American History I Final Exam Review
Terms from the American History I Final Exam Review.
Terms
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- executive branch
- the part of the government that executes, or carries out laws
- popular sovereignty
- policy of letting the people in a territory decide whether slavery would be allowed there
- --
- --
- manifest destiny
- argrument that it was the undeniable fate of the US to expand across North America
- Gadsden Purchase
- 1853 purchase by the US of southwestern lands from mexico
- Lower South
- states of Texas, Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama, Florida, Georgia, and South Carolina
- pass
- a low place in a mountain range that allowes travelers to cross over the other side
- neutral
- not taking sides in a conflict or dispute
- constitution
- a written plan of government
- checks and balances
- system in which each of the branches of the federal government can check the actions of the other branches
- Federalist
- supporters of the constitution during the debate over its ratification; favored a strong national government
- administration
- a presidents term in office, or the group of officials that makes up the executive branch, including the president
- Virginia and Kentucky resolution
- Resolutions passed in 1798 that attacked the Alien and Sedition Acts as being unconstitutional
- Fort Sumter
- Federal fort in the harbor of Charleston, South Carolina; the confederate attack on the fort marked the start of the Civil War
- strict construction
- belief that the goavernment should not do anything that the constitution does not specifically say it can do
- judicial branch
- the part of the government that decides if laws have been broken
- Missouri Compromise
- 1820 agreement calling for the admission of Missouri as a slave state and Maine as a free state, and outlawing slavery in future states to be created North of 36 30 N lattitude
- ratify
- approve or sanction
- inauguration
- official swearing-in ceremony
- Robert E. Lee
- general of confederate forces during the civil war
- spoils system
- patronage system under president Andrew Jackson
- REPEAT
- REPEAT
- Fugitive Slave Act
- part of the compromise of 1850, a law ordering all citizens of the US to assist in the return of of escapeed slaves
- domestic affairs
- Issues relating to a country's internal matters
- Trail of Tears
- forced march of 15,000 Cherokee from their homes in the southeast to western reservations from 1837 to 1838
- contraband
- items seized from the enemy during wartime
- annex
- to join or attach, as in the joining of a new territoy to an existing country
- Tariff of 1828
- A high tariff on imports that benefited the industrial North while forcing Southerners to pay higher prices on manufactured goods; called the "Tariff of Abominations" by south
- federal system of government
- a system in which power is shared among state and national authorities
- agenda
- list of items to accomplish
- greenbacks
- name given to the national paper
- abstinence
- refraining from some activity, such as drinking
- nativism
- a policy of favoring native-born americans over immigrants
- Cabinet
- heads of the major departments of the US governement who advise the President
- REPEAT
- REPEAT
- --
- --
- Three-Fifths Compromise
- Compromise at the Constitutional Convention calling for three-fifths of a states slave population to be countd for the purposes of legislative representation
- republic
- government run by the people through their elected representatives
- REPEAT
- REPEAT
- Roger Taney
- chief justice of the supreme court who wrote an opinion in the 1857 Dred Scott case that declared the Missouri compromise unconstitutional
- segregate
- Forced separation, often times by race
- secede
- formally withdraw from a political organization; southern states seceded from the US to form the confederacy in late 1860 and early 1861
- McCulloch vs. Maryland
- "Bank of the US Case" A Maryland law required federally chartered banks to use only a specail paper to print money, which amounted to a tax. McCulloh, the cashier of the Baltimore branch of the bank, refused to use the paper, claiming that states could not tax the federal government. The court declared the Maryland Law unconstitutional.
- precedent
- custom arising from previous practice rather than a written law
- trans-Appalachia
- area west of the appalacian mountans
- Monroe Doctrine
- policy of president James Monroe stating that the US would consider any European interference in the nations of the Americas as an unfriendly act
- Confederate States of American
- association of seven seceding southern states, formed in 1861
- loose construction
- belief that the government can do anything that the constitution does not prohibit
- utopian community
- small societies whose members seek perfect social and political conditions
- temperance movement
- campaign against alcohol consumption; began as part of the middle-class reform movements of the 1800s
- cede
- to surrender officailly or unformaly
- Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo
- treaty signed in 1848 by the Us and Mexico, ending the mexico war
- Texas War for Independence
- successful revolt by texans against mexican rule in 1835-1836
- John C. Fremont
- He helped to defeat the Mexican army in california
- bureaucracy
- departments that make up a large organization, such as the government
- tariff
- tax on foreign goods imported into a country
- --
- --
- Battle of the Alamo
- capture by mexican troops of a texas held mission in san antonio in 1836
- faction
- group organized around a common interest and concerned only with furthering that interest
- Gibboins vs. Ogden
- This case examined the power of Congress to regulate interstate commerce.
- John C. Calhoun
- Senator of South Carolina that declared that the south would not give up its liberty to save the union
- REPEAT
- REPEAT
- impressments
- policy of forcing people into military or public service
- mountain men
- an american fur trader who explored the rocky mountains and regions farther west in the early 1800s
- writ of habeas corpus
- legal protection requiring that a court determine whether a person is lawfully imprisioned
- Lewis and Clark expedition
- journey by Meriwether Lewis and William Clark through the Louisiana territory from 1804-1806
- REPEAT
- REPEAT
- Jefferson Davis
- elected president of the confederate states of america; from mississippi
- Dartmouth College vs. Woodward
- get
- Henry Clay
- He proposed to congress the compromise of 1850; the senator of kentucky
- Kansas-Nebraska Act
- 1854 law that called for the creation of these two new territories, and stated that the citizens in each territory should decide whether slavery would be allowed there
- separation of power
- the constitutional allotting of power within the federal government among the legislative, executive, a judicial branches
- veto
- to prevent from becoming a law
- Treaty of Ghent
- agreement, signed in 1814, that ended the War of 1812
- nomads
- people who move their homes regulary usually in serach of available food sources
- Underground Railroad
- network of people who helped fugitives from slaverey excape into the north and canada
- gag rule
- rule passed in 1836 by southern representatives in congress that prevented antislavery petitions form being considered by the house for eight years
- emancipation
- the freeing of enslaved people
- Great Plains
- vast grassland between the mississippi river and the rocky mountains
- Interest
- an extra sum of money that borrowers have to repay creditors in return for the loan
- John Brown
- An abolitionist that led the attack on the federal arsenal at Harpers Ferry in Virginia
- --
- --
- Abraham Lincoln
- He opposed slavery on moral grounds in debates with Stephen Douglas; a republican; became 16th president of the US
- legislative branch
- the part of a government that makes the laws
- REPEAT
- REPEAT
- Border states
- in the civil war the states between the north and the south: delaware, mayland, kentucky, and missouri
- specie
- gold or silver coin
- REPEAT
- REPEAT
- abolitionist movement
- Movement to end slavery
- XYZ affair
- incident of the late 1790s in which French secret agents demanded a bribe and a loan to France in lieu of negotiating a dispute over the Jay Treaty and other issues
- prejudice
- an unreasonable, usually unfavorale opinion of another group
- William Henry Seward
- republican antislavery leader during the 1860s; acquired Alaska in 1867 as Secretary of State
- amend
- to revise
- Emancipation Proclamation
- a presendential decree, by President Lincoln, effective Jan. 1, 1863, that freed slaves in Conferderate held territory
- Alien and Sedition Acts
- acts passed by federalists giving the government power to imprison or deport foreign citizens and prosecute critics of the government
- Stephen Douglas
- senator of illinios who introduced the Kansas-Nebraska Act of 1854
- Jay's Treaty
- Treaty signed in 1794 between the US and bBritain in which Britain sought to improve trade relations and agreed to withdraw from forts in the northwest territory.
- nullification
- a states refusal to recognize or uphold a federal law
- Compromise of 1850
- agreement designed to ease tensions caused by the expansion of slavery into western territories
- Upper South
- designation used in the civil war encompassing the staes of virginia, north carolina, tennessee, arkansas
- --
- --
- republican virtues
- virtues the american people would need to govern themselves, such as self-reliance, industry, frugality, harmony, and the ability to sacrifice individual needs for the communtiy
- anti-Federalist
- opponents of the Constitution: opposed the concept of a strong central government
- Indian Removal Act
- 1830 Law calling for the president to give Native Americans land in parts of the Louisiana Purchase in exchange for Land taken from them in the East.
- Charles Sumner
- Senator of Massachusetts who gave a powerful antislavery speech entitled ''The Crime Against Kansas'' in congress
- REPEAT
- REPEAT
- depression
- a severe economic downturn marked by a decrease in business activity, widespread unemployment, and falling prices and wages
- Louisiana Purchase
- Purchase by the US of the Louisiana territoy form France in 1803
- transcendentalism
- intellectual and philosophical movement of the mid-1800s esserting that the nature of reality can be learned only by intuition rather than through experience
- Bill of Rights
- first ten amendments to the constituion
- secessionist
- person who wanted the south to secede
- Battle of New Orleans
- battle in 1815 between american and british troops for control of New Orleans, ending in an american victory
- presidios
- fort built in southwest by spanish
- REPEAT
- REPEAT
- embargo
- a ban or restriction on trade