8th Grade U.S. History Final Exam Study Guide

Flashcards to help study for the 8th Grade U.S. History Final Exam.

War Hawks

Believed in war, led by Clay and Calhoun.

Neutral Rights

Rights of a nation to trade and travel in international waters without interference.

Impressment

British practice of forcing American sailors into the Royal Navy.

Judicial Review

Supreme Court's power to review and rule on acts of other branches of government.

Oliver Hazard Perry

Commander of Lake Erie naval forces.

Privateer

Armed private ship used in warfare.

Census

Official count of the population.

Robert Fulton

Designed the steamboat Clermont.

Eli Whitney

Invented the cotton gin.

Missouri Compromise

Kept an even balance of power in the Senate between free and slave states.

Monroe Doctrine

Stopped European colonization in the Americas.

Free Enterprise

Economic system with economic freedom, profit, private property, and competition.

American System

Henry Clay's plan to help the economy in each section of the country.

Internal Improvements

Building of roads, bridges, and canals.

Bureaucracy

Appointed officials, not elected ones, who carry out laws.

Mudslinging

An attempt to ruin someone’s reputation with insults.

Spoils System

Winning candidates give government jobs to their supporters and friends.

Laissez-faire

Less federal government intervention in the economy.

Plurality

Largest single share

Californios

Mexicans living in California.

Vigilantes

Taking the law into one's own hands.

Ranchos

Huge Mexican properties.

Manifest Destiny

Belief to expand the U.S. from coast to coast.

Strike

A refusal to work as a sign of protest.

Prejudice

Unfair opinion not based on facts.

Capital

Money to invest.

Credit

Purchasing goods with loaned money.

Literacy

Ability to read and write.

Discrimination

Unfair treatment of a specific group.

Nativists

Opposed immigration.

Spirituals

Enslaved peoples folk songs to express their religious beliefs

Yeomen

Largest group of whites in the South.

Plantations

Large farms in the South that earn a profit.

Abolition

End slavery.

Abstain

To not vote.

Habeas Corpus

Prisoners right to be heard in court.

Casualties

People killed or wounded.

Resistance

Refusal to give in

Total War

Destruction of entire land

Thirteenth Amendment

Outlawed slavery.

Fourteenth Amendment

Anyone born in the country is a citizen.

Amnesty

A group pardon or forgiveness.

Reconstruction

Rebuilding of the South after the Civil War.

Scalawags

Southern whites who supported the Republican policies.

Carpetbaggers

Northerners who moved to the South and supported Republican policies.

Segregation

Legally enforced separation of races.

Ku Klux Klan

Terrorized African Americans and Republican voters.

Corruption

Dishonest or illegal use of authority.