PERIOD 5 APUSH VOCAB

40 acres and a mule

A promise made to freed slaves during the Reconstruction era to provide them with land and a means of livelihood.

Battle of Fort Sumter

The first battle of the Civil War, fought in April 1861, marking the official start of the conflict.

Abraham Lincoln

16th President of the United States who led the country during the Civil War and abolished slavery.

10% Plan

Lincoln's plan for reconstruction that allowed Southern states to rejoin the Union when 10% of their voters took an oath of loyalty.

Black codes

Laws passed in the South after the Civil War to restrict the rights of freedmen.

Battle of Gettysburg

A pivotal battle in July 1863, considered the turning point of the Civil War.

Andrew Johnson

17th President of the United States who succeeded Lincoln and oversaw the Reconstruction era.

13th amendment

The amendment that abolished slavery in the United States.

Conscription

Mandatory military service enacted during the Civil War.

Battle of Little Big Horn

A battle in 1876 between U.S. Army forces and Native American tribes led by Sitting Bull, resulting in a major defeat for the U.S. Army.

Carpetbaggers

Northerners who moved to the South after the Civil War, often perceived as exploiting the local populace.

14th amendment

The amendment that granted citizenship to all persons born or naturalized in the United States and provided equal protection under the law.

Habeas corpus

A legal principle that protects individuals from unlawful detention.

Compromise of 1850

A package of five bills aimed at defusing tensions related to slavery.

Civil War

A conflict from 1861-1865 between the Northern states (Union) and Southern states (Confederacy).

15th amendment

The amendment that granted African American men the right to vote.

Inflation

A general increase in prices and fall in the purchasing value of money, notably affecting the economy during the Civil War.

Election of 1860

The presidential election that resulted in Abraham Lincoln's victory and precipitated the secession of Southern states.

Copperheads

Northern Democrats who opposed the Civil War and advocated for peace with the Confederacy.

Manifest destiny

The 19th-century doctrine that the expansion of the United States throughout the American continents was both justified and inevitable.

Emancipation Proclamation

An executive order by President Lincoln in 1863 freeing the slaves in the Confederate states.

Dred Scott

A Supreme Court case ruling that concluded that African Americans could not be American citizens and invalidated the Missouri Compromise.

Compromise of 1877

An unwritten deal that settled the disputed 1876 presidential election and ended Reconstruction.

Loyalty oath

A pledge of allegiance or loyalty to the government, often required during the Reconstruction.

Bleeding Kansas

A series of violent political confrontations in the United States involving anti-slavery and pro-slavery elements.

Exodusters

African American migrants who moved from the South to Kansas in the late 1870s after the Civil War.

Dred Scott v. Sandford

The landmark Supreme Court case that denied citizenship to African American slaves.

Nativism

The political policy of preserving the interests of native-born or established inhabitants against those of immigrants.

Gold Rush

A rapid influx of fortune-seekers to California following the discovery of gold in 1848.

Forty-Niners

The name given to the settlers who flocked to California in 1849 in search of gold.

Hampton Roads Conference

A meeting in 1865 between President Lincoln and Confederate leaders aimed at discussing peace.

Popular sovereignty

The principle that the authority of a state is created and sustained by the consent of its people.

Great Migration

The mass movement of African Americans from the rural South to the urban North from 1916 to 1970.

Freedmen’s Bureau

A U.S. federal government agency established in 1865 to aid freed slaves in the South.

Homestead Act

A law passed in 1862 that provided 160 acres of land to settlers for a small fee.

Segregation

The enforced separation of different racial groups in a country, community, or establishment.

President Johnson’s impeachment

The impeachment of Andrew Johnson in 1868 by the House of Representatives, primarily over conflicts with Congress.

Free-Soil Party

A political party formed in 1848 to oppose the expansion of slavery into the territories gained from the Mexican War.

Fugitive Slave Act

Laws that provided for the return of enslaved people who escaped from one state into another.

Sharecropping

A system of agriculture where a landowner allows a tenant to use the land in return for a share of the crops.

Mexican-American War

A war fought between the United States and Mexico from 1846 to 1848, leading to significant territorial gains for the U.S.

Harriet Beecher Stowe

Author of Uncle Tom's Cabin, a novel that highlighted the realities of slavery and fueled abolitionist sentiments.

Kansas-Nebraska Act

An 1854 law that allowed for popular sovereignty to determine the status of slavery in Kansas and Nebraska.

Uncle Tom’s Cabin

An anti-slavery novel by Harriet Beecher Stowe published in 1852 that depicted the harsh realities of slavery.

Minstrel shows

Popular entertainment in the 19th century that depicted racial stereotypes in a derogatory manner.

Hiram Revels

The first African American to serve in the U.S. Senate, representing Mississippi from 1870 to 1871.

Personal liberty laws

Laws enacted in Northern U.S. states to counter the Fugitive Slave Act and protect the rights of escaped slaves.

Transcontinental railroad

The first railway line that connected the eastern United States with the Pacific Coast, completed in 1869.

Sand Creek Massacre

An attack by U.S. Army troops on a Cheyenne and Arapaho village in 1864, resulting in the deaths of numerous Native Americans.

James Buchanan

15th President of the United States, serving just prior to the Civil War.

Reconstruction Act

Laws passed in 1867 that outlined the process for readmitting Southern states into the Union.

Sherman’s March to the Sea

A military campaign led by General William Tecumseh Sherman during the Civil War, aimed at destroying Confederate infrastructure.

James K. Polk

11th President of the United States, known for his expansionist policies and the Mexican-American War. (manifest destiny guy)

Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo

The 1848 treaty that ended the Mexican-American War and ceded significant territory to the U.S.

Lincoln-Douglas debates

A series of debates between Abraham Lincoln and Stephen Douglas during the 1858 Illinois senatorial race concerning slavery.

Jefferson Davis

President of the Confederate States during the Civil War.

Twenty Negro Law

A Confederate law that exempted from military service one white man for every 20 slaves owned.

Panic of 1873

A financial crisis that triggered a severe national economic depression in the U.S.

John Breckenridge

A Southern politician and candidate for the presidency in 1860 who represented the pro-slavery faction.

Wade-Davis Bill

A controversial Reconstruction proposal that required a majority of white males in a Confederate state to take a loyalty oath.

Seneca Falls Convention

The first women's rights convention held in 1848 advocating for women's suffrage and equality.

John Brown

An abolitionist who believed in and advocated armed insurrection to overthrow the institution of slavery.

Wilmot Proviso

An unsuccessful proposal to ban slavery in territories acquired from Mexico.

John C. Calhoun

A prominent South Carolina politician and advocate for states' rights and slavery.

U.S. v. Cruikshank

A Supreme Court case in 1876 that ruled the federal government couldn’t protect the civil rights of African Americans against private discrimination.

Rutherford B. Hayes

19th President of the United States, associated with the end of Reconstruction.

Know-Nothing Party

A political movement in the 1850s that was anti-immigrant and anti-Catholic.

Ku Klux Klan

A white supremacist hate group founded in the post-Civil War era to oppose African American civil rights.

36-30’

The latitude line established as a divider for slave and free territories in the Missouri Compromise of 1820.

Matthew Perry

A U.S. Navy commodore who played a key role in opening Japan to the West in the 1850s.

54-40’

The northern latitude line that expansionists sought to claim as the U.S.-Canadian border in the 1840s.

Millard Fillmore

13th President of the United States, known for signing the Compromise of 1850.

Confederate states

The 11 Southern states that seceded from the Union, forming the Confederacy during the Civil War.

Radical Republicans

A faction within the Republican Party that advocated for harsh penalties on Southern states and full civil rights for African Americans during Reconstruction.

Fort Sumter

A fort in South Carolina where the first shots of the Civil War were fired.

Republican Party

A political party formed in the 1850s to oppose the expansion of slavery into the territories.

Harper’s Ferry, West Virginia

The site of John Brown's raid in 1859 aimed at inciting an armed slave revolt.

Robert Smalls

An African American civil rights activist and politician who escaped slavery and served in the U.S. House of Representatives.

Scalawags

Southern whites who supported Reconstruction and the Republican Party.

Stephen Douglas

A prominent U.S. politician known for his debates with Abraham Lincoln and his support of the Kansas-Nebraska Act.

Ulysses S. Grant

18th President of the United States and Union general during the Civil War.