Important terms and ideas for the AP U.S. History Exam.
*note: this is not complete and probably will not be in time for the 2013 exam; however, I will try to finish as much as possible in the coming days.
Terms : Hide Images
| 791146781 | "10 percent" Reconstruction (1863) | introduced by Lincoln; a state may be readmitted to the Union when 10% of its voters had pledged loyalty to the U.S. and promised to honor emancipation | |
| 791146782 | Battle of Acoma (1599) | Spaniards (Onate) vs. Pueblo Indians; leads to establishment of "New Mexico" as a Spanish territory | |
| 791146783 | Toleration Act (1649) | Maryland; guaranteed toleration of Christians of all types in order to attract more Catholic migrants to the colony | |
| 791146784 | Adamson Act (1916) | eight-hour work day for all employees of trains involved in *interstate commerce *The government could do this because the trade was going between states and, therefore, fell under the jurisdiction of the federal government. | |
| 791146785 | Adkins v. Children's Hospital (1923) | case that reversed Muller v. Oregon - ruled that women do not deserve special protection in the workplace | |
| 791146786 | affirmative action (1960s) | programs/plans to get rid of racial discrimination, came from JFK's ideas, continued under Nixon | |
| 791146787 | New Deal Programs: AAA (1933) | Agricultural Adjustment Administration; designed to raise agricultural prices by paying farmers not to grow a specific crop -declared unconstitutional by the Supreme Court- | |
| 791146788 | Albany Congress (1754) | intercolonial congress summoned by British to ensure colonial unity/support for the French and Indian War | |
| 791146789 | Alien Laws (1798) | passed by Congress (Federalist) raising the residency requirement for citizenship to 14 years and giving the president power to deport anyone he saw fit ("dangerous") in times of peace | |
| 791146790 | WWI: The Allies | Britain, Russia, France, Italy, Japan, U.S. | |
| 791146791 | American Anti-Slavery Society (1833-1870) | founded by William Lloyd Garrison, abolitionist | |
| 791146792 | American Federation of Labor [A.F. of L.] (1886) | only skilled workers, almost entirely white males until the middle of the twentieth century | |
| 791146793 | American System (1820s) | Henry Clay's system - strong banking system, protective tariff, federally-funded trasportation network | |
| 791146794 | antifederalists | opponents of the Constitution on the grounds that it was not democratic, they did not like the subordination of the states to the central government, and feared the encroachment on individuals' liberties (because there was no Bill of Rights yet) | |
| 791146795 | antinomianism (1600s) | belief held by Anne Hutchinson that the elect of God need neither obey the law of God nor of man | |
| 791146796 | appeasement (1938) | tactic used by the leaders of Britain and France when they gave the Sudetanland to Germany at the Munich conference | |
| 791146797 | Arminianism | belief that salvation is offered to all humans but is conditional on acceptance of God's grace (opposite of Calvinism) | |
| 791146798 | Army-McCarthy hearings (1954) | McCarthy accused members of the Army of Communist ties; part of the Red Scare | |
| 791146799 | Aroostook War (1839-1842) | clashes between Americans and Canadian lumberjacks in the disputed area of Maine resolved w/ establishment of a permanent boundary line | |
| 791146800 | Articles of Confederation (1781) | established the U.S. as a loose confederation of states with a weak central government | |
| 791260535 | assumption | transfer of debt from one party to another (e.g. the federal government ASSUMED the states' debts from the Revolutionary War in 1790) | |
| 791260536 | WWII: Atlantic Charter (1941) | Winston Churchill and FDR met and signed this document which outlined the future path to peace, disarmament, and a permanent system of security after WWII | |
| 791260537 | baby boom (1946-1964) | demographic explosion of births after WWII; this new generation forced the expansion of many instutions (e.g. colleges, schools) | |
| 791260538 | Bacon's Rebellion (1676) | uprising of white bachelors from the Virginia backcountry led by Nathaniel Bacon against Governor Berkely in response to Berkely's refusal to protect backcountry settlers from Indian attacks | |
| 791260539 | First Bank of the United States (1791) | part of Alexander Hamilton's financial program; printed paper money and served as a depository for Treasury funds -argued as being unconstitutional by Jeffersonians- | |
| 791260540 | Bank War (1832) | Jackson vs. Congress members who supported the B.U.S. (Bank of the United States, whose charter had expired during the War of 1812); Jackson vetoed the Bank bill | |
| 791260541 | Bay of Pigs invasion (1961) | CIA plot to overthrow Fidel Castro by training Cuban exiles to invade and supporting them with U.S. airpower; failed | |
| 791260542 | Berlin Airlift (1948) | U.S. flies food and supplies to the USSR-blockaded West Berlin | |
| 791260543 | Bill of Rights (1791) | first ten amendments to the Constitution; secured key rights for individuals and states | |
| 791260544 | Black Codes (1865-66) | passed throughout the South to restrict the rights of emancipated blacks | |
| 791260545 | Black Hawk War | American forces and Chief Black Hawk (Sauk and Fox tribes) clash in Black Hawk's attempts to regain territory lost under the 1830 Indian Removal Act | |
| 791260546 | Black Power (began 1965) | doctrine of militancy and separatism that promoted pride in African heritage and a militant position in supporting black rights | |
| 791260547 | Black Tuesday (1929) | over 16,410,000 shares of stock sold on October 29, 1929; major trigger of the Great Depression | |
| 791260548 | Bleeding Kansas (1856-61) | civil war in Kansas over slavery in the territory | |
| 791260549 | Bolshevik Revolution (November 1917) | Lenin and the Bolsheviks seize power in Russia and establish a Communist state | |
| 791260550 | Civil War: border states | do not secede - Missouri, Kentucky, Maryland, Delaware, West Virginia | |
| 791260551 | Boston Massacre (1770) | colonists jeering, mocking, and throwing snowballs with rocks in them at stationed British soldiers; soldiers open fire and kill/wound 11 colonists | |
| 791260552 | Boston Tea Party (1773) | colonists' protest against the British East India Company's monopoly on the tead trade; led to harsh sanctions by Parliament | |
| 791260553 | Bretton Woods Conference (1944) | meeting of Western Allies that led to the creation of the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank | |
| 791260554 | Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka, KS (1954) | overturned Plessy v. Ferguson and abolished racial segregation in public schools | |
| 791260555 | California gold rush (began1849) | thousands of miners go to California in hopes of finding gold; led to the territory's applying for statehood in 1849 | |
| 791260556 | Calvinism | only the elect of God can be saved | |
| 791260557 | WWI: Central Powers | Germany, Austria-Hungary, Turkey, Bulgaria | |
| 791260558 | Chesapeake affair (1807) | a British ship fired on the American ship Chesapeake off the coast of Virginia; led to the Embargo Act of 1807 | |
| 791260559 | Civil Rights Act (1875) | promised blacks equal access to public accommodations; ineffective b/c of lack of means to enforce it | |
| 791260560 | Civil Rights Act (1964) | banned racial discrimination in public facilities and strengthened the government's power to fight segregation in schools | |
| 791260561 | Civil Rights Bill (1866) | passed by Congress over Jackson's veto to counterract the Black Codes by giving citizenship to blacks and making it a crime to deprive blacks of their rights to sue, testify in coury, or hold property | |
| 791260562 | New Deal Programs: CCC (1933) | Civilian Conservation Corps; hired unemployed men to do public service/improvement projects for the government | |
| 791260563 | Clayton Anti-Trust Act (1914) | extends Sherman Anti-Trust Act and exempting labor unions and agricultural organizations from antimonopoly constraints *good for labor* | |
| 791260564 | closed shop | practice of allowing only unionized employees to work for a particular company; advocated for by the A.F. of L. | |
| 791260565 | Cohens v. Virginia (1821) | reestablishes the right of the Supreme Court to review decisions of state supreme courts in questions involving the power of the federal government | |
| 791260566 | Cold War (1946-91) | diplomatic tension between the U.S. and USSR that divided capitalists and Communists | |
| 791260567 | Committee on Public Information (1917) | under George Creel, sought to win approval of the common American for the U.S.'s involvement in WWI | |
| 791260568 | Commonwealth v. Hunt (1842) | Massachusetts Supreme Court decision that upheld the legality of unions | |
| 791260569 | Compromise of 1850 | 1) admitted CA as a free state 2) opened NM and UT to popular sovereignty 3) ended slave trade in Washington, D.C. 4) harsher Fugitive Slave Laws | |
| 792698070 | Compromise of 1877 | resolved the 1876 election and officially ended Reconstruction; Hayes wins the election on the condition that federal troops be withdrawn from former Confederate states | |
| 792698071 | compromise tariff of 1833 | provided that tariffs be lowered gradually, over a period of ten years until they were at the rates they had been in 1816; resolved the nullification crisis | |
| 792698072 | Congress of Industrial Organizations (1938-1955) | organized unskilled industrial workers; merged with the A.F. of L. in 1955 to form the A.F.L.-C.I.O. | |
| 792698073 | Civil War: Congressional Committee on the Conduct of the War (1861-65) | established by radical Republicans during the Civil War; agitated for a more vigorous war effort and pressed Lincoln for emancipation | |
| 792698074 | containment doctrine | based on the ideas of George Kennan; USSR had to be stopped from spreading by creating military and political pressure; guided U.S. through the Cold War | |
| 792698075 | Convention of 1800 | agreement to dissolve the U.S.'s treaty w/ France from the Revolutionary War | |
| 792698076 | Civil War: Copperheads | Northern Democrats who obstructed the war effort by attacking Lincoln, the draft, and emancipation | |
| 792698077 | corrupt bargain (1820) | "deal" between John Quincy Adams and Henry Clay to throw the election in Adams' favor; never proven but became a mark on Adams' administration and a point that was hammered on by supporters of Jackson in the election of 1824 | |
| 792729850 | court-packing plan (1937) | FDR's plan to add a new justice to the Supreme Court for every current member over 70 that should be retired in order to overcome the Court's objections to his New Deal plans | |
| 792729851 | Credit Mobilier scandal (1872) | this construction company was created by the Union Pacific railroad company to receive inflated government contracts; was discovered to have bribed Congressmen and even V.P. Schuyler to keep up the ruse | |
| 792729852 | Cuban missile crisis (1962) | JFK vs. Krushchev over USSR plans to install nuclear missiles in Cuba; nearly brought world to nuclear war, but was resolved in U.S.'s favor | |
| 792729853 | cult of domesticity (1800s) | venerated the role of domestic women and limited women's public scope of power (e.g. voting) | |
| 792729854 | Dartmouth College v. Woodward (1819) | Supreme Court decision that protected corporations from domination by state governments | |
| 792729855 | Dawes Plan (1924) | plan to reschedule German reparations payments from WWI; stabilized German currency and opened the way for further private U.S. loans to Germany | |
| 793268113 | Dawes Severalty Act (1887) | 1) broke up the Indian reservations 2) leftover land was sold and money went towards government efforts to "civilize" the Native Americans | |
| 793268114 | WWII: D-Day (June 6, 1944) | military invasion of Normandy led by American troops that led to the liberation of France and brought on the final phases of WWII | |
| 793268115 | Declaratory Act (1766) | reaffirmed Parliament's unqualified sovereignty over the North American colonies after the repeal of the Stamp Act | |
| 793268116 | detente | period of Cold War thawing when the U.S. and USSR negotiated armament treaties under Ford, Nixon, and Carter; marked a departure from previous Cold War policy | |
| 793268117 | dollar diplomacy | Taft's policy of suppoting U.S. investments and political interests abroad | |
| 793268118 | 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 and that slaves were not citizens of the U.S. | |
| 793268119 | 18th Amendment (1919) | prohibited the manufacture, sale, and transportation of alcoholic beverages (Prohibition) | |
| 793268120 | Elkins Act (1903) | imposed penalties on railroads that offered rebates and customers who accepted them; strengthened the Interstate Commerce Act of 1887 | |
| 793268121 | Emancipation Proclamation (1863) | declared all slaves in Confederacy free; closed the door on possible compromise with the South and encouraged thousands of southern slave to flee to the Union | |
| 793268122 | Embargo Act (1807) | banned the export of American goods to any foreign port; created strains on U.S. economy while causing little to no damage to economies of Britain and France; repealed in 1809 | |
| 793361071 | Employment Act of 1946 | declared that the government's economic policy should aim to promote maximum employment, production, and purchasing power, as well as to keep inflation low; *created the Council of Economic Advisers to provide the president with data and recommendations to make economic policy* | |
| 793361073 | Environmental Protection Agency [EPA] (1970) | designed to regulate pollution, emissions, and other factors that negatively influence the environment under Nixon | |
| 793361075 | Era of Good Feelings (1816-24) | name for the presidency of Monroe; inaccurate b/c of the conflicts over slavery, internal improvements, and the national bank | |
| 793361076 | Epsionage Act (1917) | prohibited interference with the draft and other acts of national "disloyalty" | |
| 793361078 | excise tax | tax on goods produced domestically; part of Hamilton's economic plan in 1791 with the tax on whiskey | |
| 793361080 | Executive Order 9066 (1942) | FDR authorized the War Department to remove Japanese-Americans to isolated internment camps Constitutional in Korematsu v. U.S. (1944) | |
| 793361082 | Fair Deal | Truman's social program that included establishing a minimum wage, providing for more public housing, and extending old-age insurance to more people under the Social Security Act | |
| 793361084 | Federal Highway Act of 1956 | Eisenhower; construct thousands of miles of national highway (in the name of national defense) | |
| 793361085 | Federal Reserve Act (1913) | Wilson; established twelve regional Federal Reserve Banks and a Federal Reserve Board to regulate banking and create stability on a national level | |
| 793361087 | Federal Trade Commission Act (1914) | empowered a commission appointed by the president to investigate illegal business practices in interstate commerce | |
| 793361089 | federalists | supporters of the Constitution who favored a strong national government | |
| 793361091 | 15th Amendment (1870) | prohibited states from denying citizens the franchise on account of race | |
| 793361093 | First Continental Congress (1774) | twelve of the thirteen colonies send delegates to Philadelphia to create a response to the Intolerable Acts; decided on a complete boycott of British goods | |
| 793361094 | Florida Purchase Treaty (1819) | Spain ceded Florida to the U.S. in return for the U.S. abandoning its claim to Texas | |
| 793361096 | Fordney-McCumber tariff (1922) | protective tariff; led to many European nations creating their own trade barriers | |
| 793361098 | Civil War: Fort Sumter, SC (April 1861) | South fires on this fort and starts the Civil War | |
| 793361099 | WWI: Fourteen Points (1918) | Wilson's proposal to ensure peace after WWI - end to secret treaties, widespread arms reduction, national self-determination, and League of Nations | |
| 793361101 | 14th Amendment (1868) | extended civil rights to freedmen and prohibited states from taking away such rights without due process | |
| 793361103 | Freedom Riders (1961) | groups who rode interstate buses into the deep South to protest racial segregation as part of the Civil Rights Movement | |
| 793361104 | French and Indian War (1754-63) | war between the British and French/Indians that led to the expulsion of the French from North America; sparked the Seven Years' War in Europe | |
| 793361106 | Fugitive Slave Law (1850) | set high penalties for anyone who aided escaped slaves | |
| 793361108 | funding at par | paying debts at face value; proposed by Hamilton to make U.S. credit better |
