This was my history exam in college and l’ve attached my solutions to some of the problems.
SHORT IDS: ANSWER 10, AT LEAST 4 SENTENCES EACH
1. Abolitionist Movement
The Abolitionist Movement was started in the United States in the 18th century to end slavery and emancipate slaves. The presidential victory of Abraham Lincoln who opposed the spread of slavery to the Western United States marked a turning point in the movement. Lincoln issued the Emancipation Proclamation in 1863, which freed slaves held in the Confederate States. The 13th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution in 1865 prohibited slavery throughout the country.
2. National Bank controversy
The first National Bank was controversial because its creation was entirely justified by the elastic clause of the Constitution. Alexander Hamilton, Secretary of the Treasury, first proposed the creation of the Bank based on the idea that the Bank was “necessary and proper”, and the Constitution allowed for things that were “necessary and proper”. However, strict central government opponents like Thomas Jefferson and James Madison believed the national bank wasn’t in the provisions of the Constitution. In addition Jefferson and Madison feared that a national bank would strengthen the central government, and that it would lend more power to the bankers and traders of city life.
3. John Quincy Adams
He was the Sixth President of the United States from 1825-1829. He served as a Secretary of State prior to his presidency and elected a US representative after he lost the presidency to Andrew Jackson.
Adams is considered one of the greatest American diplomats who shaped America’s foreign policy. He signed the Treaty of Ghent, which ended the war of 1812. He was a leading member of the opponents of slavery and he predicted correctly that a Civil War could end slavery.
4. Nat Turner Rebellion
It was a slave rebellion that took place in Virginia in 1831 led by Nat Turner. Rebel slaves killed about 60 white people, the highest number of fatalities caused by slave uprisings in the South. The rebellion was put down within a few days, but Turner survived in hiding for over two months afterwards. In the aftermath, there was widespread fear, and white militias organized in retaliation against slaves. The state executed 56 slaves accused of being part of the rebellion
5. Know-Nothing Party
It was a party that emerged from a secret society in the 19th century that held the idea that Americans should rule America. It is also called the American party or the Nativists. The party consists mainly of white supremacies with ideas to restrict immigration, increase the naturalization year and prevent immigrants from politics. They also called for the abolishment of Catholic schools to prevent Irish religious power in the United States.
6. Paternalism
7. Andrew Jackson
He was the seventh President of the United States (1829–1837). Jackson was a politician and an army general. As a president he destroyed the national bank and relocated most Indian tribes from the Southeast to west of the Mississippi River. Jackson has a tough and aggressive personality and was a rich slaveholder.
Jackson supported a small and limited federal government. He was supportive of states’ rights, but during the Nullification Crisis, declared that states do not have the right to nullify federal laws.
7. Republican Party
It was founded in the 1790s by Thomas Jefferson and James Madison. In a broader sense the party was formed to contest elections and oppose the programs of Treasury Secretary Alexander Hamilton. The Party opposed the Jay Treaty with Britain and supported good relations with France. The Party opposed the national bank and called for limited power for the federal government. It favored states’ rights and committed to the principles of republicanism, which they feared were threatened by the supposed monarchical tendencies of the Federalists. Thomas Jefferson , James Madison and James Monroe were all presidents elected by the party.
8. Charles Finney
9. Separate Spheres
It refers to how gender roles separate females and males in the 1830s. It appeared after the market revolution that has created many changes in the United States around 1815-1830. Women played the roles of “house keeping”, raising morally good children and providing a comfortable home for their husbands. The men played the roles of being out of home for salaried job and engaging in politics and business. Women later protested against this separation through reform movements to have the same opportunities available to males.
10. Dred Scot Decision
Dred Scott was a slave who sued for his freedom in 1854 based on the fact that although he was a slave, he had lived with his master Dr. John Emerson in Illinois and the Wisconsin Territories where slavery was illegal according to state laws. The Supreme Court Chief Justice Roger B. Taney made the outrageous argument that neither he, nor any black person could claim citizenship in the United States, and therefore Scott could not bring suit in federal court under diversity of citizenship rules. That Scott’s temporary residence outside Missouri did not bring about his emancipation under the Missouri Compromise, as it would improperly deprive Scott’s owner of his legal property. James Buchanan, a proslavery president was in office at the time and had coerced the decision of the court.
11. Secession Movement
It was a movement by several southern states to secede from the Union in the 1860s. Eleven of the fifteen southern states where slavery was legal declared their secession from the United States and joined together as the Confederate States of America. These southern states claimed the Union was an enemy of the South that will eventually destroy the South. They also claimed the Union has placed limits on the rights of the states. The movement collapsed in 1865 after losing the war with the Union in the American Civil War.
12. Emancipation Proclamation
It is an executive order issued by Abraham Lincoln in 1863, during the American Civil War. It proclaimed the freedom of the nation’s slaves, and immediately freed about 50,000 of them, with nearly all the rest freed as Union armies advanced. The Proclamation made abolition a central goal of the war. This outraged white Southerners who envisioned a race war, angered some Northern Democrats, energized anti-slavery forces, and weakened forces in Europe that wanted to intervene to help the Confederacy.
13. Second Great Awakening
It was a Christian revival movement during the early 19th century in the United States. It expressed the idea that every person could be saved through revivals. It led to the formation of new denominations. The Second Great Awakening stimulated the establishment of many reform movements designed to remedy the evils of society before the Second Coming of Jesus Christ.
14. Harriet Jacobs
15. Seneca Falls Convention
It was an influential women’s rights convention held in Seneca Falls, New York, in 1848. It was organized by local New York women upon the occasion of a visit by Lucretia Mott, a Quaker famous for her speaking ability, a skill rarely cultivated by American women at the time. The meeting included lecture on laws and discussions on the role of women in society. The Declaration of Sentiments which included many rights for women, such as the right to vote which was supported by Frederick Douglas, was signed by about 100 women at the meeting.
16. Fugitive Slave Law of 1850
17. Stephen Douglas
18. Gettysburg
19. Trail of Tears
20. Gold Rush
21. Whig Party
The Whig Party was formed in the 1830s. The party was formed in opposition to the policies of President Andrew Jackson and his Democratic Party. The Whigs supported the supremacy of Congress over the presidency. The name “Whig” was given to the party to portray their idea of opposing tyranny, just like the American Whigs who fought for independence. Henry Clay was the leader of the Whig Party. The Whig Party had two of its candidates, William Henry Harrison and Zachary Taylor, elected president. The party was ultimately destroyed by the question of whether to allow the expansion of slavery to the territories. The anti-slavery faction prevented the re-nomination of its incumbent candidate and most leaders quit politics or changed parties, as in the case of Abraham Lincoln.
22. Harper’s Ferry
23. War of 1812
It was a military conflict fought between the forces of the United States of America and those of the British Empire. The Americans declared war in 1812 for several reasons, including trade restrictions because of Britain’s ongoing war with France, and British support of American Indian tribes against American expansion. General Andrew Jackson destroyed the military strength of the Creek nation at the Battle of Horseshoe Bend. The British captured and burnt Washington, D.C but American forces later had victory over the British in New York, Baltimore and New Orleans. The war was very controversial in the U.S but after it came the “Era of good feelings” in which partisan bitterness abated and the country became more united.
24. John C. Calhoun
25. James Buchanan
26. Kansas-Nebraska Act
27. Lecompton Constitution
28. Manifest Destiny
29. Mexican-American War
It was an armed conflict between the United States and Mexico from 1846 to 1848 in the wake of the 1845 U.S. annexation of Texas, which Mexico considered part of its territory despite the 1836 Texas Revolution. James K. Polk, the United States president with goals of American territorial expansion ordered American forces to invade New Mexico, the California Republic, and part of the current northern Mexico, and capture Mexico City. America won the war and forced Mexico to agree to the cession of its northern territories to the U.S. The war was controversial in the U.S especially with the Whig Party and anti-slavery leaders. The U.S. paid in exchange $18 million to Mexico and forgave debt owed by the Mexican government to U.S. citizens.
30. Missouri Compromise
It was an agreement passed in 1820 between the pro-slavery and anti-slavery factions in the United States Congress, involving primarily the regulation of slavery in the western territories. It prohibited slavery in the former Louisiana Territory except within the boundaries of the proposed state of Missouri. Before admitting the slave state of Missouri into the Union, an amendment was offered which provided that the further introduction of slaves into Missouri should be forbidden, and that all children of slave parents born in the state after its admission should be free at the age of 25. This was adopted by the committee and incorporated in the bill that was passed by the house but the Senate refused to concur in the amendment.
SHORT-ANSWER QUESTIONS (Answer 4 out of 8 with 7-10 sentences):
1. What were the major social effects of the market revolution in early 19th century America? How did it impact worker’s lives, including women and African-Americans?
Answer: The market revolution is a period after 1815 within which many changes occurred in the United States. The changes include the decline of paternalistic employment arrangements. There were labor contracts and major decline in relative self-sufficiency. There were increase in trade markets and the growing work force has become more urbanized. This has resulted in men working outside for longer hours and not available to their women when needed. Some women also have started working outside. The market revolution has divided the country into two sections because most of the revolution was happening in the North. This made the North’s economy to become stronger and more attractive. The Steam boat, Rail Road canals, Cotton Gin, Sewing Machine were all invented during the market revolution and all of these technological innovations has impacted women and African Americans in many ways such as dilution of skills, devaluation of women’s labor, competition, economic dependence and separation of home and work.
2. What were the sources and significance of the antebellum women’s rights movement? What changes did advocates of women’s rights want to see?
Answer: The antebellum women’s rights movement started in the 1820’s to 1860’s as a movement to fight the limits that society imposed on women. The rapid changes in society and the separation of work and home, along with the psychological need to preserve an ideal family, led to a belief that men and women lived in separate but complementary spheres. Men were best suited for public worlds of business and politics while Women, who were by nature gentle, emotional, and sensitive, belonged in the private world of the home. There, they provided a haven for husbands and children from the rigors of modern capitalism.
In other to fight and gain access to the same opportunities of education and others that men enjoyed, 200 women gathered at Seneca Falls in New York, with the message that women deserve full rights and privileges of a citizen. The advocates want women to be able to act in public, pursue medical or law careers, or be involved in important issues that affect their life as well.
3. What were the major forces that caused territorial expansion in the 1840s? Which groups pushed for expansion and why?
4. How politically influential were the abolitionists? What other people/groups opposed the spread of slavery and why?
5. How was the “Nullification Crisis” a dress rehearsal for secession? What motivated the “nullifiers” of South Carolina?
The Nullification Crisis was a sectional crisis during the presidency of Andrew Jackson created by South Carolina’s 1832 Ordinance of Nullification. This ordinance declared by the power of the State that the federal Tariff of 1828 and 1832 were unconstitutional and therefore null and void within the sovereign boundaries of South Carolina. At the time, South Carolina and most southern states considered the Federal government as friends to the North and enemies of the South. The slave insurrection in Virginia at the same time in 1831 by Nat Turner also heightened the pressure on South Carolina because the south’s population is becoming black majority as whites started moving to the west due to the economic downturn in the south.
South Carolinians feared blacks could overtake the state if the economy of the south doesn’t improve to retain whites in the south. This sets a rehearsal for secession because the south is becoming more aware that if they remain in the Union, they are likely going to be destroyed by the Federal government and their institution of slavery could be abolished by the Federal government.
6. Describe Southern proslavery ideology after 1830. Why did arguments in defense of slavery change around this time? How were they different from attitudes of the Revolutionary generation?
7. Describe the ideology of the Republican Party in the 1850s. What did this party stand for? What was its platform? Who did it most appeal to?
8. How was the concept of “popular sovereignty” used as a possible solution to the problem of slavery’s expansion in the West? Who were the biggest advocates of “popular sovereignty”? Who were its biggest opponents and why?
9. Why did eleven southern states secede from the Union in 1860-61? What were the reasons given for secession?
Answer: Restive Southerners had questioned their future within the Union well before the election of the Republican Abraham Lincoln in 1860, whose name did not even appear on the ballots for some southern states. The eleven southern states made the proclamation that the Union was not composed of the American people but rather was composed of states linked by a contractual agreement that could be severed by a state deciding that its continued presence in that Union no longer served the state’s best interests.
The Mississippi legislature urging secession summed up that the several States are distinct sovereignties, whose supremacy is limited so far only as the same has been delegated by voluntary compact to a Federal Government, and when it fails to accomplish the ends for which it was established, the parties to the compact have the right to resume, each State for itself, such delegated powers. The south considered election of Abraham Lincoln as declaration of war on the institutions and interest of the south and they see the need to dissociate themselves from the Union to protect the rights of the southern states.
10. Why is the Civil War considered to be the first Modern War? How the technologies and conduct of the war differ from previous wars?
Answer: The Civil war was fought from 1861-1865 between the Union and the Confederacy on the basis of slave abolition. The war is considered to be the first Modern War because the war was fought at a time when technology has started to evolve and has changed most of the existing ways of battling. It was the deadliest war and has shaped the United States and its slave institution. There were improvements to the riffles resulting in the increase of their accuracy. There was the innovation of railroads that were used to transport armies. There were ironclad w+arships with turret guns and telegraphs were available to communicate between different sectors of government and the army. As opposed to lining up people and burning them down as it was done in the past, during the Civil War people’s houses were burnt down to motivate the Southern states and its people to surrender or retreat. There were improvements in the type of trench warfare formed by armies during the war. All these improvements have resulted in the Civil War being the deadliest war.
