Unit 2 Study Guide-Immigration, Urbanization, and Westward Expansion

Mechanized Farming

Using modern machinery (like tractors, combines, and reapers) instead of human or animal labor to farm faster and on a larger scale.

urban

Relating to a city or town with high population density and built-up infrastructure.

rural

Relating to the countryside, farmland, or sparsely populated areas outside of cities

push factors

Negative conditions that force people to leave their home country or region (e.g., poverty, war, crop failure, religious persecution)

pull factors

Positive conditions that attract people to move to a new country or region (e.g., job opportunities, freedom, cheap land).

bessemer process

The first cheap and efficient industrial method for mass-producing steel from molten iron.

factors of production

The essential resources needed to produce goods and services: Land (natural resources), Labor (workers), Capital (money, tools, machines), and Entrepreneurship (business organizers).

corporations

Businesses owned by stockholders that operate as separate legal entities, protecting individual owners from personal financial liability.

robber barons

A critical term for 19th-century wealthy industrialists who built fortunes by using ruthless, unethical, or exploitative business practices.

captains of industry

A positive term for 19th-century business leaders who built massive fortunes while contributing positively to the country through innovation, job creation, or philanthropy.

monopoly

A market condition where a single company controls an entire industry, eliminating competition and setting prices at will.

Laissez-Faire

An economic philosophy where the government avoids regulating or interfering in private business and the free market ("hands-off")

transcontinental railroad

A continuous rail line completed in 1869 that linked the Eastern U.S. rail network with the Pacific coast, revolutionizing trade and travel.

populist party (their platform)

A 1890s political party formed by farmers and industrial workers that campaigned for free coinage of silver (inflation), government ownership of railroads, a direct election of senators, and an 8-hour workday

ellis island

The primary federal immigration station on the East Coast (New York Harbor) that processed millions of European immigrants from 1892 to 1954

angel island

The main West Coast immigration station (San Francisco Bay) that processed primarily Asian immigrants from 1910 to 1940, often subjecting them to long detentions and strict interrogations.

old immigration

The wave of immigrants who arrived in the U.S. before 1880, primarily coming from Northern and Western Europe (e.g., Britain, Ireland, Germany).

new immigration

The wave of immigrants who arrived in the U.S. between 1880 and 1920, primarily coming from Southern and Eastern Europe (e.g., Italy, Russia, Poland)

nativism

Anti-immigrant sentiment favoring native-born inhabitants over newcomers, often leading to discrimination or laws restricting immigration.

immigration act of 1924

A federal law that established strict national quotas based on population censuses, sharply curbing immigration—especially from Southern/Eastern Europe and Asia.

social darwinism

A 19th-century ideology applying biological "survival of the fittest" to human societies, used to justify extreme wealth inequality, imperialism, and racial discrimination.

manifest destiny

The 19th-century belief that the United States was divinely ordained to expand its territory across the entire North American continent from the Atlantic to the Pacific.

trail of tears

The forced relocation of Cherokee and other Southeastern Native American nations to territory west of the Mississippi River in the 1830s, resulting in thousands of deaths from disease, exposure, and starvation.

assimilation

The process through which a minority group is forced or encouraged to absorb the cultural customs, language, and beliefs of a dominant group.

osage nation

A Native American tribe originally occupying regions of the Midwest and Plains, later forcibly relocated to Indian Territory (present-day Oklahoma), where they famously retained underground oil rights on their reservation.

reservation system

Federal policies that designated specific tracts of land where Native American tribes were forced to live and maintain limited self-governance.

dawes act (1887)

A federal law that broke up communal tribal reservation lands into individual family allotments to force Native American assimilation, resulting in the loss of millions of acres of tribal land to white settlement.

ghost dance

A religious movement among Plains Native American tribes in the late 19th century that offered hope for a restoration of traditional life, the return of buffalo herds, and the departure of white settlers.