| Term | Definition |
|---|
| Separatist vs. non-Separatist Puritans | Radical Calvinists against the Church of England; Separatists (Pilgrims) argued for a break from the Church of England, led the Mayflower, and established the settlement at Plymouth |
| Northwest Passage | believed to provide shortcut from Atlantic to Pacific, searched for by Giovanni de Verrazano for Francis I in the race to Asian wealth |
| Conversion Experience | required of members of the Puritan Church; took the place of baptism required by the Catholic Church |
| Social Reciprocity | society naturally punishes criminals indiscriminantly |
| Church of England | Protestant church led by the king of England, independent of Catholic Church; tended toward Catholicism during reign of Catholic royalty |
| Atlantic slave trade | often debtors sold to slave traders by African kings seeking riches; Columbian Exchange |
| Jamestown | first permanent English settlement in the Americas (1607), along James River |
| John Smith | introduced work ethic to Jamestown colony, sanitation, diplomat to local Native American tribes; had fought Spanish and Turks |
| Pocahontas | key to English-Native American relationship, died in England in 1617 |
| Mayflower Compact | foundation for self-government laid out by the first Massachusetts settlers before arriving on land |
| John Winthrop | Calvinist, devised concept of "city on a hill" ("A Model of Christian Charity"); founded highly successful towns in Massachusetts Bay |
| "City on a Hill" | exemplary Christian community, rich to show charity, held to Calvinistic beliefs |
| Indentured servants | settlers to pay the expenses of a servant's voyage and be granted land for each person they brought over; headright system |
| Maryland Act of Religious Toleration (1649) | mandated the toleration of all Christian denominations in Maryland, even though Maryland was founded for Catholics (but majority was protestant) |
| King James I, King Charles | reluctant to give colonists their own government, preferred to appoint royal governors |
| William Penn and the Quakers | settled in Pennsylvania, believed the "Inner Light" could speak through any person and ran religious services without ministers |
| Roger Williams | challenged New Englanders to completely separate Church from State, as the State would corrupt the church |
| Anne Hutchinson | challenged New England Calvinist ministers' authority, as they taught the good works for salvation of Catholicism |
| The Half-Way Covenant | New Englanders who did not wish to relate their conversion experiences could become half-way saints so that their children would be able to have the opportunity to be saints |
| Bacon's Rebellion | rebels felt the governor of Virginia failed to protect the frontier from the Native Americans |
| Navigation Acts | only English and American ships allowed to colonial ports; dissent began in 1763 |
| Mercantilism | ensured trade with mother country, nationalism; too restrictive on colonial economy, not voted on by colonists |
| Charles II, James II | tried to rule as absolute monarchs without using Parliament, little to no sympathy for colonial legislatures |
| William and Mary | ended the Dominion of New England, gave power back to colonies |
| Dominion of New England | combined Massachusetts, New Hampshire, Connecticut, Rhode Island, and Plymouth (and later Jersey and New York) into one "supercolony" governed by Sir Edmond Andros, a "supergovernor" |
| The Glorious Revolution | William and Mary kicked James II out of England (exiled into France), allowed more power to the legislatures |
| James Oglethorpe | established colony of Georgia as a place for honest debtors |
| The Enlightenment | emphasis on human reason, logic, and science (acquired, not nascent, knowledge); increased followers of Christianity |
| Benjamin Franklin | connected the colonies to Britain, opposed to unnecessary unfair taxation; strong influence on Albany Plan |
| The Great Awakening | began by Edwards to return to Puritanism, increased overall religious involvement, gave women more active roles in religion, more and more ministers sprouted up throughout the country; mainly affected towns and cities |
| Deists | believed that God created the universe to act through natural laws; Franklin, Jefferson, Paine |
| George Whitefield | powerful speaker, toured the country and inspired many into Christianity |
| Jonathan Edwards | Puritan minister, led revivals, stressed immediate repentance, wrote "Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God" |
| New Lights vs. Old Lights | New Lights brought new ideas, rejected by Old Lights; both sought out institutions independent of each other |
| Albany Plan of Union | colonies proposed colonial confederation under lighter British rule (crown-appointed president, "Grand Council"); never took effect |
| French and Indian War | French threat at the borders was no longer present, therefore the colonies didn't need English protection; more independent stand against Britain |
| Proclamation of 1763 | prohibited settlements west of Appalachian, restriction on colonial growth |
| Salutary Neglect | Parliament took minor actions in the colonies, allowing them to experiment with and become accustomed to self-government, international trade agreements |
| Writs of Assistance | search warrants on shipping to reduce smuggling; challenged by James Otis |
| Townshend Act (1767) | similar to Navigation; raised money to pay colonial officials by American taxes; led to Boston boycott of English luxuries |
| Sugar Act | increased tariff on sugar (and other imports), attempted to harder enforce existing tariffs |
| Stamp Act | taxes on all legal documents to support British troops, not approved by colonists through their representatives |
| Stamp Act Congress | held in New York, agreed to not import British goods until Stamp Act was repealed |
| Virginia Resolves | "no taxation without representation," introduced by Patrick Henry |
| Currency Act | prohibited colonies from issuing paper money, destabilized colonial economy |
| Virtual Representation | all English subjects are represented in Parliament, including those not allowed to vote |
| The Loyal Nine | group of Bostonians in opposition to the Stamp Act, sought to drive stamp distributors from the city |
| Sons of Liberty | organized and controlled resistance against Parliamentary acts in less violent ways (strength of martyrdom), advocated nonimportation |
| Declaratory Act | allowed Parliament to completely legislate over the colonies, limited colonists' say |
| Boston Massacre | British soldiers shot into crowd of snowball fight; two of nine soldiers (defended by John Adams) found guilty of manslaughter |
| Committees of Correspondence | committees appointed from different colonies to communicate on matters; asserted rights to self¬government, cooperation between colonies |
| Tea Act (1773) | intended to save British East India Company from bankruptcy, could sell directly to consumers rather than through wholesalers (lowered prices to compete with smuggled tea) |
| Boston Tea Party | peaceful destruction of British tea in Boston Harbor by colonists disguised as Indians |
| Quebec Acts | former French subjects in Canada allowed to keep Catholicism, while American colonists expected to participate in the Church of England |
| Intolerable Acts (Coercive Acts) | in reaction to the Boston Tea Party; closing of Boston Harbor, revocation of Massachusetts charter (power to governor), murder in the name of royal authority would be tried in England or another colony |
| Suffolk Resolves | organize militia, end trade with Britain, refuse to pay taxes to Britain |
| Olive Branch Petition | politely demanded from the king a cease¬fire in Boston, repeal of Coercive Acts,. guarantee of American rights |
| Thomas Paine, Common Sense | stressed to the American people British maltreatment and emphasize a need for revolution; appealed to American emotions |
| George Washington | American commander-in-chief; first president, set precedents for future presidents, put down Whiskey Rebellion (enforced Whiskey Tax), managed first presidential cabinet, carefully used power of executive to avoid monarchial style rule |
| Whigs (Patriots) | most numerous in New England, fought for independence |
| Tories (Loyalists) | fought for return to colonial rule, usually conservative (educated and wealthy |
| British strengths and weaknesses | British citizenship outnumbered colonies', large navy and professional army; exhausted resources (Hessians hired), national debt |
| Colonial strengths and weaknesses | fair amount of troops, short guerilla tactics, strong leaders (Washington); nonprofessional army that could not handle long battles |
| Battle of Saratoga | American general Horatio Gates was victorious over British general Burgoyne |
| Valley Forge | scarce supplies (food and clothing), army motivated by von Steuben |
| Battle of Yorktown | last major battle; surrender of Cornwallis, led King George III to officially make peace with the colonies |
| Treaty of Paris (1783) | full American independence, territory west of Appalachian ceded to America, loyalists to be compensated for seized property, fishing rights off of Newfoundland |
| American society during the Revolution | British-occupied cities, new governments, fighting by any with experience, loaned money, African-Americans and Native Americans involved |
| Articles of Confederation | states joined for foreign affairs, Congress reigned supreme (lacked executive and judicial), one vote per state, 2/3 vote for bills, unanimous for amendments; too much power to states, unable to regulate commerce or taxes |
| Virginia Statute on Religious Freedom (1786) | foundation for First Amendment, offered free choice of religion, not influenced by state |
| Northwest Ordinance of 1787 | defined process for territories to become states (population reached 60,000), forbade slavery in the new territories |
| Alexander Hamilton | pushed for Assumption (federal government to assume state debts), pushed creation of the National Bank (most controversial), loose interpretation of Constitution, leader of Federalist Party |
| James Madison | strong central government, separation of powers, "extended republic" |
| Shays's Rebellion | mistreated farmers, fear of monocracy, forced people to think about central government |
| Connecticut Compromise | advocated by Roger Sherman, proposed two independently-voting senators per state and representation in the House based on population |
| Virginia Plan | bicameral congressional representation based on population |
| New Jersey Plan | equal representation in unicameral congress |
| Commerce Compromise | congress could tax imports but not exports |
| Federalism | strong central government provided by power divided between state and national governments, checks and balances, amendable constitution |
| Changes in the Constitution from the Articles | stronger union of states, equal and population-based representation, simple majority vote (with presidential veto), regulation of foreign and interstate commerce, execution by president, power to enact taxes, federal courts, easier amendment process |
| Elastic Clause ("necessary and proper") | gives Congress the power to pass laws it deems necessary to enforce the Constitution |
| Federalists vs. Anti-Federalists | Anti-Federalists wanted states' rights, bill of rights, unanimous consent, reference to religion, more power to less-rich and common people; Federalists wanted strong central government, more power to experienced, separation of church and state, stated that national government would protect individual rights |
| The Federalist Papers | written anonymously by Hamilton, Jay, and Madison; commentary on Constitution, republicanism extended over large territory |
| Judiciary Act of 1789 | established federal district courts that followed local procedures, Supreme Court had final jurisdiction; compromise between nationalists and advocates for states' rights |
| Bill of Rights | protected rights of individual from the power of the central government |
| Bank of the United States | Hamilton's plan to solve Revolutionary debt, Assumption highly controversial, pushed his plan through Congress, based on loose interpretation of Constitution |
| Report on Public Credit | proposed by Hamilton to repair war debts; selling of securities and federal lands, assumption of state debts, set up the first National Bank |
| Report on Manufactures (tariffs) | Hamilton praised efficient factories with few managers over many workers, promote emigration, employment opportunities, applications of technology |
| Strict vs. Loose interpretation of the Constitution | loose interpretation allowed for implied powers of Congress (such as the National Bank), strict interpretation implied few powers to Congress |
| Whiskey Rebellion | Western Pennsylvanian farmers' violent protest against whiskey excise tax, Washington sent large army to put down revolt, protests to be limited to non-violent |
| Citizen Genet | Edmond Genet contributed to polarization of the new nation by creating his American Foreign Legion in the south, which was directed to attack Spanish garrisons in New Orleans and St. Augustine |
| Impressment | British Navy would take American sailors and force them to work for Britain |
| Jay's Treaty | provided for evacuation of English troops from posts in the Great Lakes |
| Nullification | states could refuse to enforce the federal laws they deemed unconstitutional |
| Federalists and Republicans | the two political parties that formed following Washington's presidency; Federalists for stronger central government, Republicans for stronger state governments |
| Washington's Farewell Address | warned against permanent foreign alliances and political parties, called for unity of the country, established precedent of two-term presidency |
| Neutrality Proclamation of 1793 | response to French attempts for alliance with US |
| XYZ Affair | French foreign minister (Talleyrand) demanded bribe in order to meet with American peace commission, made Adams unpopular among the people |
| Alien and Sedition Acts | meant to keep government unquestioned by critics, particularly of the Federalists |
| Virginia and Kentucky Resolutions | argued that states had the right to determine whether or not the laws passed by Congress were constitutional |
| 12th Amendment | required separate and distinct ballots for presidential and vice presidential candidates |
| Second Great Awakening | emphasis on personal salvation, emotional response, and individual faith; women and blacks; nationalism (Manifest Destiny) |
| Election of 1800 | Adams, Jefferson, and Burr: Adams lost, Jefferson and Burr tied, Hamilton convinced other Federalists to vote for Jefferson to break the tie |
| Barbary Pirates | North African Muslim rulers solved budget problems through piracy and tributes in Mediterranean, obtained fees from most European powers |
| Midnight judges | judges appointed to Supreme Court by Adams in the last days of his presidency to force them upon Jefferson, Marshall among those appointed |
| Marbury v. Madison | John Marshall declared that the Supreme Court could declare federal laws unconstitutional |
| Lewis and Clark expedition | Meriwether Lewis and William Clark sent by Jefferson to explore the Louisiana Territory on "Voyage of Discovery" |
| Non-Intercourse Act | sought to encourage domestic American manufacturing |
| Macon's Bill No. 2 | president has power to cease trade with any foreign country that violated American neutrality |
| Embargo Act (1807) | prohibited exports (and imports) based in American ports, most controversial Jefferson legislation |
| War hawks | Clay and Calhoun, eager for war with Britain (War of 1812) |
| Henry Clay and the American System | Henry Clay aimed to make the US economically independent from Europe (e.g., support internal improvements, tariff protection, and new national bank) |
| John C. Calhoun | opposed Polk's high-handedness, avid Southern slave-owner (right to own property, slaves as property) |
| William Henry Harrison | military hero from War of 1812; elected president 1840, died of pneumonia a month later, gave presidency to Tyler |
| Battle of Tippecanoe | decisive victory in the War of 1812 by Harrison over Tecumseh, used in Harrison's campaign for presidency |
| Hartford Convention | December 1814, opposed War of 1812, called for one-term presidency, northern states threatened to secede if their views were left unconsidered next to those of southern and western states, supported nullification, end of Federalist Party |
| Essex case | Federalist cause leading up to Hartford Convention |
| Era of Good Feelings | Monroe presidency, national unity behind Monroe, post-war boom (foreign demand for cotton, grain, and tobacco), Depression of 1819 (cheap British imports, tightened credit, affected West the most) |
| James Monroe | provided country with a break from partisan politics, Missouri Compromise, issued Monroe Doctrine |
| Missouri Compromise (1820) | Maine as free state, Missouri as slave state, slavery prohibited north of 36°30' |
| Tallmadge Amendment | no further introduction of slaves into Missouri, all children born to slaves to become free at 25 |
| Rush-Bagot Treaty (1817 | agreement between US and Britain to remove armed fleets from the Great Lakes |
| Adams-Onis Treaty | remainder of Florida sold by Spain to US, boundary of Mexico defined |
| Monroe Doctrine | Europeans should not interfere with affairs in Western Hemisphere, Americans to stay out of foreign affairs; supported Washington's goal for US neutrality in Americas |
| Panic of 1819 | Bank tightened loan policies, depression rose throughout the country, hurt western farmers greatly |
| Election of 1824 | "corrupt bargain" and backroom deal for JQ Adams to win over Jackson |
| Tariff of Abominations | under JQ Adams, protectionist tariff, South considered it the source of economic problems, made Jackson appear to advocate free trade |
| Jackson's Presidency | focused on the "Common Man;" removal of Indians, removal of federal deposits in BUS, annexation of territory, liberal use of veto |
| Transportation Revolution | river traffic, road building, canals (esp. Erie), rise of NYC |
| Erie Canal | goods able to be transferred from New York to New Orleans by inland waterways |
| National Road | part of transportation revolution, from Cumberland MD to Wheeling WVa, toll road network; stimulated Western expansion |
| Indian Removal Act | Jackson was allowed to relocate Indian tribes in the Louisiana Territory |
| Five Civilized Tribes | Cherokees, Choctaws, Creeks, Chickasaws, and Seminoles; "civilized" due to their intermarriage with whites, forced out of their homelands by expansion |
| "Trail of Tears" | Cherokee tribe forced to move from southern Appalachians to reservations in current-day Oklahoma, high death toll |
| Cherokee Nation v. Georgia | first attempt of Cherokees to gain complete sovereign rule over their nation |
| Worcester v. Georgia | Georgia cannot enforce American laws on Indian tribes |
| Spoils System | "rotation in office;" Jackson felt that one should spend a single term in office and return to private citizenship, those who held power too long would become corrupt and political appointments made by new officials was essential for democracy |
| Kitchen Cabinet | Jackson used personal friends as unofficial advisors over his official cabinet |
| Lowell mill/system | young women employed by Lowell's textile company, housed in dormitories |
| Cotton Gin | allowed for faster processing of cotton, invented by Eli Whitney, less need for slaves |
| Nullification Controversy | southern states (especially South Carolina) believed that they had the right to judge federal laws unconstitutional and therefore not enforce them |
| South Carolina Exposition and Protest | written by Calhoun, regarding tariff nullification |
| Bank of the United States | destroyed by Jackson on the grounds that it was unconstitutional and too much power for a federal institution |
| Pet banks | small state banks set up by Jackson to keep federal funds out of the National Bank, used until funds were consolidated into a single treasury |
| Independent Treasury Bill | government would hold its revenues rather than deposit them in banks, thus keeping the funds away from private corporations; "America's Second Declaration of Independence" |
| Specie | paper money; specie circular decreed that the government would not accept specie for government land |
| Maysville Road Veto | vetoed by Jackson on the count that government funds for the Maysville Road would only benefit one state |
| Liberty Party | supported abolition, broke off of Anti-Slavery Society |
| Whig Party | believed in expanding federal power on economy, encouraged industrial development; could only gain power on the local level, led by Henry Clay (anti-Jackson) |
| John C. Calhoun | opposed Polk's high-handedness, avid Southern slave owner |
| Marshall Court (all cases) | Marbury v. Madison (judicial review), McChulloch v. Maryland (loose Constitutional interpretation, constitutionality of National Bank, states cannot control government agencies), Gibbons v. Ogden (interstate commerce controlled by Congress), Fletcher v. Peck (valid contract cannot be broken, state law voided), Dartmouth College v. Woodward (charter cannot be altered without both parties' consent) |
| Second Great Awakening | religious movements, traveling "meetings," rise of Baptist and Methodist ministries; Charles G. Finney |
| Burned-Over District | heavily evangelized to the point there were no more people left to convert to other religions, upstate New York, home to the beginning of Smith's Mormonism movement |
| Horace Mann | worked to reform the American education system, abolitionist, prison/asylum reform with Dorothea Dix |
| William Lloyd Garrison | editor of The Liberator (strongly abolitionist newspaper calling for immediate abolition of slavery), fought for feminist movement ("Am I not a woman and a sister" picture of slave woman) |
| Frederick Douglass | runaway slave, well-known speaker on the condition of slavery, worked with Garrison and Wendell Phillips, founder of The North Star |
| Seneca Falls Convention of 1848 | for women's rights, organized by Lucretia Mott and Elizabeth Cady Stanton, modeled requests after the Declaration of Independence |
| Elizabeth Cady Stanton | organized Seneca Falls Convention, founded (with Anthony) National Women Suffrage Organization |
| Hudson River School | taught American landscape painting rather than Classical subjects |
| Transcendentalism | founded by Emerson, strong emphasis on spiritual unity (God, humanity, and nature), literature with strong references to nature |
| Ralph Waldo Emerson | in Brook Farm Community, literary nationalist, transcendentalist (nascent ideas of God and freedom), wrote "The American Scholar" |
| Henry David Thoreau | in Brook Farm Community, lived in seclusion for two years writing Walden and On Civil Disobedience, proved that man could provide for himself without materialistic wants |
| Nat Turner's Rebellion | led a slave rebellion in Virginia, attacked many whites, prompted non-slaveholding Virginians to consider emancipation |
| Yeoman Farmers | family farmers who hired out slaves for the harvest season, self-sufficient, participated in local markets alongside slave owners |
| Underground Railroad | network of safe houses of white abolitionists used to bring slaves to freedom |
| Harriet Tubman | worked alongside Josiah Henson to make repeated trips to get slaves out of the South into freedom |
| Angelina and Sarah Grimke | fought for women's rights and abolition, "Men and women are CREATED EQUAL!" |
| Dorothea Dix | worked towards asylums for the mentally insane, worked alongside Mann |
| John Humphrey Noyes/Oneida Community | John Noyes, New York; utopian society for communalism, perfectionism, and complex marriage |
| New Harmony | first Utopian society, by Robert Owen |
| "Wage slaves" | northern factory workers who were discarded when too old to work (unlike the slaves who were still kept fed and clothed in their old age) |
| Nativism | anti-immigrant, especially against Irish Catholics |
| The Alamo | Mexicans held siege on the Alamo (in San Antonio), Texans lost great number of people, "Remember the Alamo" |
| Stephen Austin | American who settled in Texas, one of the leaders for Texan independence from Mexico |
| James K. Polk | "dark horse" Democratic candidate; acquired majority of the western US (Mexican Cession, Texas Annexation, Oregon Country), lowered tariffs, created Independent Treasury |
| Oregon and "Fifty-four Forty or Fight!" | Oregon Territory owned jointly with Britain, Polk severed its tie to Britain, forced to settle for compromise south of 49° rather than 54°40' |
| Manifest Destiny | stated the United States was destined to span the breadth of the entire continent with as much land as possible, advocated by Polk |
| Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo | acquired Mexican Cession (future California, Arizona, and New Mexico); Mexico acknowledged American annexation of Texas |
| Wilmot Proviso | slavery to be barred in all territory ceded from Mexico; never fully passed Congress |
| California Gold Rush | gold discovery in Sutter's Mill in 1848 resulted in huge mass of adventurers in 1849, led to application for statehood, opened question of slavery in the West |
| William Seward | Secretary of State under Lincoln and Johnson; purchase of Alaska "Seward's Folly" |
| Compromise of 1850 | (1) California admitted as free state, (2) territorial status and popular sovereignty of Utah and New Mexico, (3) resolution of Texas-New Mexico boundaries, (4) federal assumption of Texas debt, (5) slave trade abolished in DC, and (6) new fugitive slave law; advocated by Henry Clay and Stephen A. Douglas |
| Fugitive Slave Act | runaway slaves could be caught in the North and be brought back to their masters (they were treated as property — running away was as good as stealing) |
| Harriet Beecher Stowe, Uncle Tom's Cabin | depicted the evils of slavery (splitting of families and physical abuse); increased participation in abolitionist movement, condemned by South |
| Know-Nothing (American) Party | opposed to all immigration, strongly anti-Catholic |
| Popular Sovereignty | the principle that a state should decide for itself whether or not to allow slavery |
| Kansas-Nebraska Act | territory split into Kansas and Nebraska, popular sovereignty (Kansas slave, Nebraska free); proposed by Stephen A. Douglas |
| "Bleeding Kansas" | border ruffians in election on issue of slavery incited controversy, proslavery group attacked Lawrence, Kansas, Pottawatomie Massacre |
| Lecompton Constitution | proslavery constitution in Kansas, supported by Buchanan, freesoilers against it (victorious), denied statehood until after secession |
| John Brown | led Pottawatomie Massacre, extreme abolitionist who believed he was doing God's work |
| Pottawatomie Creek (May 1856) | John Brown and his sons slaughtered five men as a response to the election fraud in Lawrence and the caning of Sumner in Congress |
| Republican Party | formed in response to Kansas-Nebraska Act, banned in the South, John C Fremont first presidential candidate |
| Harpers Ferry (1859) | Brown aimed to create an armed slave rebellion and establish black free state; Brown executed and became martyr in the North |
| Dred Scott v. Sandford | slaves could not sue in federal courts (blacks no longer considered citizens), slaves could not be taken from masters except by the law, Missouri Compromise unconstitutional, Congress not able to prohibit slavery in a state |
| Lincoln-Douglas Debates (1858) | over Senate seat for Illinois (Douglas victor), Lincoln stated the country could not remain split over the issue of slavery |
| Freeport Doctrine | Douglas was able to reconcile the Dred Scott Decision with popular sovereignty; voters would be able to exclude slavery by not allowing laws that treated slaves as property |
| Fort Sumter | first shots are fired at Charleston, North Carolina |
| 20-Negro Law | exempted those who owned or oversaw twenty or more slaves from service in the Confederate Army; "rich man's war but a poor man's fight" |
| Anaconda plan | the Union planned a blockade that would not allow supplies of any sort into the Confederacy; control the Mississippi and Atlantic/Gulf of Mexico |
| Ulysses S. Grant | won battles in the West and raised northern morale (esp. Shiloh, Fort Henry, and Fort Donelson), made Union commanding general |
| William T. Sherman | pushed through northern Georgia, captured Atlanta, "march to the sea" (total war and destruction), proceeded to South Carolina |
| Robert E. Lee | opposed to slavery and secession, but stayed loyal to Virginia, despite offer for command of Union Army |
| Thomas J. "Stonewall" Jackson | Lee's chief lieutenant and premier cavalry officer |
| Battle of Antietam | Lee's attack on Maryland in hopes that he could take it from the Union, bloodiest day of the war, stalemate, McClellan replaced by Burnside, stalemate, South would never be so close to victory again |
| Emancipation Proclamation | issued by Lincoln following Antietam (close enough to a victory to empower the proclamation), declared slaves in the Confederacy free (did not include border states), symbolic gesture to support Union's moral cause in the war |
| Battle of Gettysburg | Lee invaded Pennsylvania, bloodiest battle of the war, Confederate Pickett's Charge (disastrous), Lee forced to retreat (not pursued by Meade), South doomed to never invade North again, Gettysburg Address given by Lincoln (nation over union) |
| New York City draft riots (1863) | drafting extremely hated by Northerners, sparked by Irish-Americans against the black population, 500 lives lost, many buildings burned |
| Military Reconstruction Act (1867) | South divided into 5 military districts; states to guarantee full suffrage for blacks; ratify 14th amendment |
| Compromise of 1877 | South to gain removal of last troops from Reconstruction; North wins Hayes as president |
| Andrew Carnegie | achieved an abnormal rise in class system (steel industry), pioneered vertical integration (controlled Mesabie Range to ship ore to Pittsburgh), opposed monopolies, used partnership of steel tycoons (Henry Clay Frick as a manager/partner), Bessemer steel process |
| Standard Oil Trust | small oil companies sold stock and authority to Rockefeller's Standard Oil Company (consolidation), cornered world petroleum market |
| John D. Rockefeller | Standard Oil Company, ruthless business tactics (survival of the fittest) |
| Vertical and horizontal integration | beginnings of trusts (destruction of competition); vertical- controlling every aspect of production (control quality, eliminate middlemen - Rockefeller); horizontal- consolidating with competitors to monopolize a market (highly detrimental) |
| Sherman Anti-Trust Act | forbade restraint of trade and did not distinguish good from bad trusts, ineffective due to lack of enforcement mechanism (waited for Clayton Anti-Trust Act) |
| United States vs. EC Knight Company | decision under Sherman Anti-Trust Act shot down by Supreme Court — sugar refining was manufacturing rather than trade/commerce |
| National Labor Union | founded by William Sylvis (1866); supported 8-hour workday, convict labor, federal department of labor, banking reform, immigration restrictions to increase wages, women; excluded blacks |
| Knights of Labor | founded by Uriah Stephens (1869); excluded corrupt and well-off; equal female pay, end to child/convict labor, employer-employee relations, proportional income tax; "bread and butter" unionism (higher wages, shorter hours, better conditions) |
| Terence V. Powderly | Knights of Labor leader, opposed strikes, producer-consumer cooperation, temperance, welcomed blacks and women (allowing segregation) |
| American Federation of Labor | craft unions that left the Knights (1886), led by Gompers, women left out of recruitment efforts |
| Samuel Gompers | focused on skilled workers (harder to replace than unskilled), coordinated crafts unions, supported 8¬hour workday and injury liability |
| "Yellow dog contracts" | fearing the rise of labor unions, corporations forced new employees to sign and promise not to be part of a union |
| Pinkertons | detectives hired by employers as private police force, often used to end strikes |
| Chinese Exclusion Act (1882) | 10-year moratorium on Chinese immigration to reduce competition for jobs (Chinese willing to work for cheap salaries) |
| Haymarket Bombing | bomb thrown at protest rally, police shot protestors, caused great animosity in employers for workers' unions |
| Eugene V. Debs | led railroad workers in Pullman Strike, arrested; Supreme Court (decision in re Debs) legalized use of injunction (court order) against unions and strikes |
| Social Darwinism | natural selection applied to human competition, advocated by Herbert Spencer, William Graham Sumner |
| Henry George, Progress and Poverty | single tax on speculated land to ameliorate industrialization misery |
| Edward Bellamy, Looking Backwards | state-run economy to provide conflict-free society |
| Karl Marx, Das Kapital | working class exploited for profit, proletariat (workers) to revolt and inherit all society |
| Thomas Edison | electric light, phonograph, mimeograph, Dictaphone, moving pictures |
| Louis Sullivan | led architectural movement to create building designs that reflected buildings' functions, especially in Chicago |
| Interstate Commerce Act | created Interstate Commerce Commission to require railroads to publish rates (less discrimination, short/long haul), first legislation to regulate corporations, ineffective ICC |
| Social Gospel movement | stressed role of church and religion to improve city life, led by preachers Walter Raushenbusch and Washington Gladen; influenced settlement house movement and Salvation Army |
| Young Men's and Young Women's Christian Association (YMCA & YWCA) | provided housing and recreation to city youth, imposing Protestant morals, unable to reach out to all youth |
| Jane Addams | helped lead settlement house movement, co-founded NAACP, condemned war and poverty |
| Hull House | Jane Addams's pioneer settlement house (center for women's activism and social reform) in Chicago |
| Salvation Army | established by "General" William Booth, uniformed volunteers provided food, shelter, and employment to families, attracted poor with lively preaching and marching bands in order to instill middle-class virtues |
| Declining death rate | sewer systems and purification of water |
| New immigrants vs. old immigrants | old immigrants from northern and western Europe came seeking better life; new immigrants came from southern and eastern Europe searching for opportunity to escape worse living conditions back home and often did not stay in the US |
| Cult of domesticity | Victorian standards confined women to the home to create an artistic environment as a statement of cultural aspirations |
| William Marcy Tweed | leader of Tammany Hall, gained large sums of money through the political machine, prosecuted by Samuel Tilden and sent to jail |
| Tammany Hall | Democratic political machine in NYC, "supported" immigrants and poor people of the city, who were needed for Democratic election victories |
| Theodore Dreiser, Sister Carrie, The Financier | attacked industrial elite, called for business regulation, publisher refused works breaking with Victorian ideals |
| Regionalist and naturalist writers | writing took a more realistic approach on the world, regionalist writers focused on local life (Sarah Orne Jewett), naturalist writers focused on economy and psychology (Stephen Crane) |
| Bland-Allison Act (1878) | government compromised to buy and coin $2-4 million/month; government stuck to minimum and inflation did not occur (lower prices); economy grew |
| Sherman Silver Purchase Act (1890) | government to buy silver to back money in addition to gold |
| James G. Blaine | Republican candidate for president in 1884, quintessence of spoils system; highly disgusted the mugwumps (many Republicans turned to Democrat Cleveland) |
| Pendleton Civil Service Act | effectively ended spoils system and established civil service exams for all government positions, under Pres. Garfield |
| Farmers'Alliance movement | Southern and Midwestern farmers expressing discontent, supported free silver and subtreasury plan (cash advance on future crop — farmers had little cash flow during the year), criticized national banks |
| Greenback Party | supported expanded money supply, health/safety regulations, benefits for workers and farmers, granger (farmer)-supported |
| Populist Party | emerged from Farmers' Alliance movement (when subtreasury plan was defeated in Congress), denounced Eastern Establishment that suppressed the working classes; Ignatius Donnelly (utopian author), Mary E Lease, Jerry Simpson |
| Convict-lease system | blacks who went to prison taken out and used for labor in slave-like conditions, enforced southern racial hierarchy |
| Civil Rights Cases | Civil Rights Act of 1875 declared unconstitutional by Supreme Court, as the fourteenth amendment protected people from governmental infringement of rights and had no effect on acts of private citizens |
| Plessy v. Ferguson | Supreme Court legalized the "separate but equal" philosophy |
| Munn v. Illinois | private property subject to government regulation when property is devoted to public interest; against railroads |
| Jim Crow laws | educational and residential segregation; inferior facilities allotted to African-Americans, predominantly in South |
| Coxey's Army | Coxey and unemployed followers marched on Washington for support in unemployment relief by inflationary public works program |
| Panic of 1893 | 8,000 businesses collapsed (including railroads); due to stock market crash, overbuilding of railroads, heavy farmer loans, economic disruption by labor efforts, agricultural depression; decrease of gold reserves led to Cleveland's repeal of Sherman Silver Purchase Act |
| William Jennings Bryan | repeat candidate for president, proponent of silver-backing (16:1 platform), cross of gold speech against gold standard; Democratic candidate (1896) |
| Free silver | Populists campaigned for silver-backed money rather than gold-backed, believed to be able to relieve working conditions and exploitation of labor |
| Triangle Shirtwaist fire | workers unable to escape (locked into factory), all died; further encouraged reform movements for working conditions |
| Gifford Pinchot | head of federal Division of Forestry, contributed to Roosevelt's natural conservation efforts |
| Frederick W. Taylor, Principles of Scientific Management | increase working output by standardizing procedures and rewarding those who worked fast; efficiency |
| Industrial Workers of the World | supported Socialists, militant unionists and socialists, advocated strikes and sabotaging politics, aimed for an umbrella union similar to Knights of Labor, ideas too radical for socialist cause |
| "Big BM" Haywood | leader of IWW, from Western Federation of Miners |
| Thorstein Veblen, The Theory of the Leisure Class | satirized wealthy captains of industry, workers and engineers as better leaders of society |
| Herbert Croly, The Promise of American Life | activist government to serve all citizens (cf. Alexander Hamilton); founded New Republic magazine |
| John Dewey | social ideals to be encouraged in public school (stress on social interaction), learning by doing |
| Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr. | law meant to evolve as society evolves, opposed conservative majority |
| Booker T. Washington | proponent of gradual gain of equal rights for African-Americans |
| "Atlanta Compromise" speech | given by BTW to ease whites' fears of integration, assuring them that separate but equal was acceptable, ideas challenged by DuBois |
| WEB DuBois, Souls of Black Folk | opposed BTW's accommodation policies, called for immediate equality, formed Niagara Movement to support his ideas |
| National Association for the Advancement of Colored People | formed by white progressives, adopted goals of Niagara Movement, in response to Springfield Race Riots |
| Muckrakers | uncovered the "dirt" on corruption and harsh quality of city/working life; heavily criticized by Theodore Roosevelt; Ida Tarabell (oil companies), David Graham Phillips (Senate), Aschen School (child labor — photography), mass magazines McClure's and Collier's |
| Upton Sinclair, The Jungle | revealed unsanitary nature of meat-packing industry, inspired Meat Inspection Act and Pure Food and Drug Act (1906) |
| Thomas Nast | political muckraking cartoonist, refused bribes to stop criticism |
| Robert La Follette | created the Wisconsin Idea (as governor of Wisconsin) — regulated railroad, direct-primary system, increased corporate taxes, reference library for lawmakers |
| Mann Act | made it illegal to transport women across state borders for "immoral purposes," violated by black boxer Jack Johnson (w/ white woman) |
| Women's Christian Temperance Union | led by Francis Willard, powerful "interest group" following the civil war, urged women's suffrage, led to Prohibition |
| Charlotte Perkins Gilman | women must gain economic rights in order to impact society (cf. rising divorce rates) |
| Northern Securities Case | Northern Securities Company (JP Morgan and James G. Hill - railroads) seen by Roosevelt as "bad" trust, Supreme Court upheld his first trust-bust |
| Theodore Roosevelt | first "modern" president, moderate who supported progressivism (at times conservative), bypassed congressional opposition (cf. Jackson), significant role in world affairs |
| Square Deal | Roosevelt's plan that aimed to regulate corporations (Anthracite coal strike, Dept. of Commerce and Labor, Elkins and Hepburn Acts), protect consumers (meat sanitation), and conserve natural resources (Newlands Reclamation Act) |
| Preservationism vs. Conservationism | Roosevelt and Pinchot sided on conservation rather than preservation (planned and regulated use of forest lands for public and commercial uses) |
| William H. Taft | "trustbuster" (busted twice as many as Roosevelt), conservation and irrigation efforts, Postal Savings Bank System, Payne-Aldrich Tariff (reduction of tariff, caused Republican split) |
| Bull Moose Party | party formed from Republican split by Roosevelt, more progressive values, leaving "Republican Old Guard" to control Republican party |
| New Nationalism | federal government to increase power over economy and society by means of progressive reforms, developed by Roosevelt (after presidency) |
| New Freedom | ideas of Wilson: small enterprise, states' rights, more active government, trust busting, left social issues up to the states |
| Woodrow Wilson | Democratic candidate 1912, stood for antitrust, monetary change, and tariff reduction; far less active than Roosevelt, Clayton Anti-trust Act (to enforce Sherman), Child Labor Act |
| Federal Reserve Act | created Federal Reserve System, regional banks set up for twelve separate districts, final authority of each bank lay with the Federal Reserve Board, paper money to be issued "Federal Reserve Notes" |
| Pan-Americanism | James G. Blaine sought to open up Latin American markets to the U.S.; rejected by Latin America due to fear of U.S. dominance and satisfaction with European market |
| Yellow journalism | created by Joseph Pulitzer and William Randolph Hearst; aimed to excite American imperialist interests; media bias, subjective representation of events |
| Jingoism | belligerent nationalism against other threatening nations |
| Secretary of State John Hay | ex-Lincoln secretary; worked to gain Open Door Notes' acceptance from the major powers |
| Open Door Policy | sought to eliminate spheres of influence and avoid European monopolies in China; unaccepted by the powers in mind |
| Spanish American War (1898) | McKinley reluctant; armed intervention to free Cuba from Spain; Roosevelt's "Rough Riders" made attack on Spanish at Cuba |
| Explosion of USS Maine | meant to provide evacuation opportunity for Americans in Cuba; internal accidental explosion blamed on Spanish mines, leading to Spanish¬ American War |
| Platt Amendment | U.S. would ensure that Cuba would be protected from European powers and maintain a place in Cuban affairs; provided coal and naval stations |
| US acquisitions | Philippines, Hawaii, Puerto Rico, Guam: granted to U.S. at the end of Spanish-American War; Philippines were captured after treaty, and thus not part of spoils, but kept as territory with an inevitable movement for independence; Philippines and Hawaii steps toward Asia |
| Naval battle in Manila Bay, Philippines | Admiral Dewey defeated Spanish initially; American troops (aided by Aguinaldo's insurgents) captured Manila, leading to annexation |
| TR mediates Russo-Japanese War | secretly sponsored peace negotiations so as to prevent Japanese or Russian monopoly on Asia; concerned with safety of Philippines |
| Roosevelt Corollary to the Monroe Doctrine | U.S. felt it was its duty to "watch out" for the interests of other countries in the Western hemisphere; provided justification for invasions of Latin America. |
| Panama Canal | needed to protect new Pacific acquisitions, U.S. took over the project from the French after overcoming Clatyton¬ Bulwer Treaty (prohibited exclusive control of canal) with the Hay¬ Pauncefote Treaty |
| "Gentlemen's Agreement" (1908) | in response to Japanese discrimination in San Fran schools; Japanese to stop laborers into U.S., Californians forbidden to ban Japanese from public schools |
| Dollar Diplomacy" | government would protect America's foreign investments with any force needed; under president Taft |
| Moral Diplomacy | intervention in Mexican Revolution (Madero overthrew dictator Diaz) to overthrow Madero out of fear of property confiscation, General Huerta (seen as "brute" by Wilson, sought new leader) replaced Madero |
| Invasion of Mexico, Pancho Villa | Huerta's enemy, reluctantly supported by U.S.; U.S. sought Villa's submission due to terrorism, eventually assassinated; Wilson's policy highly unpopular |
| Lusitania | British passenger liner secretly carrying ammunition sunk by German u-boat, included American passengers |
| Zimmerman Note | intercepted by Britain; Germany proposed alliance with Mexico, using bribe of return of TX, NM, and AZ; Japan included in alliance |
| Unrestricted submarine warfare | Germany announced that it would sink all (including American) ships, attempt to involve U.S. in war |
| Creel Committee | Committee on Public Information; aimed to sell America and the world on Wilson's war goals; propaganda, censorship, "four-minute men" speeches, "Liberty Leagues" (spy on community) |
| War Industries Board | attempted to centralize production of war materials; ineffective due to American desire for laissez-faire government |
| Conscription policies | Selective Service Act to require men to register with few exceptions; women and blacks drafted/enlisted, highly successful |
| Herbert Hoover's Food Administration | relied on voluntary compliance (no formal laws), propaganda; high prices set on commodities to encourage production, Prohibition |
| Wilson's 14 points | public treaties, free trade, free seas, reduced armament burdens, anti-imperialism, independence to minorities, international organization |
| League of Nations | foreshadowed in 14 points, hoped to guarantee political independence and integrity of all countries |
| Great Migration | mass migration northward; mainly blacks migrating from the southern states into the north hoping for less discrimination |
| Lodge Reservations | 14 formal amendments to the treaty for the League of Nations; preserved Monroe Doctrine, Congress desired to keep declaration of war to itself |
| Isolationism | avoided league of Nations, opposed Latin American involvement |
| Espionage Act and Sedition Act | fines and imprisonment for aiding the enemy or hindering U.S. military; forbade any form of criticism of the government and military |
| Schenk v. U.S. | court case, upheld constitutionality of Espionage Act; Congress right to limit free speech during times of war |
| "Red Scare" (1919) | anti-communist crusades due to fear of radicalism spurred by Bolshevik rebellion |
| Palmer Raids | Congressional support to raid houses of radicals believed to have connections to communism |
| "Red Summer," race riots (1919) | spurred by Great Migration, large-scale riots, lynchings, &c. |
| Nativism | severe immigration laws to discourage and discriminate against foreigners, believed to erode old-fashioned American values |
| Ku Klux Klan | spread quickly; opposed everything that was not White Anglo-Saxon Protestant (WASP) (and conservative), Stephenson's faults and jail sentence led to demise |
| National Origins Act (1924) | reduced quota, reduced numbers from eastern and southern Europe, Asians banned, Canadians and Latin Americans exempt |
| Sacco and Vanzetti Trial | prejudiced jury sentenced them to death, caused riots around the world, new trial denied |
| Scopes Trial | Darwinian (influenced by jazz age and new scientific ideas) against Fundamentalist (the Bible and Creationism); John Scopes convicted for teaching Darwinism (defended by Clarence Darrow); Scopes found guilty |
| Prohibition, rise of organized crime | supported by women and churches, instituted by Volstead Act, lacked enforcement; bootlegging and speakeasies, Al Capone and John Dillinger — gangsters and organized crime (casual breaking of the law) |
| Frederick W. Taylor, Scientific Management | efficient working methods to increase productivity; usually resulted in lower wages (hated by workers), power to managers |
| Henry Ford's assembly line | mass production of the Model-T, workers as potential consumers (raise wages), supported other industries and raised employment |
| Bruce Barton | The Man Nobody Knows, glorification of business, Jesus as a businessman, relationship between religion and manufacturing |
| Equal Rights Amendment (ERA) | Alice Paul; shocked traditionalism, League of Women Voters supported; new organization of women who were now more independent |
| Jazz | dance music, slave spirituals adapted into improvisation and ragtime; jazz migrated along with blacks in the Great Migration |
| "Lost Generation" | new generation of writers outside of Protestantism, resentment of ideals betrayed by society; Fitzgerald (despised materialism, Great Gatsby), Hemingway (disillusionment, war experience), Lewis (against upper class — Babbit and Mainstreet), Faulkner (stream of consciousness), T.S. Eliot |
| Harlem Renaissance | authors included Langston Hughes, McKay, Zora Neale Hurston, Countee Cullet — praise and expression of black culture of the time |
| Marcus Garvey | started the United Negro Improvement Association (UNIA) — "Back to Africa" movement for racial pride and separatism; inspired self-confidence in blacks |
| Charles Lindbergh | considered a hero for his solo crossing of the Atlantic by plane |
| Washington Disarmament Conference (1921) | US, Britain, Japan, France, and Italy to reduce naval tonnage and halt construction for 10 years; US and Japan to respect Pacific territorial holdings, Kellog-Briand Pact to "outlaw war" |
| Dawes Plan (1924) | to make German reparations from WWI more accessible to Germans; evacuation of troops from Germany, reorganization of the Reichsbank, and foreign loans |
| Conservative policies of Harding and Coolidge | lowering of income taxes for wealthy (trickle-down economics), refusal to create higher prices to help farmers (McNary-Haugen Bill) |
| Fordney-McCumber Tariff and Smoot-Hawley Tariff | 1922 and 1930, raised tariffs extremely high on manufactured goods; benefited domestic manufacturers, but limited foreign trade |
| Teapot Dome scandal | Albert Fall accused of accepting bribes for access to government oil in Teapot Dome, Wyoming |
| Herbert Hoover, secretary of commerce | known as "wartime food czar;" created recreation policies and reintroduced leisure culture and conservation ethic to get Americans escaping the cities and improve tourism, etc. |
| Andrew Mellon, secretary of the treasury | introduced the "trickle-down" economics theory in order to promote business and increase money available for speculation |
| Farm crisis | agricultural depression as precursor to the depression; unheeded omen of problems in the economic structure (prices too low — too much supply for the demand) |
| Causes of the depression | rise in stock prices and speculation, decline of construction industry, mistaken "trickle-down" economics, reliance on credit |
| Stock market crash | (1929) stock prices fell drastically; without buyers, the stocks became essentially worthless; cause bank crashes, &c. |
| Hoover's policy of voluntarism | emphasized importance of private charities to help the depression |
| Hoovervilles | sets of cardboard box houses that epitomized the country's blame on Hoover for the cause of the Depression |
| Bonus Army | veterans from WWI sought their pensions before they were too old to use them; they were denied and were run out of Washington (violently, by MacArthur) |
| Reconstruction Finance Corporation (RFC) | attempted to boost economy by making loans to banks and insurance companies, hoping to restart them |
| President Franklin Roosevelt | introduced his "New Deal," won election by a relative landslide (he was not Hoover, whom the public now did not trust) |
| New Deal | FDR's plan (although vague during the campaign) to restart the economy and pull America out of the Great Depression |
| "Brain trust" | FDR's inner circle of experts rather than just politicians in the cabinet |
| "Hundred days" | accomplished great number of relief, recovery, and reform efforts; sought practical solutions to the problems by experimentation |
| Emergency Banking Relief Act | four-day banking holiday to create controlled inflation, followed by reopening of sound banks, and reorganization of unsound banks |
| National Industrial Recovery Act (NIRA) & National Recovery Administration (NRA) | Part of "First" New Deal Program (1933-1935), prevented extreme competition, labor management disputes, and over-production; federally coordinated consensus of business leaders (Hugh Johnson) to regulate businesses (wages, limits, working conditions) |
| Agricultural Adjustment Act (AAA) | Part of "First" New Deal Program, subsidies to farmers to decrease production and thus increase prices |
| Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA) | Part of "First" New Deal Program (1933-1935), hydroelectric power to river valley; brought social and economic development to very poor area |
| Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC) | Part of "First" New Deal Program (1933-1935), employed young jobless men with government projects on work relief and environment |
| Federal Emergency Relief Act (FERA) | Part of "First" New Deal Program (1933-1935), provided more funds to state and local relief efforts |
| Public Works Administration (PWA) | Part of "First" New Deal Program (1933-1935), Harold Icicles, provided public construction projects |
| Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC) | Part of "First" New Deal Program (1933-1935), insured deposits < $5000, reassured American public of the worth of banks |
| Social Security Act of 1935 (SSA) | Part of "Second" New Deal Programs (1935-1938), used withheld money from payrolls to provide aid to the unemployed, industrial accident victims, and young mothers; principle of government responsibility for social welfare |
| Works Progress Administration (WPA) | Part of "Second" New Deal Programs (1935-1938), Harry Hopkins; provide work for unemployed and construct public works, &c. through Emergency Relief Appropriation Act; much like Civil Works Administration |
| Wagner Act / National Labor Relations Act | Part of "Second" New Deal Programs (1935-1938), collective bargaining rights, closed shops permitted (where workers must join unions), outlawed anti-union tactics |
| Fair Labor Standards Act | Part of "Second" New Deal Programs (1935-1938), banned child labor, established minimum wage |
| Keynesian economics | philosophy that deficit spending during a depression would increase purchasing power and stimulate economy; FDR disagreed with the policy at first and borrowed money to cover deficits |
| Indian Reorganization Act (1934) | halted sale of tribal lands, enabled tribes to regain unallocated lands; repealed Dawes Severalty Act of 1887; helped secure Indians' entry into New Deal associations; led by John Collier |
| Frances Perkins, Secretary of Labor | first female cabinet member |
| Butler v. U.S. | court case, killed the AAA, although FDR insisted on continuing by creating smaller state-level AAAs |
| Schechter v. U.S | court case, unconstitutionalized the NRA due to delegation of legislative authority from Congress to executive |
| Court Packing | Judiciary Reorganization Bill; FDR's attempt to put in extra judges who would support him without doubt |
| Okies" and "Arkies" | Americans who were forced out of their homes in Oklahoma and Arkansas (respectively) due to the dust storms and drought known as the Dust Bowl |
| Deportations of Mexicans | nationalists against foreign non-English speaking workers (took jobs away from American men); encouraged to leave the U.S. |
| Critics of FDR | Father Charles Coughlin (benefited only wealthy people and corporations), Huey Long ("share our wealth"), Francis Townshend (Old Age Revolving Pension) |
| Congress of Industrial Organizations (CIO) | created by John L. Lewis for unskilled labor, organized "sit-down strike" against GM to work for recognition |
| Dorothea Lange | hired to photograph ordinary Americans experiencing the depression |
| Good Neighbor Policy | withdrawal of American troops from foreign nations (especially Latin America) to improve international relations and unite western hemisphere; Clark Memorandum (rebukes the "big stick"); peaceful resolution of Mexican oil fields |
| Isolationism in 1920s & 1930s | Americans concerned with economic depression; sought to avoid European involvement, no apparent immediate threats |
| Neutrality Acts, 1935-37 | prohibited aiding of belligerent nations, banned civilian involvement; limited power of president during international war, built up armed forces |
| Quarantine Speech, 1937 | FDR encouraged democracies to quarantine their opponents (economic embargos); criticized by isolationists |
| Neutrality Act, 1939 | allowed sale of weaponry to democracies on "cash-and-carry" basis, avoided full-blown war; danger zones proclaimed; solved American unemployment crisis |
| Four Freedoms" speech | FDR asked for increased authority to aid Britain; freedom of speech/expression, of religion, from want, from fear; resulted in Lend-Lease |
| Lend-Lease Act (1941) | President to offer military supplies to nations "vital to the defense of the US"; ended US neutrality (economic war against Germany); Hitler began to sink American ships (limited scale) |
| Pearl Harbor | Japanese bombing of ships in harbor; resulted in FDR's request for declaration of war against Japan; Germany and Italy responded with declarations of war |
| First American strategy in WWII | FDR and Churchill agreed to defeat Germany first rather than concentrate on Japan |
| Important WWII Battles | Midway (US Signal Corps, turning point of war in the Pacific), D-Day (Eisenhower's amphibious invasion of Normandy, led to depletion of German forces), Stalingrad (Russians defeated Germans, saved Moscow and Leningrad, turning point in Europe) |
| Japanese internment | fear of Japanese-Americans as traitors, sent off (by law) to internment camps; removal of deemed threats in military areas |
| Reasons for US to drop atomic bombs | risk of too many casualties and high costs for hand-to-hand combat/invasion, Japanese surrender unlikely |
| Yalta Conference (1945) | established world organization; Soviet Union pledged to allow democratic procedures in Eastern Europe; pledge broken, led to Cold War |
| Potsdam Conference (1945) | decided to punish war crimes, established program for de-Nazification of Germany |
| The Homefront | westward migration of workers (new economic opportunities, esp. aircraft industry), high rates of divorce and family/juvenile violence, women encouraged to work in factories, still held inferior to men |
| Rationing | Americans at home reminded to conserve materials in all aspects of life to support the military; resulted in saving up of money to cause economic boom after war |
| Rosie the Riveter | symbol of women workers during the war |
| John L. Lewis | through CIO, led three coal mine strikes (some of the very few strikes during the time period) |
| Bracero program | brought in Mexicans for temporary jobs, concentrated in southern CA, given extremely poor working conditions (as they were not American citizens) |
| Zoot Suit riots | racism riots against Mexican laborers (imported for jobs) |
| A. Philip Randolph and the March on Washington | led Brotherhood of Sleeping Car Porters: threatened a siege on DC if FDR did not agree to end discrimination in military |
| Fair Employment Practices Commission (FEPC) | prohibited discrimination in any government-related work; increased black employment |
| President Harry Truman | first president to show positive response to civil rights movement; worked heavily on keeping Soviet spread of communism in check |
| Jackie Robinson | first African-American in major league baseball |
| Desegregation of Armed Forces (1947) | banned racial discrimination in federal practices; To Secure These Rights called for desegregation, anti-lynching, end of poll taxes |
| Dixiecrats, 1948 | fought for old Southern way of life (states' rights), attempted to gain higher standing within Democratic party; aimed to deny Truman enough electoral votes to avoid his reelection by nominating Strom Thurmond (SC governor) |
| Fair Deal | preservation of New Deal, attempt at additions; raised minimum wage, public housing, old-age insurance extension, agricultural price supports (lowering of farm price) |
| George Kennan | US ambassador to Russia, notified Truman of Soviet ambitions to expand empire and overthrow other political forces; established concern for Soviet policy in Eastern Europe, Germany, and the Middle East |
| Truman Doctrine | support people oppressed by communism and non-democratic governments; worked with democratic governments in Greece, Turkey, and Israel |
| Marshall Plan | US provided financial assistance to recover economies in Europe; aimed towards anti-communist governments in France, Italy, and Germany; Eastern European nations prohibited from receiving help from US |
| Berlin Airlift | Soviets cut Berlin off from the rest of Germany by blockade; US organized airlift to drop supplies into Britain; blockade lifted in May 1949 |
| North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) | response to Berlin crisis, warned Moscow that threats would be answered with force; Warsaw Pact formed by Soviets in response |
| Soviet atomic bomb | September 1949, US no longer held monopoly; two atomic powers |
| China turns communist | Mao Zedong (communist) defeated nationalist forces of Kai-Shek (supported by US); seen as defeat for US, not officially fully recognized until 1973 |
| Korean War | Soviet-aided North Korea attack on South Korea; MacArthur named general on behalf of UN (excluded Russia), US supplied majority of troops; recapture of South Korea and suppression of North forces to northern border; introduction of Chinese, MacArthur fired for suggestion to use nuclear weapons on China; nuclear incentives for peace negotiations |
| President Dwight D. Eisenhower | Republican, popular hero of WWII; "dynamic conservatism" as a middle ground btw. Rep. and Dem.; Interstate Highway System (ulterior motive of weapons transportation); St. Lawrence Seaway opened Great Lakes to Atlantic Ocean via locks; Depts. Of Health, Education, and Welfare to oversee New Deal programs |
| Conformity in the 1950s | strong patriotism and need to conform to try to avoid blame during red scare, non-churchgoers, unmarried, and critics suspected as communists |
| Suburbia | middle class; white flight from urban areas due to black migration; government supported insurance for homeowners and builders |
| "Baby Boom" | unprecedented sudden growth spurt of American population (especially urban and suburban areas) |
| GI Bill of Rights | government ensured readjustment rights to GIs after WWI unrest, loans to veterans for higher education and mortgages (contributed to economic prosperity) |
| Consumerism | Americans could now spend what they had been told to save during the war (disposable income); increased purchasing of luxury items |
| "Affluent Society" | economic prosperity of American society following WWII; doubling of national income, jobs to women, defense industry's support of economy |
| Non-conformity | Elvis Presley, Marilyn Monroe, James Dean, Beatniks — rebelled against conservative conformity of the rest of the country (esp. targeted youth) |
| Rock `n' Roll | influence of African-American blues, music of the younger generation (gap between them and their parents) |
| David Riesman | (The Lonely Crowd) "outer directed" Americans conforming to peer pressure on moral and social issues, rather than independently thinking on morals |
| Richard Nixon, Alger Hiss | Nixon led movement to Hiss's indictment; convicted of perjury, Nixon gained national prominence |
| McCarthyism | attacked people for being communist by association and unsubstantiated claims, against Truman, Marshall, and Ike; downfall came with attack on the military (condemned by Senate); led hysteria of the red scare |
| Domino theory | one country that falls into communism will cause surrounding nations to also fall "like dominos"; spurred by Southeast Asia regimes (esp. Vietnam) |
| Community on Un-American Activities (HUAC) | attacked public figures (Hollywood, New-Dealers, liberals) to root out communist spies |
| Truman's Loyalty Program | Truman tested for communist alliances within government; government employees prohibited from taking part in remotely-communist activities |
| Rosenbergs | executed for leaking atomic secrets to Soviets, avowed communists |
| John Foster Dulles | secretary of state, policy to liberate captive people in Eastern Europe by political pressure and propaganda; massive retaliation to counter SovietlChinese aggression with nuclear weapons; brinksmanship to be persistent to solve crises (even to the extent of war) |
| CIA overthrow of Iran (1953) | installed Shah as dictator, overthrew Moussadegh (communist interests), in order to resist nationalization British oil holdings |
| CIA overthrow of Guatemala (1954) | overthrew Pres. Guzman after he nationalized American fruit fields and accepted arms from USSR (communist sympathies) |
| Sputnik | caused American hysteria (1957), fear that Soviets were technologically superior; led Ike to order more rigorous education program to rival Soviets (National Defense Education Act) |
| National Aeronautics Space Agency (NASA) | launched in 1958 by Ike; successful launch of American satellite (Explorer I); massive arms builup |
| U-2 Incident | American U-2 spy plane shot down over USSR (Ike: "for national security); US suspended further flights, Krushchev demanded apology (refused) |
| Ike's Farewell Speech | warned of dangerous military-industrial complex (newly-found power of the military to affect the path of democracy) |
| AFL-CIO (1955) | unemployment jitters; expelled Teamster union (resorted to gangsterism); height of power of workers' unions |
| US economy since WWII (service economy) | highest peacetime deficit in US history (due to lower tax rates for high-income taxpayers, spent too much money attempting to reduce price supports to farmers) |
| Brown v. Board of Education (1954) | blacks denied admission to all-white school; overturned Plessy v. Ferguson, negating "separate but equal", ordered integration of schools as soon as possible; white southerners protested (refused to attend integrated schools) |
| Rosa Parks and the Montgomery Bus Boycott (1955) | Parks arrested for refusing to give up bus seat to white man, African American leaders called for city-wide boycott of bus system (lasted almost 400 days); Supreme Court ruled segregated buses unconstitutional |
| Martin Luther King Jr., Southern Christian Leadership Conference | led boycott, became leader of civil rights movement; urged nonviolent resistance (cf. tactics of Ghandi); |
| Little Rock Crisis (1957) | Ike forced to send National Guard to escort black children to school to quell riots and resistance (first time since Reconstruction that troops used in the south to enforce Constitution); resistance by white community (private schools) |
| Greensboro sit-in (1960) | nonviolent protest to college students (NC) being refused lunch service; part of "sit-in" movement to integrate all aspects of life (hotels, entertainment, &c.) |
| Civil Rights Acts of 1957 and 1960 | commission on civil rights to attempt to guarantee the ballot to blacks; showed government's changing views of race relations |
| Election of 1960 | Kennedy vs. Nixon, Kennedy (due to televised charisma) won over Nixon (pale and nervous) |
| President John F. Kennedy | second youngest president, entered presidency as tensions of the Cold War increased; unable to get major initiatives through Congress due to conservative bloc; tax cuts (economic stimulation); reluctantly gets involved in civil rights; emphasizes Space Race (man on the moon) |
| Rachel Carson, Silent Spring | effects of pesticides on the environment; changed way Americans viewed their impact on nature |
| Berlin Wall | due to threat of nuclear war, Soviets erected wall to separate East Berlin from West Berlin (end exodus of intellect to west); symbol of communist denial of freedom |
| Peace Corps | created in 1961 as example of liberal anticommunism in third world countries; "reform-minded missionaries of democracy" |
| Alliance for Progress (Marshall Plan of Latin America) | Americans feared Soviet infiltration into Latin America, placed secret police and military forces to prevent it |
| Bay of Pigs invasion | CIA attempt to institute Cuban support to overthrow Castro; cover-up uncovered, became representation of Cuban resistance to American aggression |
| Cuban Missile Crisis | storage of Soviet missiles in Cuba (threat of nuclear war); Krushchev demanded that US never invade Cuba and remove forces from Turkey; mutual compliance with each other's demands |
| Nuclear Test Ban Treaty | prohibited testing of nuclear bombs above ground to slow the nuclear arms race and the release of nuclear fallout into the atmosphere |
| Freedom Riders (Congress of Racial Equality - CORE) | interracial group of protestors who aimed to dramatize the violations of the call for desegregation; harsh treatment by southern whites provoked Kennedy to more strictly enforce desegregation |
| James Meredith | black veteran escorted to be enrolled in Univ. of Miss. by military (school reluctant, cf. Little Rock Nine) |
| March on Birmingham | King hosted myriad nonviolent protesting activities to fill jail with protestors, Bill Connor (police commissioner) began violent resistance to protestors |
| March on Washington, "I have a dream" | 25,000 people (including whites) convened for political rally, MLK's speech to historical event; attempted to push civil rights bill through Congress |
| Assassination of JFK, Warren Commission | Assassinated by Lee Harvey Oswald (hated his anti-Cuban policies); LBJ instituted Warren Commission to investigate assassination (headed by Chief Justice Earl Warren) |
| President Lyndon B. Johnson | dealt with Vietnam War, "Great Society" program for improvement of American society, antipoverty and anti-discrimination programs |
| "Great Society" | LBJ's flood of proposals to Congress for the beautification and amelioration of American society (War on Poverty, Medicare, public education spending, public television (PBS), National Endowments for the Humanities and Arts (NEH, NEA)) |
| Affirmative Action | sets of programs geared towards minorities and oft-discriminated populations |
| Immigration Act of 1965 | abolished national origins quotas, dramatically increased immigration (especially from Asia and Latin America) |
| Civil Rights Act of 1964 | banned racial discrimination and segregation (public), bias by federal government; enforced by Equal Employment Opportunity Commission |
| Voting Rights Act of 1965 | prohibited use of any devices (e.g., literacy tests) to deny the right to vote and enforced black suffrage rights |
| Forced busing | due to parents unhappy with encouraged segregation of schools, Supreme Court instituted forced busing policies (using school buses as a method of integration) |
| Malcolm X, Nation of Islam | Black Muslim worked to raise black spirits and pride (cf. Marcus Garvey); emphasized black institutions rather than mere desegregation, blacks to gain freedom at any cost |
| Black Power, Stokely Carmichael | black rights leader, heavily influenced by Malcolm X (advocated black separatism rather than integration) |
| Black Panther Party | another black separatist movement; known for peaceful demonstrations, but more for police shootouts |
| Gains for women | rejection of negative portrayals of women (language, entertainment), increased quality and use of education, more job opportunities, acceptance into military |
| National Organization of Women | founded by Betty Friedan, Bella Abzug, and Aileen Hernandez; lobbied for equal opportunity where the EEOC was lacking (gender discrimination); lawsuits and mobilization of public opinion |
| Betty Friedan, The Feminine Mystique | denounced the "housewife trap" which caused educated women to hold even themselves inferior to men |
| Roe v. Wade | court case, unconstitutionalized all state laws prohibiting women's rights to have an abortion performed during the first trimester of pregnancy |
| Cesar Chavez, United Farm Workers | used nonviolent protest and boycott to achieve better working conditions for farmers (esp. Mexican-Americans) |
| Vietnam War | United States aided South Vietnam in its war of power struggle against North Vietnam, the Vietcong, USSR, and China |
| Ngo Dinh Diem | Catholic communist autocrat of Vietnam, assassinated (with aid of US) |
| Ho Chi Minh | contending communist politician in Vietnam, had more popularity than Diem, took power upon Diem's death |
| Vietcong | National Liberation Front, guerilla militia from south Vietnam fighting alongside the Democratic Republic of Vietnam (North Vietnam) |
| Gulf of Tonkin Resolution | Congress authorized LBJ to repel and prevent aggression against US troops in Vietnam, used as a blank check (perhaps too much, caused protests) |
| Tet Offensive (1968) | NLF attacked numerous South Vietnamese cities and American embassies, eventually repulsed; spoiled LBJ's record to reelection, resulted in massive protests in US to end the war; atrocities such that war could only end in stalemate |
| Impact of LBJ's Vietnam decision on 1968 election | left primary open to Robert Kennedy and Eugene McCarthy, both promising to end the controversial war |
| "New Left" (free speech movement) | youth activists (often liberal arts students) spoke out against Vietnam War, supported widespread liberalization |
| Students for a Democratic Society (SDS) | part of the New Left that envisioned "participatory democracy" (individuals control life-affecting decisions), end materialism, militarism, and racism; inspired by young black activists |
| Andy Warhol | pop art, mass production of art by screening |
| Warren Court | desegregation (Brown v. Board of Ed), rights of the accused (Miranda v. Arizona), voting reforms (Wesberry v. Sanders, Reynolds v. Sims, Katzenbach v Morgan) |
| 1968 as "the year of shocks" | Tet Offensive in Vietnam, assassination of MLK and Robert Kennedy (presidential candidate), Riot of Democratic National Convention (Chicago police beat antiwar protestors), Black Panthers |
| 1968 Presidential Election | George Wallace vs. Nixon vs. Humphrey; very narrow popular vote triumph to Nixon (although he had clear majority of electoral votes) |
| Richard Nixon (R) | "Southern Strategy" lured many southern Democrats to the Republican party (esp. due to southern opposition to Civil Rights Act of 1964) |
| George Wallace, American | appealed to many conservatives, especially southerners (opposed massive protests and integration) |
| Vietnamization | part of Nixon's tri-faceted plan to honorably remove troops from Vietnam; wean the South Vietnamese off of American support, gradually reducing number of American troops present |
| Bombing and invasion of Cambodia | another part of Nixon's out-of-Vietnam plan, destroy supply routes to North Vietnam through Cambodia |
| Kent State Protest | Kent State University students protesting against invasion of Cambodia, not allowed to demonstrate, violence (murder) caused by guardsmen |
| "Silent Majority" | speech symbolized polarization between conservatives and liberals |
| Conservative backlash against liberalism | conservatives like Reagan benefited from denouncing the New Left and excessive antiwar protests; gave him political prominence |
| Detente, realpolitik | detente achieved with USSR and China by withdrawal from Vietnam; realpolitik shed the use of doctrines and policies, instead using China and USSR in alternative ways to achieve other goals (pitting China and USSR against each other, as communist nations) |
| Strategic Arms Limitation Talks (SALT I) | Nixon agreed with USSR to achieve nuclear equality rather than the superiority that threatened the destruction of the world; further reduced tensions between the two countries |
| New Federalism | Nixon's domestic policy; federal revenues shared with states (revenue sharing), minimum income proposed |
| Watergate Scandal | despite near-guaranteed second term, campaign workers burglarized Democratic offices, cover-up unsuccessful, resigned to avoid impeachment |
| Energy Crisis, OPEC | increased already high rate of inflation by quadrupling the price of crude oil |
| Stagflation | Ford's and Carter's presidencies experienced a recession and inflation simultaneously, solved by Keynesian economics |
| President Jimmy Carter | Panama Canal Treaty, diplomacy with China, end of recognition of Taiwan; little accomplished domestically due to conservative opposition, foreign policy more successful; Washington outsider, Experienced high interest rates, inflation, increased government spending, rising unemployment, decreased union membership |
| Humanitarian diplomacy | fought for human rights in Africa, Panama Canal returned to Panama, relations with China resolved |
| Camp David Accords | (peace btw Egypt and Israel) followed years of tension, Israel would leave newly acquired lands from war, Egypt would respect Israel's other land claims; accords not completely followed, Sadat (Egypt) assassinated |
| Iran Hostage Crisis, 1979 | American hostages taken by US hating Shiites upon Shah's flight from uprising, botched rescue attempts |
| Soviet invasion of Afghanistan | despite CIA-sponsored Soviet resistance, Afghanistan taken by Soviet Union; ended detente between USSR and US |
| Deregulation | drastic cutbacks in regulation of business by the federal government (banks, transportation, communications |
| Election of 1980 | decisive victory to Reagan due to his appeal over Carter (now unpopular due to lack of success in the presidency |
| President Ronald Reagan | offered a New Deal (reminiscent of FDR) of smaller government, reduced taxes, and free enterprise; Washington outsider |
| Conservatism | belief in minimal government so as to allow the people their own free reign, lower taxes to stimulate economy, &c. |
| Religious Right | political action for religion justified by decreased presence of religion in society; Pat Robertson's Christian Coalition to expand national influence |
| Reaganomics | capitalism would become productive when uninhibited by taxes and regulation |
| Supply-side economics, tax cuts | tax cuts to increase population spending (help economy), drastic cutting back on government programs due to lack of funds |
| Nicaraguan Contras | guerilla army sponsored by CIA to attack procommunist revolutionaries in Nicaragua; fear of another Vietnam |
| "Evil Empire" speech, "Star Wars" | Reagan called the Soviet Union an "evil empire"; Korean passenger plane shot down near Moscow (increased anti-Soviet rhetoric); Strategic Defense Initiative (SDI) used space-based lasers as defense from nuclear attack |
| Mikhail Gorbachev | Soviet leader undergoing tensions on superpower and domestic level |
| Intermediate-range Nuclear Forces (INF) Treaty (1987) | Reagan and Gorbachev agree to remove and destroy nuclear weapons from Eastern and Western Europe; eased international tension and allowed Soviet domestic reforms to take place |
| Fall of communism in Eastern Europe (1989) | Gorbachev announced Soviet withdrawal of power from all of Eastern Europe, including Berlin (wall torn down, free movement, &c.) |
| Fall of Soviet Union (1991) | Gorbachev decreased nuclear arsenals, Communist Party lost power, Boris Yeltsin (president of Russian Republic) led Muscovites to take control |
| "Graying of America" | economic recession (collapse of savings-and-loan industry, increasing deficit due to Reagan tax cuts, retail decreased, higher crime rate) |
| Economic transition | to service economy in late 20 century (end of industrialism) – higher focus on services (esp. education) rather than material products |
| Gulf War, "Operation Desert Storm" (1991) | Saddam Hussein's invasion of Kuwait despite peace treaty and refusal to abandon Iraqi occupation |
| 1992 Election | Bush vs. Clinton vs. Perot; focus on stagnancy of economy and problems of middle class (Clinton) |
| President Bill Clinton | scholarly, welfare-reform, "Contract with America," impeachment over Monica Lewinski Scandal, War in Kosovo |
| Gays in the military | ended exclusion of homosexuals from military; due to controversy, compromise of "don't ask, don't tell" instituted |
| North American Free Trade Agreement NAFTA (1994) | established free trade zone between Canada, United States and Mexico, net gain in jobs due to opening of Mexican markets |
| "Contract with America" (1994) | Newt Gingrich (Republican congressman) planned for success of Republican party in upcoming election by pledging tax cuts, congressional term limits, tougher crime laws, balanced budget amendment, popular reforms &c. |
| Clinton impeachment (1997) | helped approval ratings, not removed from office despite all the efforts of Republican congressmen |
| Bush v. Gore (2000) | Gore promising with experience, Bush appealing by family influence and plans for presidency (tax cuts, education reform, defense, &c.) |
| 9/11 Terrorist Attacks on NYC & DC (2001) | planes hijacked by terrorists for destruction; blame pinned on Al Qaeda and Osama bin Laden, sought out in attempt to completely destroy terrorism |
| Invasion of Afghanistan (2002) | overthrow of the Taliban, in search of bin Laden |
| Invasion of Iraq, removal of Saddam Hussein, 2003 | Iran, Iraq, and North Korea designated as the "axis of evil," institution of democratic government in Iraq to replace Hussein's dictatorship (return to spread and protection of democracy throughout the world, moving beyond containment of communism) |
| Citizen Genet | Edmond Genet contributed to polarization of the new nation by creating his American Foreign Legion in the south, which was directed to attack Spanish garrisons in New Orleans and St. Augustine |
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