U.S. History to 1877
Exam Materials
Course Introduction
U.S. History to 1877 surveys the major political, social, economic, and cultural developments in what would become the United States, from pre-Columbian societies through the end of Reconstruction. The course explores European colonization, interactions with Indigenous peoples, the growth of colonial settlements, the causes and consequences of the American Revolution, the formation of the Constitution, and the dynamic changes in American society throughout the early 19th century. Special emphasis is placed on the rise of sectionalism, the institution of slavery, westward expansion, and the Civil War, culminating with the Reconstruction era and its lasting impact on the nation.
Recommended Textbook
The Unfinished Nation A Concise History of the American People Volume I To 1877 5th Edition by
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2093 Verified Questions
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Chapter 1: The Meeting of Cultures
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Sample Questions
Q1) What factor is believed to have dramatically reduced New World native populations after contact with Europeans?
A)war
B)disease
C)starvation
D)enslavement
E)religious conversion
Answer: B
Q2) The pioneer of English colonization who died in the service of Queen Elizabeth I was _______________.
Answer: Humphrey Gilbert
Q3) Christopher Columbus
A)was trained as a sailor through his long service to Italy.
B)was a man of little ambition.
C)believed that Asia could only be reached by sailing east.
D)believed the Americas consisted of a few islands.
E)thought the world was much smaller than it was in reality.
Answer: E
Q4) John Calvin introduced the doctrine of ___________________.
Answer: predestination
Page 3
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Chapter 2: Transplantations and Borderland
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Sample Questions
Q1) William Penn
A)was a man of great wealth who converted to Quakerism.
B)established a moderately successful but never cosmopolitan colony.
C)suppressed the local Indians in Pennsylvania with a strong military presence.
D)never visited Pennsylvania.
E)used unscrupulous and deceptive advertising to attract settlers.
Answer: A
Q2) Like New York, the New Jersey colony
A)quickly developed a strong local government.
B)had few slaves during its early existence.
C)was characterized by a unified and generally peaceful society.
D)had great ethnic and religious diversity.
E)developed an important class of large landowners.
Answer: D
Q3) Anne Hutchinson preached the _________________ heresy. Answer: Antinomian
Q4) The Jamestown settlement was an instant success.
A)True
B)False
Answer: False
Page 4
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Chapter 3: Society and Culture in Provincial America
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Sample Questions
Q1) The wide availability of reading material in colonial America was the result of A)colonial laws which protected freedom of speech in the printed word.
B)high rates of men who attended college.
C)the Stamp Act of 1765.
D)the invention of the printing press in the early 1700s.
E)high rates of male literacy.
Answer: D
Q2) In the early seventeenth century, the legal status of slaves was ambiguous and fluid.
A)True
B)False
Answer: True
Q3) Religious toleration was more pronounced in America than anywhere in Europe.
A)True
B)False
Answer: True
Q4) Those Puritans who could give evidence of grace and were admitted to full church membership were called ______________________.
Answer: visible saints
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Chapter 4: The Empire in Transition
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Sample Questions
Q1) Trace the course and nature of colonial objections to British policies between 1763 and 1775.
Q2) The "Virginia Resolves" stated that
A)Virginians should not be required to pay taxes.
B)the English government had no authority over the economic activities of Virginians.
C)anyone who supported the right of Parliament to tax was an enemy of the colony.
D)independence from England was the only solution to the tax crisis.
E)Virginia must do its part to reimburse England for the cost of colonial defense.
Q3) At the time of the Battle of Lexington and Concord, General Thomas Gage, the commander of the British garrison in Boston,
A)considered his army too small to act without reinforcements.
B)was convinced that Americans would never actually dare to fight.
C)arrested Sam Adams and John Hancock near Lexington.
D)offered to resign his command to avoid war.
E)believed the colonists' calls for independence were justified.
Q4) The newly organized Sons of ____________ did their best to block enforcement of the Stamp Act.
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Chapter 5: The American Revolution
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Sample Questions
Q1) The British military campaigns of 1777 saw
A)General William Howe stay in camp when he was supposed to have moved south.
B)General John Burgoyne suffer a major defeat at Saratoga.
C)a major American victory at Philadelphia.
D)the British surround and lay siege to George Washington's army at Valley Forge.
E)the British retake Boston and set it afire.
Q2) The 1794 Battle of Fallen Timbers
A)forced the Miami Indians into negotiations with the United States.
B)saw the United States forces suffer a significant defeat.
C)led the United States to temporarily evacuate from the Ohio Valley.
D)resulted in the death of General Anthony Wayne.
E)represented the last major military victory for Indians against the US.
Q3) Published in January 1776, Common Sense was written by
A)Thomas Jefferson.
B)Tom Paine.
C)James Madison.
D)Ben Franklin.
E)James Otis.
Q4) Why did the Articles of Confederation fail?
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Chapter 6: The Constitution and the New Republic
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Sample Questions
Q1) Federalists controlled the new government under the Constitution for its first A)four years.
B)eight years.
C)twelve years.
D)sixteen years.
E)twenty years.
Q2) The "XYZ Affair" involved the United States and England. A)True
B)False
Q3) The most sustained opposition to Alexander Hamilton's economic program came from A)creditors.
B)manufacturers.
C)urban wealthy.
D)Federalists.
E)small farmers.
Q4) At the Philadelphia convention the small state plan was called the ______________.
Q5) Who were the primary authors of the Federalist Papers and what was the significance of these publications?
Page 8
Q6) James Madison decided that sovereignty ultimately resided with
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Chapter 7: The Jeffersonian ERA
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Sample Questions
Q1) During his first term, President Thomas Jefferson
A)sought to create a tax on personal income.
B)restricted the sale of government lands to western settlers.
C)saw a doubling of the national debt.
D)eliminated all internal taxes.
E)drastically increased government spending.
Q2) The cotton gin was invented by
A)Robert Fulton.
B)Eli Whitney.
C)Samuel Slater.
D)Albert Gallatin.
E)Moses Brown.
Q3) ____________________ presided over the treason trial of Aaron Burr.
Q4) In the early nineteenth-century, many members of Congress
A)had to live in tents when in Washington D.C.
B)considered their state legislatures to be more prestigious political bodies.
C)stayed in Washington year-round.
D)All the answers are correct.
E)None of the answers are correct.
Q5) The Treaty of ______________ ended the War of 1812.
Page 10
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Chapter 8: Varieties of American Nationalism
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Sample Questions
Q1) How did the United States government attempt to stimulate economic growth during the early nineteenth century?
Q2) During the presidential campaign of 1828,
A)Republicans were able to effectively unite.
B)President Adams was accused of adultery.
C)Andrew Jackson was labeled a murderer.
D)the major election issue was the Bank of the United States.
E)John Quincy Adams gave a strong showing in the South.
Q3) What factors motivated Americans to engage in a westward migration in the early nineteenth century? What type of American was more likely to move into the West?
Q4) Pre-Civil War explorers called the Great Plains the _______________________.
Q5) President James Monroe began his administration under what seemed to be remarkably favorable circumstances.
A)True
B)False
Q6) When Jefferson referred to a "fire bell in the night" he was talking about the issue of _______________________.
Q7) Was the "corrupt bargain" of 1824 really corrupt? Explain.
Page 11
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Chapter 9: Jacksonian America
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Sample Questions
Q1) President Jackson's distrust of paper currency became obvious when in 1836 he issued an executive order called the "_____________________."
Q2) In the years after the War of 1812, support for the idea of political parties was greatest in
A)Virginia.
B)New Jersey.
C)New York.
D)Rhode Island.
E)Pennsylvania.
Q3) How did Andrew Jackson's ideals of democracy compare with Thomas Jefferson's?
Q4) Senator Robert Hayne represented the state of A)New York.
B)Ohio.
C)Pennsylvania.
D)Virginia.
E)South Carolina.
Q5) In 1840 the Whigs elected a president for the first time. A)True
B)False
Q6) In the election of 1832, Andrew Jackson was opposed by _________________.
Page 12
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Chapter 10: Americas Economic Revolution
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Sample Questions
Q1) Despite contrasts between great wealth and great poverty, there was very little overt class conflict in pre-Civil War America.
A)True
B)False
Q2) The rise of the American factory system
A)complemented the nation's traditional republican ideals.
B)resulted in a rise in the status of skilled artisans among consumers.
C)saw the government act to maintain the trade of skilled artisans.
D)led some Northerners to advocate repealing abolition.
E)led to the creation of skilled workingmen's craft societies.
Q3) When it was completed, the _____________________ was the greatest construction project Americans had yet undertaken.
Q4) The growth of commerce and industry allowed more Americans the chance to become prosperous without
A)a professional education.
B)producing a product or service.
C)owning land.
D)capital.
E)marrying.
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Chapter 11: Cotton, Slavery, and the Old South
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Sample Questions
Q1) Sexual relationships between white Southern men and female slaves was
A)virtually unheard of.
B)against the law in all slave states.
C)encouraged by proponents of slavery such as George Fitzhugh.
D)an accepted cause for divorce in the Southern court system.
E)a common practice.
Q2) Southern white lower-class resentment of the aristocratic system was most likely to be found in
A)the cities.
B)river and ocean port towns.
C)the upper South.
D)the mountain regions.
E)the Deep South.
Q3) Which of the following statements regarding urban slavery is FALSE?
A)Some urban slaves were skilled trade workers.
B)Urban slaves were prohibited from having contact with free blacks.
C)Urban slaves were less supervised than rural slaves.
D)Urban slaves had little working competition from European immigrants.
E)The line between slavery and freedom in cities was less distinct.
Q4) The "peculiar institution" was _________________.
Page 14
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Chapter 12: Antebellum Culture and Reform
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Sample Questions
Q1) One leading abolitionist who was murdered for his activism was
A)William Lloyd Garrison.
B)Frederick Douglass.
C)Sojourner Truth.
D)Benjamin Lundy.
E)Elijah Lovejoy.
Q2) The term "penitentiary" comes from the word _________________.
Q3) In the first half of the nineteenth century, ________________ epidemics devastated many American cities.
Q4) Prior to the Civil War, the religious denomination most active in feminism was the A)Baptists.
B)Quakers.
C)Presbyterians.
D)Unitarians.
E)Methodists.
Q5) In the North, abolitionists were a small, dissenting minority of the total population.
A)True
B)False
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Chapter 13: The Impending Crisis
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Sample Questions
Q1) James Buchanan
A)weakly endorsed the Dred Scott decision.
B)supported the admission of Kansas as a slave state.
C)pressured Congress to admit Kansas under the Lecompton constitution.
D)All the answers are correct.
E)None of the answers are correct.
Q2) The United States went to war with Mexico in 1846 without a formal declaration of war.
A)True
B)False
Q3) On the trails westward, almost everyone, male and female, walked most of the time.
A)True
B)False
Q4) Some advocates of Manifest Destiny believed the United States should control the Western Hemisphere.
A)True
B)False
Q5) In 1856, the Democrats picked ________________ to be their "uncontroversial" candidate for president.
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Chapter 14: The Civil War
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Q1) Which battle-Vicksburg or Gettysburg-was more significant in determining the outcome of the Civil War?
Q2) Lincoln dared to fight the Civil War without a formal declaration of war, but he did not dare suspend habeas corpus.
A)True
B)False
Q3) In what ways did women participate in the Civil War, and how did their activities compare with the involvement of women in the American Revolution?
Q4) Given the material and manpower advantage of the North, what factors enabled the South to wage war as long as it did?
Q5) "Cotton diplomacy" worked to the extent that England extended diplomatic recognition to the Confederacy.
A)True
B)False
Q6) The _______________________ was the best known of the black Union regiments.
Q7) Four days of draft riots in ________________ in 1863 constituted the bloodiest riot in all of American history.
Q8) Why did 1863 prove to be such a pivotal year on the battlefield?
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Chapter 15: Reconstruction and the New South
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Q1) Advocates of the "New South"
A)opposed using Northern capital.
B)discouraged white women from working outside of the home.
C)promoted Southern industry and railroad development.
D)challenged the assumptions of white supremacy.
E)in fact advocated a return to the plantation system of the antebellum South.
Q2) In 1896 the Supreme Court declared that "separate but equal" in matters of race relations was constitutional in the case of __________ v._____________.
Q3) In what ways did Reconstruction succeed? In what ways did it fail? What has been its legacy?
Q4) During the Grant administration, the United States acquired
A)Alaska.
B)Hawaii.
C)Guam.
D)the Virgin Islands.
E)Puerto Rico.
Q5) Why would the legacy of Reconstruction matter throughout the twentieth century?
Q6) What did the Thirteenth, Fourteenth, and Fifteenth Amendments to the U.S.Constitution do? How successful was each in practice?
Page 18
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Chapter 16: The Conquest of the Far West
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Q1) Which of the following statements regarding Hispanic New Mexico is FALSE?
A)At the time of the Mexican War, Hispanics greatly outnumbered Anglo-Americans.
B)The Spanish had settlements in the area since the seventeenth century.
C)Taos Indians, allied with Navajo and Apaches, forced out Anglo-Americans until 1847.
D)Military victories by the U.S.Army led to a large increase in Hispanic migration.
E)Descendants of the original settlers engaged primarily in cattle and sheep ranching.
Q2) In the late nineteenth century, the western agricultural economy
A)attracted mostly settlers who had little to no experience with farming.
B)saw the Plains states experience a drought during the 1870s.
C)began a long and steady improvement after 1880.
D)saw the development of massive irrigation projects.
E)saw the railroad become the most important factor in its development.
Q3) By 1880, more than 200,000 Chinese had settled in the United States.
A)True
B)False
Q4) The 1869 completion of the _________________ speeded development of the West.
Q5) Many of the Plains Indians subsisted largely through hunting ___________.
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Chapter 17: Industrial Supremacy
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Sample Questions
Q1) The Knights of Labor were followed by the American Federation of Labor as the most significant national labor union.
A)True
B)False
Q2) In the late nineteenth century, due to the growth of industrial capitalism, American workers
A)saw a rise in their standard of living.
B)experienced a loss in their control over their own work.
C)were forced to contend with arduous and dangerous working conditions.
D)All the answers are correct.
E)None of the answers are correct.
Q3) Eugene Debs played a leading role in what labor event?
A)the Homestead strike
B)the Pullman strike
C)the Haymarket Square riot
D)the Railroad strike of 1877
E)All the answers are correct.
Q4) Russell Conwell became prominent in the late nineteenth century by delivering his "_______________" lecture more than 6,000 times.
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