US History flashcards

unit 1 us history

Jamestown and Plymouth

• Jamestown founded in 1607

  • Bad relationship with the natives 😡

    • very close to native land

  • Starvation (really bad)

  • 60/500 original settlers left

    • John Rolfe saved the colony later by cultivating Tobacco

• Plymouth founded in 1620

  • Good relationship with the natives 😁

  • Harsh winters & seasons

  • Poor soil led to bad harvests

  • Proper foundation laid out, was more advanced than Jamestown

  • Thanksgiving!!!!!

New England, Middle, Southern Colonies: at least 2 Motivations & 2 Economy reasons

New England: 
motivations — Continue practicing religion; religious freedom, keeping family close
economic — mostly farming & fishing, people made their own clothes/shoes, shipped food from England

Middle Colonies:
motivations — practicing religion (religious freedom), making money
economic — agricultural/industrial economy, plentiful trade w/ England, iron factories in Maryland, paper & textile factories in Pennsylvania

Southern Colonies:
motivations — make good money, families working together on plantations
economic — almost entirely agricultural, plantations, lots of slaves

Relationship between settlers & Native Americans

Jamestown — bad relationship 😡

Plymouth — good relationship 😊

• thanksgiving

Boston Massacre

May 5, 1770

• angry colonists vs British redcoats

  • 5 colonists killed

• Boston had one of the most important shipping ports in the colonies!

Declaration of Independence

Adopted in 1776 by the 13 colonies announcing the separation of the colonies & Britain

1764: Sugar Act

taxed imported sugar & molasses

1765: Stamp Act

taxed printed materials (newspaper, pamphlets, etc) “no taxation without representation”

1765: Quartering Act 

Colonists forced to house & supply British soldiers (created irritation & financial burden)

1767: Townshend Acts

taxes on imported goods like tea, paper, & glass; led to boycotts & increased unity among colonists

1770: Boston Massacre

British soliders kill 5 colonists, anti-british sentiment & colonial outrage both increased

1773: Tea Act

British East India company sold tea directly to colonies, meaning local colonial merchants couldn’t

1773: Boston Tea Party

Colonists dump british tea into Boston harbor, protesting taxation & lack of representation on the British Govt

1774: Intolerable Acts (Coercive Acts)

British punishment for Boston Tea party, Boston Harbor is closed so colonists couldn’t make as much money from trade

1774: First Continental Congress

56 Representatives (delegates) from colonies met to determine a response to british actions

1775: Battles of Lexington & concord (🇺🇸 Rev.)

1st armed conflicts between the colonists & british soliders, marks beginning of revolutionary war

• Paul Revere’s midnight ride

• Black men were free & not enslaved, fought alongside white colonists

• Muskets fired in rounds uniformly & charging spear first

Fighting style of Morgan’s Riflemen (🇺🇸 Rev.)

• used camouflage with different uniforms

• used american rifles & skills from the frontier

• shooting through bushes & trees, guerilla warfare

Conditions of Valley Forge (🇺🇸 Rev.)

• no shoes in HARSH COLD winter 

• no food

• smallpox epidemic

  • started on slave ships

  • spread very quickly, through healthy cells 

  • 4/10 victims die

  • putting pus on open wounds (inoculation) helped lower death rate (1/50 died)

Creation of the Constitution

Official Seal: “E Pluribus Unum: Out of many, One.”

• Only white land owners could vote

• Articles of Confederation

• Philadelphia convention of May 1787

• Great compromise

• 3/5ths clause

• Separation of powers

• Federalists vs Antifederalists

• Popular Sovereignity

Who was/wasn’t allowed to vote

Only white land owners could

• Exception: New Jersey, women could vote until 1807

Black free/enslaved & native americans couldn’t

Articles of Confederation

Articles of Confederation created the United states & most of the power remained with states & NOT govt

• decentralized govt, federal gov

May 1787 Philadelphia convention

Originally was to draft proposed amendments to the Articles

• Didn’t revise Articles of Confederation, restructured national govt. instead

Great Compromise 2⃣

Solved equal representation by the creation of bicameral/2-house legislature

3/5ths Clause

Slave owners could still own slaves: Slaves worth 3/5ths of a person 🙁

• basically no rights to slaves

Seperation of Powers ➗

Dividing govt branches into 3, so legislative branches don’t get too much power 

Federalists vs Antifederalists

federalists: supported constitution

antifederalists: didn’t support constitution

Popular sovereignity

law stating that government’s political authority is derived from the people people

Louisiana Purchase: Who, what, where, when, why, how

Who: Thomas Jefferson
What: Peaceful annexation of land between France & United States. $15 Million & doubled U.S. size
Where: Mississippi —> Rocky Mountains
When: 1803
How: Louisiana Purchase Treaty

Manifest Destiny

Belief that it was the God-given right for White Americans to expand & settle across North America

What was the journey like for settlers moving west?

• Harsh: ~20,000 Americans died in total

• 0 miles/day for 6 months

• tolls from Natives for trails/rivers to pass

Native American relationship with settlers moving west?

Americans paid tolls to natives to cross

• disagreement often led to conflict/death

Donner party?

• took a supposed “shortcut”, ended up adding 100 miles & being stranded 5 months in the mountains

  • Due to snowfall overnight

• Starvation; resorted to cannibalism

• Low supplies in the mountains (60ft deep drifts)

• barely any survivors

Lewis & Clark Expedition: Goals

St. Louis —> Oregon west coast
May 1804 - Sept 1806
Goal: Find water route to connect the Pacific Ocean to the inner United States

• Secondary goals:
  1. Establish American presence
  2. Explore map & new territory
  3. Establish trade w/ local Natives
  4. Study new plants/animals

Indian Removal Act: Who, what, where, when, why, how

Who: Signed by Andrew Jackson / Tribes: Cherokee, Chickasaw, Seminole, Creek, Chocktaw
What: Forced relocation of American tribal people onto reservations for 1,000 miles; trail of tears
Where: Moved tribal people West, off of the Mississippi River territory
When: 1830
Why: Remove natives off of Mississippi river territory so Americans could move west & have more land
How: Soldiers forced Natives to leave

Gold Rush

• 1848 in California in Sutter’s mill

  • 300,000 people came to strike it rich

• 49ers 

• brought immigrants around the world

• CA became a free state in 1850

Homestead Act

Settlers could receive 160 acres if they:

• Lived on it for 5 years

• Improved the land

  • Hard bc there was little rain & not many crops grew

Transcontinental Railroad

• completed in 1869

• Connected Sacramento CA —> Omaha NE

• Mostly Irish(EAST) & Chinese(WEST) workers

• Faster, safer & easier travel for people & goods but destroyed land

Abolitionist

Anti-enslavement; person who favors end of enslavement

Cotton Gin

Machine that sped up cotton production by 50x (remove seeds from cotton)

Nat Turner’s Rebellion

Freed slaves killed white slave owners & their family, while also freeing slaves

Underground Railroad

Led by Harriet Tubman, helped enslaved people escape to the North & be freed

60,000 escaped, $50 million loss!!!!

Compromise of 1850

• California became a free state

• D.C. can’t have slave trade BUT slavery is still Ok

• New Mexico & Utah open to slavery through popular sovereignity

Fugitive Slave Act (part of Comp. of 1850)

• free states had to cooperate with slave states

• fines for helping enslaved

• Captures: Bonus & promotions
  Slave helpers: Fine & imprisonment

Uncle Tom’s Cabin

Book that strongly opposed slavery

• became a play, was very widely known & spread

• helped North gain supporters, challenged South’s views

Bleeding Kansas

• Violent acts between the North & South in Kansas

• Caused by Kansas-Nebraska act: Allowed slavery on prev. illegal slave states

John Brown & Harpers Ferry

• Radical John Brown & group of people raided Harpers Ferry’s arsenal

  • Wanted to distribute weapons to slaves while Brown & his men raided the city

    • Slaves did not end up following through with the plan

• Plan failed, John Brown eventually arrested & publicly hanged

Frederick Douglass

• Slave who escaped & wrote a best-selling autobiography

• Debated Lincoln

• Became icon for African Americans

Harriet Tubman

• Risked her life to save enslaved

• Most famous underground RR “conductor”

Lincoln elected in 1860

• Southern states decided to secede

• Lincoln was anti-enslavement

Sectionalism (Incl. identity of north & south)

North: Feared slavery across entire nation
South: Feared total abolishment & more enslaved would rebel/run away

North’s advantages/disadvantages

Advantages:

• 22.67 Million population

• Industrial manufacturing, more railroads, farm acreage, workers, & factories

• Well organized Navy: 250+ warships, allowed union to blockade South’s vital ports

Disadvantages:

• Had to go onto unfamiliar territory

Abraham Lincoln

South

Advantages:

• 8.73 Million Population

• Motivated soldiers

• Skilled & experienced officers

• Agricultural mostly

• War was defensive; on their territory

Disadvantages:

• outnumbered

• not as industrial

Jefferson Davis

Border States

Slave states remaining loyal to the Union despite practicing slavery

Conscription

required/forced enlistment to fight for the army (but if you can pay you can get a substitute)

Life on the Front Lines

• Food shortages

• Diseases

  • took more lives than war did

  • Caused by no sterilization

• 20,000 women volunteering as nurses

• 1st war to be documented by photos

• 620,000 dead (~6mil in today’s population)

Emancipation Proclamation

Established by Lincoln in 1863

abolished slavery in Southern states

End of War

• General Lee surrenders after William T. Sherman’s march through Georgia & South Carolina

• Many north & south soldiers killed/disabled

• Southern economy in shambles

• Displaced Southerners (moved west/north)