Chapter 5

"I have heard it asserted by some, that as America hath flourished under her former connection with Great Britain, that the same connection is necessary towards her future happiness, and will always have the same effect. Nothing can be more fallacious [untrue] than this kind of argument. We may as well assert that because a child has thrived upon milk, that it is never to have meat, or that the first twenty years of our lives is to become a precedent for the next twenty. But even this is admitting more than is true, for I answer roundly, that America would have flourished as much, and probably much more, had no European power had any thing to do with her. . . . "But Britain is the parent country, say some. Then the more shame upon her conduct. Even brutes do not devour their young, nor savages make war upon their families. . . . Europe, and not England, is the parent country of America. This new world hath been the asylum for the persecuted lovers of civil and religious liberty from every part of Europe. Hither have they fled, not from the tender embraces of the mother, but from the cruelty of the monster; and it is so far true of England, that the same tyranny which drove the first emigrants from home, pursues their descendants still." Thomas Paine, Common Sense, 1776 Paine's rhetoric in the excerpt would have most likely been interpreted at the time as promoting the

Independence of the American colonies

Which of the following was true of the Continental Congress in its drafting of the Articles of Confederation?

It was cautious about giving the new government powers it had just denied Parliament.

As the Revolutionary War began, most Americans believed they were fighting for

A redress of grievances against the British Empire.

In the first phase of the American Revolution, between early 1775 and early 1776, the fighting resulted in British forces

Abandoning American soil for a while.

In the second phase of the American Revolution, between early 1776 and 1778, the fighting resulted in the British forces

Achieving several important victories but failing to crush the Americans because of mistakes and blunders.

"The petition of a great number of blacks detained in a state of slavery in the bowels of a free and Christian country humbly showeth that...they have in common with all other men a natural and inalienable right to that freedom which the Great Parent of the Universe has bestowed equally on all mankind and which they have never forfeited by any compact or agreement whatever.... "[E]very principle from which America has acted in the course of their unhappy difficulties with Great Britain pleads stronger than a thousand arguments in favor of your petitioners. They therefore humbly beseech your honors to give this petition its due weight and consideration and cause an act of the legislature to be passed whereby they may be restored to the enjoyments of that which is the natural right of all men." Petition for freedom to the Massachusetts Council and the House of Representatives for the State of Massachusetts, January 1777 Which of the following most likely helped to prompt the petition in the excerpt?

American colonists' declaration of independence from Britain

In 1781, the states ratified a plan for a decentralized national government of the United States that was called the

Articles of Confederation

"I have heard it asserted by some, that as America hath flourished under her former connection with Great Britain, that the same connection is necessary towards her future happiness, and will always have the same effect. Nothing can be more fallacious [untrue] than this kind of argument. We may as well assert that because a child has thrived upon milk, that it is never to have meat, or that the first twenty years of our lives is to become a precedent for the next twenty. But even this is admitting more than is true, for I answer roundly, that America would have flourished as much, and probably much more, had no European power had any thing to do with her. . . . "But Britain is the parent country, say some. Then the more shame upon her conduct. Even brutes do not devour their young, nor savages make war upon their families. . . . Europe, and not England, is the parent country of America. This new world hath been the asylum for the persecuted lovers of civil and religious liberty from every part of Europe. Hither have they fled, not from the tender embraces of the mother, but from the cruelty of the monster; and it is so far true of England, that the same tyranny which drove the first emigrants from home, pursues their descendants still." Thomas Paine, Common Sense, 1776 Which of the following historical situations most directly shaped Paine's argument that Britain's policies were economically harming its colonies?

Continued enforcement of mercantilism

"[George] Washington's gratitude was genuine . . . but the fact remains that the members of the association, who had embarked on a very unfeminine enterprise, were ultimately deflected into a traditional domestic role.... Ironically and symbolically, the Philadelphia women of 1780, who had tried to establish an unprecedented nationwide female organization, ended up as what one amused historian has termed 'General Washington's Sewing Circle.' "Male Revolutionary leaders too regarded women's efforts with wry condescension. . . . The women, on the other hand,... could reflect proudly that 'whilst our friends were exposed to the hardships and dangers of the fields of war for our protection, we were exerting at home our little labours to administer to their comfort and alleviate their toil.'" Mary Beth Norton, historian, "The Philadelphia Ladies Association," American Heritage, 1980 Which of the following pieces of evidence could best be used to support the argument in the excerpt?

Correspondence between husbands and wives involved in Revolutionary politics

"Resolved, That woman is man's equal.... "Resolved, That woman has too long rested satisfied in the circumscribed limits which corrupt customs... have marked out for her, and that it is time she should move in the enlarged sphere... assigned her. "Resolved, That it is the duty of the women of this country to secure to themselves their sacred right to the elective franchise. "Resolved,... That, being invested by the Creator with the same capabilities, and the same consciousness of responsibility for their exercise, it is demonstrably the right and duty of woman, equally with man, to promote every righteous cause, by every righteous means." Declaration of Sentiments and Resolutions (Seneca Falls Convention), 1848 The language and themes of the excerpt were most directly inspired by the

Declaration of Independence

During the War for Independence, the principal reason the American government sought diplomatic recognition from foreign powers was to

Facilitate the purchase of arms and borrowing of money from other nations

"In the time of the late war, being desirous to defend, secure, and promote the Rights and Liberties of the people, we spared no pains but freely granted all the aid and assistance of every kind that our civil fathers [political leaders] required of us. "We are sensible also that a great debt is justly brought upon us by the War, and we are as willing to pay our share towards it as we are to enjoy our shares in independency. . . . "But with the greatest submission we beg leave to inform your Honors that unless something takes place more favorable to the people, in a little time at least one half of our inhabitants in our opinion will become bankrupt. . . . When we compute the taxes laid upon us the five preceding years, the State and County, town, and class taxes, the amount is equal to what our farms will rent for. Sirs in this situation, what have we to live on: No money to be had; our estates daily posted and sold. . . . Surely your Honors are no strangers to the distresses of the people but do know that many of our good inhabitants are now confined in jail for debt and for taxes. . . . Will not the people in the neighboring states say of this state: although the Massachusetts [people] boast of their fine Constitution, their government is such that it devours their inhabitants? ". . . If your Honors find anything above mentioned worthy of notice, we earnestly pray that . . . [the state legislature] would point out some way whereby the people might be relieved." Petition from the town of Greenwich to the Massachusetts state legislature, 1786 Which of the following evidence used in the petition supports the claim that the Massachusetts government "devours their inhabitants"?

Many Massachusetts farmers were held in debtor's prison.

During the final phase of the American Revolution, between early 1778 and late 1783, the fighting resulted in British forces

Moving their major efforts into the South, where their forces were finally worn down and suffered a major defeat.

"Threatened by popular political victories [in the states] and widespread resistance, many elite Pennsylvanians launched an effort to remake the state and national governments so that they were less democratic. . . . Popular policies and resistance . . . threatened elite ideals. . . . Popular calls for a revaluation of war debt certificates, bans on for-profit corporations, progressive taxation, limits on land speculation, and every other measure designed to make property more equal promised to take wealth away from the elite. . . . It was also threatening that popular politics frightened off potential European investors. . . . [They] were alarmed by the Pennsylvania legislature's 1785 [cancellation] of the Bank of North America's corporate charter. . . . . . . The push for the Constitution was based in part on the belief that state governments across the new nation had been too democratic and, as a result, had produced policies . . . that threatened elite interests. Most of the men who assembled at the Constitutional Convention in Philadelphia in 1787 were also convinced that the national government under the Articles of Confederation was too weak to counter the rising tide of democracy in the states." Terry Bouton, historian, Taming Democracy: "The People," the Founders, and the Troubled Ending of the American Revolution, 2007 One piece of evidence Bouton uses to support his argument about why some United States political leaders sought to replace the Articles of Confederation in 1787 was that they

Opposed the economic policies that some state legislatures pursued

"The emancipation of slaves in New England, beginning around 1780, was a gradual process, whether by post nati statute [laws freeing enslaved people born after a certain date], as in Rhode Island and Connecticut, or by effect, as in Massachusetts and New Hampshire, where ambiguous judicial decisions and constitutional interpretations discouraged slaveholding without clearly outlawing it. The gradual nature of the process encouraged Whites to transfer a language and set of practices shaped in the context of slavery to their relations with a slowly emerging population of free people of color. The rhetoric of antislavery and revolutionary republicanism fostered this transfer, undergirding Whites' assumptions that emancipated slaves, likely to be dependent and disorderly, would constitute a problem requiring firm management in the new republic. . . . "Even more problematic was the promise implicit in antislavery rhetoric that abolition, by ending 'the problem'—the sin of slavery and the troublesome presence of slaves—would result in the eventual absence of people of color themselves. In other words, Whites anticipated that free people of color, would, by some undefined moment (always imminent), have disappeared." Joanne Pope Melish, historian, Disowning Slavery: Gradual Emancipation and "Race" in New England, 1780-1860, published in 1998 The author argues that emancipation in northern states occurred

Over a long period of time

The 1777 victory which marked the major turning point of the Revolutionary War occurred at the Battle of

Saratoga

A Maryland master placed the following newspaper advertisement in 1772 after Harry, his slave, had run away: "He has been seen about the Negro Quarters in Patuxent, but is supposed to have removed among his Acquaintances on Potomack; he is also well acquainted with a Negro of Mr. Wall's named Rachael; a few miles from that Quarter is his Aunt, and he may possibly be harboured thereabouts." Which of the following statements about conditions under slavery is best supported by the passage above?

Slaves maintained social networks among kindred and friends despite forced separations.

The pamphlet "Common Sense" was instrumental in gaining support for

The idea of independence from Great Britain.

"The emancipation of slaves in New England, beginning around 1780, was a gradual process, whether by post nati statute [laws freeing enslaved people born after a certain date], as in Rhode Island and Connecticut, or by effect, as in Massachusetts and New Hampshire, where ambiguous judicial decisions and constitutional interpretations discouraged slaveholding without clearly outlawing it. The gradual nature of the process encouraged Whites to transfer a language and set of practices shaped in the context of slavery to their relations with a slowly emerging population of free people of color. The rhetoric of antislavery and revolutionary republicanism fostered this transfer, undergirding Whites' assumptions that emancipated slaves, likely to be dependent and disorderly, would constitute a problem requiring firm management in the new republic. . . . "Even more problematic was the promise implicit in antislavery rhetoric that abolition, by ending 'the problem'—the sin of slavery and the troublesome presence of slaves—would result in the eventual absence of people of color themselves. In other words, Whites anticipated that free people of color, would, by some undefined moment (always imminent), have disappeared." Joanne Pope Melish, historian, Disowning Slavery: Gradual Emancipation and "Race" in New England, 1780-1860, published in 1998 The author claims in the excerpt that antislavery rhetoric in the late eighteenth century was based on

The concern that revolutionary conflict would spread from France to the United States

"[George] Washington's gratitude was genuine . . . but the fact remains that the members of the association, who had embarked on a very unfeminine enterprise, were ultimately deflected into a traditional domestic role.... Ironically and symbolically, the Philadelphia women of 1780, who had tried to establish an unprecedented nationwide female organization, ended up as what one amused historian has termed 'General Washington's Sewing Circle.' "Male Revolutionary leaders too regarded women's efforts with wry condescension. . . . The women, on the other hand,... could reflect proudly that 'whilst our friends were exposed to the hardships and dangers of the fields of war for our protection, we were exerting at home our little labours to administer to their comfort and alleviate their toil.'" Mary Beth Norton, historian, "The Philadelphia Ladies Association," American Heritage, 1980 During and immediately after the Revolutionary era, which of the following resulted most directly from the efforts of women such as those described in the excerpt?

The ideal that women would teach republican values

In which of the following ways did slavery change in the late 1700s?

The ideals of the American Revolution prompted some individuals and groups to call for the abolition of slavery.

"What do we mean by the Revolution? The war? That was no part of the Revolution; it was only an effect and consequence of it. The Revolution was in the minds of the people, and this was effected from 1760 to 1775, in the course of fifteen years, before a drop of blood was shed at Lexington." John Adams, former president of the United States, letter to Thomas Jefferson, former president of the United States, 1815 Which of the following factors most directly contradicted Adams' theory about the Revolution?

The importance of support from European allies in defeating the British

By the time of the American Revolution, most patriots had come to believe that, in republican government, sovereignty was located in

The people

"We are reduced to the alternative of choosing an unconditional submission to the tyranny of irritated ministers, or resistance by force. . . . "We fight not for glory or for conquest. We exhibit to mankind the remarkable spectacle of a people attacked by unprovoked enemies, without any imputation or even suspicion of offense. They boast of their privileges and civilization, and yet proffer no milder conditions than servitude or death. "In our own native land, in defense of the freedom . . . , and which we ever enjoyed till the late violation of it—for the protection of our property, acquired solely by the honest industry of our forefathers and ourselves, against violence actually offered, we have taken up arms." Declaration of the Causes and Necessity of Taking Up Arms, July 1775 Which of the following most immediately built on the ideas expressed in the excerpt?

The publication of the pamphlet Common Sense

"In the time of the late war, being desirous to defend, secure, and promote the Rights and Liberties of the people, we spared no pains but freely granted all the aid and assistance of every kind that our civil fathers [political leaders] required of us. "We are sensible also that a great debt is justly brought upon us by the War, and we are as willing to pay our share towards it as we are to enjoy our shares in independency. . . . "But with the greatest submission we beg leave to inform your Honors that unless something takes place more favorable to the people, in a little time at least one half of our inhabitants in our opinion will become bankrupt. . . . When we compute the taxes laid upon us the five preceding years, the State and County, town, and class taxes, the amount is equal to what our farms will rent for. Sirs in this situation, what have we to live on: No money to be had; our estates daily posted and sold. . . . Surely your Honors are no strangers to the distresses of the people but do know that many of our good inhabitants are now confined in jail for debt and for taxes. . . . Will not the people in the neighboring states say of this state: although the Massachusetts [people] boast of their fine Constitution, their government is such that it devours their inhabitants? ". . . If your Honors find anything above mentioned worthy of notice, we earnestly pray that . . . [the state legislature] would point out some way whereby the people might be relieved." Petition from the town of Greenwich to the Massachusetts state legislature, 1786 The concern in the petition about the effect of taxation is best understood in continuity with which of the following earlier developments?

The revolt against British imperial control of the North American colonies

During the American Revolution, the real center of authority was

The state governments

"I have heard it asserted by some, that as America hath flourished under her former connection with Great Britain, that the same connection is necessary towards her future happiness, and will always have the same effect. Nothing can be more fallacious [untrue] than this kind of argument. We may as well assert that because a child has thrived upon milk, that it is never to have meat, or that the first twenty years of our lives is to become a precedent for the next twenty. But even this is admitting more than is true, for I answer roundly, that America would have flourished as much, and probably much more, had no European power had any thing to do with her. . . . "But Britain is the parent country, say some. Then the more shame upon her conduct. Even brutes do not devour their young, nor savages make war upon their families. . . . Europe, and not England, is the parent country of America. This new world hath been the asylum for the persecuted lovers of civil and religious liberty from every part of Europe. Hither have they fled, not from the tender embraces of the mother, but from the cruelty of the monster; and it is so far true of England, that the same tyranny which drove the first emigrants from home, pursues their descendants still." Thomas Paine, Common Sense, 1776 The ideas expressed in the excerpt best reflect which of the following historical processes?

The transmission of Enlightenment ideals across the Atlantic

"The emancipation of slaves in New England, beginning around 1780, was a gradual process, whether by post nati statute [laws freeing enslaved people born after a certain date], as in Rhode Island and Connecticut, or by effect, as in Massachusetts and New Hampshire, where ambiguous judicial decisions and constitutional interpretations discouraged slaveholding without clearly outlawing it. The gradual nature of the process encouraged Whites to transfer a language and set of practices shaped in the context of slavery to their relations with a slowly emerging population of free people of color. The rhetoric of antislavery and revolutionary republicanism fostered this transfer, undergirding Whites' assumptions that emancipated slaves, likely to be dependent and disorderly, would constitute a problem requiring firm management in the new republic. . . . "Even more problematic was the promise implicit in antislavery rhetoric that abolition, by ending 'the problem'—the sin of slavery and the troublesome presence of slaves—would result in the eventual absence of people of color themselves. In other words, Whites anticipated that free people of color, would, by some undefined moment (always imminent), have disappeared." Joanne Pope Melish, historian, Disowning Slavery: Gradual Emancipation and "Race" in New England, 1780-1860, published in 1998 The author makes which of the following arguments in the excerpt about the perceptions Whites maintained regarding emancipated people in the North?

They believed that emancipated people were unable to take care of themselves.

"In the time of the late war, being desirous to defend, secure, and promote the Rights and Liberties of the people, we spared no pains but freely granted all the aid and assistance of every kind that our civil fathers [political leaders] required of us. "We are sensible also that a great debt is justly brought upon us by the War, and we are as willing to pay our share towards it as we are to enjoy our shares in independency. . . . "But with the greatest submission we beg leave to inform your Honors that unless something takes place more favorable to the people, in a little time at least one half of our inhabitants in our opinion will become bankrupt. . . . When we compute the taxes laid upon us the five preceding years, the State and County, town, and class taxes, the amount is equal to what our farms will rent for. Sirs in this situation, what have we to live on: No money to be had; our estates daily posted and sold. . . . Surely your Honors are no strangers to the distresses of the people but do know that many of our good inhabitants are now confined in jail for debt and for taxes. . . . Will not the people in the neighboring states say of this state: although the Massachusetts [people] boast of their fine Constitution, their government is such that it devours their inhabitants? ". . . If your Honors find anything above mentioned worthy of notice, we earnestly pray that . . . [the state legislature] would point out some way whereby the people might be relieved." Petition from the town of Greenwich to the Massachusetts state legislature, 1786 Which of the following claims did the residents of Greenwich use to most support their argument that they should be "relieved" by the Massachusetts legislature from the situation described in the petition?

They had aided the government during the Revolutionary War.

Which of the following most appropriately characterizes the violence exhibited in such episodes as Bacon's Rebellion, the Boston Tea Party, Shays' Rebellion, and the Whiskey Rebellion?

Violence was directed at "outsiders" or representatives of distant authority.

When diplomats met to negotiate the treaty that ended the Revolutionary War, the process

Was slow and difficult because the other countries fighting Britain were willing to sacrifice the interests of the Americans to their own objectives.

In discussing the American Revolution, the basic controversy among historians involves the question:

Was the motivation for the Revolution primarily political ideology or essentially economic and social interests?