US History Lecture Notes

Flashcards of vocabulary related to the US History lecture.

Atlantic Ocean

The ocean bordering the US to the east.

Pacific Ocean

The ocean bordering the US to the west.

International Trade Via Shipping

International exchange of goods via waterways.

Climate Regulation

Climate control in coastal regions.

Great Lakes

Huron, Erie, Superior, Michigan, Ontario

Mississippi River

Traditional dividing line between the east and west of the USA.

Denali (Mount McKinley)

The highest peak in the USA, measuring 6,190m.

Alaska

The largest state in the USA.

Rhode Island

The smallest state.

Pacific Ring (or Rim) of Fire

Also referred to as the Circum-Pacific Belt, is a path along the Pacific Ocean characterized by active volcanoes and frequent earthquakes.

Names for the US Flag

Old Glory, Stars and Stripes, Star-Spangled Banner.

Blue (in the American seal)

Vigilance, perseverance, and justice

Red (in the American seal)

Hardiness and valor

White (in the American seal)

Purity and innocence

Hernando Cortes

arrived in Mexico and discovered the Aztec Empire’s capital, Tenochtitlan, and began the conquest of the Aztec Empire in 1519.

Roanoke Colony

Also known as the Lost Colony, was the first British colony in the Americas to disappear, and the only trace left behind was the word CROATOAN carved into a post and the letters CRO on a tree.

Jamestown, Virginia

Established in 1607, and Plymouth, Massachusetts, established in 1620; the first two successful British colonies in America.

Mayflower Compact

A written agreement signed by the Pilgrims aboard the Mayflower in 1620, establishing a self-governing body for the Plymouth colony.

Social Order and Stability

an agreement to create and obey just and equal laws helped ensure order and stability in the new colony during a time of uncertainty and hardship.

Stamp Act

Sought to raise money to pay for the British army in North America through a tax on all legal and official papers and publications circulating in the colonies (1765).

Boston Tea Party

Act of defiance where colonists threw tea into Boston Harbor to protest taxation without representation (December 16, 1773).

Intolerable Acts (Coercive Acts)

A series of four laws passed by the British Parliament in 1774 to punish Massachusetts and reassert British authority over the colonies.

Minutemen

Specialized members of the colonial militia, known for their ability to respond to a conflict within a minute's notice.

Paul Revere

Best known for his midnight ride to warn the colonists about the approaching British troops before the Battles of Lexington and Concord.

Battle of Bunker Hill

First major war of the American revolution, fought in Charlestown during the siege of Boston (17 June 1775)

Committee of Five

Thomas Jefferson, John Adams, Benjamin Franklin, Robert R. Livingston, and Roger Sherman

American Revolutionary War

The insurrection fought between 1775 and 1783 through which 13 of Great Britain's North American colonies threw off British rule to establish the sovereign United States of America.

Articles of Confederation

Considered the first constitution of the United States; adopted by the Continental Congress in 1777.

Great Compromise

Created a bicameral (two-house) legislature. The Senate would have equal representation, with two senators from each state. The House of Representatives would have representation based on population.

Three-Fifths Compromise

Stipulated that each enslaved person would be counted as three-fifths of a person for both representation and taxation purposes.

Federalist Papers

Presented a masterly defense of the new federal system and of the major departments in the proposed central government between 1787 and 1788 by Alexander Hamilton, James Madison, and John Jay.

George Washington

The first president of the United States of America.

Elements of the Constitution

Composed of the Preamble, seven articles, and 27 amendments; the first 10 amendments are known as the Bill of Rights.

First Amendment

Protects fundamental rights related to religion, expression, assembly, and petition.

Second Amendment

Protects the right of individuals to keep and bear arms, primarily for the purpose of maintaining a well-regulated militia.

Fourteenth Amendment

Declares that all persons born or naturalized in the U.S. are citizens, including formerly enslaved people, and ensures equal protection under the laws.

19th Amendment

Guaranteed women the right to vote.

13th Amendment

Freed the slaves.

26th Amendment

Lowered the voting age to 18.

Popular Sovereignty

The idea that the government's power comes from the people.

Rule of Law

The principle that everyone, including the government, is subject to and accountable under the law.

Supreme Court of the United States

The highest court in the United States.

Department of Justice

Headed by the U.S. attorney general, who reports directly to the president of the United States and is a member of the president's Cabinet.

President of the Senate

The vice president of the United States.

Gerrymandering

Deliberate manipulation of political district boundaries to benefit one political party over another.

A bill becoming law without the consent of the President

Can happen either through a presidential veto override or if the President does not act on the bill within a certain timeframe, typically 10 days, while Congress is in session.

Executive order No.9066

Signed by Roosevelt, made it possible to relocate Japanese Americans from the west coast.

Democrats

Donkey, blue

Republicans

Elephant, red

President’s Cabinet

Includes the Vice President of the United States and the heads of the 15 executive departments — whose primary role is to advise the the President on matters related to their respective departments and other issues relevant to the President’s duties.

FCC (Federal Communications Commission)

Regulatory agency that regulates interstate and international communications by radio, television, wire, satellite, and cable.

Caucus

Acts more as a hectic political event- controlled and run by political parties, with no funding, regulating or oversight provided by state and local governments; interaction between voters is common.

Primary

Are directly run by state and local governments, where voters choose their candidate from a list on an official ballot.

Presidential Election Day

The Tuesday after the first Monday of November (so anything between November 2 to November 8)

When the presidential term starts

At noon on January 20th of the year following the election

Executive orders

Official, legally binding directives issued by the President to federal agencies, having the force of law.

Presidential Memorandums

Like executive orders, presidential memorandums have the force of law, directing federal agencies.

Presidential Proclamations

Are legally considered ceremonial or celebratory and do not have the same legal weight as executive orders or memorandums.

State of the Union speech

An annual message delivered by the President of the United States to a joint session of Congress about the current condition of the nation, outlining the President's agenda, priorities, and legislative proposals for the coming year.

Offenses for which the president can be impeached

Treason, bribery, or other high crimes and misdemeanors.

Values associated with frontier experience

Self-reliance, inventiveness, equality of opportunity, individualism

Proclamation Line of 1763

A British-declared boundary in North America (1763), that prohibited Anglo-American colonists from settling west of the Appalachian Mountains.

Indian Removal Act of 1830

Allowed the government to negotiate treaties with tribes east of the Mississippi River to exchange their ancestral lands for lands west of the river; allowed the government to forcibly remove and relocate Native American tribes to designated “Indian Territory”.

Trail of Tears

The forced relocation of Native American tribes, primarily the Cherokee, from their ancestral lands in the southeastern United States to Indian Territory (present-day Oklahoma) during the 1830s.

The Dawes Act (1887) and Land Allotment

Dismantled tribal lands by allotting them to individual Native Americans, encouraging them to adopt farming and individual land ownership.

Boarding schools

Native American children were forcibly removed from their families and placed in boarding schools run by the US government or Christian missionaries; aimed to strip children of the Native languages, cultures and traditions, replacing them with English/American and Christian beliefs.

Termination policy

In the mid 20th century, aimed to end federal recognition of tribes and their special relationship with the government, to dissolve reservations and assimilate Native Americans into mainstream society.

Dawes Allotment Act

Introduced the concept of allotment to break up tribal lands into individual plots, primarily for Native Americans; authorized the federal government to survey tribal lands and divide them into allotments.

Burke Act (1906)

Amended the Dawes Act by granting U.S. citizenship to Native Americans only after the government deemed them “competent” and took fee simple title to their allotted land.

Compromise of 1850

A package of five bills that aimed to balance interests of free and slave states.

Fugitive Slave Law

Required the return of escaped slaves to their owners, even if they were in free states.

Dred Scott case

Supreme Court ruled that enslaved people were not citizens and therefore could not sue in federal court (1857).

Beginning of the Civil War

Confederate attack on Fort Sumter in Charleston, South Carolina, on April 12, 1861.

Bloodiest single-day battle of the Civil War

Battle of Antietam, also known as the Battle of Sharpsburg (September 17, 1862 in Maryland)

Emancipation Proclamation

Signed by President Abraham Lincoln on January 1, 1863, declaring that all slaves in Confederate territory were to be freed.

Battle of Gettysburg

A significant victory for the Union that halted Confederate General Robert E. Lee's second invasion of the North; took place July 1-3, 1863.

Gettysburg Address

A speech delivered in 1863 by U.S. President Abraham Lincoln at the dedication of the National Cemetery at Gettysburg, Pennsylvania.

End of the Civil War

General Robert E. Lee's surrender to Union General Ulysses S. Grant at Appomattox Court House, Virginia, on April 9, 1865.

Reconstruction Era

The period in U.S. history, roughly from 1865 to 1877, following the Civil War, focused on rebuilding the nation after the war.

Sharecropping

A system where farmers cultivate land they don't own, giving a portion of their crop as rent to the landowner.

Civil Rights Act of 1866

The first federal law to define citizenship and declare that all people born in the United States were citizens, regardless of race (1866).

System of segregation

Jim Crow laws that mandated the separation of facilities and services based on race, affecting areas like schools, transportation, restaurants, and public accommodations.

Plessy v. Ferguson

Supreme Court upheld the constitutionality of state laws requiring racial segregation under the separate but equal doctrine (1896).

NAACP

National Association for the Advancement of Colored People

Double Consciousness

Introduced by W.E.B. Du Bois in his 1903 book, The Souls of Black Folk, to describe the feeling of African Americans having to reconcile their identity as both Americans and as members of the African diaspora.

Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka

Ruled unanimously that racial segregation of children in public schools was unconstitutional (1954).

Martin Luther King Jr.

Preached civil disobedience as a means of achieving social change.

The Civil Rights Act of 1964

Prohibited discrimination based on race, color, religion, sex, or national origin (1964).

Black Panthers

Revolutionary political organization founded in 1966 in Oakland, California, by Huey P. Newton and Bobby Seale.

Black Lives Matter Movement

Alicia Garza, Patrisse Cullors, and Opal Tometi co-founded it in 2013.

How the concept of the American Dream change after the World War II

Material wealth, homeownership (especially in the suburbs), and upward mobility became central to the American Dream.

Melting Pot

Suggests that various cultures blend into a single, new, unified culture, potentially losing their original characteristics.

Salad Bowl

Posits that different cultures coexist and retain their distinct identities while contributing to a larger society.

Geary Act of 1892

Extended the Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882 for another ten years, and also added new requirements for Chinese residents in the United States.

Ladies’ Agreement of 1921

An informal agreement between the United States and Japan that effectively ended the practice of picture brides immigrating to the US from Japan (1921).

Immigration and Nationality Act of 1965

Hart-Celler Act; Significantly reformed U.S. immigration law by abolishing the national origins quota system that had been in place since the 1920s (1965).

Consequences of the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo on Mexico

Territorial loss for Mexico.

Consequences of the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo on the United States

Territorial gain for the United States.

Sussex Pledge

Promised by Germany to the United States during World War I in 1916, promising to cease unrestricted submarine warfare.

Zimmermann Telegram

A secret diplomatic communication in January 1917, during World War I, in which Germany proposed a military alliance with Mexico against the United States.