Unit 2 Terms and Definitions for Recke's AP History class.
Terms : Hide Images
| 211719122 | Abigal Adams | Wife of John Adams at the 2nd Contintal Congress; tried to influence her husband John, to include women's rights in the Declaration. | |
| 211719123 | Annapolis Convention | A convention held in September 1786 to consider problems of trade and navigation, attended by five states and important because it issued the call to Congress and the states for what became the Constitutional Convention. | |
| 215025546 | Battle of Yorktown | Last major battle of the Revolutionary War. Cornwallis and his troops were trapped in the Chesapeake Bay by the French fleet. He was sandwiched between the French navy and the American army. He surrendered October 19, 1781. | |
| 215025547 | Battles of Lexington and Concord | The battles of Lexington and Concord initiated the Revolutionary War between the American colonists and the British. British governor Thomas Gage sent troops to Concord to stop the colonists who were loading arms. The next day, on April 19, 1775, the first shots were fired in Lexington, starting the war. The battles resulted in a British retreat to Boston. | |
| 215025548 | Bill of Rights | A statement of fundamental rights and privileges (especially the first ten amendments to the United States Constitution). | |
| 215025549 | New Jersey Plan | Opposite of the Virginia Plan, it proposed a single-chamber congress in which each state had one vote. This created a conflict with representation between bigger states, who wanted control befitting their population, and smaller states, who didn't want to be bullied by larger states. | |
| 215025550 | Northwest Land Ordinance of 1787 | The lone accomplishment of the Articles of Confederation-it created a system for admitting new states from the territory acquired originally during the French and Indian War. | |
| 215025551 | The Federalist Papers | Series of newspaper articles written by John Hay, James Madison and Alexander Hamilton which enumerated arguments in favor of the Constitution and refuted the arguments of the anti-federalists. | |
| 215025552 | Virginia Statute on Religious Freedom | Foundation for first ammendment, offered free choice of religion, not influenced by state. | |
| 215025553 | Valley Forge | Place where Washington's army spent the winter of 1777-1778, a 4th of troops died here from disease and malnutriton, Steuben comes and trains troops. | |
| 215025554 | Articles of Confederation | This document, the nations first constitution, was adopted by the second continental congress in 1781during the revolution. the document was limited because states held most of the power, and congress lacked the power to tax, regulate trade, or control coinage. | |
| 215025555 | Battle of Saratoga | Turning point of the American Revolution. It was very important because it convinced the French to give the U.S. military support. It lifted American spirits, ended the British threat in New England by taking control of the Hudson River, and, most importantly, showed the French that the Americans had the potential to beat their enemy, Great Britain. | |
| 215025556 | Benjamin Franklin | Printer, author, inventor, diplomat, statesman, and Founding Father. One of the few Americans who was highly respected in Europe, primarily due to his discoveries in the field of electricity. | |
| 215025557 | Boston Massacre | The first bloodshed of the Amercan Revolution, as British guards at the Boston Customs House opened fire on a crowd killing five americans. | |
| 215025558 | Boston Tea Party | Demonstration (1773) by citizens of Boston who (disguised as Indians) raided three British ships in Boston harbor and dumped hundreds of chests of tea into the harbor. | |
| 215054046 | Coercive/Intolerable Acts | Applied only to Massachusetts to punish them for Boston Tea Party; closed Boston's port, reduced powers of self-government, allowed royal officers to be tried in England or other colonies, and provided for quartering of British troops in empty houses or barns. | |
| 215054047 | Connecticut Compromise | Compromise agreement by states at the Constitutional Convention for a bicameral legislature with a lower house in which representation would be based on population and an upper house in which each state would have two senators. | |
| 215054048 | Crisis Papers | A series of works by Thomas Paine written between 1776 and 1783 during the American Revolution. These papers were written in a language common people could understand it increase American morale. | |
| 215054049 | Currency Act | Restricted colonists from printing their own currency and instead using "hard" currency (gold and silver). | |
| 215054050 | Declaration of Independence | The document recording the proclamation of the second Continental Congress (4 July 1776) asserting the independence of the colonies from Great Britain. | |
| 215054051 | Declaratory Act | Act passed in 1766 just after the repeal of the Stamp Act. Stated that Parliament could legislate for the colonies in all cases. | |
| 215054052 | Ethan Allen | A soldier of the American Revolution whose troops helped capture Fort Ticonderoga from the British (1738-1789). | |
| 215054053 | Federalists v. Anti-federalists | Federalists were conservatives who wished for a strong national government, while anti-federalists triumphed the states' power in the matter. | |
| 215136665 | First/Second Continental Congress | Brought together delegates from each of the thirteen colonies except Georgia; represents first time colonists actually met together; served as a model for forming the U.S. government. | |
| 215136666 | Fort Stanwix Treaty | An important treaty between North American Indians and the British Empire. It was signed in 1768 at Fort Stanwix, located in present-day Rome, New York. The purpose of the conference was to adjust the boundary line between Indian lands and British colonial settlements set forth in the Royal Proclamation of 1763. | |
| 215136667 | Gaspee Affair | The colonists thought that there was a conspiracy against them. Seizing their opportunity to destroy the hated vessel, a group of colonists disguised as Native Americans ordered the British crew ashore and then set fire to the ship. | |
| 215136668 | George Washington | Commander of the Continental Army. Also the 1st President of the United States. | |
| 215136669 | John Locke | English empiricist philosopher who believed that all knowledge is derived from sensory experience (1632-1704). | |
| 215136670 | Judiciary Act of 1789 | In 1789 Congress passed this Act which created the federal-court system. The act managed to quiet popular apprehensions by establishing in each state a federal district court that operated according to local procedures. | |
| 215136671 | Land Ordinance of 1785 | A law that divided much of the United States into a system of townships to facilitate the sale of land to settlers. | |
| 215136672 | Loyalists/Tories | American colonists who remained loyal to Britain and opposed the war for independence. | |
| 215136673 | Navigation Acts | Laws that governed trade between England and its colonies. Colonists were required to ship certain products exclusively to England. These acts made colonists very angry because they were forbidden from trading with other countries. | |
| 215197890 | No Taxation Without Representation | Reflected the colonists' belief that they should not be taxed because they had no direct representatives in Parliament. | |
| 215197891 | Non-Importation Agreements | Agreements not to import goods from Great Britain. They were designed to put pressure on the British economy and force the repeal of unpopular parliamentary acts. | |
| 215197892 | Olive Branch Petition | On July 8, 1775, the colonies made a final offer of peace to Britain, agreeing to be loyal to the British government if it addressed their grievances (repealed the Coercive Acts, ended the taxation without representation policies). It was rejected by Parliament, which in December 1775 passed the American Prohibitory Act forbidding all further trade with the colonies. | |
| 215197893 | Paxton Boys | A mob of Pennsylvania frontiersmen led by the Paxtons who massacred a group of non-hostile Indians. | |
| 215197894 | Phillis Wheatly | Former slave who wrote plays and poems supporting American Independence. | |
| 215197895 | Pontiac's Rebellion | A 1763 conflict between Native Americans and the British over settlement of Indian lands in the Great Lakes area. | |
| 215197896 | Proclamation of 1763 | A proclamation from the British government which forbade British colonists from settling west of the Appalacian Mountains, and which required any settlers already living west of the mountains to move back east. | |
| 215197897 | Quebec Acts | It set up a government for Canada and gave complete religious freedom to French Catholics. Also expended the borders of Quebec to include land between the Ohio and Missouri Rivers. | |
| 215197898 | Sons of Liberty | A radical political organization formed after the passage of the Stamp Act to protest various British acts; organization used poth peaceful and violent means of protest. | |
| 215197899 | Stamp Act Congress | Group of colonists who protested the Stamp Act, saying that Parliament couldn't tax without colonist' consent. | |
| 215223013 | Suffolk Resolves | The First Continental Congress endorsed Massachusetts's Suffolk Resolves, which declared that the colonies need not obey the 1773 Coercive Acts, since they infringed upon basic liberties. | |
| 215223014 | Sugar Act 1764 | An act that raised tax revenue in the colonies for the crown. It also increased the duty on foreign sugar imported from the West Indies. | |
| 215223015 | Tea Act | Law passed by parliament allowing the British East India Company to sell its low-cost tea directly to the colonies - undermining colonial tea merchants; led to the Boston Tea Party. | |
| 215223016 | Thomas Hobbes | English materialist and political philosopher who advocated absolute sovereignty as the only kind of government that could resolve problems caused by the selfishness of human beings (1588-1679). | |
| 215223017 | Thomas Paine/Common Sense | A British citizen, he wrote Common Sense, published on January 1, 1776, to encourage the colonies to seek independence. It spoke out against the unfair treatment of the colonies by the British government and was instrumental in turning public opinion in favor of the Revolution. | |
| 215223018 | Townshend Acts | A tax that the British Parliament placed on leads, glass, paint and tea. | |
| 215247267 | Treaty of Alliance 1778 | Made during the American Revolution and created a defensive alliance between France and the U.S. | |
| 215247268 | Treaty of Paris 1783 | Treaty Between England and the Colonies , formally ended the American Revolutionary War. | |
| 215247269 | Virginia Plan | Virginia delegate James Madison's plan of government, in which states got a number of representatives in Congress based on their population. | |
| 215247270 | Virtual Representation | British governmental theory that Parliament spoke for all British subjects, including Americans, even if they did not vote for its members. | |
| 215247271 | Whigs/Torries | The names of the two political parties that formed during the dapete on a bill in Parlment in 1679. | |
| 215247272 | Writs of Assistance | It was part of the Townshend Acts. It said that the customs officers could inspect a ship's cargo without giving a reason. Colonists protested that the Writs violated their rights as British citizens. | |
| 215247273 | Stamp Act | A tax that the British Pariliament placed on newspapers and official documents sold in the American Colonies. | |
| 215247274 | Quartering Acts | Colonists were required to provide housing and food to British soldiers. |
