sectionalism
Americannoun
noun
Other Word Forms
- sectionalist noun
Etymology
Origin of sectionalism
Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
“What we call polarization, they called sectionalism, and in the 1850s there was a growing sense that the sections of the country were pulling apart,” said Matthew Pinsker of Dickinson University.
From Los Angeles Times • Sep. 13, 2025
Legislatures enacted more stringent codes restricting the rights of slaves and free blacks, and sectionalism replaced nationalism as the sharply divided country inched inexorably toward civil war.
From Washington Post • Jul. 7, 2018
It’s easy to find sectionalism in Southern politics before the Civil War, but the most powerful antebellum Southerners — from Andrew Jackson to Jefferson Davis — were nationalists, not separatists.
From Salon • Oct. 31, 2016
Indeed, the basic sectionalism of American politics would endure through most of the 20th century, even surviving Franklin Roosevelt’s unprecedented New Deal coalition of white ethnics, Northern blacks, Southern segregationists, and liberal reformers.
From Slate • Jul. 24, 2014
The United States, by 1890, had begun to feel the influence of the agencies of communication in breaking down sectionalism and letting in the light of comparative experience.
From The New Nation by Dodd, William E.
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
