democratic participation. This narrative is not false, but it is partial: it draws its evidence from the expansion of white male suffrage and presents that expansion as the defining democratic story of the era. Adichie’s framework asks: what happens to the historical record when that partial story is treated as complete? Who is written out? What is misunderstood about the nature of democratic change in this period?

Your task is to demonstrate — using the three primary sources — that the period contains multiple competing stories about democracy, and that a historically accurate account requires engaging with all of them, not just the one that fits the dominant label.

Three Ways to Deploy the Adichie Framework in Your Essay

Option 1 — Introduction and Thesis: Introduce Adichie’s argument briefly in your opening paragraph as the analytical lens, then use it as the frame for your thesis. “The label ‘Age of Democracy’ represents the danger Adichie identifies — a single story drawn from one group’s experience that obscures the simultaneous contraction of democratic rights for others.”

Option 2 — Dedicated Section: After analysing the primary sources, include a paragraph that explicitly names how the Adichie framework applies — what the single story is, who is erased by it, and what a more complete historical account would require. This approach keeps the framework from being scattered across the essay and makes the conceptual application visible to the grader.

Option 3 — Conclusion: Return to Adichie in the conclusion after building the evidence-based argument, using the framework to explain why the label problem matters beyond this specific period — what it means for how historians use broad labels and for whose experiences those labels typically privilege.

All three work. Option 2 produces the clearest Adichie application because it requires you to name the framework explicitly and connect it to your specific historical evidence in one place, making it easier for the grader to see that you have satisfied that element.

Each Primary Source: Argument, Audience, and Analytical Use

The assignment requires you to use all three primary sources and to show how they differ in their interpretation of democracy. Generic analysis — “all three sources argue that democracy should be expanded” — does not satisfy the comparison requirement. Each source makes a distinct argument from a distinct position, and the analytical value comes from putting those arguments against each other and against the textbook’s account of the same period.

Rhode Islanders Protest Property Restrictions on Voting, 1834

Who: Non-landholding white men in Rhode Island. Argument: Property ownership is an arbitrary and anti-republican basis for suffrage — a mechanic who pays taxes, serves in the military, and contributes to the community should not be excluded from voting simply because he has not yet accumulated land. Key claim: Suffrage is a right claimed by the people, not a gift granted by the government. How to use it: This source represents the successful democratic expansion narrative — these men eventually won suffrage. It also shows that expansion required sustained political struggle, not natural democratic progress.

Black Philadelphians Defend their Voting Rights, 1838

Who: Free Black men in Philadelphia, represented by Robert Purvis. Argument: The expansion of suffrage to poor white men came at the direct cost of Black men’s voting rights — Pennsylvania’s 1838 constitution stripped Black men of a right they had previously held for 47 years. The document argues this is not just unjust but anti-republican and economically irrational. Key claim: Democratic expansion for one group was structurally connected to democratic contraction for another. How to use it: This is the source that most directly complicates the “Age of Democracy” label. Black Philadelphians were not merely excluded from a new expansion — they were actively removed from a participation they already had.

Petition of Citizens of Richmond, 1829–1830 & Warren Dutton, Massachusetts 1820

Who: Two documents in one — Richmond’s non-freeholders petitioning the Virginia Constitutional Convention, and Warren Dutton making the opposing case for retaining property qualifications. Arguments in conflict: Richmond’s petitioners argue landless citizens are treated like “aliens or slaves” and that virtue, intelligence, and patriotism — not land — constitute civic worth. Dutton argues property qualifications protect against “paupers” and corruption, and that universal suffrage risks making democracy indistinguishable from despotism. How to use it: This source is the most useful for demonstrating that democratic expansion was contested — it gives you both sides of the internal debate about who deserves the vote, and Dutton’s argument shows that opposition to expansion had its own principled (if exclusionary) logic.

“The assignment’s analytical core is not that some groups were excluded — it is that different groups’ experiences of the same period were structurally incompatible. Expanding suffrage for white men required redefining citizenship in racial terms. That is not a side note to the Age of Democracy. It is what the Age of Democracy produced.”

The Textbook’s Role: Chapter 10, “Suffrage Reform,” p. 314

The assignment requires you to use the textbook — Chapter 10 on suffrage reform, page 314 — and to cite it with a page number. The textbook is not just supporting material; it is the source that establishes the dominant historical interpretation you are evaluating. The textbook’s account of suffrage reform in this period will provide the context for the label “Age of Democracy” and the data about democratic expansion that makes the label seem reasonable on its surface.

Your analytical task is to use the textbook’s account as the “single story” that Adichie’s framework critiques — and then use the primary sources to show what that story leaves out. This is the structural logic of the essay: the textbook provides the established interpretation; the primary sources complicate it; Adichie’s framework explains why that complication matters historically and methodologically.

How to Cite the Textbook Correctly

The assignment specifies that textbook evidence requires a page number citation. Use a parenthetical citation format: (Textbook, p. 314) or whichever citation format your professor has specified. Do not summarise an entire chapter — pull one or two specific claims or data points from the textbook that directly support your contextualisation of the era. The most useful textbook material for this essay is whatever the textbook says about the expansion of white male suffrage, the state-by-state removal of property qualifications, and the numerical or geographic scope of that expansion. That evidence establishes the factual basis for the “Age of Democracy” label — which you then complicate using the primary sources.

Building a Thesis That Answers the Real Question

Your thesis needs to do three things: take a position on the accuracy of the label “Age of Democracy,” identify the evidence-based reason that position is qualified, and signal the analytical framework (Adichie / the danger of a single story) that explains why the qualification matters. A thesis that does only the first thing — “the Jacksonian era was only partially democratic” — is a claim without an argument. A thesis that does all three gives your essay a coherent analytical direction from the first paragraph.

Weak Thesis — Descriptive, Not Analytical

“The Jacksonian era was called the Age of Democracy because voting rights expanded for white men, but Black Americans and women were excluded, making it not truly democratic for all people.” This describes the contradiction but explains nothing about why it is historically significant or what analytical framework it illustrates.

Stronger Thesis — Analytical and Framework-Linked

“While the Jacksonian era produced a genuine expansion of suffrage for white men without property, the label ‘Age of Democracy’ constitutes the single story Adichie warns against — one that treats the experiences of those who gained rights as the era’s defining democratic narrative while erasing the simultaneous disfranchisement of Black citizens whose participation was actively revoked, not merely withheld.”

The stronger thesis is not better because it is longer — it is better because it commits to a specific analytical claim (the label “erases” rather than merely “ignores”), names the specific evidence it will use (disfranchisement of Black citizens), and frames the argument using the required conceptual tool (Adichie’s single story). That specificity gives every subsequent paragraph a clear job to do.

Paragraph-by-Paragraph Structure for a 2-Page Minimum Essay

Two pages minimum at standard formatting (double-spaced, 12pt, 1-inch margins) is approximately 500–600 words. That is enough for an introduction with thesis, three body paragraphs, and a conclusion — but only if every paragraph is analytically dense. If you write thin paragraphs that summarise sources without analysing them, you will hit the page minimum without satisfying the six graded elements. Structure the essay around the analytical tasks, not the sources — each paragraph should make an analytical claim and use source evidence to support it, rather than being organised as “paragraph 1 = source 1, paragraph 2 = source 2.”

Introduction: Contextualise the Era and State the Thesis (75–100 words)
Open with the historical context: what historians mean by “Jacksonian Democracy,” what the textbook says about suffrage expansion in this period, and why the label “Age of Democracy” became the standard description of the Jackson era. Close the introduction with your thesis — a specific, analytical claim about the label’s accuracy and its limitations as identified through the primary sources and the Adichie framework. Do not summarise the primary sources here; introduce the analytical problem.
Body Paragraph 1: What Democratic Expansion Looked Like — and Who Drove It (100–120 words)
Use the Rhode Island petition (1834) and the Richmond petition (1829–1830) together to show what democratic expansion in this era actually looked like: a contested, politically organised struggle by landless white men who used the language of republican rights to demand inclusion. Use the textbook (p. 314) to provide the national context for this expansion. The analytical claim: democratic expansion in this period was not a natural evolution of American ideals — it was the result of specific political mobilisation by one group, using arguments that were simultaneously used to exclude others.
Body Paragraph 2: What Democratic Expansion Cost — The Disfranchisement of Black Men (100–120 words)
Use the Black Philadelphians document (1838) as the central evidence for this paragraph. The analytical claim: the expansion of white male suffrage was structurally connected to the contraction of Black male suffrage — Pennsylvania’s 1838 “Reform Convention” stripped Black men of voting rights they had held under the original constitution for 47 years. The document’s specific evidence (the community’s tax contributions, population data, public welfare statistics) should be cited to show that Black Philadelphians met and exceeded every civic criterion the Rhode Island and Richmond petitioners used to claim their own inclusion — and were still excluded. This is the most direct challenge to the “Age of Democracy” label.
Body Paragraph 3: The Adichie Framework — Why the Label Is Historically Dangerous (80–100 words)
This paragraph makes the conceptual framework explicit. Name Adichie’s argument briefly, then apply it directly: the “Age of Democracy” label is not merely incomplete — it actively shapes how the period is remembered by centering one group’s democratic gains as the era’s defining story. The label teaches a version of American democratic development that equates democratic expansion with democratic progress, without accounting for the groups whose political participation was simultaneously eroded. Identify specifically which perspectives are erased by the label and what a more accurate historical account would need to include.
Conclusion: The Historically Grounded Argument (60–80 words)
The conclusion should restate your thesis in light of the evidence you have assembled — not just restate it verbatim, but show that the essay has supported it. Address the assignment’s “make a historically grounded argument” element directly: state whether the label is accurate, misleading, or incomplete; explain how the different perspectives in the sources reveal contradictions in the era; and close with a sentence about why historians must examine multiple viewpoints before applying broad labels to historical periods.

How to Satisfy All Six Graded Elements

The assignment lists six elements your essay should explain. Each maps directly to a specific part of the essay structure above. Use this table as a self-check before submitting.

Graded Element	Where It Goes in the Essay	What “Satisfying It” Looks Like
1. Contextualise the Era	Introduction	A specific explanation of what “Jacksonian Democracy” means as a historical label, supported by the textbook (p. 314) with page citation — not a general statement about Jackson being president
2. Analyse the Primary Sources	Body paragraphs 1 and 2	Each source cited with a specific claim it makes, identification of who benefits from democracy in that source, and explicit comparison of how sources differ — not just what each says, but how they contradict or complicate each other
3. Incorporate the Textbook	Introduction and body paragraph 1	At least one specific piece of evidence from Chapter 10, p. 314, cited with the page number in the format your professor requires — not a generic reference to “the textbook”
4. Evaluate the Meaning of “Democracy”	Body paragraphs 1, 2, and conclusion	A direct answer to “for whom?” — naming which groups are included and excluded, with evidence, and addressing whether democracy is equally distributed in this era based on the sources
5. Apply Adichie’s Argument	Body paragraph 3 (and optionally thesis and conclusion)	An explicit named connection between Adichie’s “danger of a single story” concept and the specific label problem in this assignment — not just “there are many perspectives” but a specific claim about what story is being told, by whom, and whose perspectives it erases
6. Make a Historically Grounded Argument	Thesis and conclusion	A clear position on whether the label is accurate, misleading, or incomplete — supported by evidence from the sources throughout the essay, not just asserted in the conclusion

What This Essay Is NOT: The Assignment’s Own Warning, Expanded

The assignment sheet lists five things this essay is not. Each one describes a failure mode that is common enough to be worth naming explicitly. Understanding what each prohibition means in practice prevents the most frequent errors on this type of assignment.

Not a Summary of Jackson’s Presidency

Andrew Jackson is barely relevant to this essay. The assignment is about the label “Jacksonian Democracy” — a historical concept applied to an era — not about Jackson’s specific policies, the Bank War, the Trail of Tears, or his personality. If your draft spends more than two sentences on anything Jackson personally did, you have drifted into a biographical summary. Refocus on the sources and the suffrage question.

Not a Definition-Only Exercise on Democracy

Spending a paragraph defining democracy before analysing the sources is a common avoidance strategy that costs words and earns no analytical credit. The assignment assumes you know what democracy means as a concept. What it is asking is whether the label describes this specific historical period accurately given this specific historical evidence. Start analysing; don’t start defining.

Not a Paragraph Response to Each Prompt

The six essay elements are analytical targets, not a list of questions to answer one by one. An essay that has six paragraphs each beginning “The assignment asks…” or that mechanically addresses each bullet point is a list of answers, not a sustained argument. Write paragraphs organised around analytical claims, not around assignment prompts.

Not an Opinion Piece Without Historical Support

Every claim in the essay needs evidence from the assigned sources. “It is unfair that Black Americans lost voting rights” is an opinion. “The Black Philadelphians document demonstrates that Pennsylvania’s 1838 Reform Convention revoked suffrage from men who had held it under the original constitution for 47 years, despite those men paying $3,252.83 in taxes the previous year” is a historically supported analytical claim. The difference between these is the difference between a personal reflection and a historical analysis essay.

Not a Discussion of Modern Politics Without Historical Support

The Adichie framework is contemporary; the sources are historical. Connecting this essay to contemporary voting rights debates or modern racial politics might feel natural, but the assignment is specifically about evaluating a historical label using historical evidence. A brief forward-looking sentence in the conclusion is acceptable; an essay that uses the Jacksonian era as a springboard to discuss present-day voter suppression has left the historical analysis assignment entirely.

Mistakes That Lose Points on This Specific Assignment

Treating the Sources as Equally Weighted

The Black Philadelphians document is the analytically pivotal source for this assignment because it is the only source that shows democratic contraction happening simultaneously with democratic expansion. If your essay treats all three sources as making similar points about excluded groups, you have missed the structural argument the assignment is built around. The Rhode Island and Richmond sources show contestation within the expansion story; the Black Philadelphians source shows the expansion story’s cost.

Applying Adichie Generically

“There is a danger of a single story” is not an application of Adichie’s argument — it is a restatement of the concept’s title. An actual application names the specific single story (the “Age of Democracy” label), identifies specifically whose story it tells (propertyless white men who gained suffrage), names what it erases (Black men who lost suffrage, women, enslaved people), and explains the consequence of that erasure for historical understanding.

Missing the Textbook Page Citation

The assignment explicitly requires textbook evidence with a page number citation. A reference to Chapter 10 without “p. 314” (or the relevant page number from your edition) is an incomplete citation. The grader is checking for this specifically — it demonstrates that you used the assigned source rather than outside material or general knowledge.

A Thesis That Only Describes Rather Than Argues

The most common thesis error: stating that “the Jacksonian era was democratic for some but not others.” This is a description, not an argument. An argument makes a claim about what that pattern means — why it matters, what it reveals about the label, how it illustrates the Adichie framework, and what it tells us about how historians should use broad labels.

Frequently Asked Questions

Do I need to use all three primary sources, or can I focus on two?

All three are listed as required sources — the assignment says “you must use all of the following.” More importantly, the analytical argument the assignment is designed to produce requires all three. The Rhode Island and Richmond sources provide the evidence of contested expansion; the Black Philadelphians source provides the evidence of simultaneous contraction. Without all three, the “competing perspectives” element and the Adichie application both weaken significantly. Use all three and make sure each is explicitly cited in the body of the essay, not just mentioned.

How do I cite the primary sources — do I need formal footnotes or is in-text citation enough?

The assignment does not specify a citation format, but it does require the textbook to be cited with a page number. For primary sources, standard practice in a US history survey course is to include the source name and date in the sentence or in a parenthetical the first time you cite it — for example: “The Black Philadelphians document (1838) argues…” or “(Black Philadelphians, 1838).” For the textbook, use a parenthetical with the page number: (Chapter 10, p. 314) or the format specified in your course’s Historical Analysis Instructions document. When in doubt, use the same format your professor has used in examples.

The assignment says “2 page minimum” — what does that actually mean in terms of word count?

Two pages double-spaced at 12pt font with standard margins is approximately 500–600 words. This is the floor, not the target. An essay that hits exactly 500 words through thin analysis will not earn full marks on the six analytical elements even if it meets the page requirement. Aim for 600–750 words — enough to develop each analytical paragraph substantively without padding. If you find yourself significantly over 750 words, you are likely over-summarising sources or repeating points; if you are significantly under 500 words, you have not developed the argument adequately.

Warren Dutton’s argument is the opposite of the other sources — how do I use it?

Dutton’s argument is one of the most analytically useful pieces in the assignment precisely because it is the opposite of what the other sources argue. He makes the case for retaining property qualifications — arguing that wealth correlates with virtue, that universal suffrage creates instability, and that men without property would place the property of others at risk. Using Dutton alongside the Richmond petition (which argues the opposite) lets you show that democratic expansion was contested, that the opposition had its own principled (if exclusionary) logic, and that the outcomes of that contest — who gained rights and who did not — were political choices, not inevitable democratic progress. That is a much stronger analytical point than simply saying Dutton was wrong.

Can I use sources beyond the four listed in the assignment?

The assignment states explicitly: “You may not use outside sources.” This means no Wikipedia, no secondary sources beyond the textbook, no additional primary sources found online. The assignment is designed to develop your ability to build an analytical argument from a constrained set of evidence — using outside sources either inflates the essay with material the professor cannot verify or demonstrates that you did not engage seriously with the assigned materials. Stick to the four required sources.

Where does the Adichie framework appear in the essay — does it need its own paragraph?

It does not need to be confined to a single paragraph, but it does need to be named explicitly at least once and applied specifically rather than gesturally. The most reliable approach is to introduce the concept briefly in the thesis or introduction (“what Adichie calls the danger of a single story”), apply it specifically to the label problem in one body paragraph, and return to it in the conclusion as the reason the label problem matters beyond this specific case. Spreading it thinly across the essay without ever applying it to specific evidence risks the grader seeing it as a passing reference rather than a genuine analytical application.

Putting the Argument Together

The structure of this essay is straightforward once you have the analytical clarity. The textbook provides the dominant story — democratic expansion, suffrage reform, the Age of Democracy. The Rhode Island and Richmond sources show that even the “winning” side of this story required contestation and political struggle, not natural democratic development. The Black Philadelphians source shows that the expansion of democracy for white men was not incidental to but structurally dependent on the contraction of democracy for Black men — Pennsylvania did not simply fail to include Black citizens in a new expansion; it removed them from participation they had previously held. And Adichie’s framework provides the analytical vocabulary for explaining why that matters: calling this an “Age of Democracy” is not just incomplete — it is the kind of single story that forecloses the more complex and more accurate account the historical evidence demands.

Every paragraph of your essay should be doing analytical work that serves that argument. If a sentence could be removed without weakening the argument, it should be cut. If a source is cited without an analytical claim about what it means for the central question, the citation is decorative, not evidential. Write with the six graded elements as your checklist and the central question as your compass, and the 2-page minimum will take care of itself.

Required Sources for This Assignment

Primary Sources: Rhode Islanders Protest Property Restrictions on Voting (1834) · Black Philadelphians Defend their Voting Rights (1838) · Petition of Citizens of Richmond (1829–1830) and Warren Dutton, Standard Argument against Expanded Suffrage, Massachusetts (1820) · Course Textbook: Chapter 10, “Suffrage Reform,” p. 314 · Conceptual Framework: Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie, “The Danger of a Single Story” · No outside sources permitted.

Assignment #4: Jacksonian Democracy and the Danger of a Single Story