AP US History Review (8-41)

Virginia Plan

"Large state" proposal for the new constitution, calling for proportional representation in both houses of a bicameral Congress. The plan favored larger states and thus prompted smaller states to come back with their own plan for apportioning representation. p. 170

rachel carson

"Silent Spring", sparked a real environmentalist movement: which introduced the adverse environmental effects of DDT and the fact that it would kill the enviornment and there would be no birds to sing.- a silent spring

New Jersey Plan

"Small-state plan" put forth at the Philadelphia convention, proposing equal representation by state, regardless of population, in a unicameral legislature. Small states feared that the more populous states would dominate the agenda under a proportional system. p. 170

Battle of Gettysburg

( July 1863): Civil War battle in Pennsylvania that ended in Union victory, spelling doom for the Confederacy, which never again managed to invade the North. Site of General George Pickett's daring but doomed charge on the Northern lines.

James Monroe

(1758-1831): Revolutionary war soldier, statesman and fifth president of the United States. As president, he supported protective tariffs and a national bank, but maintained a Jeffersonian opposition to federally-funded internal improvements. Though Monroe sought to transcend partisanship, even undertaking a goodwill tour of the states in 1817, his presidency was rocked by bitter partisan and sectional conflicts.

Black Hawk

(1767-1838) Sauk war chief who led the Sauk and Fox resistance against eviction under the Indian Removal Act in Illinois and Wisconsin. Brutally crushed by American forces, he surrendered in 1832 and lived out his days on a reservation in Iowa.

Andrew Jackson

(1767-1845) War hero, congressman and sixth president of the United States. A Democrat, Jackson ushered in a new era in American politics, advocating white manhood suffrage and cementing party loyalties through the spoils system. As presi- dent, he dismantled the Bank of the United States, asserted federal supremacy in the nullification crisis, and oversaw the harsh policy of Indian removal in the South.

John Quincy Adams

(1767-1848) Son of second president John Adams, John Quincy Adams served as secretary of State under James Monroe before becoming the sixth president of the United States. A strong advocate of national finance and improvement, Adams faced opposition from states' rights advocates in the South and West. His controversial election—the allegedly "corrupt bar- gain" of 1824—and his lack of political acumen further hampered his presidential agenda.

Isaac Brock

(1769-1812): British general who helped stave off an American invasion of Upper Canada during the War of 1812. Brock successfully captured Detroit from American forces in August of 1812, but was killed in battle later that year.

George Canning

(1770-1827): British foreign secretary who pro- posed what would later become the Monroe Doctrine—a declara- tion issued by James Monroe, warning European powers to refrain from acquiring new territories in the Americas.

William Henry Harrison

(1773-1841) Hero of the Battle of Tippecanoe and ninth president of the United States. Harrison, a Whig, won the 1840 election on a "Log Cabin and Hard Cider" cam- paign, which played up his credentials as a backwoods westerner and Indian fighter. Harrison died of pneumonia just four weeks after his inauguration.

Henry Clay

(1777-1852) Secretary of state and U.S. senator from Kentucky, Clay was known as the "Great Compromiser," helping to negotiate the Missouri Compromise in 1820, the Compromise Tariff of 1833 and the Compromise of 1850. As a National Republican, later Whig, Clay advocated a strong national agenda of internal improvements and protective tariffs, known as the American System.

Roger B. Taney

(1777-1864): Chief Justice of the Supreme Court from 1836-1864, Taney overturned Marshall's strict emphasis on contract rights, ruling in favor of community interest in the famous Charles River Bridge case in 1837. Maryland-born Taney also pre- sided over the landmark Dred Scott decision, which ruled that Congress had no power to restrict slavery in the territories.

Francis Scott Key

(1779-1843): American author and lawyer who composed the "Star Spangled Banner"—now the national anthem— purportedly while observing the bombardment of Fort McHenry from the deck of a British ship where he was detained.

John C. Calhoun

(1782-1850) Vice president under Andrew Jackson, Calhoun became a U.S. senator from South Carolina after a public break with the administration. A fierce supporter of states' rights, Calhoun advocated South Carolina's position during the nullification crisis. In the 1840s and 1850s, he staunchly defended slavery, accusing free-state Northerners of conspiring to free the slaves.

Daniel Webster

(1782-1852) Lawyer, congressman and secretary of state, Webster teamed up with Henry Clay in the Bank War against Andrew Jackson in 1832. Hoping to avoid sectional conflict, Webster opposed the annexation of Texas but later urged the North to support the Compromise of 1850.

Martin Van Buren

(1782-1862) Jacksonian Democrat who became the eighth president of the United States after serving as vice presi- dent during Andrew Jackson's second term. As president, Van Buren presided over the "hard times" wrought by the Panic of 1837, cling- ing to Jackson's monetary policies and rejecting federal intervention in the economy.

Lewis Cass

(1782-1866): War veteran, diplomat and U.S. senator, Cass ran as the Democratic candidate in the 1848 election, losing to Zachary Taylor. Cass is best known as the father of "popular sover- eignty," the notion that the sovereign people of a territory should themselves decide the issue of slavery.

Thomas Macdonough

(1783-1825): American naval officer who secured a decisive victory over a British fleet at the Battle of Plattsburg, halting the British invasion of New York.

Zachary Taylor

(1784-1850): Military general and twelfth U.S. pres- ident, Taylor emerged as a popular war hero after defeating Santa Anna's forces at Buena Vista in the war with Mexico. As president, Taylor, a Louisiana slave owner, sought to avoid a sectional con-frontation over slavery, though he opposed the Compromise of 1850.

Oliver Hazard Perry

(1785-1819): American naval officer whose decisive victory over a British fleet on Lake Erie during the War of 1812 reinvigorated American morale and paved the way for General William Henry Harrison's victory at the Battle of the Thames in 1813.

Nicholas Biddle

(1786-1844) Banker, financier, and President of the Second Bank of the United States from 1822 until the bank's charter expired in 1836.

James Buchanan

(1791-1868): Fifteenth president of the United States, Buchanan, a Pennsylvania-born Democrat, sympathized with the South and opposed any federal interference with its "pecu- liar institution." As president, he supported Kansas' Lecompton Constitution and opposed the Homestead Act, antagonizing north- ern Democrats and hopelessly splitting the Democratic Party.

Cotton gin

(1793) Eli Whitney's invention that sped up the process of harvesting cotton. This made cotton cultivation more profitable, revitalizing the southern economy and increasing the importance of slavery in the South.

Stephen Austin

(1793-1836) Established the first major Anglo set- tlements in Texas under an agreement with the Mexican govern- ment. Though loyal to Mexico, Austin advocated for local Texans' rights, particularly the right to bring slaves into the region. Briefly imprisoned by Santa Anna for inciting rebellion, Austin returned to Texas in 1836 to serve as secretary of state of the newly-independent republic until his death later that year.

Sam Houston

(1793-1863) President of the Republic of Texas and U.S. senator, Houston led Texas to independence in 1836 as com- mander in chief of the Texas army. As President of the Republic, Houston unsuccessfully sought annexation into the United States. Once Texas officially joined the Union in 1845, Houston was elected to the U.S. Senate, later returning to serve as Governor of Texas until 1861, when he was removed from office for refusing to take an oath of loyalty to the Confederacy.

The Age of Reason

(1794) Thomas Paine's anticlerical treatise that accused churches of seeking to acquire "power and profit" and to "enslave mankind".

Matthew C. Perry

(1794-1858): American Naval officer sent by Millard Fillmore to negotiate a trade deal with Japan. Backed by an impressive naval fleet, Perry showered Japanese negotiators with lavish gifts. Combining military bravado with diplomatic finesse, he negotiated the landmark Treaty of Kanagawa in 1854, ending Japan's two centuries of isolation.

Santa Anna

(1794-1876) Mexican general, president and dictator, who opposed Texas' independence and later led the Mexican army in the war against the United States.

Haitian Revolution

(1797-1804) War incited by a slave uprising in French-controlled Saint Domingue, resulting in the creation of the first independent black republic in the America

Dred Scott

(1800-1858): Black slave who sued his master for free- dom, triggering the landmark Supreme Court decision that extended federal protection for slavery in the territories. Scott, backed by abolitionists, based his case on the five years he spent with his master in free soil Illinois and Wisconsin.

John Brown

(1800-1859): Radical abolitionist who launched an attack on a federal armory at Harper's Ferry, Virginia in an effort to lead slaves in a violent uprising against their owners. Brown, who first took up arms against slavery during the Kansas civil War, was captured shortly after he launched his ill-conceived raid on the armory and sentenced to hang.

Millard Fillmore

(1800-1874): New York Congressman and vice president under Taylor, Fillmore took over the presidency after Taylor's death in 1850. Fillmore, a practical politician, threw his support behind the Compromise of 1850, ensuring its passage. He was passed over for the Whig nomination in 1852 when the party chose to select the legendary war hero, Winfield Scott.

Caleb Cushing

(1800-1879): Massachusetts born Congressman and diplomat who "opened" China to U.S. trade, negotiating the Treaty of Wanghia in 1844.

Midnight judges

(1801) Federal justices appointed by John Adams during the last days of his presidency. Their positions were revoked when the newly elected Republican Congress repealed their Judiciary Act.

Tripolitan War

(1801-1805) Four-year conflict between the American Navy and the North-African nation of Tripoli over piracy in the Mediterranean. Jefferson, a staunch noninterventionist, reluctantly deployed American forces, eventually securing a peace treaty with Tripoli.

Louisiana Purchase

(1803) Acquisition of Louisiana territory from France. The purchase more than doubled the territory of the United States, opening vast tracts for settlement.

Marbury v. Madison

(1803) Supreme Court case that established the principle of "judicial review"—the idea that the Supreme Court had the final authority to determine constitutionality.

Corps of Discovery

(1804-1806) Team of adventurers, led by Meriwether Lewis and William Clark, sent by Thomas Jefferson to explore Louisiana Territory and find a water route to the Pacific. Louis and Clark brought back detailed accounts of the West's flora, fauna and native populations, and their voyage demonstrated the viability of overland travel to the west.

Franklin Pierce

(1804-1869): Pro-southern Democrat from New Hampshire who became the fourteenth president of the United States on a platform of territorial expansion. As president, he tried to provoke war with Spain and seize Cuba, a plan he quickly aban- doned once it was made public. Pierce emphatically supported the Compromise of 1850, vigorously enforced the Fugitive Slave Law, and threw his support behind the Kansas-Nebraska Bill.

Orders in Council

(1806-1807) Edicts issued by the British Crown closing French-owned European ports to foreign shipping. The French responded by ordering the seizure of all vessels entering British ports, thereby cutting off American merchants from trade with both parties.

Chesapeake affair

(1807) Conflict between Britain and the United States that precipitated the 1807 embargo. The conflict developed when a British ship, in search of deserters, fired on the American Chesapeake off the coast of Virginia.

Embargo Act

(1807) Enacted in response to British and French mistreatment of American merchants, the Act banned the export of all goods from the United States to any foreign port. The embargo placed great strains on the American economy while only marginally affecting its European targets, and was therefore repealed in 1809.

Robert E. Lee

(1807-1870): Confederate general in command of first, the Army of the Potomac, and later, the entire Confederate army during the Civil War. A bold tactician, Lee kept his army on the offensive throughout most of the war, skillfully outmaneuvering Union armies in key battles. Lee's fortunes reversed after his defeat at Gettysburg, though he continued to battle Union forces through- out Virginia until his surrender at Appomattox. After the war Lee was indicted for treason but never charged, and he actively worked to bring about a peaceful reunion of North and South.

Salmon Chase

(1808-1873): New England born abolitionist who, as secretary of the treasury, pushed Lincoln to take a tougher stance on slavery during the Civil War. In 1864, Radical Republicans unsuc- cessfully tried to replace Lincoln with Chase on the Republican ticket. Later that year, Lincoln appointed Chase as chief justice of the Supreme Court, where Chase served until his death.

Non-Intercourse Act

(1809) Passed alongside the repeal of the Embargo Act, it reopened trade with all but the two belligerent nations, Britain and France. The Act continued Jefferson's policy of economic coercion, still with little effect.

Abraham Lincoln

(1809-1865): Sixteenth president of the United States. An Illinois lawyer and politician, Lincoln briefly served in Congress from 1847-1848, introducing the famous "spot" resolu- tions on the Mexican war. He gained national prominence in 1858 during the Lincoln-Douglas debates in the Illinois senate race and emerged as the leading contender for the Republican nomination in 1860. Lincoln's election in 1860 drove South Carolina from the Union, eventually leading to the Civil War.

Charles Darwin

(1809-1882): A British naturalist whose 1859 book On the Origin of Species outlined a theory of evolution based on natural selection, whereby the strongest individuals of a particular species survived and reproduced while weaker individuals died out. This theory had an enormous impact not just on science but on religion and society too, as people wrestled with the challenge evo-lutionary theory posed to Biblical notions of divine creation and applied the ideas of natural selection to human society.

Fletcher v. Peck

(1810): Established firmer protection for private property and asserted the right of the Supreme Court to invalidate state laws in conflict with the federal Constitution.

Battle of Tippecanoe

(1811) Resulted in the defeat of Shawnee chief Tenskwatawa, "the Prophet" at the hands William Henry Harrison in the Indiana wilderness. After the battle, the Prophet's brother, Tecumseh, forged an alliance with the British against the United States.

War hawks

(1811-1812) Democratic-Republican Congressmen who pressed James Madison to declare war on Britain. Largely drawn from the South and West, they resented British constraints on American trade and accused the British of supporting Indian attacks against American settlements on the frontier.

Charles Sumner

(1811-1874): Massachusetts senator and aboli- tionist, Sumner opposed the extension of slavery, speaking out pas- sionately on the civil war in Kansas. Sumner is best known for the caning he received at the hands of Preston Brooks on the Senate floor in 1856. After his recovery he returned to the Senate, leading the Radical Republican coalition in the Senate against Andrew Johnson during Reconstruction.

Harriet Beecher Stowe

(1811-1896): Connecticut born abolitionist and author of best-selling Uncle Tom's Cabin, a novel that awakened millions of Northerners to the cruelty of slavery.

War of 1812

(1812-1815): Fought between Britain and the United States largely over the issues of trade and impressment. Though the war ended in a relative draw, it demonstrated America's willingness to defend its interests militarily, earning the young nation new- found respect from European powers.

Stephen A. Douglas

(1813-1861): U.S. senator and Democratic presidential candidate, Douglas played a key role in passing the Compromise of 1850, though he inadvertently reignited sec- tional tensions in 1854 by proposing the Kansas-Nebraska Act. In 1858, Douglas famously sparred with Abraham Lincoln in the Lincoln-Douglas debates, defeating Lincoln in the senate race that year but losing to the Illinois republican in the presidential election of 1860.

Henry Ward Beecher

(1813-1887): Preacher, reformer and aboli- tionist, Beecher was the son of famed evangelist Lyman Beecher and brother of author Harriet Beecher Stowe. In the 1850s, he helped raise money to support the New England Emigrant Aid Company in its efforts to keep slavery out of Kansas territory. After the War, Beecher emerged as perhaps the best known Protestant minister, in part because of his ability to adapt Christianity to fit the times, emphasizing the compatibility of religion, science and modernity.

Hartford Convention

(1814-1815): Convention of Federalists from five New England states who opposed the War of 1812 and resented the strength of Southern and Western interests in Congress and in the White House.

Congress of Vienna

(1814-1815): Convention of major European powers to redraw the boundaries of continental Europe after the defeat of Napoleonic France.

Joseph ("Fighting Joe") Hooker

(1814-1879): Union army general, known as "Fighting Joe" for his bold attacks on Confederate lines during McClellan's peninsular campaign. He took command of the Army of the Potomac from A.E. Burnside in 1863, a post he lost just six months later after he led a failed attack on Lee's forces at Chancellorsville.

Treaty of Ghent

(1815): Ended the War of 1812 in a virtual draw, restoring prewar borders but failing to address any of the griev- ances that first brought America into the war.

George G. Meade

(1815-1872): Union general who led the Army of the Potomac to victory against Lee's forces at Gettysburg. Meade, unable to stomach the immense human costs of his victory, refused to pursue Lee back across the Potomac, and thus lost his post to Ulysses S. Grant shortly thereafter.

Era of Good Feelings

(1816-1824): Popular name for the period of one-party, Republican, rule during James Monroe's presidency. The term obscures bitter conflicts over internal improvements, slavery, and the national bank.

Rush-Bagot agreement

(1817): Signed by Britain and the United States, it established strict limits on naval armaments in the Great Lakes, a first step in the full demilitarization of the U.S.-Canadian border, completed in the 1870s.

Anglo-American Convention

(1818): Signed by Britain and the United States, the pact allowed New England fishermen access to Newfoundland fisheries, established the northern border of Louisiana territory and provided for the joint occupation of the Oregon Country for ten years.

Tallmadge amendment

(1819): Failed proposal to prohibit the importation of slaves into Missouri territory and pave the way for gradual emancipation. Southerners vehemently opposed the amendment, which they perceived as a threat to the sectional bal- ance between North and South.

Dartmouth College v. Woodward

(1819): Supreme Court case that sustained Dartmouth University's original charter against changes proposed by the New Hampshire state legislature, thereby protecting corporations from domination by state governments.

McCulloch v. Maryland

(1819): Supreme Court case that strength- ened federal authority and upheld the constitutionality of the Bank of the United States by establishing that the State of Maryland did not have power to tax the bank.

Florida Purchase Treaty (Adams-Onís Treaty)

(1819): Under the agreement, Spain ceded Florida to the United States, which, in exchange, abandoned its claims to Texas.

Preston S. Brooks

(1819-1857): Fiery South Carolina congressman who senselessly caned Charles Sumner on the Senate floor in 1856. His violent temper flared in response to Sumner's "Crime Against Kansas" speech, in which the Massachusetts senator threw bitter insults at the Southern slaveocracy, singling out Brooks' South Carolina colleague, Senator Andrew Butler.

Missouri Compromise

(1820): Allowed Missouri to enter as a slave state but preserved the balance between North and South by carv- ing free-soil Maine out of Massachusetts and prohibiting slavery from territories acquired in the Louisiana Purchase, north of the line of 36°30'.

Clement L. Vallandigham

(1820-1871): Democratic congressman from Ohio who led the Copperhead faction of the party in opposi- tion to the Civil War. Convicted by a military tribunal for his trea- sonous outbursts, Vallandigham was banished to the South though he later made his way to Canada and made an unsuccessful bid for the Ohio governorship.

William Tecumseh Sherman

(1820-1891): Union general who led the destructive march through Georgia in 1864. A pioneer practi- tioner of "total war," he advocated bringing war to the civilian pop- ulation to undercut morale and destroy supplies destined for Confederate troops.

American System

(1820s): Henry Clay's three-pronged system to promote American industry. Clay advocated a strong banking system, a protective tariff and a federally funded transportation network.

Cohens v. Virginia

(1821): Case that reinforced federal supremacy by establishing the right of the Supreme Court to review decisions of state supreme courts in questions involving the powers of the federal government.

John C. Breckinridge

(1821-1875): Vice president under James Buchanan, Breckenridge ran as the candidate of the Southern wing of the Democratic party in 1860, losing the election to Abraham Lincoln. A Kentucky slave owner, Breckenridge acknowledged the South's right to secede but worked tirelessly to hammer out a com- promise in the weeks before Lincoln's inauguration. Once the Civil War began, he served as a Confederate General, briefly serving as Jefferson Davis's Secretary of War in 1865.

Ulysses S. Grant

(1822-1885): Ohio born Union general and eigh- teenth president of the United States. During the war, Grant won Lincoln's confidence for his boldness and his ability to stomach the steep casualties that victory required. First assigned to the West, Grant attained Union victories at Fort Donelson, Shiloh and Vicksburg, seizing control of the Mississippi River and splitting the South in two. After taking command of the Union Army, he fought Lee in a series of bloody battles in Virginia, culminating in Lee's sur- render at Appomattox. As President, he took a hard line against the South, but economic turmoil and waning support for Reconstruction undermined his efforts.

John Pope

(1822-1892): Union general whose army suffered a crushing defeat at the hands of Robert E. Lee in the Second Battle of Bull Run (Manassas).

Monroe Doctrine

(1823): Statement delivered by President James Monroe, warning European powers to refrain from seeking any new territories in the Americas. The United States largely lacked the power to back up the pronouncement, which was actually enforced by the British, who sought unfettered access to Latin American markets.

Russo-American Treaty

(1824): Fixed the line of 54°40' as the south- ernmost boundary of Russian holdings in North America.

Gibbons v. Ogden

(1824): Suit over whether New York State could grant a monopoly to a ferry operating on interstate waters. The rul- ing reasserted that Congress had the sole power to regulate inter- state commerce.

William Walker

(1824-1860): Tennessee-born adventurer who made several forays into Central America in the 1850s. After an unsuccessful ploy to take over Baja California in 1853, Walker ven- tured into Nicaragua, installing himself as president in 1856. His dream of establishing a planter aristocracy in the Central American nation faltered when neighboring Central American nations allied against him. Walker met his fate before a Honduran firing squad in 1860.

Thomas J. ("Stonewall") Jackson

(1824-1863): Daring Confederate general and brilliant tactician, who routinely took men on long marches to outflank Union lines. He led his troops to victory at the First Battle of Bull Run (Manassas) and protected Virginia's Shenandoah Valley from Northern invasion in the first year of the Civil War. Joining Lee at Richmond, he helped halt the Union's Peninsula Campaign in 1862. Jackson was killed by friendly fire at the battle of Chancellorsville in May of 1863.

A. E. Burnside

(1824-1881): Union general who replaced George B. McClellan as commander of the Army of the Potomac in 1862. He lost his command after a foolhardy attack on Lee's forces at Fredericksburg, where more than ten thousand union soldiers were killed or wounded.

New Harmony

(1825-1827) Communal society of around one thousand members, established in New Harmony, Indiana, by Robert Owen. The community attracted a hodgepodge of individuals, from scholars to crooks, and fell apart due to infighting and confusion after just two years.

George Pickett

(1825-1875): Confederate general who led the bold but ill-fated charge against union forces at Gettysburg.

George B. McClellan

(1826-1885): Union general in command of the Army of the Potomac from 1861 to 1862, McClellan led the failed Peninsular Campaign in 1861 and later fought Lee to a virtual stalemate at Antietam. He boosted the morale and confidence of his troops, but tested Lincoln's patience by routinely hesitating to send men into battle. In 1864, McClellan ran against Lincoln as the Democratic nominee, campaigning against emancipation and the harsh treatment of the South while repudiating the antiwar stance of the Copperheads.

Tariff of Abominations

(1828) Noteworthy for its unprecedentedly high duties on imports. Southerners vehemently opposed the Tariff, arguing that it hurt Southern farmers, who did not enjoy the protec- tion of tariffs, but were forced to pay higher prices for manufac- tures.

Appeal to the Colored Citizens of the World

(1829) Incendiary abolitionist tract advocating the violent overthrow of slavery. Published by David Walker, a southern born free black.

Indian Removal Act

(1830) Ordered the removal of Indian Tribes still residing east of the Mississippi to newly established Indian Territory west of Arkansas and Missouri. Tribes resisting eviction were forcibly removed by American forces, often after prolonged legal or military battles.

James G. Blaine

(1830-1893): American statesman who served in the House thirteen years (1863-1876), followed by a little over four years in the Senate (1876-1881). He served as Speaker of the House from 1869 to 1875. As secretary of state under James A. Garfield and Chester A. Arthur, Blaine advocated a "Big Sister" policy of United States domination in Latin America.

McCormick reaper

(1831) Mechanized the harvest of grains, such as wheat, allowing farmers to cultivate larger plots. The introduction of this in the 1830s fueled the establishment of large-scale commercial agriculture in the Midwest.

Nat Turner's Rebellion

(1831) Virginia slave revolt that resulted in the deaths of sixty whites and raised fears among white southern of further uprisings.

The Liberator

(1831-1865) Antislavery newspaper published by William Lloyd Garrison, who called for the immediate emancipation of all slaves.

Bank War

(1832) Battle between President Andrew Jackson and Congressional supporters of the Bank of the United States over the bank's renewal in 1832. Jackson vetoed the Bank Bill, arguing that the bank favored moneyed interests at the expense of western farmers.

Black Hawk War

(1832) Series of clashes in Illinois and Wisconsin between American forces and Indian chief Black Hawk of the Sauk and Fox tribes, who unsuccessfully tried to reclaim territory lost under the 1830 Indian Removal Act.

Nullification Crisis

(1832-1833) Showdown between President Andrew Jackson and the South Carolina legislature, which declared the 1832 tariff null and void in the state and threatened secession if the federal government tried to collect duties. It was resolved by a compromise negotiated by Henry Clay in 1833.

Horacio Alger

(1832-1899): The writer of dozens of novels for chil- dren, Alger popularized the notion of "rags to riches," that by hard work and a bit of a luck, even a poor boy could pull himself up into the middle class.

Force Bill

(1833) Passed by Congress alongside the Compromise Tariff, it authorized the president to use the military to collect fed- eral tariff duties.

American Anti-Slavery Society

(1833-1870) Abolitionist society founded by William Lloyd Garrison, who advocated immediate abolition of slavery, By 1838, the organization had more than 250,000 members across 1,350 chapters.

Mark Twain

(1835-1910): A satirist and writer, Twain is best known for his books The Adventures of Tom Sawyer (1876) and The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn (1884). His work critiqued American politics and society, especially the racial and economic injustice that he saw in the South and West. Twain traveled abroad exten- sively and his work was read and loved around the world.

Richard Olney

(1835-1917): The pugnacious successor to James G. Blaine as secretary of state, serving from 1895 to 1897, Olney stirred up conflict with Great Britain during the Venezuelan Crisis of 1895- 1896. He also insisted on the protection of American lives and property and on reparations for losses incurred during violent dis- turbances in Cuba, China, and Turkey.

Awful Disclosures

(1836) Maria Monk's sensational exposé of alleged horrors in Catholic convents. Its popularity reflected nativist fears of Catholic influence.

Battle of San Jacinto

(1836) Resulted in the capture of Mexican dictator Santa Anna, who was forced to withdraw his troops from Texas and recognize the Rio Grande as Texas's Southwestern border.

Specie Circular

(1836) U.S. Treasury decree requiring that all pub- lic lands be purchased with "hard," or metallic, currency. Issued after small state banks flooded the market with unreliable paper currency, fueling land speculation in the West.

The American Scholar

(1837) Ralph Waldo Emerson's address at Harvard College, in which he declared an intellectual independence from Europe, urging American scholars to develop their own traditions.

George Dewey

(1837-1917): Commander of the American Asiatic Squadron who boldly captured Manila Bay and the Philippines at the launch of the Spanish American War. His actions ultimately led to fierce debates about the propriety of American imperialism.

Trail of Tears

(1838-1839) Forced march of 15,000 Cherokee Indians from their Georgia and Alabama homes to Indian Territory. Some 4,000 Cherokee died on the arduous journey.

John Wilkes Booth

(1838-1865): Maryland-born actor and Confederate sympathizer who assassinated Abraham Lincoln at Ford's Theater on April 14, 1865. Booth died of a gunshot wound a week later after refusing to surrender to federal troops, though it is unclear if the fatal bullet came from one of the soldiers or his own revolver.

John Hay

(1838-1905): Named U.S. ambassador to England in 1897, when William McKinley became president. Hay later served as McKinley's secretary of state. He was author of the Open Door Notes, which called for free economic competition in China.

Liliuokalani

(1838-1917): The last reigning queen of Hawaii, whose defense of native Hawaiian self-rule led to a revolt by white settlers and to her dethronement.

"Butcher" Weyler

(1838-1930): Valeriano "Butcher" Weyler was a Spanish general who arrived in Cuba in 1896 to put down the insur- rection. He became notorious for herding many civilians into barbed-wire reconcentration camps.

Amistad

(1839) Spanish slave ship dramatically seized off the coast of Cuba by the enslaved Africans aboard. The ship was driven ashore in Long Island and the slaves were put on trial. Former president John Quincy Adams argued their case before the Supreme Court, securing their eventual release.

Opium War

(1839-1842): War between Britain and China over trad- ing rights, particularly Britain's desire to continue selling opium to Chinese traders. The resulting trade agreement prompted Americans to seek similar concessions from the Chinese.

Alfred Thayer Mahan

(1840-1914): American naval officer and author whose book of 1890, The Influence of Sea Power upon History, 1660-1783, impressed a generation of imperialists around the world with its argument that control of the sea was the key to world dominance.

Clipper ships

(1840S-1850s) Small, swift vessels that gave American shippers an advantage in the carrying trade. These were made largely obsolete by the advent of sturdier, roomier iron steamers on the eve of the Civil War.

Creole Incident

(1841) A group of 130 rebelling Virginia slaves captured the American ship "Creole" and were given asylum, or a place offering safety and refuge, by British soldiers in the Bahamas. As a result, the incident raised fears among Southern planters that the British West Indies would become a Canada-like safe haven for runaway slaves. The event also created further tension between Britain and the United States.

"Self-Reliance"

(1841) Ralph Waldo Emerson's popular lecture-essay that reflected the spirit of individualism pervasive in American popular culture during the 1830s and 1840s.

Brook Farm

(1841-1846) Transcendental commune founded by a group of intellectuals, who emphasized living plainly while pursuing the life of the mind. The community fell into debt and dissolved when their communal home burned to the ground in 1846.

Commonwealth v. Hunt

(1842) Massachusetts Supreme Court decision that strengthened the labor movement by upholding the legality of unions.

Treaty of Wanghia

(1844): Signed by the U.S. and China, it assured the United States the same trading concessions granted to other powers, greatly expanding America's trade with the Chinese.

Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass

(1845) Vivid autobiography of the escaped slave and renowned abolitionist Frederick Douglass.

Wilmot Proviso

(1846) Amendment that sought to prohibit slavery from territories acquired from Mexico. Introduced by Pennsylvania congressman David Wilmot, the failed amendment ratcheted up tensions between North and South over the issue of slavery; never became federal law, but it was eventually endorsed by the legislatures of all but one of the free states, and it came to symbolize the burning issue of slavery in the territories

Walker Tariff

(1846) Revenue-enhancing measure that lowered tariffs from 1842 thereby fueling trade and increasing Treasury receipts; reduced the average rates of the Tariff of 1842 from about 32% to 25% and so it had strong support of low-tariff southerners, but had objection of Clayites, who complained that American manufacturing would be ruined; however this tariff proved to be an excellent revenue producer

Joseph Pulitzer

(1847-1911): A publisher whose newspapers, including the New York World, became a symbol of the sensational- ist journalism of the late nineteenth century.

Josiah Strong

(1847-1916): Protestant clergyman and author of Our Country: Its Possible Future and Its Present Crisis (1885). He touted the superiority of Anglo-Saxon civilization and helped sum- mon Americans to spread their religion abroad.

Women's Rights Convention at Seneca Falls

(1848) Gathering of feminist activists in Seneca Falls, New York where Elizabeth Lady Stanton read her "Declaration of Sentiments," stating that "all men and women are created equal".

Free Soil party

(1848-1854): Antislavery party in the 1848 and 1852 elections that opposed the extension of slavery into the territories, arguing that the presence of slavery would limit opportunities for free laborers.

Seventh of March speech

(1850): Daniel Webster's impassioned address urging the North to support of the Compromise of 1850. Webster argued that topography and climate would keep slavery from becoming entrenched in Mexican Cession territory and urged Northerners to make all reasonable concessions to prevent dis- union.

Fugitive Slave Law

(1850): Passed as part of the Compromise of 1850, it set high penalties for anyone who aided escaped slaves and compelled all law enforcement officers to participate in retriev- ing runaways. Strengthened the antislavery cause in the North.

Clayton-Bulwer Treaty

(1850): Signed by Great Britain and the United States, it provided that the two nations would jointly protect the neutrality of Central America and that neither power would seek to fortify or exclusively control any future isthmian waterway. Later revoked by the Hay-Pauncefote Treaty of 1901, which gave the United States control of the Panama Canal.

Know-Nothing party

(1850s) Nativist political party, also known as the American party, that emerged in response to an influx of immigrants.

Dupuy de Lôme

(1851-1904): The Spanish minister to the United States who found himself at the center of a scandal when his pri- vate letter maligning President McKinley was made public in 1898.

Uncle Tom's Cabin

(1852): Harriet Beecher Stowe's widely read novel that dramatized the horrors of slavery. It heightened Northern support for abolition and escalated the sectional conflict.

Gadsden Purchase

(1853): Acquired additional land from Mexico for $10 million to facilitate the construction of a southern transcon- tinental railroad.

Treaty of Kanagawa

(1854): Ended Japan's two-hundred year period of economic isolation, establishing an American consulate in Japan and securing American coaling rights in Japanese ports.

Kansas-Nebraska Act

(1854): Proposed that the issue of slavery be decided by popular sovereignty in the Kansas and Nebraska territo- ries, thus revoking the 1820 Missouri Compromise. Introduced by Stephen Douglass in an effort to bring Nebraska into the Union and pave the way for a northern transcontinental railroad.

Ostend Manifesto

(1854): Secret Franklin Pierce administration proposal to purchase or, that failing, to wrest militarily Cuba from Spain. Once leaked, it was quickly abandoned due to vehement opposition from the North.

Bleeding Kansas

(1856-1861): Civil war in Kansas over the issue of slavery in the territory, fought intermittently until 1861, when it merged with the wider national Civil War.

Booker T. Washington

(1856-1915): As head of the Tuskegee Institute in Alabama, Washington advocated for vocational educa- tion for African-Americans so that they could gain economic secu- rity. Believing that southern whites were not yet ready for social equality, he instead concentrated on gaining economic power for blacks without directly challenging the southern racial order.

The Impending Crisis of the South

(1857): Antislavery tract, written by white Southerner Hinton R. Helper, arguing that non- slaveholding whites actually suffered most in a slave economy.

Lecompton Constitution

(1857): Proposed Kansas constitution, whose ratification was unfairly rigged so as to guarantee slavery in the territory. Initially ratified by proslavery forces, it was later voted down when Congress required that the entire constitution be put up for a vote.

Dred Scott v. Stanford

(1857): Supreme Court decision that extended federal protection to slavery by ruling that Congress did not have the power to prohibit slavery in any territory. Also declared that slaves, as property, were not citizens of the United States.

William H. Taft

(1857-1930): The corpulent civil governor of the Philippines under William McKinley. Taft went on to become twenty-seventh president of the United States in 1909.

Freeport Doctrine

(1858): Declared that since slavery could not exist without laws to protect it, territorial legislatures, not the Supreme Court, would have the final say on the slavery question. First argued by Stephen Douglass in 1858 in response to Abraham Lincoln's "Freeport Question".

Freeport question

(1858): Raised during one of the Lincoln- Douglas debates by Abraham Lincoln, who asked whether the Court or the people should decide the future of slavery in the terri- tories.

Lincoln-Douglas debates

(1858): Series of debates between Abraham Lincoln and Stephen Douglass during the U.S. Senate race in Illinois. Douglass won the election but Lincoln gained national prominence and emerged as the leading candidate for the 1860 Republican nomination.

Theodore ("Teddy") Roosevelt

(1858-1919): Rough Rider "Teddy" Roosevelt was a cowboy-hero of the Cuban campaign who rode his popularity into the governorship of New York state and then into the vice-president's office. He became president when McKinley was assassinated in 1901. He won reelection as a Republican in 1904 and then lost to Democrat Woodrow Wilson in 1912, when he tried for another term as the Progressive Party candidate.

Carrie Chapman Catt

(1859-1947): A leader of the revived women's suffrage movement, Catt served as president of the National American Women's Suffrage Association (NAWSA) from 1900-1904 and again from 1915-1920. She was also active internationally, helping women in other countries gain suffrage and advocating for international peace.

John Dewey

(1859-1952): A leader of the pragmatist movement of the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, Dewey applied the philosophy to education and social reform, advocating "learn- ing by doing" as well as the application of knowledge to solving real life problems. He became an outspoken promoter of social and political reforms that broadened American democracy.

Constitutional Union party

(1860): Formed by moderate Whigs and Know-Nothings in an effort to elect a compromise candidate and avert a sectional crisis.

Crittenden amendments

(1860): Proposed in an attempt to appease the South, the failed Constitutional amendments would have given federal protection for slavery in all territories south of 36°30' where slavery was supported by popular sover- eignty.

Pony Express

(1860-1861) Short-lived, speedy mail service between Missouri and California that relied on lightweight riders galloping between closely placed posts.

Jane Addams

(1860-1935): Addams founded Hull House, America's first settlement house, to help immigrants assimilate through edu- cation, counseling, and municipal reform efforts. She also advo- cated pacifism throughout her life, including during World War I, and won the Nobel Peace Prize in 1931.

Molly Maguires

(1860s-1870s) Secret organization of Irish miners who campaigned, at times violently, against poor working conditions.

Congressional Committee on the Conduct of the War

(1861-1865): Established by Congress during the Civil War to oversee military affairs. Largely under the control of Radical Republicans, the committee agitated for a more vigor- ous war effort and actively pressed Lincoln on the issue of emancipation.

Confederate States of America

(1861-1865): Government estab- lished after seven Southern states seceded from the Union. Later joined by four more states from the Upper South.

Merrimack

(1862): Confederate ironclad whose successes against wooden ships signaled an end to wooden warships. They fought an historic, though inconsequen- tial battle in 1862.

Peninsula Campaign

(1862): Union General George B. McClellan's failed effort to seize Richmond, the Confederate Capital. Had McClellan taken Richmond and toppled the Confederacy, slavery would have most likely survived in the South for some time.

Monitor

(1862): Union ironclad whose successes against wooden ships signaled an end to wooden warships. They fought an historic, though inconsequen- tial battle in 1862.

Gettysburg Address

(1863): Abraham Lincoln's oft-quoted speech, delivered at the dedication of the cemetery at Gettysburg battle- field. In the address, Lincoln framed the war as a means to uphold the values of liberty.

Emancipation Proclamation

(1863): Declared all slaves in rebelling states to be free but did not affect slavery in non-rebelling Border States. The Proclamation closed the door on possible compromise with the South and encouraged thousands of Southern slaves to flee to Union lines.

The Man Without a Country

(1863): Edward Everett Hale's fictional account of a treasonous soldier's journeys in exile. The book was widely read in the North, inspiring greater devotion to the Union.

siege of Vicksburg

(1863): Two-and-a-half-month siege of a Confederate fort on the Mississippi River in Tennessee. Vicksburg finally fell to Ulysses S. Grant in July of 1863, giving the Union Army control of the Mississippi River and splitting the South in two.

William Randolph Hearst

(1863-1951): A newspaper magnate who started by inheriting his father's San Francisco Examiner and ulti- mately owned newspapers and magazines published in cities across the United States. He was largely responsible for the spread of sen- sationalist journalism. The Hearst Corporation still owns dozens of newspapers, magazines, and other media outlets in the United States and around the world.

Union party

(1864): A coalition party of pro-war Democrats and Republicans formed during the 1864 election to defeat anti-war Northern Democrats.

Wilderness Campaign

(1864-1865): A series of brutal clashes between Ulysses S. Grant's and Robert E. Lee's armies in Virginia, leading up to Grant's capture of Richmond in April of 1865. Having lost Richmond, Lee surrendered to Grant at Appomattox Courthouse.

Sherman's march

(1864-1865): Union General William Tecumseh Sherman's destructive march through Georgia. An early instance of "total war," purposely targeting infrastructure and civil- ian property to diminish morale and undercut the Confederate war effort.

Thirteenth Amendment

(1865): Constitutional amendment prohib- iting all forms of slavery and involuntary servitude. Former Confederate States were required to ratify the amendment prior to gaining reentry into the Union.

W. E. B. Du Bois

(1868-1963): A Harvard-educated leader in the fight for racial equality, Du Bois believed that liberal arts education would provide the "talented tenth" of African Americans with the ability to lift their race into full participation in society. From New York, where he was a founder of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP), he relentlessly brought attention to racism in America and demanded legal and cultural change. During his long life he published many important books of history, sociol- ogy, and poetry and provided intellectual leadership to those advo- cating civil rights. One of his deepest convictions was the necessity of American blacks connecting their freedom struggle with African independence and he died as a resident of the new nation of Ghana

Emilio Aguinaldo

(1869-1964): Well-educated Filipino leader who first fought against Spain and later led the Philippine insurgency against United States colonial rule.

John Jordan Crittenden

(1876-1863): U.S. senator from Kentucky who introduced a compromise in 1860 in an effort to avoid a civil war. Crittenden proposed to amend the constitution, prohibiting slavery in territories north of 36° 30' but expending federal protec- tion to slavery in territories to the south.

Big Sister policy

(1880s) A foreign policy of Secretary of State James G. Blaine aimed at rallying Latin American nations behind American leadership and opening Latin American markets to Yankee traders. The policy bore fruit in 1889, when Blaine presided over the First International Conference of American States.

McKinley Tariff

(1890) Shepherded through Congress by President William McKinley, this tariff raised duties on Hawaiian sugar and set off renewed efforts to secure the annexation of Hawaii to the United States.

Dwight D. ("Ike") Eisenhower

(1890-1969): Supreme Commander of U.S. Forces in Europe during World War II, Eisenhower the war hero later became the thirty-fourth president of the United States. During his two terms, from 1952 to 1960, Eisenhower presided over the economically prosperous 1950s. He was praised for his dignity and decency, though criticized for not being more assertive on civil rights.

World's Columbian Exposition

(1893) Held in Chicago, Americans saw this World's Fair as their opportunity to claim a place among the world's most "civilized" societies, by which they meant the countries of western Europe. The Fair honored art, architecture, and science, and its promoters built a mini-city in which to host the fair that reflected all the ideals of city planning popular at the time. For many, this was the high point of the "City Beautiful" movement.

Teller Amendment

(1898) A proviso to President William McKinley's war plans that proclaimed to the world that when the United States had overthrown Spanish misrule, it would give Cuba its freedom. The amendment testified to the ostensibly "anti-imperialist" designs of the initial war plans.

Maine

(1898) American battleship dispatched to keep a "friendly" watch over Cuba in early 1898. It mysteriously blew up in Havana harbor on February 15, 1898, with a loss of 260 sailors. Later evidence confirmed that the explosion was accidental, resulting from combustion in one of the ship's internal coal bunkers. But many Americans, eager for war, insisted that it was the fault of a Spanish submarine mine.

Rough Riders

(1898) Organized by Theodore Roosevelt, this was a colorful, motley regimen of Cuban war volunteers consisting of western cowboys, ex-convicts, and effete Ivy Leaguers. Roosevelt emphasized his experience with the regiment in subsequent campaigns for Governor of New York and Vice-President under William McKinley.

Anti-Imperialist League

(1898-1921) A diverse group formed in order to protest American colonial oversight in the Philippines. It included university presidents, industrialists, clergymen, and labor leaders. Strongest in the Northeast, the Anti- imperialist League was the largest lobbying organization on a U.S. foreign-policy issue until the end of the nineteenth century. It declined in strength after the United States signed the Treaty of Paris (which approved the annexation of the Philippines), and especially after hostilities broke out between Filipino nationalists and American forces.

Open Door note

(1899-1900) A set of diplomatic letters in which Secretary of State John Hay urged the great powers to respect Chinese rights and free and open competition within their spheres of influence. The notes established the "Open Door Policy," which sought to ensure access to the Chinese market for the United States, despite the fact that the U.S. did not have a formal sphere of influence in China.

Boxer Rebellion

(1900) An uprising in China directed against foreign influence. It was suppressed by an international force of some eighteen thousand soldiers, including several thousand Americans. The Boxer Rebellion paved the way for the revolution of 1911, which led to the establishment of the Republic of China in 1912.

Foraker Act

(1900) Sponsored by Senator Joseph B. Foraker, a Republican from Ohio, this accorded Puerto Ricans a limited degree of popular government. It was the first comprehensive congressional effort to provide for governance of territories acquired after the Spanish American War, and served as a model for a similar act adopted for the Philippines in 1902.

Hay-Pauncefote Treaty

(1901) A treated signed between the United States and Great Britain, giving Americans a free hand to build a canal in Central America. The treaty nullified the Clayton-Bulwer Treaty of 1850, which prohibited the British or U.S. from acquiring territory in Central America.

Platt Amendment

(1901) following its military occupation, the United States successfully pressured the Cuban government to write this amendment into its constitution. It limited Cuba's treaty making abilities, controlled its debt, and stipulated that the U.S. Could intervene militarily to restore order when it saw fit

Insular Cases

(1901-1904) Beginning in 1901, a badly divided Supreme Court decreed in these cases that the Constitution did not follow the flag. In other words, Puerto Ricans and Filipinos would not necessarily enjoy all American rights.

Roosevelt Corollary

(1904) A brazen policy of "preventive intervention" advocated by Theodore Roosevelt in his Annual Message to Congress in 1904. Adding ballast to the Monroe Doctrine, his corollary stipulated that the United States would retain a right to intervene in the domestic affairs of Latin American nations in order to restore military and financial order.

Root-Takahira agreement

(1908) Signed on November 30, 1908, the United States and Japan agreed to respect each other's territorial possessions in the Pacific and to uphold the Open Door in China. The Agreement was credited with easing tensions between the two nations, but it also resulted in a weakened American influence over further Japanese hegemony in China.

Teapot Dome scandal

(1921) A tawdry affair involving the illegal lease of priceless naval oil reserves in Teapot Dome, Wyoming, and Elk Hills, California. The scandal, implicated President Harding's secretary of the interior, was one of several that gave his administration a reputation for corruption

Forney-McCumber Tariff Law

(1922) A comprehensive bill passed to protect domestic production from foreign competitors. As a direct result, many European nations were spurred to increase their own trade barriers.

Nine-Power Treaty

(1922) Agreement coming out of the Washington Disarmament Conference of 1921-1922 that pledged Britain, France, Italy, Japan, The United States, China, The Netherlands, Portugal, and Belgium to abide the Open Door Policy in China. The Five-Power Naval Treaty on ship ratios and the Four-Power treaty to preserve the status quo in the Pacific also came out of this conference.

Adkins v Children's Hospital

(1923) A landmark supreme court decision reversing the ruling of Muller v. Oregon, which had declared women to be deserving of special protection in the workplace.

Dawes Plan

(1924) An arrangement negotiated in 1924 to reschedule German reparation payments. It stabilized the German currency and opened the way for further American private loans to Germany.

McNary-Haugen Bill

(1924-1928) A farm relief bill that was championed throughout the 1920s and aimed to keep agricultural prices high by authorizing the government to buy up surpluses and sell the abroad. Congress twice passed this bill, but President Calvin Coolidge vetoed it in 1927 and 1928

Kellogg-Briand Pact

(1928) A sentimental triumph of the 1920s peace movement , this 1928 pact linked sixty-two nations in the supposed "outcry of war"

Black Tuesday

(1929) the dark, panicky day of October 29, 1929 when over 16,410,000 shares of stock were sold on Wall Street. It was a trigger that helped bring on the Great Depression.

Agricultural Marketing Act

(1929) this act established the Federal Farm Board, a lending bureau for hard pressed farmers. The act also aimed to help farmers help themselves through new producers' cooperatives. As the depression worsened in 1930, the Board tried to bolster falling prices by buying up surpluses, but it was unable to cope with the flood of farm produce to market

Hawley-Smoot Tariff

(1930) The highest protective tariff in the peacetime history of the United States, passed as a result of good-old fashioned horse trading. To the outside world, it smacked of ugly economic warfare.

Reconstruction Finance Corporation (RFC)

(1932) A government lending agency established under the Hoover administration in order to assist insurance companies, banks, agricultural organizations, railroads, and local governments. It was a precursor to later agencies that grew out of the New Deal and symbolized a recognition by the Republicans that some federal action was required to address the Great Depression.

Bonus Army

(1932) Officially known as the Bonus Expeditionary Forces (BEF), this rag-tag group of twenty thousand veterans marched on Washington to demand immediate payment of bonuses earned during World War I. General Douglass MacArthur dispersed the veterans with tear gas and bayonets

Norris-La Guardia Anti-Injunction Act

(1932) This law banned "yellow-dog" or antiunion, work contracts that and forbade federal courts from issuing injunctions to quash strikes and boycotts. It was an nearly piece of labor-friendly federal legislation

six day war

(1967) Short conflict between Egypt and her allies against Israel won by Israel; Israel took over the Golan Heights , The West Bank of the Jordan River; and the Sanai Peninsula.

"Don't Ask, Don't Tell"

(1993-2010) the policy affecting homosexuals in the military. Compromise bw the standing prohibition against homosexuals in the armed forces & President Clinton's push to allow all citizens to serve regardless of sexual orientation. Military authorities forbidden to ask about a service member's orientation, and gay service personnel could be discharged if they publicly revealed their homosexuality. (At Pres Obama's urging, Congress repealed this in 2010, permitting gays to serve openly in uniform.)

Battle of Shiloh

(April 1862): Bloody Civil War battle on the Tennessee-Mississippi border that resulted in the deaths of more than 23,000 soldiers and ended in a marginal Union victory.

Second Battle of Bull Run

(August 1862): Civil War battle that ended in a decisive victory for Confederate General Robert E. Lee, who was emboldened to push further into the North.

Battle of Fredericksburg

(December 1862): Decisive victory in Virginia for Confederate Robert E. Lee, who successfully repelled a Union attack on his lines.

Battle of Fort Henry and Fort Donelson

(February 1862): Key vic- tory for Union General Ulysses S. Grant, it secured the North's hold on Kentucky and paved the way for Grant's attacks deeper into Tennessee.

Lyceum

(From the Greek name for the ancient Athenian school where Aristotle taught) Public lecture hall that hosted speakers on topics ranging from science to moral philosophy. Part of a broader flourishing of higher education in the mid-nineteenth century.

Battle of New Orleans

(January 1815): Resounding victory of American forces against the British, restoring American confidence and fueling an outpouring of nationalism. Final battle of the War of 1812.

Battle of Bull Run (Masassas Junction)

(July 1861): First major battle of the Civil War and a victory for the South, it dispelled Northern illusions of swift victory.

Battle of Antietam

(September 1862): Landmark battle in the Civil War that essentially ended in a draw but demonstrated the prowess of the Union army, forestalling foreign intervention and giving Lincoln the "victory" he needed to issue the Emancipation Proclamation.

California gold rush

(beginning in 1849): Inflow of thousands of miners to Northern California after news reports of the discovery of gold at Sutter's Mill in January of 1848 had spread around the world by the end of that year. The onslaught of migrants prompted Californians to organize a government and apply for statehood in 1849.

Denmark Vesey

(c.1767-1822) Free black who orchestrated an aborted slave uprising in Charleston, South Carolina in 1822. Vesey's plan was uncovered before he could put it in motion, and he and thirty-four accomplices were put to death.

Harriet Tubman

(c1820-1913): Famed conductor on the Underground Railroad, Harriet Tubman helped rescue more than three hundred slaves from bondage. Born into slavery, Tubman fled to the North in 1849 but returned to the South nineteen times to guide fellow bondsman to freedom. After the Civil War, she worked to give freedmen access to education in North Carolina.

Erie Canal

(completed 1825) New York state canal that linked Lake Erie to the Hudson River. It dramatically lowered shipping costs, fueling an economic boom in upstate New York and increasing the profitability of farming in the Old Northwest.

Second Great Awakening

(early nineteenth century) Religious revival characterized by emotional mass "camp meetings" and widespread conversion. Brought about a democratization of religion as a multiplicity of denominations vied for members.

Tammany Hall

(established 1789) Powerful New York political machine that primarily drew support from the city's immigrants, who depended on Tammany Hall patronage, particularly social services.

West Africa Squadron

(established 1808) British Royal Navy force formed to enforce the abolition of the slave trade in 1807. It intercepted hundreds of slave ships and freed thousands of Africans.

Anti-Masonic party

(established c. 1826) First founded in New York, it gained considerable influence in New England and the mid- Atlantic during the 1832 election, campaigning against the politi- cally influential Masonic order, a secret society. Anti-Masons opposed Andrew Jackson, a Mason, and drew much of their support from evangelical Protestants.

Shakers

(established ca. 1770s) Called this for their lively dance worship, they emphasized simple, communal living and were all expected to practice celibacy. First transplanted to America from England by Mother Ann Lee, they counted six thousand members by 1840, though by the 1940s the movement had largely died out.

New England Emigrant Aid Company

(founded 1854): Organization created to facilitate the migration of free laborers to Kansas in order to prevent the establishment of slavery in the territory.

popular sovereignty

(in the context of the slavery debate) Notion that the sovereign people of a given territory should decide whether to allow slavery. Seemingly a compromise, it was largely opposed by Northern abolitionists who feared it would promote the spread of slavery to the territories.

Hudson River School

(mid-nineteenth century) American artistic movement that produced romantic renditions of local landscapes.

Ancient Order of Hibernians

(mid-nineteenth century) Irish semisecret society that served as a benevolent organization for downtrodden Irish immigrants in the United States.

Transcendentalism

(mid-nineteenth century) Literacy and intellectual movement that emphasized individualism and self-reliance, predicted upon a belief that each person possesses an "inner light" that can point the way to truth and direct contact with God.

Committee on Public Information

..., It was headed by George Creel. The purpose of this committee was to mobilize people's minds for war, both in America and abroad. Tried to get the entire U.S. public to support U.S. involvement in WWI. Creel's organization, employed some 150,000 workers at home and oversees. He proved that words were indeed weapons.

Trent affair

1861; Diplomatic row that threatened to bring the British into the Civil War on the side of the Confederacy, after a Union warship stopped a British steamer and arrested two Confederate diplomats on board.

Morrill Tariff Act

1861; Increased duties back up to 1846 levels to raise revenue for the Civil War.

Alabama

1862 - 1864; British-built and manned Confederate warship that raided Union shipping during the Civil War. One of many built by the British for the Confederacy, despite Union protests.

Homestead Act

1862; A federal law that sold settlers 160 acres of land for about $30 if they lived on it for five years and improved it by, for instance, building a house on it. The act helped make land accessible to hundreds of thousands of westward-moving settlers, but many people also found disappointment when their land was infertile or they saw speculators grabbing up the best land.

National Banking System

1863; Network of member banks that could issue currency against purchased government bonds. Created during the Civil War to establish a stable national currency and stimulate the sale of war bonds.

Laird rams

1863; Two well-armed ironclad warships constructed for the Confederacy by a British firm. Seeking to avoid war with the United States, the British government purchased the two ships for its Royal Navy instead.

New York draft riots

1863; Uprising, mostly of working-class Irish Americans, in protests of the draft. Rioters were particularly incensed by the ability of the rich to hire substitutes or purchase exemptions.

Crédit Mobilier scandal

1872; A construction company was formed by owners of the Union Pacific Railroad for the purpose of receiving government contracts to build the railroad at highly inflated prices - and profits. In 1872 a scandal erupted when journalists discovered that the Crédit Mobilier Company had bribed congressmen and even the vice president to allow the ruse to continue.

Chinese Exclusion Act

1882 federal legislation that prohibited most further Chinese immigration to the United States. This was the first major legal restriction on immigration in US history.

Pendleton Act

1883 Congressional legislation that established the Civil Service Commission, which granted federal government jobs on the basis of examinations instead of political patronage, thus reining in the spoils system.

Homestead Strike

1892; A strike at a Carnegie steel plant in Homestead, Pennsylvania, that ended in an armed battle between the strikers, three hundred armed Pinkerton detectives hired by Carnegie, and federal troops, which killed ten people and wounded more than sixty. The strike was part of a nationwide wave of labor unrest in the summer of 1892 that helped the Populists gain some support from industrial workers.

Jones Act

1916 - Promised Philippine independence. Given freedom in 1917, their economy grew as a satellite of the U.S. Filipino independence was not realized for 30 years.

Adamson Act

1916 law that established 8 hour workday for railroad workers in order to avert a national strike, w/ extra pay for overtime

Herbert Hoover

1928; Republican; approach to economy known as voluntarism (avoid destroying individuality/self-reliance by government coercion of business); of course, in 1929 the stock market crashed; tried to fix it through creating the Emergency Relief and Construction Act and the Reconstruction Finance Corporation (didn't really work)

Civil Rights Act of 1964

1964; banned discrimination in public acomodations, prohibited discrimination in any federally assisted program, outlawed discrimination in most employment; enlarged federal powers to protect voting rights and to speed school desegregation; this and the voting rights act helped to give African-Americans equality on paper, and more federally-protected power so that social equality was a more realistic goal

eugene mccarthy

1968 Democratic candidate for President who ran to succeed incumbent Lyndon Baines Johnson on an anti-war platform.

Phyllis Schlafly

1970s; a new right activist that protested the women's rights acts and movements as defying tradition and natural gender division of labor; demonstrated conservative backlash against the 60s

war powers act

1973. A resolution of Congress that stated the President can only send troops into action abroad by authorization of Congress or if America is already under attack or serious threat.

Roe v. Wade

1973. Landmark Supreme Court decision that forbade states from barring abortion by citing a woman's constitutional right to privacy. Seen as a victory for feminism and civil liberties by some, the decision provoked a strong counterreaction by opponents to abortion, galvanizing the pro-life movement.

malaise speech

1979. National address by Jimmy Carter in July 1979 in which he chided American materialism and urged a communal spirit in the face of economic hardships. Although Carter intended the speech to improve both public morale and his standing as a leader, it had the opposite effect and was widely perceived as a political disaster for the embattled president.

Rutherford B. Hayes

19th president of the United States who was famous for being part of the Hayes-Tilden election in which electoral votes were contested in 4 states; the most corrupt election in US history

No Child Left Behind Act

2001; An education bill created and signed by the George W. Bush administration. Designed to increase accountability standards for primary and secondary schools, the law authorized several federal programs to monitor those standards and increased choices for parents in selecting schools for their children. The program was highly controversial, in large part because it linked results on standardized tests to federal funding for schools and school districts.

9/11

2001; Common shorthand for the terrorist attacks that occurred on September 11, 2001, in which nineteen militant Islamist men hijacked and crashed four commercial aircraft. Two planes hit the twin towers of the World trade Center in New York City, causing them to collapse. One plane crashed into the Pentagon in Washington DC, and the fourth, overtaken by passengers, crashed into a field in rural Pennsylvania. Nearly three thousand people were killed in the worst case of domestic terrorism in American history.

USA Patriot Act

2001; Legislation passed shortly after the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001, that granted broad surveillance and detention authority to the government.

Hurricane Katrina

2005; The costliest and one of the deadliest hurricanes in the history of the United States, which killed nearly two thousand Americans. The storm ravaged the Gulf Coast, especially the city of New Orleans, in late August 2005. In new Orleans, high winds and rain caused the city's levees to break, leading to catastrophic flooding, particularly in the city's most impoverished wards. A tardy and feeble response by local and federal authorities exacerbated the damage and led to widespread criticism of the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA).

American Recovery and Reinvestment Act

2009; Among the earliest initiatives of the Obama administration to combat the Great Recession. It was based on the economic theories of John Maynard Keynes that called for increased government spending to offset decreased private spending in times of economic downturn. The act was controversial from the outset, passing with no Republican votes in the House and only three in the Senate, and helping to foster the "Tea Party" movement to curb government deficits, even while critics on the left argued that the act's $787 billion appropriation was not enough to turn the economy around.

Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (ACA)

2010; Also known as "Obamacare," the act extended healthcare insurance to some 30 million Americans, marking a major step toward achieving the century-old goal of providing universal healthcare coverage.

Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act

2010; Also known as the Dodd-Frank Act, after its Democratic sponsors, Connecticut senator Christopher Dodd and Massachusetts representative Barney Frank. In an effort to avoid another financial crisis like the Great Recession, the act updated many federal regulations affecting the financial and banking systems and created some new agencies, such as the Bureau of Consumer Financial Protection.

Grover Cleveland

22nd and 24th president; Democrat; honest and hardworking; as a Republican fought corruption; as president he vetoed hundreds of wasteful bills, achieved the Interstate Commerce Commission and civil service reform; violent suppression of strikes

Warren G. Harding

29th president involved in laissez-faire, little regard for government or presidency. "return to normalcy" after Wilson + his progressive ideals. Office became corrupt: allowed drinking in prohibition, had an affair, surrounded himself w/ cronies (used office for private gain). Ex) Sec. of Interior leased gov't land w/ oil for $500,000 and took money himself. Died after 3 years in office, VP: Coolidge took over

Joseph R. Joe Biden

47th and most recent Vice President of the United States before the P.O.S. gay-hating white man was elected, jointly elected with President Barack Obama, the love of my life.

pentagon papers

A 7,000-page top-secret United States government report on the history of the internal planning and policy-making process within the government itself concerning the Vietnam War.

Lusitania

A British passenger ship that was sunk by a German U-Boat on May 7, 1915. 128 Americans died. The sinking greatly turned American opinion against the Germans, helping the move towards entering the war.

Father Charles Coughlin

A Catholic priest from Michigan who goaded 40 million radio listeners with his weekly anti-New Deal harangues. He was a well-known opponent of Franklin D. Roosevelt's New Deal policies (1891-1979).

Robert F. Wagner

A Democratic senator from New York State from 1927-1949, he was responsible for the passage of some of the most important legislation enacted through the New Deal. The National Labor Relations Act of 1935 was popularly known as the Wagner Act in honor of the senator. He also played a major role in the National Industrial Recovery Act of 1933 and the Wagner-Steagall Housing Act of 1937 (1877-1953).

John Adams

A Federalist who was Vice President under Washington in 1789, and later became President by three votes in 1796. Known for his quarrel with France, and was involved in the XYZ Affair, Quais War, and the Convention of 1800. Later though he was also known for his belated push for peace with France in 1800. Regarding his personality he was a "respectful irritation."

Napoleon Bonaparte

A French military and political leader who rose to prominence during the French Revolution and led several successful campaigns during the Revolutionary Wars.

Tecumseh

A Native American leader of the Shawnee and a large tribal confederacy which opposed the United States during Tecumseh's War and became an ally of Britain in the War of 1812.

Tenskwatawa ("the Prophet")

A Native American religious and political leader of the Shawnee tribe, known as The Prophet or the Shawnee Prophet. He was a brother of Tecumseh, leader of the Shawnee.

Sacajawea

A Native American woman who proved an indispensable guide to Lewis and Clark during their 1804-1806 expedition. She showed the men how to forage for food and helped them maintain good relations with tribes in the Northwest.

Agricultural Adjustment Administration (AAA)

A New Deal program designed to raise agricultural prices by paying farmers not to farm. It was based on the assumption that higher prices would increase farmers' purchasing power and thereby help alleviate the Great Depression (1933).

Congress of Industrial Organizations (CIO)

A New Deal-era labor organization that broke away from the American Federation of Labor (AFL) in order to organize unskilled industrial workers regardless of their particular economic sector or craft. The CIO gave a great boost to labor organizing in the midst of the Great Depression and during World War II. In 1955, the CIO merged with the AFL.

Thomas Jefferson

A Republican who believed that the future of the U.S. would lie in the hands of farmers. He was inaugurated to the presidency in the swampy village of Washington on March 4, 1801. While he was president, the Louisiana Purchase was made, Lewis and Clark were sent to explore the newly acquired land, the Barbary Pirate threat was silenced, and the Embargo Act was passed. While all of his presidential acts were not always successful, he always put the country ahead of himself. His patriotism and loyalty to the U.S.

george mcgovern

A Senator from South Dakota who ran for President in 1972 on the Democrat ticket. His promise was to pull the remaining American troops out of Vietnam in ninety days which earned him the support of the Anti-war party, and the working-class supported him, also. He lost however to Nixon.

Plessy v. Ferguson

A Supreme Court case that upheld the constitutionality of segregation laws, saying that as long as blacks were provided with "separate but equal" facilities, these laws did not violate the Fourteenth Amendment. This decision provided legal justification for the Jim Crow system until the 1950s.

War Refuge Board

A U.S. agency formed to help rescue Jews from German-occupied territories and to provide relief for inmates of Nazi concentration camps. The agency performed noble work, but it did not begin operations until very late in the war, after million had already been murdered.

Frederick Law Olmsted

A United States landscape architect, famous for designing many well-known urban parks, including Central Park and Prospect Park in New York City, the country's oldest coordinated system of public parks and parkways in Buffalo, New York, the Niagara Reservation in Niagara Falls, and the landscape surrounding the United States Capitol building.

Gold Standard Act

A act that guaranteed that paper currency would be redeemed freely in gold, putting an end to the already dying "free silver" campaign.

Good Neighbor Policy

A departure from the Roosevelt Corollary to the Monroe Doctrine, the Good Neighbor Policy stressed nonintervention in Latin America. It was begun by Herbert Hoover but associated with Franklin D. Roosevelt.

Abu Ghraib prison

A detention facility near Baghdad, Iraq. Under Saddam Hussein, the prison was the site of infamous torturing and execution of political dissidents. In 2004, during the US occupation of Iraq, the prison became the focal point of a prisoner-abuse and torture scandal after photographs surfaced of American soldiers mistreating, torturing, and degrading Iraqi war prisoners and suspected terrorists. The scandal was one of the several dark spots on the image of the Iraq War and led to increased criticism of Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld.

pragmatism

A distinctive American philosophy that emerged in the late nineteenth century around the theory that the true value of an idea lay in its ability to solve problems. The pragmatists thus embraced the provisional, uncertain nature of experimental knowledge. Among the most well-known purveyors of pragmatism were John Dewey, Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr., and William James.

Social Security Act

A flagship accomplishment of the New Deal, this law provided for unemployment and old-age insurance financed by a payroll tax on employers and employees. It has long remained a pillar of the "New Deal Order" (1935).

Harry L. Hopkins

A former New York social worker, he came to be one of the major architects of the New Deal, heading up the Federal Emergency Relief Administration and Works Progress Administration and serving as a personal confidant to President Roosevelt (1890-1946).

Sojourner Truth

A freed slave who lived in America during the late 1800's. From her home in New York she waged a constant battle for the abolition of slavery. She was also a prominent figure in the fight for women's rights.

Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC)

A government program created by Congress to hire young unemployed men to improve the rural, out-of-doors environment with such work as planting trees, fighting fires, draining swamps, and maintaining National Parks. It proved to be an important foundation for the post-World War II environmental movement (1933).

Tea Party

A grassroots conservative political movement mobilized in opposition to Barack Obama's fiscal, economic, and healthcare policies. Named after the Boston Tea Party of the Revolutionary Era, Tea Party protestors first demonstrated in early 2009, and they grew steadily in visibility and power as a pressuring force within the Republican Party through the 2010 midterm election and beyond.

earth day

A holiday conceived of by environmental activist and Senator Gaylord Nelson to encourage support for and increase awareness of environmental concerns; first celebrated on March 22, 1970

Glass-Steagall Banking Reform Act

A law creating the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation, which insured individual bank deposits and ended a century-long tradition of unstable banking that had reached a crisis in the Great Depression (1933).

voting rights act of 1965

A law designed to help end formal and informal barriers to African American suffrage. Under the law, hundreds of thousands of African Americans were registered and the number of African American elected officials increased dramatically.

detente

A lessening of tensions between U.S. and Soviet Union. Besides disarming missiles to insure a lasting peace between superpowers, Nixon pressed for trade relations and a limited military budget. The public did not approve.

Alexander Hamilton

A native of the British West Indies, who was the Secretary of the Treasury. He favored a central government with a weak legislature to unify the infant nation and encourage industry. He set out immediately to correct the economic vexations that had crippled the Articles of Confederation by proposing that the federal government pay its Revolutionary war debts, which would bolster the nation's credit. He also proposed a bank of the United States.

Tuskegee Institute

A normal and industrial school led by Booker T. Washington in Tuskegee, Alabama. It focused on training young black students in agriculture and the trades to help them achieve economic independence. Washington justified segregated, vocational training as a necessary first step on the road to racial equality, although critics accused him of being too "accomodationist."

affirmative action

A policy in educational admissions or job hiring that gives special attention or compensatory treatment to traditionally disadvantaged groups in an effort to overcome present effects of past discrimination.

Francisco Villa

A popular leader during the Mexican Revolution. An outlaw in his youth, when the revolution started, he formed a cavalry army in the north of Mexico and fought for the rights of the landless in collaboration with Emiliano Zapata.

Wendell L. Wilkie

A presidential election got in the way of focusing on WWII. The Republicans nominated this man, who up until recently was a political nobody. He wasn't against the New Deal, like the Republican platform suggested, but rather its inefficiencies. FDR broke tradition by running for a third term. This man ran a campaign similar to that of William Jennings Bryan, making over 500 speeches around the country. FDR ended up winning the election, shattering the two term tradition.

regionalism

A recurring artistic movement that, in the context of the late nineteenth century, aspired to capture the peculiarities, or "local color," of America's various regions in the face of modernization and national standardization.

grandfather clause

A regulation established in many southern states in the 1890s that exempted from voting requirements (such as literacy tests and poll taxes) anyone who could prove that his ancestors ("grandfathers") had been able to vote in 1860. Because slaves could not vote before the Civil War, these clauses guaranteed the right to vote to many whites while denying it to blacks.

Francis E. Townsend

A retired physician who had lost his savings in the Great Depression and promoted a plan, popular with senior citizens, to pay every person over sixty $200 a month, provided that the money was spent within the month. One estimate had the scheme costing one-half of the national income (1867-1960).

Aaron Burr

A running mate with Thomas Jefferson. They tied for the presidency. Jefferson won the run off. ____ killed Alexander Hamilton in a famous duel. He was tried and acquitted for treason involving a plan to separate the US and combine with Spain.

yellow journalism

A scandal-mongering practice of journalism that emerged in New York during the Gilded Age out of the circulation battles between Joseph Pulitzer's New York World and William Randolph Hearst's New York Journal. The expression has remained a pejorative term referring to sensationalist journalism practiced with unethical, unprofessional standards.

London Economic Conference

A sixty-six nation economic conference organized to stabilize international currency rates. Franklin Roosevelt's decision to revoke American participation contributed to a world deepening economic crisis.

black power

A slogan used to reflect solidarity and racial consciousness, used by Malcolm X. It meant that equality could not be given, but had to be seized by a powerful, organized Black community.

Pullman Strike

A strike by railroad workers upset by drastic wage cuts. Led by Socialist Eugne Debs.

Samuel Chase

A strong supporter of the American Revolution, a signer of the Declaration of Independence, an ardent Federalist, and the only Supreme Court Justice ever to be impeached. A lawyer by profession, in 1796 he was appointed to the U.S. Supreme Court by president Washington. This was after he served as Chief Justice of the General Court of Maryland in 1791. In 1804, for alleged prejudice against the Jeffersonians in treason and sedition trials.

Proposition 13 (1978)

A successful California state ballot initiative that capped the state's real estate tax at 1 percent of assessed value.

Tweed Ring

A symbol of Gilded Age corruption, "Boss" Tweed and his deputies ran the New York City Democratic party in the 1860s and swindled $200 million from the city through bribery, graft, and vote-buying. Boss Tweed was eventually jailed for his crimes and died behind bars.

patronage

A system, prevalent during the Gilded Age, in which political parties granted jobs and favors to party regulars who delivered votes on election day. Patronage was both an essential wellspring of support for both parties and a source of conflict within the Republican party.

Gilded Age

A term given to the period 1865-1896 by Mark Twain, indicating both the fabulous wealth and the widespread corruption of the era.

Fourth Party System

A term used to describe national politics from 1896-1932, when Republicans had a tight grip on the White House.

City Beautiful movement

A turn-of-the-century movement among progressive architects and city planners, who aimed to promote order, harmony, and virtue while beautifying the nation's new urban spaces with grand boulevards, welcoming parks, and monumental public buildings.

vietnamization

A war policy in Vietnam initiated by Nixon in June of 1969. This strategy called for dramatic reduction of U.S. troops followed by an increased injection of S. Vietnamese troops in their place. A considerable success, this plan allowed for a drop in troops to 24,000 by 1972. . This policy became the cornerstone of the so-called "Nixon Doctrine". As applied to Vietnam, it was labeled "Vietnamization".

What are James K. Polks goals and objectives while in office?

A workaholic, America's new chief executive set an ambitious agenda with four major goals: cut tariffs, reestablish an independent U.S. Treasury, secure the Oregon Territory and acquire the territories of California and New Mexico from Mexico. Polk eventually achieved all his goals.

League of Nations

A world organization established in 1920 to promote international cooperation and peace. It was first proposed in 1918 by President Woodrow Wilson, although the United States never joined the League. Essentially powerless, it was officially dissolved in 1946.

panic of 1873

A worldwide depression that began in the United States when one of the nation's largest banks abruptly declared bankruptcy, leading to the collapse of thousands of banks and businesses. The crisis intensified debtors' calls for inflationary measures such as the printing of more paper money and the unlimited coinage of silver. Conflicts over monetary policy greatly influenced politics in the last quarter of the nineteenth century.

Elizabeth Cady Stanton

Abolitionist and woman suffragist, she organized the first Woman's Rights Convention near her home in Seneca Falls, New York in 1848. After the Civil War, she urged Congress to include women in the fourteenth and fifteenth amendments, despite urgings from Frederick Douglass to let freedmen have their hour. In 1869, she, along with Susan B. Anthony, founded the National Woman Suffrage Association to lobby for a constitutional amendment granting women the vote.

Lucy Stone

Abolitionist and women's rights activist, who kept her maiden name after marriage, inspiring other women to follow her example. Though she campaigned to include women in the fourteenth and fifteenth amendments, she did not join Stanton and Anthony in denouncing the amendments when it became clear the changes would not be made. In 1869 she founded the American Woman Suffrage Association, which lobbied for suffrage primarily at the state level.

William Lloyd Garrison

Abolitionist who published "The Liberator" in Boston and helped found the American Anti-Slavery Society. He favored Northern secession and renounced politics.

Impressment

Act of forcibly drafting an individual into military service, employed by the British navy against American seamen in times of war against France, 1793-1815. It was a continual source of conflict between Britain and the United States in the early national period.

Alien Laws (1798)

Acts passed by a Federalist Congress raiding the residency requirement for citizenship to fourteen years and granting the president the power to deport dangerous foreigners in times of peace.

Compromise of 1850

Admitted California as a free state, opened New Mexico and Utah to popular sovereignty, ended the slave trade (but not slavery itself ) in Washington D.C., and introduced a more stringent fugitive slave law. Widely opposed in both the North and South, it did little to settle the escalating dispute over slavery.

West Virginia

Admitted to the Union in 1863. Mountainous region that broke away from Virginia in 1861 to form its own state after Virginia seceded from the Union. Most of the residents of West Virginia were independent farmers and miners who did not own slaves and thus opposed the Confederate cause.

malcom x

African-American civil rights leader who encouraged violent responses to racial discrimination

Great Rapprochement

After decades of occasionally "twisting the lion's tail," American diplomats began to cultivate close, cordial relations with Great Britain at the end of the nineteenth century—a relationship that would intensify further during World War I.

Mining Industry

After gold and silver strikes in Colorado, Nevada, and other western territories in the second half of the ninteenth century, fortune-seekers by the thousands rushed to the West to dig. These metals were essential to U.S. industrial growth and were also sold into world markets.

War Industries Board

Agency established during WWI to increase efficiency & discourage waste in war-related industries., Headed by Bernard Baruch, could order businesses to support war by building more plants, etc.

Convention of 1800

Agreement to formality dissolve the United States' treaty with France, originally signed during the Revolutionary War. The difficulties posed by America's peacetime alliance with France contributed to Americans' long-standing opposition to entangling alliances with foreign powers.

Macon's Bill No. 2

Aimed at resuming peaceful trade with Britain and France, the act stipulated that if either Britain or France repealed its trade restrictions, the United States would reinstate the embargo against the non-repealing nation. When Napoleon offered to lift his restrictions on British ports, the United States was forced to declare an embargo on Britain, thereby pushing the two nations closer toward war.

george c wallace

Alabama governor who spoke for millions of working-class white Americans (third-party candidate 1968) also strongly believed in segregation (now, tomorrow, forever) and resisted integration (Birmingham most determined resistance)

corrupt bargain

Alleged deal between presidential candidates John Quincy Adams and Henry Clay to throw the election, to be decided by the House of Representatives, in Adams' favor. Though never proven, the accusation became the rallying cry for supporters of Andrew Jackson, who had actually garnered a plurality of the popular vote in 1824.

Wagner Act

Also known as the National Labor Relations Act, this law protected the right of labor to organize in unions, bargain collectively with employers, and established the National Labor Relations Board to monitor unfair labor practices on the part of the employer. Its passage marked the culmination of decades of labor protest (1935).

Milton Friedman

American economist. Conservative thinker famous for his advocacy of monetarism (an revision of the quantity theory of money) in works like A Monetary History of the United States

American Expeditionary Forces

American force of 14,500 that landed in France in June 1917 under the command of General John Pershing. Both women and blacks served during the war, mostly under white officers

Isaac Singer

American inventor and manufacturer, who made his fortune by improving on Elias Howe's sewing machine. His machine fueled the ready-made clothing industry in New England.

James Fenimore Cooper

American novelist and a member of New York's Knickerbocker Group, he wrote adventure tales, including The Last of the Mohicans, which won acclaim on both sides of the Atlantic.

Edgar Allan Poe

American poet, short-story writer, editor and literary critic who is best known for his tales of mystery and the macabre.

Patrick Henry

American revolutionary and champion of states rights, Henry became a prominent anti-federalist during the ratification debate, opposing what he saw as despotic tendencies in the new national constitution.

Caroline

American steamer, was carrying supplies across Niagara River, was attacked on the New York shore by the British, who set it on fire, was a blatant counter-violation of neutrality, people made a huge deal out of it (a Canadian was bragging about his part in the raid and was arrested and indicted for murder)

Henry David Thoreau

American transcendentalist and author of Walden: Or Life in the Woods. A committed idealist and abolitionist, he advocated civil disobedience, spending a night in jail for refusing to pay a poll tax to a government that supported slave

Meriwether Lewis

An American explorer, soldier, politician, and public administrator, best known for his role as the leader of the Lewis and Clark Expedition, also known as the Corps of Discovery, with William Clark.

Pearl Harbor

An American naval base in Hawaii where Japanese war planes destroyed numerous ships and caused three thousand casualties on December 7, 1941 - a day that, in President Roosevelt's words, was to "live in infamy." the attack brought the United States into World War II.

Horace Greeley

An American newspaper editor and founder o the Republican party. His New York Tribune was America's most influential newspaper 1840-1870. Greeley used it to promote the Whig and Republican parties, as well as antislavery and a host of reforms.

George W. Bush

An American politician and businessman who served as the 43rd President of the United States from 2001 to 2009, and the 46th Governor of Texas from 1995 to 2000.

Richard Cheney

An American politician and businessman who was the 46th Vice President of the United States from 2001 to 2009, under President George W. Bush.

Sarah Palin

An American politician, commentator, and author who served as the ninth Governor of Alaska, from 2006 to 2009.

Jefferson Davis

An American statesman and politician who served as President of the Confederate States of America for its entire history from 1861 to 1865.

Dawes Severalty Act(1887)

An act that broke up Indian reservations and distributed land to individual households. Leftover land was sold for money to fund U.S. government efforts to "civilize" Native Americans.

sharecropping

An agricultural system that emerged after the Civil War in which black and white farmers rented land and residences from a plantation owner in exchange for giving him a certain "share" of each year's crop. Sharecropping was the dominant form of southern agriculture after the Civil War, and landowners manipulated this system to keep tenants in perpetual debt and unable to leave their plantations.

Equal Rights Amendment (ERA)

An amendment that declared full constitutional equality for women. Although it passed both houses of Congress in 1972, a concerted grassroots campaign by antifeminists led by Phyllis Schlafly persuaded enough state legislatures to vote against ratification. The amendment failed to become part of the Constitution.

Tampico incident

An arrest of American sailors by the Mexican government that spurred Woodrow Wilson to dispatch the American navy to seize the port of Vera Cruz in April 1914. Although war was avoided, tensions grew between the US and Mexico.

Keynesianism

An economic theory based on the thoughts of British economist John Maynard Keynes, holding that central banks should adjust interest rates and governments should use deficit spending and tax policies to increase purchasing power and hence prosperity.

Sally Hemings

An enslaved woman of mixed race owned by President Thomas Jefferson and who is believed to have had a long-term relationship and six children with him, of whom four survived and all were given freedom by Jefferson.

Quarantine Speech

An important speech delivered by Franklin Roosevelt in which he called for "positive endeavors" to "quarantine" land-hungry dictators through economic embargoes. The speech flew in the face of isolationist politicians.

EPA

An independent federal agency established to coordinate programs aimed at reducing pollution and protecting the environment

World Trade Organization (WTO) (1995)

An international body to promote and supervise liberal trade among nations. Successor to the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade, it marked a key world trade policy achievement of the Clinton administration

naturalism

An offshoot of mainstream realism, this late-nineteenth-century literary movement purported to apply detached scientific objectivity to the study of human characters shaped by degenerate heredity and extreme or sordid social environments.

National American Woman Suffrage Association (NAWSA)

An organization founded in 1890 to demand the vote for women. NAWSA argued that women should be allowed to vote because their responsibilities in the home and family made them indispensable in the public decision-making process. During World War I, NAWSA supported the war effort and lauded women's role in the Allied victory, which helped to finally achieve nationwide woman suffrage in the Nineteenth Amendment (1920).

Joint Resolution

Annexation of Texas; U.S. made Texas a state in 1845; both houses of Congress supported annexation under Tyler, and he signed the bill shortly before leaving office;

Clayton Anti-Trust Act

Anti monopoly law that specifically stated that unions could not be considered "combinations in restraint of trade" and therefore unions could not be prosecuted under anti-monopoly laws.

Contras

Anti-Sandinista fighters in the Nicaraguan civil war. The contras were secretly supplied with American military aid, paid for with money the United Sates clandestinely made selling arms to Iran.

Nelson Mandela (1918-2013)

Anti-apartheid activist and leader of the African National Congress. After spending twenty-seven years in prison in South Africa, Mandela became the first black president of South Africa in 1994, dramatically signaling the end of racial apartheid in the country.

John Marshall

Appointed by John Adams (1801) as Chief Justice of the Supreme Court- was a Virginia Federalist. Even as the Federalists died out, he continued to hand down Federalist decisions. Although he dismissed the Marbury suit (1801) to avoid direct political showdown, he said that part of the Judiciary Act of 1789, on which Marbury tried to base his appeal was unconstitutional.

Chester Arthur

Appointed customs collector for the port of New York - corrupt and implemented a heavy spoils system. He was chosen as Garfield's running mate. Garfield won but was shot, so Arthur became the 21st president.

Al Qaeda

Arabic for "The Base," an international alliance of anti-Western Islamic Fundamentalist terrorist organizations founded in the late 1980s by veterans of the Afghan struggle against the Soviet Union. The group was headed by Osama bin Laden and has taken responsibility for numerous terrorist attacks, especially after the late 1990s. Al Qaeda organized the attacks of September 11, 2001, in the United States from its headquarters in Taliban-controlled Afghanistan. Since the US-led invasion of Afghanistan in 2001 and the launch of the "global war on terror," the group has been weakened but still poses significant threats around the world.

John McCain

Arizona senator and war hero who was runner up to George W. Bush for the GOP presidential nomination in 2000 and was the nominee in 2008

Shay's Rebellion

Armed uprising of western Massachusetts debtors seeking lower taxes and an end to property foreclosures. Though quickly put down, the insurrection inspired fears of "mob rule" among leading Revolutionaries. p. 168

Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces (NIF) Treaty (1987)

Arms limitation agreement settled by Reagan and Gorbachev after several attempts. It banned all of these types of missiles from Europe and marked a significant thaw in the Cold War.

Federal Trade Commission Act

Authorized after the passage of the Clayton Antitrust Act of 1914; major government body in charge of regulating big business; investigates possible violation of antitrust laws

henry kissinger

Awarded 1973 Nobel Peace Prize for helping to end Vietnam War and withdrawing American forces. Heavily involved in South American politics as National Security Advisor and Secretary of State. Condoned covert tactics to prevent communism and facism from spreading throughout South America.

J. P. Morgan

Banker who buys out Carnegie Steel and renames it to US Steel. Was a philanthropist in a way: he gave all the money needed for WWI and was payed back. Was one of the "robber barons"

Lend-Lease Bill

Based on the motto "send guns, not sons," that law abandoned former pretenses of neutrality by allowing Americans to sell unlimited supplies of arms to any nation defending itself against the Axis Powers. Patriotically numbered 1776, the bill was praised as a device for keeping the nation out of World War II.

Calvin Coolidge

Became president when Harding died of pneumonia. He was known for practicing a rigid economy in money and words, and acquired the name "Silent Cal" for being so soft-spoken. He was a true republican and industrialist. Believed in the government supporting big business.

Martin Delany

Black abolitionist and advocate of relocating freed blacks to Africa, even visiting West Africa's Niger Valley in search of a suitable location in 1859.

Nat Turner

Black slave and prophet who led a revolt in Virginia in 1831 which killed 60 people (mostly women and children). This scared the Southerners because it was the first really violent action of the slaves. As a result, slave codes were made more strict

Ralph Waldo Emerson

Boston-born scholar and leading American transcendentalist, whose essays, most notably "Self- Reliance" stressed individualism, self-improvement, optimism and freedom.

William Wilberforce

British politician who championed the abolition of the slave trade, and later slavery itself. An evangelical Christian, he delivered rousing speeches on the floor of the Commons, galvanizing public support for the abolitionist cause.

Samuel Slater

British-born mechanic and father of the American "Factory System," establishing textile mills throughout New England.

Walt Whitman

Brooklyn-born poet and author of Leaves of Grass, a collection of poems, written largely in free verse, which exuberantly celebrated America's democratic spirit.

Department of Homeland Security

Cabinet-level agency created in 2003 to unify and coordinate public safety and antiterrorism operations within the federal government.

Responsorial

Call and response style of preaching that melded Christian and African traditions. Practiced by African slaves in the South.

Bank of the United States (1791)

Chartered by Congress as part of Alexander Hamilton's financial program, the bank printed paper money and served as a depository to Treasury funds. It drew opposition from Jeffersonian Republicans, who argued that the bank was unconstitutional.

John Jay

Chief Justice who negotiated with the British to avoid going to war with them, known as Jay's treaty.

Jerry Falwell (1933-2007)

Christian evangelical reverend and radical right-wing traditionalist. In 1979, Falwell founded the Moral Majority, a political action committee dedicated to moral values and in opposition to feminism and gay rights.

The Federalist

Collection of essays written by John Jay, James Madison, and Alexander Hamilton and published during the ratification debate in New York to lay out the Federalists' arguments in favor of the new Constitution. Since their publication, these influential essays have served as an important source for constitutional interpretation. p. 176

land-grant colleges

Colleges and universities created from allocations of public land through the Morrell Act of 1862 and the Hatch Act of 1887. These grants helped fuel the boom in higher education in the late nineteenth century, and many of the today's public universities derive from these grants.

holding companies

Companies that hold a majority of another company's stock in order to control the management of that company. Can be used to establish a monopoly.

Allies

Composed of France, Britain, and Russia, and later Japan and Italy, the Allies fought the Central Powers in World War I. The United States joined the Allies in 1917, and after major economic and military blows, World War I ended with the Treaty of Versailles.

Sally Tompkins

Confederate nurse who ran a hospital in Richmond, Virginia during the Civil War.

Margaret Thatcher (1925-2013)

Conservative prime minister of the United Kingdom from 1979 to 1990. As an ideological partner to President Ronald Reagan, Thatcher enacted economic liberalization reforms and attempted to check the powers of labor unions in Britain.

Guantánamo Detention Camp

Controversial prison facility constructed after the US-led invasion of Afghanistan in 2001. Located on territory occupied by the US military, but not technically part of the United States, the facility serves as an extra-legal holding area for suspected terrorists.

North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA)

Created a free-trade zone bw Mexico, Canada, & US (eliminated tariffs bw the countries). A symbol of the increased reality of a globalized marketplace, the treaty passed despite opposition from protectionists and labor leaders.

Northwest Ordinance of 1787

Created a policy for administering the Northwest Territories. It included a path to statehood and forbade the expansion of slavery into the territories. p. 166

Treaty of Versailles

Created by the leaders victorious allies Nations: France, Britain, US, and signed by Germany to help stop WWI. The treaty 1)stripped Germany of all Army, Navy, Airforce. 2) Germany had to repair war damages(33 billion) 3) Germany had to acknowledge guilt for causing WWI 4) Germany could not manufacture any weapons.

James Earl Carter, Jr.

Created the Department of Energy and the Depatment of Education. He was criticized for his return of the Panama Canal Zone, and because of the Soviet war in Afghanistan, he enacted an embargo on grain shipments to USSR and boycotted the 1980 Olympics in Moscow

insurrectos

Cuban insurgents who sought freedom from colonial Spanish rule. Their destructive tactics threatened American economic interests in Cuban plantations and railroads.

Battle of Fallen Timbers (1794)

Decisive battle between the Miami Confederacy and the U.S. Army. British forces refused to shelter the routed Indians, forcing the latter to attain a peace settlement with the United States.

William Jennings Bryan

Democratic candidate who ran for president in 1896 and again in 1900; his goal of "free silver" (unlimited coinage of silver) won him the support of the Populist Party. Though a gifted orator, he lost the election to Republican Willam McKinley. He ran again for president and lost again in 1900. Later he opposed America's imperialist actions, and in the 1920s, he made his mark as a leader of the fundamentalist cause and prosecuting attorney in the Scopes Monkey Trial.

Hillary Rodham Clinton

Democratic senator from New York who, in 2008, became the first highly competitive female candidate for president. A lawyer and political activist, she was First Lady from 1993 to 2001, and then became the first former First Lady to serve in elected office when she was elected to the Senate. She tried unsuccessfully to win the Democratic nomination for president in 2008.

Sheppard-Towner Maternity Act

Designed to appeal to new women voters, this act provided federally financed instruction in maternal and infant health care and expanded the role of government in family welfare.

three-fifths compromise

Determined that each slave could bed counted at three-fifths of a person for the purpose of apportioning taxes and representation. The compromise granted disproportionate political power to southern slave states p. 172

XYZ Affair (1797)

Diplomatic conflict between France and the United States when American envoys to France were asked to pay a hefty bribe for the privilege of meeting with the French foreign minister. Many in the United States called for war against France, while American sailors and privateers waged an undeclared war against French merchants in the Caribbean.

irreconcilables

During World War I, senators William Borah of Idaho and Hiram Johnson of California, led a group of people who were against the United States joining the League of Nations. Also known as "the Battalion of Death". They were extreme isolationists and were totally against the U.S. joining the League of Nations.

Nixon Doctrine

During the Vietnam War, the Nixon Doctrine was created. It stated that the United States would honor its exisiting defense commitments, but in the future other countries would have to fight their own wars without support of American troops.

Francis Parkman

Early American historian who wrote a series of volumes on the imperial struggle between Britain and France in North America.

Federal Style

Early national style of architecture that borrowed from neoclassical models and emphasized symmetry, balance, and restraint. Famous builders associated with this style included Charles Bulfinch and Benjamin Latrobe.

Romanticism

Early nineteenth-century movement in European and American literature and the arts that, in reaction to the hyper-rational Enlightenment, emphasized imagination over reason, nature over civilization, intuition over calculation, and the self over society.

panic of 1837

Economic crisis triggered by bank failures, elevated grain prices, and Andrew Jackson's efforts to curb overspeculation on western lands and transportation improvements. In response, President Martin Van Buren proposed the "Divorce Bill," which pulled treasury funds out of the banking system altogether, con- tracting the credit supply.

supply-side economics

Economic theory that underlay Ronald Reagan's tax and spending cuts. Contrary to Keynesianism, supply-side theory declared that government policy should aim to increase the supply of goods and services, rather than the demand for them. It held that lower taxes and decreased regulation would increase productivity by providing increased incentives to work, thus increasing productivity and the tax base.

Market revolution

Eighteenth- and nineteenth-century transformation from a disaggregated, subsistence economy to a national commercial and industrial network.

Deism

Eighteenth-centuyr religious doctrine that emphasized reasoned moral behavior and the scientific pursuit of knowledge. Most Deists rejected biblical inheritance and the divinity of Christ, but they did not believe that a Supreme Being created the universe.

Tom Watson

Elected to the US Congress; became known as a champion of Georgia's farmers, and he sponsored and pushed through a law providing for RFD-rural free delivery

Revolution of 1800

Electoral victory of Democratic Republicans over the Federalists, who lost their Congressional majority and the presidency. The peaceful transfer of power between rival parties solidified faith in America's political system.

Sedition Act (1798)

Enacted by the Federalist Congress in an effort to clamp down on Jeffersonian opposition, the law made anyone convicted of defaming government officials or interfering with government policies liable to imprisonment and a heavy fine. The act drew heavy criticism from Republicans, who let the act expire in 1801.

US Sanitary Comission

Established 1861; Government agency founded with the help of Elizabeth Blackwell that trained nurses, collected medical supplies, and equipped hospitals in an effort to help the Union army. The commission helped professionalize nursing and gave many women the confidence and organizational skills to propel the women's movement in the postwar years.

Dominion of Canada

Established in 1867. Unified Canadian government created by Britain to bolster Canadians against potential attacks or overtures from the United States.

Society of Cincinnati

Exclusive, hereditary organization of former officers in the Continental Army. Many resented the pretentiousness of the order, viewing it's a vestige of pre-Revolutionary traditions. p. 178

William Clark

Explorer along with Merriwether Lewis sent out to explore the recently purchased Louisiana Territory. He served as the artist and cartographer. Their exploring lasted from 1804-1806. They traveled up the Missouri River, through the Rockies, and to the mouth of the Columbia River. This exploration bolstered America's claim to western lands as well as opening the west to Indian trade and further exploration.

Harpers Ferry

Federal arsenal in Virginia seized by abolitionist John Brown in 1859. Though Brown was later captured and exe- cuted, his raid alarmed Southerners who believed that Northerners shared in Brown's extremism.

Patent Office

Federal government bureau that reviews applications. A patent is a legal recognition of a new invention, granting exclusive rights to the inventor for a period of years.

panic of 1857

Financial crash brought on by gold-fueled inflation, overspeculation, and excess grain production. Raised calls in the North for higher tariffs and for free homesteads on western public lands.

Articles of Confederation

First American constitution that established the United States as a loose confederation of states under a weak national Congress, which was not granted the power to regulate commerce or collect taxes. The Articles were replaced by a more efficient constitution in 1789 p. 163

Battle of Chateau-Thierry

First battle in which the Americans took part in WWI. , (World War I Events) (1918) The American troops fought with the French to turn back a determined German offensive. Shortly after this battle, the Allies ended the German advance and were ready to start their own offensive.

Boris Yeltsin (1931-2007)

First president of Russia, who took over as the former Soviet republic became independent in 1991.

Tariff of 1816

First protective tariff in American history, created primarily to shield New England manufacturers from the inflow of British goods after the War of 1812.

Border States

Five slave states - Missouri, Kentucky, Maryland, Delaware, and West Virginia - that did not secede during the Civil War. To keep the states in the Union, Abraham Lincoln insisted that the war was not abolishing slavery but rather protecting the Union.

Frederick Douglass

Former slave who was an abolitionist and was gifted with eloquent speech and self-educated. In 1838 he was "discovered" as a great abolitionist to give antislavery speeches. He swayed many people to see that slavery was wrong by publishing Narrative of the Life of Fredrick Douglass which depicted slavery as being cruel. He also looked for ways politically to end slavery.

Ronald Reagan (1991-2004)

Fortieth president of the United States, 1981-1989. A former actor and California governor, he was elected in 1980 with a pronounced conservative mandate to fix the American economy by scaling back taxes and the role of government in business.

Alamo

Fortress in Texas where four hundred American volunteers were slain by Santa Anna in 1836. "Remember the Alamo" became a battle cry in support of Texan independence.

George H. W. Bush (1924-)

Forty-first president of the United States, 1989-1993. A former congressman diplomat, businessman, Republican party chairman, and director the CIA, Bush served for eight years as Reagan's vice president before being elected president in 1988.

William Jefferson ("Bill") Clinton

Forty-second president of the United States. A former Arkansas governor and founding member of the Democratic Leadership Council, he promoted "third way" politics and distanced his policies from traditional Democratic programs. He signed the Welfare Reform Act in 1996 to fulfill a campaign promise to "end welfare as we know it." He was the first Democrat to be reelected since Franklin Roosevelt and first president to be impeached since Andrew Johnson.

Industrial Workers of the World

Founded in 1905, this radical union, also known as the Wobblies aimed to unite the American working class into one union to promote labor's interests. It worked to organize unskilled and foreign-born laborers, advocated social revolution, and led several major strikes. Stressed solidarity.

American Temperance Society

Founded in Boston in 1826 as part of a growing effort of nineteenth-century reformers to limit alcohol consumption.

Woman's Christian Temperance Union (WCTU)

Founded in Ohio in the 1870s to combat the evils of excessive alcohol consumption, the WCTU went on to embrace a broad reform agenda, including campaigns to abolish prostitution and gain the right to vote for women.

Joseph Smith

Founder of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints (Mormons), he gained a following after an angel directed him to a set of golden plates which, when deciphered, became the Book of Mormon. His communal, authoritarian church and his advocacy of plural marriage antagonized his neighbors in Ohio, Missouri and finally Illinois, where he was murdered by a mob in 1844.

Court-packing Plan

Franklin Roosevelt's politically motivated and ill-fated scheme to add a new justice to the Supreme Court for every member over seventy who would not retire. His objective was to overcome the Court's objections to New Deal reforms (1937).

William T. Johnson

Free black from New Orleans who owned fifteen slaves and was very harsh on them. He was known as the "barber of Natchez".

Charles Maurice de Talleyrand

French foreign minister who demanded an unneutral loan of 32 million florins, plus what amounted to a bribe of $250,000, for the privilege of merely talking with him once approached by "X", "Y", and "Z".

Maximilian

French viceroy appointed by Napoleon III of France to lead the new government set up in Mexico. After the Civil War, the US invaded and he was executed, a demonstration of the enforcement of the Monroe Doctrine to European powers.

John J. Audobon

French-born naturalist and author of the beautifully illustrated Birds of America.

Land Act of 1820

Fueled the settlement of the Northwest and Missouri territories by lowering the price of public land. Also pro- hibited the purchase of federal acreage on credit, thereby eliminat- ing one of the causes of the Panic of 1819.

Farewell Address (1796)

George Washington's address at the end of his presidency, warning against "permanent alliances" with other nations. Washington did not oppose all alliances, but believed that the young, fledgling nation should forge alliances only on a temporary basis, in extraordinary circumstances.

Kristallnacht

German for "night of broken glass," it refers to the murderous pogrom that destroyed Jewish businesses and synagogues and sent thousands to concentration camps on the night of November 9, 1938. Thousands more attempted to find refuge in the United States but were ultimately turned away due to restrictive immigration laws.

U-Boats

German submarines used in World War I

John Jacob Astor

German-born fur trader and New York real estate speculator, who amassed an estate of $30 million by the time of his death.

Arthur Zimmermann

Germany's foreign minister who sent a telegram proposing Mexico to join the war on Germany's side

Central Powers

Germany, Austria-Hungary, Bulgaria, Ottoman Empire

DeWitt Clinton

Governor of New York state and promoter of the Erie Canal, which linked the Hudson River to the Great Lakes. "_____'s Big Ditch", as the canal was called, transformed upstate New York into a center of industry and gave rise to the Midwestern cities of Cleveland, Detroit and Chicago.

Reform Bill of 1867

Granted suffrage to all male British citizens, dramatically expanding the electorate. The success of the American democratic experiment, reinforced by the Union victory in the Civil War, was used as one of the arguments in favor of the Bill.

Ninteenth Amendment

Granted women the right to vote in 1920

Eli Whitney

Great American inventor, best known for his Cotton Gin, which revolutionized the Southern economy. He also pioneered the use of interchangeable parts in the production of muskets.

Dust Bowl

Grim nickname for the Great Plains region devastated by drought and dust storms during the 1930s. The disaster led to the migration into California of thousands of displaced "Okies" and "Arkies".

Hoovervilles

Grim shantytowns where impoverished victims of the Great Depression slept under newspapers and makeshift tents. Their visibility (and sarcastic name) tarnished the reputation of the Hoover administration.

mississippi freedom democratic party

Group that sent its own delegates to the Democratic National Convention in 1964 to protest discrimination against black voters in Mississippi

How does John Tyler come to office?

Harrison died from Pneumonia after only four weeks in office. Tyler as Vice President assumes the presidnecy and becomes 10th president of the United States. (April 4,1841 - March 4, 1845)

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

Harvard Professor of modern languages and popular mid-nineteenth century poet, who won broad acclaim in Europe for his poetry.

Robert R. Livingston

He bought New Orleans and all the French territory west of the Mississippi River from Napoleon for 15 million dollars. He was only supposed to negotiate for a small part of New Orleans for 10 million so Jefferson was upset when he heard about this deal.

Alfred Smith

He ran for president in the 1928 election for the Democrat Party. He was known for his drinking and he lost the election to Herbert Hoover. Prohibition was one of the issues of the campaign. He was the first Roman Catholic to run for president, and it was during a time many people were prejudice toward Catholics

Toussaint L'Overture

He skillfully led a group of angry ex-slaves against French troops in Santo Domingo. The French were unable to reconquer this valuable island and hence, had no use for Louisiana to serve as a granary for Santo Domingo. The inability of the French to regain possession of the island caused Napoleon to cede the Louisiana territory to the United States for 15 million dollars. Thus, his military vigor indirectly provoked Napoleon's decision to sell Louisiana to the Americans.

David Walker

He was a black abolitionist who called for the immediate emancipation of slaves. He wrote the Appeal to the Colored Citizens of the World. It called for a bloody end to white supremacy. He believed that the only way to end slavery was for slaves to physically revolt.

Stephen W. Kearny

He was an American Army officer in the Mexican War. In 1846, he led 1,700 troops over the Santa Fe Trail to Santa Fe. He conquered New Mexico and moved his troops over to Los Angeles. He was defeated by the Mexicans at San Pascual in 1846.

John C. Fremont

He was an explorer, army major, and surveyor known as "The Pathfinder." During the Mexican War, this captain played a crucial rule in overthrowing Mexican rule in California (the Bear Flag Revolt of 1846). Following California's independence from Mexico, he and a group of American naval officers and local Americans collaborated together to form the short-lived Bear Flag Republic. In the Election of 1856, he would run as the first Republican candidate for president against the Democratic candidate James Buchanan; he would lose the election to Buchanan, but he would go on to serve as governor of the Arizona Territory.

James Wilkinson

He was one of the Commissioners appointed to receive the Purchase Louisiana from the French, and served as Governor of Louisiana from 1805-1806. He informed Pres. Jefferson of Burr's conspiracy to take over Louisiana, and was the primary witness against Burr at his treason trial, even though Wilkinson was himself implicated in the plot.

James A. Garfield

He was remembered as one of the four "lost presidents" after the civil war. He was elected to the Ohio Senate in 1859 as a Republican. During the secession crisis, he advocated coercing the seceding states back into the Union. As President, he strengthened Federal authority over the New York Customs House. Less than four months of taking office in 1881, he was assassinated. His assassination led to the Pendleton Civil Service Reform of 1883.

Eugene V. Debs

Head of the American Railway Union and director of the Pullman strike; he was imprisoned along with his associates for ignoring a federal court injunction to stop striking. While in prison, he read Socialist literature and emerged as a Socialist leader in America.

George Creel

Head of the Committee on Public Information who persuaded the nation's artistes and advertising agencies to create thousands of paintings, posters, cartoons, and sculptures promoting the war. He also recruited 75,000 men to serve as "Four-Minute Men" to speak about everything relating to war and topics

Alice Paul

Head of the National Woman's party that campaigned for an equal rights amendment to the Constitution. She opposed legislation protecting women workers because such laws implied women's inferiority. Most condemned her way of thinking.

Henry Cabot Lodge

Henry Cabot Lodge was a Republican who disagreed with the Versailles Treaty, and who was the chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. He mostly disagreed with the section that called for the League to protect a member who was being threatened.

Ecological imperialism

Historians' term for the spoliation of western natural resources through excessive hunting, logging, mining, and grazing.

republican motherhood

Ideal of family organization and female behavior after the American Revolution that stressed the role of women in guiding family members toward republican virtue. p. 179

Abraham Lincoln Brigade

Idealistic American volunteers who served in the Spanish Civil War, defending Spanish republican forces from the fascist Francisco Franco's nationalist coup. Some three-thousand Americans served alongside volunteers from other countries.

New Immigrants

Immigrants from southern and eastern Europe who formed a recognizable wave of immigration from the 1880s until 1924, in contrast to the immigrants from western Europe who had come before them. These new immigrants congregated in ethnic urban neighborhoods, where they worried many native-born Americans, some of whom responded with nativist anti-immigrant campaigns and others of whom introduced urban reforms to help the immigrants assimilate

Fair Labor Standards Act

Important New Deal labor legislation that regulated minimum wages and maximum hours for workers involved in interstate commerce. The law also outlawed labor by children under sixteen. The exclusion of agricultural service and domestic workers meant that many blacks, Mexican Americans, and women who were concentrated in these sectors—did not benefit from the act's protection (1938).

Theodore Dwight Weld

In 1832, he went to the Lane Theological Seminary in Cincinnati, Ohio. He and some of his comrades were kicked out for their actions of anti-slavery. The young men were known as the "Lane Rebels." They helped lead and continue the preaching of anti-slavery ideas. Wrote "American Slavery As It Is".

Freedom Summer

In 1964, when blacks and whites together challenged segregation and led a massive drive to register blacks to vote.

my lai

In My Lai, Calley's company killed more than three hundred apparently unarmed civilians whom they suspected of aiding the Viet Cong.

Underground Railroad

Informal network of volunteers that helped runaway slaves escape from the South and reach free-soil Canada. Seeking to halt the flow of runaway slaves to the North, Southern planters and congressmen pushed for a stronger fugitive slave law.

Greek Revival

Inspired by the contemporary Greek independence movement, this building style, popular between 1820 and 1850, imitated Ancient Greek structural forms in search of a democratic architectural vernacular.

Kyoto Treaty

International treaty to limit greenhouse gas emissions. It was negotiated and opened for signatories in 1997 and took effect in 2005. Although it was signed by 169 out of 192 countries, the Bush administration rejected the plan as too costly in 2001.

Cyrus McCormick

Inventor of the _____ mower-reaper, a horse-drawn contraption that fueled the development of large-scale agriculture in the trans-Allegheny West.

John Deere

Inventor of the steel plow, which revolutionized farming in the Midwest, where fragile wooden plows had failed to break through the thick soil.

Samuel Morse

Inventor of the telegraph and the telegraphic code that bears his name. He led the effort to connect Washington and Baltimore by telegraph and transmitted the first long-distance message—"What hath God wrought"—in May of 1844.

Saddam Hussein (1937-2006)

Iraq dictator who led the Ba'ath party in a coup in 1968and ruled in a coup in 1968 and ruled Iraq until the U.S. invasion.

Neutrality Proclamation (1793)

Issued by George Washington, it proclaimed America's formal neutrality in the escalating conflict between England and France, a statement that enraged pro-French Jeffersonians.

Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo

It was the treaty negotiated between Mexico and the United States during the Mexican War and signed on February 2, 1848. In an attempt to secure territorial gains by the end of the war, President James Polk sent chief clerk of the State Department, Nicholas P. Trist, to negotiate a treaty with Mexican dictator Santa Anna. The terms of this treaty confirmed the American title to Texas and yielded the enormous area stretching westward to Oregon and the Pacific Ocean (this area was called the Mexican Cession, a territory that included the coveted California). This treaty had Mexico to cede about half of its land to the United States, but America agreed to pay $15 million for the territory and to assume the claims of its citizens against Mexico for $3.25 million.

John Tyler (1841-1845)

John Tyler was the tenth president of the United States. Although he was originally a Whig, most of his actions as President did not reflect the Whig's beliefs. He vetoed a bill for "Fiscal Bank", which would establish a new bank of the United States this led to his rejection by his Whig party. He vetoed a proposed Whig tariff. He signed a law ending the independent treasury system. He signed the redrafted tariff of 1842. Whig extremists referred to him as "His Accidency" because he was not fulfilling their plan. He would not be re-elected and would lose to James Polk.

kent state university

Kent State was the location of one of the many college student protests against the Vietnam War. The protest ended with a clash against the police and the death of several students. The incident greatly decreased the support for U.S. involvement in Vietnam and caused even more protest and resentment.

National Recovery Administration (NRA)

Known by its critics as the "National Run Around," the NRA was an early New Deal program designed to assist industry, labor, and the unemployed through centralized planning mechanisms that monitored workers' earnings and working hours to distribute work and established codes for "fair competition" to ensure that similar procedures were followed by all firms in any particular industrial sector (1933).

Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) (1990)

Landmark law signed by President George H.W. Bush that prohibited discrimination against people with physical or mental handicaps. I represented a legislative triumph for champions of equal protections to all.

Mikhail Gorbachev (1931-)

Last leader of the Soviet Union. Gorbachev assumed control in 1985 and ushered in a period of reforms known as glasnost and perestroika.

Clara Barton

Launched the American Red Cross in 1881. An "angel" in the Civil War, she treated the wounded in the field.

common law

Laws that originate from court rulings and customs, as opposed to legislative statutes. The United States Constitution grew out of the Anglo-American common law tradition and thus provided only a general organizational framework for the new federal government. p. 171

"Mad Anthony" Wayne

Led a new army in 1794, routing the Miamis at the Battle of Fallen Timbers. Since the Indians were abandoned by the British, they offered this general a peace pipe.

Sandinistas

Leftwing anti-American revolutionaries in Nicaragua who launched a civil war in 1979.

loose construction

Legal doctrine which holds that the federal gov- ernment can use powers not specifically granted or prohibited in the Constitution to carry out its constitutionally mandated respon- sibilities.

Limited liability

Legal principle that facilitates capital investment by offering protection for individual investors, who, in cases of legal claims of bankruptcy, cannot be held responsible for more than the value of their individual shares.

Welfare Reform Bill (1996)

Legislation passed by a conservative Congress that made deep cuts in welfare grants and required able-bodied welfare recipients to find employment. Part of Clinton's campaign platform in 1992, the reforms were widely seen by liberals as an abandonment of key New Deal / Great Society provisions to care for the impoverished.

Huey P. ("Kingfish") Long

Louisiana governor, later senator, whose anti-New Deal "Share Our Wealth" program promised to make "Every Man a King"-that is, until he was gunned down in 1935 (1893-1935).

Tariff of 1857

Lowered duties on imports in response to a high Treasury surplus and pressure from Southern farmers.

Emily Dickinson

Massachusetts born poet who, despite spending her life as a recluse, created a vivid inner world through her poetry, exploring themes of nature, love, death and immortality. Refusing to publish during her lifetime, she left behind nearly two thousand poems, which were published after her death.

Elias Howe

Massachusetts-born inventor of the sewing machine. Unable to convince American manufacturers to adopt his invention, he briefly moved to England before returning to the United States to find his sewing machine popularized by Isaac Singer. He won a patent infringement suit against Singer in 1854 and continued to produce sewing machines until his death.

Glasnost

Meaning "openness," a cornerstone along with perestroika of Soviet president Mikhail Gorbachev's reform movement in the USSR in the 1980s. These policies resulted in greater market liberalization, access to the West, and ultimately the end of communist rule.

Perestroika

Meaning "restructuring," a cornerstone along with glasnost of Soviet president Mikhail Gorbachev's reform movement in the USSR in the 1980s

Virginia Statute for Religious Freedom

Measure enacted by the Virginia legislature prohibiting state support for religious institutions and recognizing freedom of worship Served as model for the religion clause of the First Amendment to the Constitution. p. 178

Atlantic Charter

Meeting on a warship off the coast of Newfoundland in August 1941, Franklin Roosevelt and prime minister Winston Churchill signed this covenant outlining the future path for disarmament, peace, and the founding of the United Nations and raised awareness of the human rights of individuals after World War II.

liberal Protestants

Members of a branch of Protestantism that flourished from 1875 to 1925 and encouraged followers to use the Bible as a moral compass rather than to believe that the Bible represented scientific or historical truth. Many Liberal Protestants became active in the "social gospel" and other reform movements of the era.

Peter Cartwright

Methodist revivalist who traversed the frontier from Tennessee to Illinois in the first decades of the nineteenth century, preaching against slavery and alcohol, and calling on sinners to repent.

realism

Mid-nineteenth-century movement in European and American literature and the arts that sought to depict contemporary life and society as it actually was, in all its unvarnished detail. Adherents eschewed the idealism and nostalgia of the earlier romantic sensibility.

Charles Francis Adams

Minister to Great Britain during the Civil War, he wanted to keep Britain from entering the war on the side of the South.

Nancy Pelosi

Minority Leader of the United States House of Representatives and served as the 60th Speaker of the United States House of Representatives from 2007 to 2011.

settlement houses

Mostly run by middle-class native-born women, settlement houses in immigrant neighborhoods provided housing, food, education, child care, cultural activities, and social connections for new arrivals to the United States. Many women, both native-born and immigrant, developed life-long passions for social activism in the settlement houses. Jane Addams's Hull House in Chicago and Lillian Wald's Henry Street Settlement in New York City were two of the most prominent.

Occupy Wall Street

Name of the original protest that launched the populist, anti-Wall Street "Occupy" movement in late 2010 and early 2011. Youthful radicals pitched tents and occupied Zuccotti Park in New York's financial district beginning in September 2010 to protest inequality and corporate political power. This demonstration inspired similar occupations in many other cities.

Rome-Berlin Axis

Nazi-Germany, under Adolf Hitler, and Fascist Italy, led by Benito Mussolini, allied themselves under this nefarious treaty. The pact was signed after both countries had intervened on behalf of the Fascist leader Francisco Franco during the Spanish Civil War.

Jay's Treaty (1794)

Negotiated by Chief Justice John Jay in an effort to avoid war with Britain, the treaty included a British promise to evacuate outposts on US soil and pay damages for seized American vessels, in exchange for which Jay bound the United States to repay pre-Revolutionary war debts and to abide by Britain's restrictive trading policies toward France.

Napoleon III

Nephew of Napoleon Bonaparte, and elected emperor of France from 1852-1870, he invaded Mexico when the Mexican government couldn't repay loans from French bankers, he sent in an army and set up a new government under Maximilian during the Civil War. He refused Lincoln's request that France withdraw. After the Civil War, the US sent an army to enforce the request and Napoleon withdrew.

Louisa May Alcott

New England born author of popular novels for adolescents, most notably Little Women.

Dorothea Dix

New England teacher-author and champion of mental health reform, she assembled damning reports on insane asylums and petitioned the Massachusetts legislature to improve conditions.

Herman Melville

New York author who spent his youth as a whaler on the high seas, an experience which no doubt inspired his epic novel, Moby Dick.

Neal S. Dow

Nineteenth century temperance activist, dubbed the "Father of Prohibition" for his sponsorship of the Main Law of 1851, which prohibited the manufacture and sale of alcohol in the state.

Democratic Leadership Council (DLC)

Nonprofit organization of centrist Democrats (having moderate political views; new democrats) founded in the mid-1980s. The group attempted to push the Democratic party toward pro-growth, strong defense, and anti-crime policies. Among its most influential early members was Bill Clinton, whom it held up as an example of "third way" politics (tries to reconcile right-wing and left-wing politics by advocating a varying synthesis of right-wing economic and left-wing social policies)

Copperheads

Northern Democrats who obstructed the war effort attacking Abraham Lincoln, the draft and, after 1863, emancipation.

"Conscience Whigs"/"Mexican Whigs"

Northern Whigs who opposed slavery on moral grounds. Conscience Whigs sought to prevent the annexation of Texas as a slave state, fearing that the new slave territory would only serve to buttress the Southern "slave power"

Elizabeth Blackwell

Northern woman who was the first woman to become a licensed doctor in the US and helped run the US Sanitary Commission

Nathaniel Hawthorne

Novelist and author of The Scarlet Letter, a tale exploring the psychological effects of sin in seventeenth century Puritan Boston.

Black Monday

October 19, 1987. Date of the largest single-day decline in the Dow Jones Industrial Average until September 2001. The downturn indicated instability in the booming business culture of the 1980s but did not lead to a serious economic recession.

Spot Resoltution

Offered in the United States House of Representatives in 1847 by Abraham Lincoln, Whig representative from Illinois, the resolutions requested President James K. Polk to provide Congress with the exact location (the "spot") upon which blood was spilt on American soil, as Polk had claimed in 1846 when asking Congress to declare war on Mexico. So persistent was Lincoln in pushing his "spot resolutions" that some began referring to him as "spotty Lincoln." Lincoln's resolutions were a direct challenge to the validity of the president's words, and representative of an ongoing political power struggle between Whigs and Democrats.

Populist

Officially known as the People's party, the Populists represented Westerners and Southerners who believed that the U.S. economic policy inappropriotly favored Eastern businessmen instead of the nation's farmers. Thier proposals included tax, and most significantly, the unlimited coinage of silver.

Charles Grandison Finney

One of the leading revival preachers during the Second Great Awakening, he presided over mass camp meetings throughout New York state, championing temperance and abolition, and urging women to play a greater role in religious life.

Oneida Community

One of the more radical utopian communities established in the nineteenth century, it advocated "free love", birth control, and eugenics. Utopian communities reflected the reformist spirit of the age.

Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA)

One of the most revolutionary of the New Deal public works projects, the TVA brought cheap electric power, full employment, low-cost housing, and environmental improvements to Americans in the Tennessee Valley (1933).

anti-federalists

Opponents of the 1787 Constitution, they cast the document as antidemocratic, objected to the subordination of the sates to the central government, and feared encroachment on individuals' liberties in the absence of a bill of rights

black panther party

Organization of armed black militants formed in Oakland, California, in 1966 to protect black rights. The Panthers represented a growing dissatisfaction with the non-violent wing of the civil rights movement, and signaled a new direction to that movement after the legislative victories of 1964 and 1965. (989)

Judiciary Act of 1789

Organized the federal legal system, establishing the Supreme Court, federal district and circuit courts, and the office of the attorney general.

Mason-Dixon line

Originally drawn by surveyors to resolve the boundaries between Maryland, Delaware, Pennsylvania, and Virginia in the 1760s, it came to symbolize the North-South divide over slavery.

What were the profits and losses from the war with Mexico?

Over 13,000 men died mostly from disease in the war. Robert E. Lee and Ulysses S. Grant had practice for the civil war. Outside countries respected America More because the took no blunders and proved fighting ability. It paved the way for civil war even more in a sense as it brought new land to dispute the issue of slavery on.

Manuel Noriega (1935-)

Panamanian general and dictator from 1983 to 1989. Noriega was ousted from power after the U.S. invasion in late 1989, convicted in the United States of drug trafficking, and imprisoned in Miami, Florida.

greenbacks

Paper currency issued by the Union Treasury during the Civil War. Inadequately supported by gold, greenbacks fluctuated un value throughout the war, reaching a low of 39 cents on the dollar.

Lord Sheffield

Parliamentarian who persuaded Britain to take a hard line in negotiations with the newly independent United States, closing off American trade with the West Indies and continuing to enforce navigation laws. His approach prompted many Americans to call for a stronger central government, culminating in the 1787 Philadelphia convention.

compromise Tariff of 1833

Passed as a measure to resolve the nul- lification crisis, it provided that tariffs be lowered gradually, over a period of ten years, to 1816 levels.

Judiciary Act of 1801

Passed by the departing Federalist Congress, it created sixteen new federal judgeships ensuring a Federal hold on the judiciary.

funding at par

Payment of debts, such as government bonds, at face value. In 1790, Alexander Hamilton proposed that the federal government pay its Revolutionary war debts in full in order to bolster the nation's credit.

Robert Fulton

Pennsylvania-born painter-engineer, who constructed the first operating steam boat, the Clermont, in 1807.

Cult of domesticity

Pervasive nineteenth-century cultural creed that venerated the domestic role of women. It gave married women greater authority to shape the home life but limited opportunities outside the domestic sphere.

writ of habeas corpus

Petition requiring law enforcement officers to present detained individuals before the court to examine the legality of the arrest. Protects individuals from arbitrary state action. Suspended by Lincoln during the Civil War.

spoils system

Policy of rewarding political supporters with public office, first widely employed at the federal level by Andrew Jackson. The practice was widely abused by unscrupulous office seekers, but it also helped cement party loyalty in the emerging two-party sys- tem.

Iran-Contra affair

Political action committee founded by evangelical Reverend Jerry Falwell in 1979 to promote traditional Christian values and oppose feminism, abortion, and gay rights. The group was a major linchpin in the resurgent religious right of the 1980s

Moral Majority

Political action committee founded by evangelical Reverend Jerry Falwell in 1979 to promote traditional Christian values and oppose feminism, abortion, and gay rights. The group was a major linchpin in the resurgent religious right of the 1980s.

Lewinsky affair (1998-1999)

Political sex scandal that resulted in Clinton's impeachment and trial by Congress. In 1998, Clinton gave sworn testimony in a sexual harassment case that he'd never engaged in sexual activity w/ White House intern Monica Lewinsky. Prosecutors discovered evidence Clinton had lied under oath about the affair, to which he admitted, Repubs in Congress began impeachment proceedings. Although Clinton wasn't ultimately convicted by the Senate, the scandal put a lasting blemish on his presidential legacy.

Stephen C. Foster

Popular American folk composer who popularized minstrel songs, which fused African rhythms with nostalgic melodies.

Burned-Over District

Popular name for western New York, a region particularly swept up in the religious fervor of the Second Great Awakening.

pet banks

Popular term for pro-Jackson state banks that received the bulk of federal deposits when Andrew Jackson moved to dis- mantle the Bank of the United States in 1833.u

Bill of Rights (1791)

Popular term for the first ten amendments to the U.S. Constitution. The amendments secure key rights for individuals and reserve to the states all powers not explicitly delegated or prohibited by the Constitution.

Great Compromise

Popular term for the measure that reconciled the New Jersey and Virginia Plans at the Constitutional Convention, giving states proportional representation in the House and equal representation in the Senate. The compromise broke the stalemate at the convention and paved the way for subsequent compromises over slavery and the Electoral College p. 171

Whiskey Rebellion (1794)

Popular uprising of whiskey distillers in southwestern Pennsylvania in opposition to an excise tax on whiskey. In a show of strength and resolve by the new central government, Washington put down the rebellion with militia drawn from several states.

Great Society

President Johnson called his version of the Democratic reform program the Great Society. In 1965, Congress passed many Great Society measures, including Medicare, civil rights legislation, and federal aid to education.

Battle of Buena Vista

President Polk, enraged with General Zachary Taylor for allowing Mexican forces to walk away armed after the Battle of Monterrey, transfers Taylor's forces to join Gen. Winfield Scott's invasion of central Mexico at Veracruz. Taylor is left to defend his position near Saltillo with an inexperienced force. To capitalize on the upheaval created by the transition in American troop assignments, Mexican General Santa Anna heads north from San Luis Potosí with an army of 20,000. At the battle of Buena Vista, Santa Anna's forces break the American line by mid-day before Taylor's reserves under the command of Colonel Jefferson Davis succeed in stalling the Mexican advance. That afternoon, Taylor orders a counter-attack and stalemates the Mexican offensive by nightfall. Over 3,400 Mexican soldiers and about 650 Americans are killed. Although Santa Anna declares the battle of Buena Vista to be a great Mexican victory, in fact, the Americans are left holding the field when Santa Anna's army withdraws.

Turnpike

Privately funded, toll-based public road constructed in the early nineteenth century to facilitate commerce.

Gag Resolution

Prohibited debate or action on antislavery appeals. Driven through the House by proslavery southerners, this resolution passed every year for eight years and was eventually overturned with the help of John Quincy Adams.

Maine Law of 1851

Prohibited the manufacture and sale of alcohol. A dozen other states followed Maine's lead, though most statutes proved ineffective and were repealed within a decade.

Lucretia Mott

Prominent Quaker and abolitionist, she became a champion for women's rights after she and her fellow female delegates were not seated at the London antislavery convention of 1840. She, along with Elizabeth Cady Stanton, held the first Woman's Rights Convention at Seneca Falls in 1848.

Cyrus Field

Promoter of the first transatlantic cable which linked Ireland and Newfoundland in 1854. After the first cable went dead, he lobbied for a heavier cable, which was finally laid in 1866.

federalists

Proponents of the 1787 Constitution, they favored strong national government, arguing that the checks and balances in the new Constitution would safe-guard the people's liberties. p. 174

Land Ordinance of 1785

Provided for the sale of land in the Old Northwest and earmarked the proceeds toward repaying the national debt. p. 166

Underwood Tariff

Pushed through Congress by Woodrow Wilson, this 1913 tariff reduced average tariff duties by almost 15% and established a graduated income tax

Strategic Defense Initiative (SDI)

Reagan administration plan announced in 1983 to create a missile-defense system over American territory to block a nuclear attack. Derided as "Star Wars" by critics, the plan typified Reagan's commitment to vigorous defense spending even as he sought to limit the size of government in domestic matters.

"smoking gun" tape

Recording made in the Oval Office in June 1972 that proved conclusively that Nixon knew about the Watergate break-in and endeavored to cover it up. Led to a complete breakdown in congressional support for Nixon after the Supreme court ordered he hand the tape to investigators.

weapons of mass destruction (WMD)

Refers to weapons - nuclear, biological, and chemical - that can kill large numbers of people and do great damage to the built and natural environment. The term was used to refer to nuclear weapons during the Cold War. The Bush administration's claims that Saddam Hussein had developed WMD provided the rationale for the United States' invasion of Iraq in 2003. These weapons were never found after the invasion.

American Colonization Society

Reflecting the focus of early abolitionists on transporting freed blacks back to Africa, the organization established Liberia, a West Africans settlement intended as haven for emancipated slaves.

Susan B. Anthony

Reformer and woman suffragist, who, with long-time friend Elizabeth Cady Stanton, advocated for temperance and women's rights in New York State, established the abolitionist Women's Loyal League during the Civil War, and founded the National Woman Suffrage Association in 1869 to lobby for a constitutional amendment giving women the vote.

Amelia Bloomer

Reformer and women's rights activist, who championed dress reform for women, wearing short skirts with Turkish trousers or "_____s," as a healthier and more comfortable alternative to the tight corsets and voluminous skirts popular with women of her day.

Black belt

Region of the Deep South with the highest concentration of slaves. This emerged in the nineteenth century as cotton production became more profitable and slavery expanded south and west.

Mormons

Religious followers of Joseph Smith, who founded a communal, oligarchic religious order in the 1830s, officially known as the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. Mormons, facing deep hostility from their non-Mormon neighbors, eventually migrated west and established a flourishing settlement in the Utah desert.

southern stategy

Rep. Party focused on winning electiond by securing electoral votes of Southern States, opposed busing as a way to desegregate so they restored federal funding to segregated districts

Thomas B. Reed

Republican Speaker of the House in 1888, he gained a reputation for an iron grip over Congress and kept Democrats in line.

Newt Gingrich

Republican congressman from Georgia who served as speaker of the house from 1995 to 1999. As the author of the "Contract with America, he led the Republican "revolution" of 1994."

Robert Dole

Republican senator from Kansas who ran unsuccessfully against Bill Clinton in 1996. He had previously been the Republican vice-presidential nominee in 1976 and served as senate minority leader during the 1980s and 1990s.

Daniel Shays

Revolutionary War veteran who led a group of debtors and impoverished back-country farmers in a rebellion against the Massachusetts government in 1786, calling for paper money, lighter taxes, and an end to property seizures for debt. Though quickly put down, the rebellion raised the specter on mob rule, precipitating calls for a stronger national government.

Robert Owen

Scottish-born textile manufacturer and founder of New Harmony, a short-lived communal society of about a thousand people in Indiana.

Brigham Young

Second president of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, he led his Mormon followers to Salt Lake City, Utah after Joseph Smith's death. Under his discipline and guidance, the Utah settlement prospered, and the church expanded to include over 100,000 members by his death in 1877.

Cordell Hull

Secretary of State under Franklin Delano Roosevelt, in charge of diplomatic relations with Japan prior to the attack on Pearl Harbor. Negotiated pacts with 21 countries by the end of 1939. These pacts were essentially trade agreements that stated if the United States lowered its tariff, then the other country would do the same.

Horace Mann

Secretary of the Massachusetts Board of Education and a champion of public education, advocating more and better school houses, longer terms, better pay for teachers and an expanded curriculum.

Leonid Brezhnev

Seized power from Nikita Khrushchev and became leader of the Soviet Communist party in 1964. Ordered forces in to Afghanistan and Czechoslovakia.

Whitewater

Series of sandals during the Clinton administration that stemmed from a failed real estate investment the Clintons were alleged to have illegally profited. The accusations prompted the appointment of a special federal prosecutor, though no charges.

Watergate

Series of scandals that resulted in President Richard Nixon's resignation in August 1974 amid calls for his impeachment. The episode sprang from a failed burglary attempt at Democratic party headquarters in Washington's Watergate Hotel during the 1972 election.

panic of 1819

Severe financial crisis brought on primarily by the efforts of the Bank of the United States to curb overspeculation on western lands. It disproportionately affected the poorer classes, especially in the West, sowing the seeds of Jacksonian Democracy. (258)

Industrial Revolution

Shift toward mass production and mechanization that included the creation of the modern factory system.

Neutrality Act of 1935, 1936, and 1937

Short-sighted acts passed to prevent American participation in a European War. Among other restrictions, they prevented Americans from selling munitions to foreign belligerents.

Pinckney's Treaty (1795)

Signed with Spain, which, fearing an Anglo-American alliance, granted Americans free navigational of the Mississippi and the disputed territory of Florida.

Appomattox Courthouse

Site where Robert E. Lee surrendered to Ulysses S. Grant in April 1865 after almost a year of brutal fighting throughout Virginia in the "Wilderness Campaign."

Breakers

Slave drivers who employed the lash to brutally "break" the souls of strong-willed slaves.

Gerald ("jerry") ford

Solely elected by a vote from Congress. He pardoned Nixon of all crimes that he may have committed. Evacuated nearly 500,000 Americans and South Vietnamese from Vietnam, closing the war.

Fort Sumter

South Carolina location where Confederate forces fired the first shots of the Civil War in April of 1861, after Union forces attempted to provision the fort.

Brain Trust

Specialists in law, economics, and welfare, many young university professors, who advised President Franklin D. Roosevelt and helped develop the policies of the New Deal.

Virginia and Kentucky resolutions (1798-1799)

Statements secretly drafted by Jefferson and Madison for the legislatures of Kentucky and Virginia. Argued that states were the final arbiters of whether the federal government overstepped its boundaries and could therefor nullify, or refuse to accept, national legislation they deemed unconstitutional.

Johnson Debt Default Act

Steeped in ugly memories of World War I, this spiteful act prevented debt-ridden nations from borrowing further from the United States.

SALT II

Strategic Arms Limitation Treaty agreement between Soviet Leader Leonid Brezhnev and American president Jimmy Carter. Despite an accord to limit weapons between the two leaders, the agreement was ultimately scuttled in the U.S. Senate following the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan in 1979.

SDS

Students for a Democratic Society-an antiestablishment New Left group, founded in 1960, this group charged that corporations and large government institutions had taken over America; they called for a restoration of "participatory democracy" and greater individual freedom

Jim Crow

System of racial segregation in the American South from the end of Reconstruction until the mid-twentieth century. Based on the concept of "separate but equal" facilities for blacks and whites, the Jim Crow system sought to prevent racial mixing in public, including restaurants, movie theaters, and public transportation. An informal system, it was generally perpetuated by custom, violence, and intimidation.

tariff

Tax levied on imports. Traditionally, manufacturers support tariffs as protective and revenue-raising measures, while agricultural interests, dependent on world markets, oppose high tariffs.

excise tax

Tax on goods produced domestically. Excise taxes, particularly the 1791 tax on whiskey, were a highly controversial component of Alexander Hamilton's financial program.

Reign of Terror (1793-1794)

Ten-month period of brutal repression when some forty thousand individuals were executed as enemies of the French Revolution. While many Jeffersonians maintained their faith in the French Republic, Federalists withdrew their already Lukewarm support once the Reign of Terror commenced.

New Right

Term for a loose network of conservative political activists and organizations that emerged in the 1970s and 1980s. More populist in tone than previous generations of conservatives, the New Right emphasized hot-button cultural issues like abortion, busing, and prayer in school. They also espoused a nationalist foreign policy outlook that rejected détente and international treaties.

boll weevils

Term for conservative southern Democrats who voted increasingly for Republican issues during the Carter and Reagan administrations.

Transportation revolution

Term referring to a series of nineteenth-century transportation innovations - turnpikes, steamboats, canals, and railroads - that linked local and regional markets, creating a national economy.

stagflation

Term referring to the simultaneous occurrence of low employment growth and high inflation in the national economy. The phenomenon characterized the economic troubles of the 1970s and posed both an intellectual challenge to economists and a policymaking challenge to government officials.

Old Northwest

Territories acquired by the federal government from the states, encompassing land northwest of the Ohio River, east of the Mississippi River, and south of the Great Lakes. The well organized management and sale of the land in the territories under the land ordinances of 1785 and 1787 established a precedent for handling future land acquisitions. p. 165

H. Ross Perot

Texas billionaire businessman who ran populist campaigns for the presidency in 1992 and 1996. In 1992, he garnered 19 percent of the popular vote, probably throwing the election to Bill Clinton. His campaigns represented anti- establishment sentiment and desires for "common sense" governance.

Goliad

Texas outpost where American volunteers, having laid down their arms and surrendered, were massacred by Mexican forces in 1836. The incident, along with the slaughter at the Alamo, fueled American support for Texan independence.

Iranian hostage crisis

The 444 days, from November 1979 to January 1981, in which American embassy workers were held captive by Iranian revolutionaries. The Iranian revolution began in January 1979 when young Muslim fundamentalists overthrew the oppressive regime of the American-backed shah, forcing him into exile. Deeming the United States "the Great Satan," these revolutionaries triggered an energy crisis by cutting off Iranian oil. The hostage crisis began when revolutionaries stormed the American embassy, demanding that the United States return the shah to Iran for a trial. The episode was marked by botched diplomacy and a failed rescue attempt by the Carter administration. After permanently damaging relations between the two countries, the crisis ended with the hostages' release the day Ronald Reagan became president, January 20, 1981.

Barack Obama

The 44th and most recent President of the United States before the literal antichrist was elected, and the first African American to hold the office.

Liberty Party

The Liberty Party (1840) was a minor political party in the US. The party advocated for the abolitionist cause, and broke away from the American Anti-Slavery Society. The party advocated that the Constitution was an anti-slavery document. William Lloyd Garrison, the leader of the American Anti-Slavery Society, saw the Constitution as an evil pro-slavery document. The party tried to use electoral politics to further their cause. The party received little support.

David Wilmot

The Pennsylvania representative of Congress who introduced the Wilmot Proviso.

Tariff of 1842

The Tariff of 1842, or Black Tariff as it became known, was a protectionist tariff schedule adopted in the United States to reverse the effects of the Compromise Tariff of 1833. The Compromise Tariff contained a provision that successively lowered the tariff rates from their level under the Tariff of 1832 over a period of ten years until the majority of dutiable goods were to be taxed at 20%. As the 20% level approached in 1842, industrial interests and members of the Whig Party began clamoring for protection, claiming that the reductions left them vulnerable to European competition. The bill restored protection and raised average tariff rates to almost 40%. The impact of the 1842 tariff was felt almost immediately through a sharp decline in international trade in 1843. Imports into the United States nearly halved from their 1842 levels and exports, which are affected by overall trade patterns, dropped by approximately 20%. The Tariff of 1842 was repealed in 1846 when it was replaced by the Walker Tariff. The Whigs' loss of Congress and the presidency in 1844 facilitated a Democratic-led effort to reduce the rates again. Concerns that the Black Tariff's high rates would suppress future trade and customs revenue with it fueled the movement to repeal the act.

Compromise of 1877

The agreement that finally resolved the 1876 election and officially ended Reconstruction. In exchange for the Republican candidate, Rutherford B. Hayes, winning the presidency, Hayes agreed to withdraw the last of the federal troops from the former Confederate states. This deal effectively completed the southern return to white-only, Democratic-dominated electoral politics.

James Madison

The author of the Constitution and the Bill of Rights, the father of the Federalist party, and the fourth President of the United States. He was President during the war of 1812 and was also vice-President under Jefferson. He was a great statesman, but was not a strong president.

Mechanization of Agriculture

The development of engine-driven machines, like the combine, which helped the dramatically increase the productivity of land in the 1870s and 1880s.

New Deal

The economic and political policies of Franklin Roosevelt's administration in the 1930s, which aimed to solve the problems of the Great Depression by providing relief for the unemployed and launching efforts to stimulate economic recovery. The New Deal built on reforms of the progressive era to expand greatly an American-style welfare state.

Sandra Day O' Connor (1930-)

The first female justice on the Supreme Court. A graduate of Stanford Law School,, she served as an attorney, jurist, and politician in Arizona before being appointed to the Supreme Court by President Ronald Reagan in 1981.

Hundred Days

The first hundred days of Franklin D. Roosevelt's administration, stretching from March 9 to June 16, 1933, when an unprecedented number of reform bills were passed by a Democratic Congress to launch the New Deal.

Frances Perkins

The first woman cabinet member and secretary of labor under Roosevelt, she helped draw labor into the New Deal coalition (1882-1965).

Mary McLeod Bethune

The highest-ranking African- American in the Roosevelt administration, she headed up the Office of Minority Affairs and was a leader of the unofficial "Black Cabinet," which sought to apply New Deal benefits to blacks as well as white (1875-1955).

deleveraging

The inverse of "leveraging," whereby businesses increase their financial power by borrowing money (debt) in addition to their own assets (equity). In times of uncertainty or credit tightening, the same businesses seek to improve their debt-to-equity ratios by shedding debt through the sale of assets purchased with borrowed money.

Civil Rights Act of 1875

The last piece of federal civil rights legislation until the 1950s, the law promised blacks equal access to public accommodations and banned racism in jury selection, but it provided no means of enforcement and was therefore ineffective. In 1883, the Supreme Court declared most of the act unconstitutional.

Battle of Wounded Knee

The massacre at Wounded Knee creek in South Dakota in 1890 effectivley ended Indian resistance to white settlement on the Plains.

Appeasement

The policy followed by leaders of Britain and France at the 1938 conference in Munich. Their purpose was to avoid war, but they allowed Germany to take the Sudetenland from Czechoslovakia.

Rendezvous

The principal marketplace of the Northwest fur trade, which peaked in the 1820s and 1830s. Each summer, traders set up camps in the Rocky Mountains to exchange manufactured goods for beaver pelts.

Clarence Thomas (1948-)

The second black American to serve on the Supreme Court, Thomas is a conservative justice who adheres to constitutional interpretation based on the doctrine of originalism.

Albert Gallatin

The secretary of the treasury under Thomas Jefferson. He was called the "Watchdog of the Treasury," and proved to be as able as Alexander Hamilton. He agreed with Jefferson that a national debt was a bane rather than a blessing. Using strict controls of the economy, he succeeded in reducing the debt, and he balanced the budget.

Reservation systems

The system that alloted land with designated boundaries to Native American tribes in the West, beginning in the 1850s and ending with the Dawes Act of 1887.

Franklin Delano Roosevelt

The thirty-second president of the United States, he was the only American president to be elected to four terms of office. He first won the presidency against Republican incumbent Herbert Hoover in 1932 in the depths of the Great Depression and was credited with having developed a program, called the New Deal, that shepherded the nation out of crisis. When World War II broke out in Europe, he steered the United States into the war, which in the end proved more effective than the New Deal in helping the nation recover from difficult economic times. His gallant struggle against polio and his enormous talents as a politician helped made him a beloved leader for a dozen difficult years in the nation's history (1882-1945).

"waving the bloody shirt"

The use of Civil War imagery by political candidates and parties to draw votes to their side of the ticket.

Fourteen Points

The war aims outlined by President Wilson in 1918, which he believed would promote lasting peace; called for self-determination, freedom of the seas, free trade, end to secret agreements, reduction of arms and a league of nations.

Elanor Roosevelt

The wife of Franklin Roosevelt, she was the most active First Lady the United States had ever seen and was known for her devotion to the impoverished and oppressed (1844-1962).

Edmond Genêt

Thirty year old representative of the French Republic who foolishly came to the United States to believe that the Neutrality Proclamation did not reflect the true wishes of the American people, and he consequently embarked upon unneutral activity not authorized by the French alliance--including the recruitment of armies to invade Spanish Florida and Louisiana. George Washington later demanded his withdrawal and the Frenchmen was replaced by a less impulsive emissary.

Reciprocal Trade Agreements Act

This Act reversed traditional high-protective-tariff policies by allowing the president to negotiate lower tariffs with trade partners, without senate approval, its chief architect was secretary of state Cordell Hull, who believed that tariff barriers choked off foreign trade.

John W. Davis

This Clarksburg native, who was the Democratic presidential nominee in 1924, represented the school systems in the historic U.S. Supreme Court case Brown v. Board of Education.

Benito Mussolini

This Fascist took power in Italy in 1922.

Federal Reserve Act

This act established the Federal System, which established 12 distinct reserve to be controlled by the banks in each district; in addition, a Federal Reserve board was established to regulate the entire structure; improved public confidence in the banking system.

Neutrality Act of 1939

This act stipulated that European democracies might buy American munitions, but only if they could pay for them in cash and transport them in their own ships, a policy known as "cash-and-carry." It represented an effort to avoid war debts and protect American arms-carriers from torpedo attacks.

Espionage Act

This law, passed after the United States entered WWI, imposed sentences of up to twenty years on anyone found guilty of aiding the enemy, obstructing recruitment of soldiers, or encouraging disloyalty. It allowed the postmaster general to remove from the mail any materials that incited treason or insurrection.

Adolf Hitler

This man rose to power in Germany in 1933. He rose to power by discussing hatred toward the Allies over the Treaty of Versailles and talked about the unemployment that came with the depression. Germany had fallen behind, and they saw no other hope for escape from the Great Depression and from national disgrace. He withdrew from the League of Nations in 1933 and began illegally rearming Germany in 1936.

Francisco Franco

This man started an uprising against Madrid, leading to the 1936-1939 Spanish Civil War.

disestablish

To separate an official state church from its connection with the government. Following the Revolution, all states disestablished the Anglican Church, though some New England states maintained established Congregational Churches well in to he nineteenth century. p. 178

assumption

Transfer of debt from one party to another. In order to strengthen the union, the federal government assumed states' Revolutionary War debts in 1790, thereby tying the interests of wealthy lenders with those of the national government.

Hitler-Stalin Pact

Treaty signed on August 23, 1939, in which Germany and the Soviet Union agreed not to fight each other. The fateful agreement paved the way for German aggression against Poland and the Western Democracies.

Oklahoma City bombing (1995)

Truck-bomb explosion that killed 168 ppl in a federal office building on April 19, 1995. The attack was perpetrated by right-wing and antigovt militant Timothy McVeigh, who was later executed by the US govt for the crime. Vengeance for a standoff in Texas bw federal agents and a fundamentalist sect known as the Branch Davidians.

Operation Desert Storm (1991)

U.S. led multicounty military engagement in January and February of 1991 that drove Saddam Hussein's Iraqi army out of neighboring Kuwait.

Treaty of Greenville (1795)

Under the terms of the treaty, the Miami Confederacy agreed to cede territory in the Old Northwest to the United Stated in exchange for cash payment, hunting rights, and formal recognition of their sovereign status.

Winfield Scott

United States Army general, and unsuccessful presidential candidate of the Whig Party in 1852. Served on active duty as a general longer than any other man in American history. During the Mexican-American War, Major General Scott commanded the southern of the two United States armies

Jay Gould

United States financier who gained control of the Erie Canal and who caused a financial panic in 1869 when he attempted to corner the gold market.

stonewall rebellion

Uprising in support of equal rights for gay people sparked by an assault by off-duty police officers at a gay bar in New York. The rebellion led to rise in activism and militancy within the gay community and furthered the sexual revolution of the late 1960s.

Minstrel shows

Variety shows performed by white actors in blackface. First popularized in the mid-nineteenth century.

Little Turtle

War chief of the Miamis who defeated, with his braves, Ramos led by Generals Josiah Harmar and Arthur St. Clair, killing hundreds of soldiers in 1790 and 1791 [possibly in the Old Northwest].

Louis XVI

Was the absolute monarch of France (1774-1792). He was forced to surrender after the storming of the Bastille and was executed in front of the people of France (accused of High Treason and Crimes against the State) in 1793.

George Washington

Was unanimously drafted as president by the Electoral College in 1789. Balanced rather than brilliant, he commanded his followers by strength of character rather than by the arts of the politician.

Liberia

West African nation founded in 1822 as a haven for freed blacks, fifteen thousand of whom made their way back across the Atlantic by the 1860s.

Battle of Little Bighorn

When gold was discovered in the Black Hills Indian Reservation in South Dakota, whites invaded the Indians lands and drove them on the warpath. The war culminated in June of 1876, when Colonel George Custar and all of his men were killed by Souix Indians and the Battle of Little Bighorn(Custar's Last Stand in Souther Montana.)

Beer Flag Revolt

When war between the United States and Mexico became likely in 1846, former general, Mariano Guadalupe Vallejo, began inciting the people of California to revolt against Mexico. When U.S. Army Major John C. Frémont arrived in California claiming to be on a mission to find a route to the Pacific (his mission officially was to find the source of the Arkansas River), he began encouraging a parallel rebellion among the Anglo-American settlers. As a result, thirty-three settlers in Sonoma, assisted by volunteers from among the American settlers and Vacqueros from the many haciendas, in the Sacramento River valley, captured the Mexican garrison of Sonoma and raised a homemade flag with a bear and star (the "Bear Flag") to symbolize their taking control. The words "California Republic" appeared on the flag but were never officially adopted by the insurgents.

Monica Lewinsky

White House intern with whom President Bill Clinton had an extra-marital affair in the late 1990s. She was the center of a protracted scandal during the second Clinton term.

Robin Morgan

Who founded the radical feminist group WITCH (Women's International Terrorist Conspiracy from Hell)

peculiar institution

Widely used term for the institution of American slavery in the South. Its use in the first half of the 19th century reflected a growing division between the North, where slav- ery was gradually abolished, and the South, where slavery became increasingly entrenched.

civic virtue

Willingness on the part of citizens to sacrifice personal self-interest for the public good. Deemed a necessary component of a successful republic. p. 179

Factory girls

Young women employed in the growing factories of the early nineteenth century, they labored long hours in difficult conditions, living in socially new conditions away from farms and families.

T S Eliot

a "high modernist" whose work broke down traditional literary forms, using new stylistic techniques to illustrate the fragmentation of post-war society

Langston Hughes

a black poet from Harlem in NYC, the birthplace of many influential black artists and activists

Lost Generation

a creative circle of expatriate american artist and writers, including Ernest Hemingway, F Scott Fitzgerald, and Gertrude Stein, who found shelter and inspiration in post-war Europe

H L Mencken

a critic and writer who was very liberal and led the modernism movement

Randolph Bourne

a critic who emphasized the benefits of the cultural blending that resulted from immigration

Nicola Sacco and Bartolomeo Vanzetti

a factory worker and a fish peddler convicted of murdering a Massachusetts paymaster and his guard. people called them martyrs of the system because people believed the jury was prejudiced against them, because they were italian atheist anarchist draft dodgers

William D. Haywood

a leader of the Industrial workers of the World, the Wester Federation of Miners, and the Socialist Party of America. He was one of the most feared of American labor radicals. During WWI, he became a special target of anti-leftist legislation. He also spent time in jail for violating the espionage act

red scare

a movement strongest in 1919-1920 where americans were afraid of communists and constantly accused one another of communism

fundamentalism

a movement that supported a literal reading of the bible and the instillation of the resulting values into society

Al Capone

a murderous bootlegging gangster who started several gang wars in Chicago and was imprisoned for tax evasion

Horace Kallen

a philosopher who emphasized the benefits of the american multiculturalism that resulted from immigration

Sigmund Freud

a really weird psychologist guy who wrote a lot about repressed sexuality, something illustrated very well by the behavior of 1920s youth

Bible belt

a strip of states in the south where the Fundamentalism movement was strongest

scientific management

a system of industrial management created and promoted by frederick w taylor, emphasizing stopwatch efficiency to improve factory performance

Zimmermann Note

a telegram sent to a German official in Mexico prior to U.S. entrance into World War I; proposed an alliance between Germany and Mexico

John T. Scopes

a tennessee biology teacher who was indicted for teaching evolution in a fundamentalist community. the trial was dramatic but inconclusive

F Scott Fitzgerald

a young author who was loved by his generation for his tendency to question the status quo, a main facet of modernism

Meuse-Argonne offensive

also called the Battle of the Argonne Forest, was a part of the final Allied offensive of World War I that stretched along the entire western front. The whole offensive was planned by Marshall Ferdinand Foch to breach the Hindenburg line and ultimately force the opposing German forces to surrender;

United Negro Improvement Association

an association founded by Marcus Garvey from Harlem in NYC to promote the resettlement of black Americans in their "African homelands"

A. Mitchell Palmer

an attorney general named the "fighting quaker" because he accused lots of people of communism

Ernest Hemingway

an author who had been badly affected by the war, so his writings reflected his criticism of the use of propaganda and hyperpatriotism

Frederick W Taylor

an engineer who improved car efficiency techniques, called the father of scientific management

Immigration act of 1924

an immigration restriction act that set a small quota for how many immigrants of each nationality could come into america. it favored northern european immigrants, and people perceived that to be for racial preference reasons.

Aroostook War

an undeclared nonviolent confrontation in 1838/1839 between the United States and Great Britain over the international boundary between British North America (Canada) and Maine. The compromise resolution wins a mutually accepted border between the state of Maine and the provinces of New Brunswick and Quebec. High tensions and heated rhetoric in Maine and New Brunswick led both sides to raise troops, arm them, and march them to the disputed border. President Martin Van Buren sent Brigadier General Winfield Scott to work out a compromise. The compromise created a neutral area, and the excitement faded away as the diplomats took over; involved no actual confrontation between military forces, and negotiations between diplomats from Britain and United States Secretary of State Daniel Webster quickly settled the dispute. Secretary of State Webster secretly funded a propaganda campaign that convinced leaders in Maine of the wisdom of compromise. Webster-Ashburton Treaty of 1842 established final boundary between the countries, giving most of the disputed area to Maine and a militarily vital connection between Canadian provinces to Britain. Though there was no conflict between military forces, occasionally civilian lumberjacks became violent if they spotted people on the wrong side of the border.

civil law

body of written law enacted through legislative statutes or constitutional provisions. In countries where civil law prevails, judges must apply the statutes precisely as written p. 171

Augustus Saint-Gaudens

born to an Irish mother and French father; adopted American; most gifted American sculptor one of his most moving works is the Robert Gould Shaw memorial

criminal syndicalism laws

controversial laws that made the advocacy of violence for social change illegal

Racketeers

gangsters who invaded, hijacked, and swindled labor unions

Henry James

grandson of John Quincy Adams and great grandson of John Adams; wrote History of the United States During the Administrations of Jefferson and Madison; defended his heritage; also wrote Monti-Stain-Michel and Chartres and a autobiography of his education and the account of his failures; for his novels, he made women his central characters; called a master of "psychological" ;The Bostonians was the first book about the rising feminist movement

Contract with America (1994)

led by Newt Gingrich to attack Clinton's liberal failures; promised all-out assault on budget deficits/radical reductions in welfare programs; Multipoint program offered by conservative Republican candidates and sitting politicians in the 1994 midterm election. The platform proposed smaller govt, congressional ethics reform, term limits, greater emphasis on personal responsibility, & a general rejection of the Democratic party. This was a blow to the Clinton administration and led to the Republican party's takeover of both houses of Congress for the first time in half a century.

Great Migration

movement of over 300,000 African American from the rural south into Northern cities between 1914 and 1920

Henry Ford

one of the first automobile inventors and promoters, he made the moving assembly line popular

Winslow Homer

painter who was resistant against foreign influences and brought rugged realism and boldness of conception; known for paintings of the sea

Workingmen's Compensation Act

provided financial assistance to federal employees injured on the job

"Fifty-Four Forty or Fight"

slogan adopted in 1846 by mid-nineteenth-century expansionists who advocated the occupation of Oregon territory, jointly held by Britain and the United States; though President Polk had pledged to seize all of Oregon, to 54° 40', he settled on the forty-ninth parallel as a compromise with the British

silent majority

that group of quiet honest hard-working middle class Americans who do their job, respect their country and support gov.; Nixon wants their votes in 1968 and 1972

Bolshevik revolution

the 1917 communist rebellion in Russia that spawned a small communist party in america

Schenck vs. United States

the 1919 Supreme Court case that declared that Charles Schenck's propaganda efforts against the military draft were illegal under the Espionage Act of 1918 and were not protected by his First Amendment right to freedom of speech

18th amendment

the 1919 amendment to the constitution that prohibited all alcoholic beverages. it was spawned by the reform movement

Manifest Destiny

the 19th century American belief that the United States was destined to expand across the continent. It was used by Democrats in the 1840s to justify the war with Mexico; the concept was denounced by Whigs, and fell into disuse after the mid-19th century. First used for the annexation of Texas issue. Opposed by Clay, Webster and Lincoln, but supported by Polk.

warren burger

the Supreme Court justice durning the Nixon admistration. He was chosen by Nixon because of his strict interpretation of the Constitution. He presided over the extremly controversal case of abortion in Roe vs. Wade.

American plan

the anti- labor union plan that big business loved. It became popular during the red scare because labor strikes were associated with communism

William Faulkner

the author of psychological novels commentating of the society of the deep south

Volstead Act

the federal act that enforced the 18th amendment

Margaret Sanger

the leader of the pro- birth control movement

Harlem Renaissance

the outpouring of creative expression from black artists in Harlem in NYC

Charles A Lindbergh

the pilot who made the first transatlantic flight in 1927. His son was allegedly kidnapped by gangsters for ransom, causing kidnapping laws to be tightened to make it a capital offense

Fordism

the practice of using a moving assembly line in factories

modernism

the shift in art and attitude away from traditional values to liberal thought and an emphasis on diversity

philadelphia plan

this plan forced any construction companies working on federal jobs in philadelphia to create plans for hiring more african american employees

miranda warning

warnings that must be read to suspects prior to questioning. Suspects must be advised that they have the rights of silence and counsel.

Albert B. Fall

was a United States Senator from New Mexico and the Secretary of the Interior under President Warren G. Harding, infamous for his involvement in the Teapot Dome scandal

James K. Polk

was the 11th President of the United States (1845-1849). A Democrat, served as the 17th Speaker of the House of Representatives (1835-1839) and the 12th Governor of Tennessee (1839-1841). was the surprise ("dark horse") candidate for president in 1844, defeating Henry Clay of the rival Whig Party by promising to annex Texas. was a leader of Jacksonian Democracy during the Second Party System. was the last strong pre-Civil War president, and he is the earliest of whom there are surviving photographs taken during a term in office. He is noted for his foreign policy successes. He threatened war with Britain over the issue of which nation owned the Oregon Territory, then backed away and split the ownership of the region with Britain. When Mexico rejected American annexation of Texas, he led the nation to a sweeping victory in the Mexican-American War, which gave the United States most of its present Southwest. He secured passage of the Walker tariff of 1846, which had low rates that pleased his native South, and he established a treasury system. he oversaw the opening of the U.S. Naval Academy and the Smithsonian Institution, the groundbreaking for the Washington Monument, and the issuance of the first postage stamps in the United States.

Louis D. Brandeis

wrote the book Other People's Money and How the Bankers Use it. Further showed the problems of the American banking system. Wilson nominated him to the supreme court making him the first jew in that position.