When the French aristocrats Alexis de Tocqueville and Gustave Beaumont toured the United States in the 1830s, both were struck by the degree of equality and social and physical mobility they witnessed in the American people. While each oversimplified, America's agrarian economy, cheap and available land, and voting laws did promote a certain equality relative to Europe. In the same era, however, the American industrial revolution was shaping a middle class and its institutions. The various embargoes of the early part of the nineteenth century caused many artisans to bring in and manage apprentices and lesser-skilled help; the rise of factories created a similar managerial class. Factories, of course, could not be homes also, and as a result more people began leaving home to go to work and cities began to divide into industrial and residential areas, which further broke down along class lines. Women were left at home, and the "woman's sphere" and cult of domesticity began to take hold. Childhood was also transformed in this era, as middle-class couples married later and had fewer children. The cult of domesticity often dovetailed into or crossed paths with other movements of the time, such as the Second Great Awaking and reform crusades including temperance, abolitionism, and women's rights. Other reformers included utopian communities, which were often, but not always, religious, and voluntary associations.
