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US History

This is a survey course that provides students with an investigation of important political, economic, and social developments in American history from the pre-colonial time period to the present day. Students will be engaged in activities that call upon their skills as historians (i.e. recognizing cause and effect relationships, various forms of research, expository and persuasive writing, reading of primary and secondary sources, comparing and contrasting important ideas and events).

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Eli Whitney

Eli Whitney was born in Massachusetts. He was a mechanical genius that graduated from Yale. After college he traveled to Georgia to be a tutor while preparing for the law. While in Georgia he was told that the South would make a lot of money if someone could invent a machine to separate the seed from cotton. In 1793, within ten days of being told this, Whitney had constructed a rough machine fifty times more effective than the handpicking process.

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Cyrus McCormick

Born in Rockbridge County, Virginia on 1809, he was very interested in helping out the fellow farmer. In 1831, he revolutionized the farming industry by inventing the mechanical reaper. He later improved upon it and patented it in 1834. He then started a company that manufactured this reaper and sold it on the market. He became tremendously rich doing this and later married. He was very generous to his nearby churches and schools.

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Samuel Slater

He was a British mechanic that moved to America and in 1791 invented the first American machine for spinning cotton. He is known as "the Father of the Factory System" and he started the idea of child labor in America's factories.

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Whig Party

The Whig party was a party that formed for those who opposed Jackson's views. It was created in the 1830s and the 1840s. When Jackson was elected, Clay and Calhoun formed a party for those who opposed Democratic views. The first Whig to become president was Harrison in the 1840 election. Whigs thought that Jackson's views were selfish.

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Pet Banks

were state banks; existed in the 1830's; state banks that received federal funds from Jackson. These funds were from the removal of the deposits in the BUS in order to insure of the bank's demise when its charter ran out. These banks then loaned money and printed paper to increase spending, which lead to inflation. Jackson attempts to stop this inflation with the Specie Circular, which lead to the Panic of 1837

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Anti-Masonic Party

The Anti-Masonic Party was a third political party that developed during the campaign of 1832 because of the fierce debate between Henry Clay and Andrew Jackson. This party also developed as opposition to the Masons (secret societies). It gained support from evangelical Protestant groups and people who were neglected by Jackson; however, it never took a majority position in elections.

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Independent Treasury

Martin Van Buren passed the "Divorce Bill" in 1840 which created an independent treasury that took the government's funds out of the pet banks that Jackson created and put them in vaults in several of the largest cities. This way the funds would be safe from inflation and denied to the state banks as revenue.

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Lone Star State

Lone Star State - Texas was first ruled by Spain for over 300 years as a part of Mexico. When Mexico became an independent country in 1821, Texas became a Mexican State and new settlers from the United States were welcomed . The large influx of Americans led to skirmishes with Mexican troops. After a successful war of independence against Mexico, Texans raised the Lone Star flag over their own republic in 1836. Their government was recognized by the United States and several other European countries.

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Bank of United States

The federal bank of US was first created in 1791under Hamilton's economic plan. In 1816, the Bank of US's charter was renewed. Because of the economic recession of the 1810's, the bank suffered great mismanagement until 1822 when Nicholas Biddle, a Philadelphia financier, became its president. Andrew Jackson, in 1831, vetoed the charter act to renew the bank's charter which would expire in 1836. This made the government to store all its funds to the state banks (aka King Andrew's pet banks).

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Divorce Bill

bill proposed by Martin Van Buren; idea: federal money in a separate bank vault so it would not be connected with the ups and downs of the federal economy; barley pass in 1840 by Democrats, then repealed when Whigs came into power a year later.

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