HIST 1301 Final Terms | Quizlet

Cotton Gin (Eli Whitney)

A machine invented by Eli Whitney in 1793 that rapidly separated cotton fibers from seeds, making short-staple cotton highly profitable and dramatically expanding the demand for enslaved labor across the South.

Colonization (movement)

A pre-Civil War movement advocating the relocation of free and freed African Americans to Africa or other locations outside the U.S., seen by some as a moderate alternative to slavery but rejected by most Black Americans as denying their claim to citizenship.

American Colonization Society

An organization founded in 1816 by white reformers and slaveholders that promoted resettling free Black Americans in Africa, eventually helping to found the colony of Liberia.

Andrew Jackson

A War of 1812 general and seventh U.S. President (1829-1837) known for his populist appeal, the spoils system, the Bank War, and his aggressive policy of Indian Removal.

Battle of New Orleans

A decisive 1815 American victory led by Andrew Jackson over British forces that made Jackson a national hero, boosting his later political career.

Era of Good Feelings

The period after the War of 1812 (roughly 1815-1825) marked by one-party rule under the Democratic-Republicans, national unity, and reduced partisan conflict, though sectional tensions still simmered beneath the surface.

Tariff of 1816

The first protective tariff in U.S. history, designed to shield American manufacturers from British competition after the War of 1812.

American System

Henry Clay's economic program calling for a protective tariff, a national bank, and federally funded internal improvements to bind the national economy together.

Erie Canal

A 363-mile canal completed in 1825 connecting the Great Lakes to the Hudson River, dramatically cutting shipping costs and spurring economic growth and westward settlement during the Market Revolution.

King Cotton

The idea that cotton was so central to the American and global economy that the South's economic power (and Confederate diplomacy) depended on it.

Textile Mills / "Mill Girls"

Early industrial factories, especially in New England (like Lowell, Massachusetts), that employed young unmarried women ("mill girls") to spin and weave cotton into cloth.

"Cult of Domesticity"

A 19th-century ideology holding that women's proper role was in the private sphere of home and family, emphasizing piety, purity, submissiveness, and domesticity.

Wage Labor

A labor system in which workers sell their labor for pay rather than owning land or tools themselves, which expanded rapidly with industrialization during the Market Revolution.

Irish Immigration

A large wave of Irish immigration to the U.S., especially following the Irish Potato Famine of the 1840s, that provided labor for industry and canal/railroad construction and provoked nativist backlash.

Nativism

A political and social movement hostile to immigrants (especially Catholic Irish and German immigrants), favoring native-born Protestant Americans and native institutions.

Transcendentalists

A mid-19th-century intellectual and literary movement (including Ralph Waldo Emerson and Henry David Thoreau) emphasizing individualism, intuition, self-reliance, and a spiritual connection to nature.

Second Great Awakening

A wave of religious revivalism in the early 19th century that emphasized personal salvation, emotional conversion, and social reform, fueling movements like abolitionism and temperance.

Sam Patch

An early 19th-century factory worker turned popular daredevil famous for jumping from waterfalls (including Niagara Falls), often cited as a symbol of the era's working-class culture and fascination with individual achievement.

John Quincy Adams

The sixth U.S. President (1825-1829), elected in the disputed 1824 election, who later served in Congress and fought against the "gag rule" on antislavery petitions.

Henry Clay

A Kentucky statesman known as the "Great Compromiser," architect of the American System, the Missouri Compromise, and the Compromise of 1850.

Adams-Onis Treaty

An 1819 treaty in which Spain ceded Florida to the United States and defined the western border of the Louisiana Purchase.

Missouri

A territory whose 1819-1820 request for admission as a slave state ignited a major sectional crisis over the balance of free and slave states in the Union.

Missouri Compromise

An 1820 agreement admitting Missouri as a slave state and Maine as a free state while banning slavery north of the 36°30' line in the remaining Louisiana Territory.

Maine

Admitted as a free state in 1820 as part of the Missouri Compromise, preserving the balance between free and slave states in the Senate.

Monroe Doctrine

An 1823 U.S. foreign policy statement declaring the Western Hemisphere off-limits to further European colonization and warning against European interference in the Americas.

Election of 1824 / "Corrupt Bargain"

A disputed election decided in the House of Representatives, where Henry Clay's support helped John Quincy Adams win the presidency over Andrew Jackson; Jackson supporters called it a "corrupt bargain" after Clay was named Secretary of State.

Democratic Party (1820s)

The political party formed around Andrew Jackson in the 1820s, emphasizing popular democracy, states' rights, and opposition to concentrated economic power like the national bank.

Cherokee Constitution (1827)

A written constitution adopted by the Cherokee Nation in 1827, modeled partly on the U.S. Constitution, asserting Cherokee sovereignty and a structured government just before the Indian Removal crisis.

Election of 1828

The presidential election in which Andrew Jackson defeated John Quincy Adams, marking a shift toward mass political participation and the rise of the Democratic Party.

Indian Removal / Trail of Tears

Indian Removal was the U.S. policy (formalized by the Indian Removal Act of 1830) of forcibly relocating Native nations west of the Mississippi; the Trail of Tears refers to the deadly forced march of the Cherokee and other nations that resulted, killing thousands.

Worcester v. Georgia

An 1832 Supreme Court case in which Chief Justice John Marshall ruled that Georgia had no authority over Cherokee lands, a decision President Jackson ignored, allowing Indian Removal to proceed.

Bank War

Andrew Jackson's political battle against the Second Bank of the United States, which he vetoed rechartering and whose funds he withdrew, believing it favored wealthy elites over ordinary Americans.

Second Party System

The competitive national political party system of the 1830s-1850s, dominated by the Democratic Party and the Whig Party.

Whig Party

A political party formed in the 1830s in opposition to Andrew Jackson, generally favoring the American System, a strong role for Congress, and economic modernization.

Tariff of 1828 (Abominations)

A high protective tariff that Southerners, especially South Carolinians, viewed as economically harmful and unconstitutional, sparking the Nullification Crisis.

John C. Calhoun

A South Carolina statesman and Vice President who developed the theory of nullification and became a leading defender of states' rights and slavery.

South Carolina Exposition and Protest

An 1828 document, anonymously authored by John C. Calhoun, arguing that states had the right to nullify federal laws they deemed unconstitutional.

Nullification

The constitutional theory that a state could declare a federal law null and void within its borders, most prominently asserted by South Carolina during the Nullification Crisis of 1832-33.

Election of 1832

The presidential election in which Andrew Jackson won reelection, largely fought over his veto of the national bank's recharter.

Stephen F. Austin

An empresario who led American settlement of Texas under Mexican authority, becoming a key figure in the Texas independence movement.

Sam Houston

A military and political leader who commanded Texan forces to victory over Mexico at San Jacinto and later served as president of the Republic of Texas.

Texas

A former Mexican territory settled by American migrants that won independence in 1836 and was annexed by the United States in 1845, intensifying sectional debate over the expansion of slavery.

Martin Van Buren

Andrew Jackson's vice president and successor as president (1837-1841), whose term was dominated by the Panic of 1837.

Panic of 1837

A severe economic depression that began in 1837, caused partly by speculative lending and Jackson's banking policies, leading to years of economic hardship.

"Gag Rule"

A House of Representatives rule (1836-1844) automatically tabling antislavery petitions without discussion, opposed by John Quincy Adams as a violation of the right to petition.

William Henry Harrison

A War of 1812 hero and Whig candidate who won the presidency in 1840 but died just one month into his term.

Election of 1840

A landmark election featuring the "log cabin and hard cider" campaign of William Henry Harrison, marking a new era of mass political campaigning.

John Tyler

Vice president who became president after William Henry Harrison's death in 1841, whose Whig-defying policies led to conflict with his own party.

James K. Polk

The eleventh U.S. President (1845-1849), an expansionist who oversaw the annexation of Texas, the Mexican-American War, and the acquisition of the Mexican Cession and Oregon Territory.

John L. O'Sullivan

A newspaper editor who coined the term "Manifest Destiny" in 1845 to describe America's supposed divine mission to expand across the continent.

Annexation

The formal incorporation of new territory into the United States, most notably Texas in 1845, which heightened sectional tensions over slavery's expansion.

"Manifest Destiny"

The widely held 19th-century belief that the United States was destined by God to expand its territory and institutions across the North American continent.

Wilmot Proviso

An 1846 proposal (never passed) to ban slavery in any territory acquired from Mexico, which intensified sectional conflict over slavery's expansion.

Mexican-American War

A war fought from 1846-1848 between the U.S. and Mexico, largely over the annexation of Texas and territorial expansion, resulting in a decisive American victory.

Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo

The 1848 treaty ending the Mexican-American War, in which Mexico ceded a vast territory (the Mexican Cession) to the United States.

Mexican Cession

The large territory, including present-day California, Nevada, Utah, and parts of other states, ceded by Mexico to the U.S. in 1848, which reignited debates over the expansion of slavery.

Denmark Vesey Conspiracy

An alleged 1822 plot by a free Black man, Denmark Vesey, to organize a large slave uprising in Charleston, South Carolina, which was discovered and led to brutal reprisals and tighter slave codes.

William Lloyd Garrison

A radical white abolitionist who founded the newspaper The Liberator in 1831 and demanded the immediate, uncompensated abolition of slavery.

The Liberator (1831)

An influential abolitionist newspaper founded by William Lloyd Garrison in 1831 that called for the immediate end of slavery.

Nat Turner's Rebellion

A violent 1831 slave uprising in Virginia led by Nat Turner that killed dozens of white people and led to brutal reprisals and much stricter slave codes across the South.

American Anti-Slavery Society

An abolitionist organization founded in 1833 by William Lloyd Garrison and others to campaign for the immediate abolition of slavery nationwide.

Angelina and Sarah Grimké

Southern-born sisters who became prominent abolitionist and women's rights advocates, arguing publicly against both slavery and gender inequality.

Frederick Douglass

A formerly enslaved man who became a leading abolitionist orator, writer, and publisher of The North Star, and a powerful voice for both Black and women's rights.

The North Star

An abolitionist newspaper founded by Frederick Douglass in 1847 to advocate for the end of slavery and for civil rights.

Seneca Falls Convention

The first women's rights convention, held in 1848 in New York, which produced the Declaration of Sentiments demanding expanded rights for women, including suffrage.

Declaration of Sentiments

A document adopted at the 1848 Seneca Falls Convention, modeled on the Declaration of Independence, asserting that "all men and women are created equal" and demanding expanded rights for women.

Harriet Tubman

A formerly enslaved woman who became a leading conductor on the Underground Railroad, personally guiding dozens of enslaved people to freedom.

Underground Railroad

An informal network of secret routes and safe houses used by enslaved people to escape to freedom in the North or Canada, aided by abolitionists both Black and white.

Fugitive Slave Act

Federal laws (especially the Fugitive Slave Act of 1850) requiring the return of escaped enslaved people to their owners even in free states, which outraged many Northerners and fueled sectional tension.

"Fourth of July" Speech (1852)

Frederick Douglass's famous 1852 address asking "What to the Slave is the Fourth of July?", exposing the hypocrisy of celebrating American liberty while slavery persisted.

Gold Rush of 1849 / California

The massive influx of migrants to California after the 1848 discovery of gold, which rapidly boosted California's population and pushed it toward statehood, intensifying the debate over slavery's expansion.

Compromise of 1850

A package of laws, engineered by Henry Clay and Stephen Douglas, that admitted California as a free state, enacted a stronger Fugitive Slave Act, and let New Mexico and Utah decide slavery by popular sovereignty.

"Popular Sovereignty"

The idea that the residents of a territory, rather than Congress, should decide for themselves whether to permit slavery, central to the Compromise of 1850 and the Kansas-Nebraska Act.

Stephen A. Douglas

An Illinois senator who championed popular sovereignty, authored the Kansas-Nebraska Act, and debated Abraham Lincoln in 1858.

Moral Suasion

An abolitionist strategy (associated with Garrison) of trying to end slavery by appealing to conscience, morality, and religious values rather than through political or violent means.

Free Soil Party

A political party (founded 1848) opposed to the expansion of slavery into new western territories, prioritizing free land for free labor over abolitionism itself.

Transcontinental Railroad

A railroad line connecting the eastern and western United States, whose route selection became entangled in sectional politics, including the Kansas-Nebraska Act.

Kansas-Nebraska Act (1854)

A law that organized Kansas and Nebraska territories and allowed popular sovereignty to decide slavery there, repealing the Missouri Compromise line and igniting violent conflict ("Bleeding Kansas").

Republican Party

A political party founded in 1854 opposed to the expansion of slavery into western territories, which grew rapidly in the North and elected Abraham Lincoln in 1860.

Know-Nothing Party

A nativist political party of the 1850s (formally the American Party) opposed to immigration and Catholic political influence.

Free Labor Ideology

The Northern belief that free wage labor, social mobility, and small-scale enterprise were morally and economically superior to the slave labor system of the South.

"Bleeding Kansas"

A period of violent conflict in Kansas Territory in the mid-1850s between pro-slavery and anti-slavery settlers following the Kansas-Nebraska Act's popular sovereignty provision.

Charles Sumner

A Massachusetts senator and staunch abolitionist who was violently beaten on the Senate floor in 1856 by Congressman Preston Brooks after an anti-slavery speech, symbolizing rising sectional violence.

Dred Scott v. Sandford (1857)

A Supreme Court decision ruling that African Americans, enslaved or free, could not be U.S. citizens and that Congress had no power to ban slavery in the territories, inflaming sectional tensions.

Abraham Lincoln

A former congressman who rose to national prominence through the Lincoln-Douglas debates and was elected sixteenth U.S. President in 1860, leading the Union through the Civil War and issuing the Emancipation Proclamation.

Lincoln-Douglas Debates

A series of 1858 Illinois Senate campaign debates between Abraham Lincoln and Stephen Douglas centered on the expansion and morality of slavery, which raised Lincoln's national profile.

John Brown

A radical abolitionist who led a violent 1859 raid on the federal arsenal at Harpers Ferry, hoping to spark a slave uprising; his capture and execution deepened sectional divisions.

Harpers Ferry, Virginia

The site of John Brown's 1859 raid on a federal arsenal, intended to arm enslaved people for rebellion, which heightened Southern fears and Northern sympathy for radical abolitionism.

Robert E. Lee

A U.S. Army officer who led the force that captured John Brown at Harpers Ferry and later resigned his commission to command Confederate forces during the Civil War.

William Seward

A prominent Republican politician and later Lincoln's Secretary of State, known for his anti-slavery views and warnings of an "irrepressible conflict" between North and South.

Declaration of the Immediate Causes of Secession (1860)

A document issued by South Carolina explaining its reasons for seceding from the Union, centered explicitly on the preservation and protection of slavery.

Secession

The act of a state formally withdrawing from the Union, beginning with South Carolina in December 1860 and followed by other Southern states, leading to the Civil War.

Confederate States of America

The government formed in 1861 by eleven seceding Southern states to preserve slavery and states' rights, with Jefferson Davis as president.

Fort Sumter

A U.S. military fort in Charleston, South Carolina, whose bombardment by Confederate forces in April 1861 marked the start of the Civil War.

"Contrabands"

A term used during the Civil War for enslaved people who escaped to Union lines and were treated as confiscated Confederate property rather than returned to slavery, a step toward emancipation.

Radical Republicans

A faction of the Republican Party that favored the immediate abolition of slavery, aggressive prosecution of the war, and, after the war, strong federal protection of Black civil rights during Reconstruction.

Battle of Antietam

A bloody 1862 Civil War battle in Maryland, the single deadliest day in American military history, whose Union victory gave Lincoln the political opening to issue the Emancipation Proclamation.

Ulysses S. Grant

The Union's top general, who accepted Confederate surrender at Appomattox in 1865 and later served as the eighteenth U.S. President during Reconstruction.

Emancipation Proclamation

Lincoln's 1863 executive order declaring enslaved people in Confederate-held territory free, transforming the Civil War's purpose to include the abolition of slavery.

Fifty-Fourth Massachusetts Volunteers

One of the first official Black regiments in the Union Army, whose valorous 1863 assault on Fort Wagner demonstrated Black soldiers' courage and helped advance the cause of Black civil rights.