US History Freedom & Protest Terms #1

Kansas-Nebraska Act

This 1854 law allowed voters in these territories to choose whether or not to allow slavery which led to violence

Dred Scott decision

This Supreme Court ruling declared enslaved people were not viewed as citizens but as property and could be taken anywhere

Abraham Lincoln

President of the United States during the Civil War who helped preserve the United States by leading the defeat of the Confederacy and ending slavery

Confederate States of America

Name of the Southern states that broke away from the United States in 1861 and wanted slavery to continue

Robert E. Lee

He was the head of all of the Confederate troops during the Civil War

Battle of Gettysburg

This marked a turning point in the Civil War because after the South lost 1/3 of its troops here (and did not have as big of a military as the North anyway), it was only a matter of time for the South to surrender

Cotton gin

Invented by Eli Whitney in 1793, this invention caused the demand for enslaved people to dramatically increase

Harriet Tubman

Former enslaved person who was the most famous "conductor" along the Underground Railroad, helping other enslaved people escape to the North

Frederick Douglass

As a runaway slave, this person was able to explain to people how bad slavery was in his public speeches

Compromise of 1850

This agreement admitted California as a free state and included the Fugitive Slave Act requiring Northerners to return runaway slaves

Uncle Tom's Cabin

This novel written by Harriet Beecher Stowe influenced many Northerners to advocate for the abolition of slavery due to its vivid portrayal of slavery and was banned in the South

French & Indian War

This led to a British and colonial victory and then the British passing more taxes/acts on the colonists to help pay for this

Stamp Act

This 1765 law taxed printed goods, including playing cards and newspapers

Navigation Acts

Laws passed by the British in the 1660s to control colonial trade

Boston Massacre

This occurred in 1770 in which British troops fired on and killed American colonists and led to many colonists getting more angry with British control

Quartering Act

This law required colonists to feed and shelter British troops in the colonies

Boston Tea Party

This was a protest against Britain's rules in which colonists dumped valuable British tea into the Harbor

Declaration of Independence

This was written mostly by Thomas Jefferson and explained why the colonies wanted to be free from Britain

Sons of Liberty

This was the name of a group of colonists who organized protests against the British rules including boycotts and tarring/feathering British officials

Intolerable Acts

These laws were meant to punish Massachusetts (including Boston) for its protests against the British and closed the Boston Harbor

George Washington

1st President of the United States and head of the colonial soldiers during the American Revolution

13th/14th/15th Amendments

These were passed after the Civil War (in the 1860s) which abolished slavery, gave blacks citizenship and the right to vote

Jim Crow Laws

These were common in the South from the 1870s to the 1960s and were meant to segregate blacks from whites in public places (i.e. separate bathrooms, schools, and lunch counters)

Ku Klux Klan

A secret society created by white southerners after the Civil War that used terror and violence to keep African Americans from getting their civil rights - particularly voting

Sharecropping

Many former slaves had this job as their only option for work in which they borrowed white's land but kept the former slaves trapped into a cycle of poverty

Plessy v. Ferguson decision

This 1896 Supreme Court decision allowed segregation so long as the facilities for blacks and whites were equal

Black Codes

These laws passed in southern states in 1870s/1880s denied legal rights to newly freed slaves by especially making it hard for blacks to make a living

Redlining

Practice used by the government and many banks in the 1940s/50s to not loan money (or insure loans) to people in certain neighborhoods - often minority dominated. Resulted in many minorities not having access to home ownership.

Red Summer

Refers to the race riots that occurred in 25 cities across the U.S. in 1919 in which white mobs killed hundreds of blacks and destroyed black homes/businesses.