US HISTORY FINAL

Stephen F. Austin

​​known as the Father of Texas. He led the second, but first legally and ultimately successful colonization of the region.

Fletcher v. Peck

the Supreme Court ruled that a grant to a private land company was a contract within the meaning of the Contract Clause of the Constitution, and once made could not be repealed.

Tariff of Abominations

sought to protect northern and western agricultural products from competition with foreign imports; however, the resulting tax on foreign goods would raise the cost of living in the South and would cut into the profits of New England's industrialists.

Era of Good Feelings

The period from 1816-1823 when the decline of the Federalist Party and the end of the War of 1812 gave rise to a time of political cooperation.

American System

An economic plan sponsored by nationalists in Congress. It was intended to capitalize on regional differences to spur U.S. economic growth and the domestic production of goods previously bought from previous manufacturers.

Protective Tariff

A tax on imported goods to make them more expensive than similar produced goods produced at home. Helps protect the market of goods produced at home.

Tariff of 1816

The very first protective tariff of U.S. history. The main purpose was to protect America's developing textile industry.

Cumberland Road

Soon would be called “The National Road.” It was a highway built with federal funds. It would stretch from Cumberland, Maryland to Wheeling, Virginia. Later it would be extended to Vandalia, Illinois and beyond.

Natchez Trace

prehistoric route that extended 440 miles from Nashville, Tennessee, through Alabama to Natchez, Mississippi, and provided a link between the Tennessee and Mississippi rivers

Dartmouth College v. Woodward

Supreme Court case where the majority ruled that private contracts are sacred and cannot be modified by state legislatures

McCullough v. Maryland

Supreme Court case where the majority ruled that federal authority is superior to the individual states. The states cannot control or tax federal operations within their borders

Gibbons v. Ogden

Supreme Court case where majority ruled that the authority of Congress is absolute in matters of of interstate commerce

Erie Canal

350 mile canal that stretched from Buffalo to Albany. It revolutionized shipping in New York state

Adams-Onís Treaty

Treaty between the US and Spain in 1819 that ceded Florida to the US, ending Spanish claims in Oregon, and recognized Spanish rights in the American Southwest

Monroe Doctrine

President Monroe's 1823 statement declaring the Americas closed to further European colonization and discouraging European interference in the affairs of the Western Hemisphere.

Napoleonic Wars

Wars in Europe waged by or against Napoleon Bonaparte between 1803 and 1815.

Missouri Compromise

Law proposed by Henry Clay in 1820 admitting Missouri to the Union as a slave state and Maine as a free state and banning slavery in the Louisiana Territory north of the latitude 36°30’.

Martin Van Buren

New York politician known for his skillful handling of party politics; he helped found the Democratic Party and later became the 8th president of the United States.

Masons

An international fraternal organization with many socially and politically prominent members, including a number of U.S. presidents

Thomas Hart Benton

U.S. senator from Missouri and legislative leader of the Democrats; he was a champion of President Jackson and a supporter of westward expansion.

Antimasonic Party

Political party formed in 1827 to capitalize on popular anxiety about the influence of the Masons; it opposed politics

Nicholas Biddle

President of the Second Bank of the United States; he struggled to keep the bank functioning when President Jackson tried to destroy it

Bank War

The political conflict that occurred when Andrew Jackson tried to destroy the Second Bank of the United States, which he thought represented special interests at the expense of the common man

Nativist

a person who favors those born in his country and is opposed to immigrants, specifically, a native born American who wants to limit immigration

Five Civilized Tribes

used by whites to describe the Cherokee, Choctaw, Seminole, Creek, and Chickasaw Indians, many of whom were planters and merchants

Indian Removal Act

Law passed by Congress in 1830 providing for the removal of all Indian tribes east of the Mississippi and the purchase of western lands for their resettlement

Cherokee Nation v. Georgia

Supreme Court case (1831) concerning Georgia's annulment of all Cherokee laws; the Supreme Court ruled that Indian tribes did not have the right to appeal to the federal court system.

Worcestor v. Georgia

supreme Court case (1832) concerning the arrest of two missionaries who were working with the Cherokees in Georgia; the Court found that Georgia had no right to rule in Cherokee territory

Trail of Tears

Forced march of the Cherokee people from Georgia to Indian Territory in the winter of 1838, during which thousands of Cherokees died

Cotton Belt

The region in the southeastern United States in which cotton is grown

Slave Codes

Laws that established the status of slaves, denying them basic rights and classifying them as the property of slaveowners

Field Hands

People who did agricultural work such as planting, weeding, and harvesting

House Slaves

People who did domestic work such as cleaning and cooking

Putting-Out System

Manufacturing system through which machine-made components were distributed to individual families who used them to craft finished goods

Interchangeable Parts

Parts that are identical and can be substituted for one another

Blue-Collar Workers

Workers who wear work clothes, such as coveralls and jeans, on the job; their work is likely to involve manual labor

Tenement

An urban apartment house, usually with minimal facilities for sanitation, safety, and comfort

Joseph Smith Jr

Founder of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints, also known as the Mormon Church, who transcribed the Book of Mormon and led his congregation westward from New York to Illinois; he was later murdered by an anti-Mormon mob

Brigham Young

Mormon leader who took over in 1844 after Joseph Smith's death and guided the Mormons from Illinois to Utah, where they established a permanent home for the church

Company Town

an economic institution that was part of the market for labor. In a company town a single firm provided its employees with goods and services, hired police, collected garbage, dispensed justice, and answered (or failed to answer) complaints from residents.

Oregon Trail

The overland route from St. Louis to the Pacific Northwest followed by thousands of settlers in the 1840s

Junipero Serra

Spanish missionary who went to California in 1769; he and his successors established near the California coast a chain of missions that depended on Indian labor

John Sutter

Swiss immigrant who founded a colony in California

Baltimore & Ohio Railroad

First steam railroad commissioned in the United States

Electric Telegraph

Device invented by Samuel F. B. Morse in 1836 that transmits coded messages along a wire over long distances; the first electronic communications device

Elizabeth Cady Stanton

abolitionist, human rights activist and one of the first leaders of the women's rights movement. She came from a privileged background, but decided early in life to fight for equal rights for women.

WIlliam Lloyd Garrison

Abolitionist leader who founded and published The Liberator, an antislavery newspaper.

The Liberator

an antislavery newspaper written by William Lloyd Garrison

Abolitionists

a person who sought to abolish slavery during the 19th century. More specifically, these individuals sought the immediate and full emancipation of all enslaved people.

Romanticism

Artistic and philosophical movement characterized by interest in nature, emphasis on emotion and imagination over rationality, and rebellion against social conventions.

Transcendentalism

Artistic and intellectual movement characterized by interest in nature, emphasis on emotion and imagination over rationality, and rebellion against social conventions.

Henry David Thoreau

Most radical transcendentalist. Writer and naturalist and friend of Ralph Waldo Emerson; his best

Alexis de Tocqueville

best known for Democracy in America, which he wrote after spending 10 months of 1831 and 1832 in the United States on a mission from France to study American prisons

Hudson River School

The first native school of landscape painting in the United States (1825–1875); it attracted artists rebelling against the neoclassical tradition

National Trades Union

The first national association of trade unions in the United States; it was formed in 1834

Unionist

supporter of the federal union of the United States of America,

New Harmony

a community that believes a perfect society can be created on Earth and that a particular group or leader has the knowledge to actually create such a society. Robert Owen established in Indiana in 1825; economic problems and discord among members led to its failure two years late

Brook Farm

An experimental farm based on cooperative living. Designed to “prepare a society of liberal, intelligent and cultivated persons, whose relations with each other would permit a more wholesome and simple life than can be led amidst the pressure of our competitive institutions.” Established in 1841, it first attracted transcendentalists and then serious farmers before fire destroyed it in 1845

Oneida Community

A religious community established in central New York in 1848; its members shared property, practiced group marriage, and reared children under communal care.

Shakers

A mid-eighteenth-century offshoot of the Quakers; founded in England by Mother Ann Lee, Shakers engaged in spirited worship, including dancing and rhythmic shaking, hence their name, and practiced communal living and strict celibacy

Second Great Awakening

spread from rural communities to Boston and New York City. An upsurge in religious fervor that began around 1800 and was characterized by revival meetings. The new revivals led to the breakdown of traditional church organizations and the creation of various Christian denominations. Congregationalists, Presbyterians, Baptists, and Methodists split into groups who supported the new theology and those who clung to more traditional notions.

Dorothea Dix

Philanthropist, reformer, and educator who was a pioneer in the movement for specialized treatment of the mentally ill. Advocated for publicly funded asylums for the insane.

Horace Mann

Educator who called for publicly funded education for all children and was head of the first public board of education in the United States

Parochial School

A school supported by a church parish; in the United States, the term usually refers to a Catholic school. Catholic parents resisted Protestant values in the public schools on their children

American Colonization Society

Society Organization founded in 1817 to end slavery gradually by assisting individual slaveowners to liberate their slaves and then transporting them to Africa

Whig Party

a political party formed in 1834 by opponents of President Andrew Jackson and his Jacksonian Democrats. Charged “King Andrew” with executive tyranny.

Panic of 1837

An economic collapse that came as the result of Andrew Jackson's fiscal policies and led to an extended national economic depression.

Specie Circular

Order issued by President Jackson in 1836 stating that the federal government would accept only specie—gold and silver—as payment for public land; one of the causes of the Panic of 1837.

John Tyler

Virginia senator who left the Democratic Party after conflicts with Andrew Jackson; he was elected vice president in 1840 and became the 10th president when William Henry Harrison died in office.

Oregon Question

The question of the national ownership of the Pacific Northwest; the United States and England renegotiated the boundary in 1846, establishing it at 49° north latitude.

Antonio Lopez de Santa Anna

Mexican general who was president of Mexico when he led an attack on the Alamo in 1836; he again led Mexico during its war with the United States in 1846–1848.

Texas Revolution

A revolt by American colonists in Texas against Mexican rule; it began in 1835 and ended with the establishment of the Republic of Texas in 1836.

Alamo

A fortified Franciscan mission at San Antonio, where Santa Anna's forces wiped out rebellious Texas defenders in 1836

Sam Houston

American general and politician who fought in the struggle for Texas's independence from Mexico and became president of the Republic of Texas.

Treaty of Velasco

Treaty that Santa Anna signed in May 1836 after his capture at the San Jacinto River; it recognized the Republic of Texas, but the Mexican congress later rejected it.

Manifest Destiny

The philosophy describing the necessary expansion of the nation westward

Daniel Webster

A whig. negotiated a treaty with Britain to settle disputes over the Canadian border resulting in the Webster

Webster-Ashburton Treaty

treaty that established the present border between Canada and northeastern Maine.

Liberty Party

The first antislavery political party; it was formed in Albany, New York, in 1840.

Zachary Taylor

American general whose defeat of Santa Anna at Buena Vista in 1847 made him a national hero and the Whig choice for president in 1848.

Wilmot Proviso

An 1846 measure that would have closed any territory acquired from Mexico to slavery; it was defeated in the Senate.

Battle of Buena Vista

February 1847 during which U.S. troops led by Zachary Taylor forced Santa Anna's forces to withdraw into the interior of Mexico.

Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo

Mexico gave up Texas above the Rio Grande and ceded New Mexico and California to the United States in return for $15 million.

Forty-Niners

Prospectors who streamed into California in 1849 after the discovery of gold in the Sierra foothills in 1848.

Free-Soil Party

Successor to the Liberty Party. this new coalition avoided taking a radical stand on the issue of slavery itself but was firm about excluding slavery from the territories.

Know-Nothings

Members of anti-Catholic, anti-immigrant organizations who eventually formed themselves into a national political party

Fugitive Slave Law

Law providing for the return of escaped slaves to their owners

Stephen A. Douglas

Illinois senator who tried to reconcile northern and southern differences over slavery through the Compromise of 1850 and the Kansas

Compromise of 1850

Plan intended to reconcile North and South on the issue of slavery; it recognized the principle of popular sovereignty and included a strong fugitive slave law.

Underground Railroad

The secret network of northerners who helped fugitive slaves escape to Canada or to safe areas in free states.

John Deere

American industrialist who pioneered the manufacture of steel plows especially suited for working hard-packed prairie soil

Cyrus McCormick

Virginia inventor and manufacturer who developed and mass-produced the McCormick reaper, a machine that harvested grain.

Abraham Lincoln

Illinois lawyer and politician who, in a losing senatorial campaign in 1858, argued against popular sovereignty in debates with Stephen Douglas; he was elected the 16th president in 1860.

Harriet Beecher Stowe

American novelist and abolitionist whose novel Uncle Tom's Cabin fanned antislavery sentiment in the North.

James Buchanan

Pennsylvania senator who was elected the 15th president in 1856 after gaining the Democratic nomination as a compromise candidate.

Gadsden Purchase

strip of land in present-day Arizona and New Mexico that the United States bought from Mexico in 1853 to secure a southern route for a transcontinental railroad.

Jefferson Davis

Secretary of war under Franklin Pierce; he later became president of the Confederacy.

Kansas-Nebraska Act

An 1854 law creating the Kansas and Nebraska territories and allowing residents to decide whether to allow slavery within their borders.

Charles Summer

Co-founder of the Republican Party and a strong advocate for abolition and racial equality; he was brutally beaten by a southern congressman in 1856 after delivering a speech attacking the South.

Ostend Manifesto

Declaration by American foreign ministers in 1854 that if Spain refused to sell Cuba, the United States might be justified in taking it by force.