APUSH Units 1-6 (Dumbed Down)

APUSH: Overview of Units 1-6

Unit 1 & 2:

The Imperial Powers

• Spain → Worst relationship with the natives

  • Conquistadors (conquerors)

    • Subdued the Aztec, Maya, and Incan empires

  • Encomienda - crown granted landowner rights to native labor in exchange for promising to christianize them

  • Intermarriage common (Mestizos)

    • Trade relations

• France → best fur trappers

  • Intermarriage with natives (mutually beneficial)(alliance)

  • Jesuit missionaries attempt to christianize

  • Settled in Canada, west of Appalachians (Quebec)

    • Samuel de Champlain est. Quebec in 1608

• Dutch → traders

  • Dutch East India Company (DOC)

  • Settled in New Amsterdam

    • Established by DOC in 1629

  • Purchased Manhattan for 24 dollars

    • Peter Minuit Dutch Governor

  • 1664 taken over by English “New York”

Colonial Regions

• New England Colonies (Pilgrims and Puritans)

  • Puritan, settled by families  - longer life expectancy, better climate, less disease

  • Merchants artisans

  • Subsistence farming

• Middle Colonies

  • Known for lumber, wheat, grains

  • Also trade in NYC and Philadelphia

• Chesapeake

  • Virginia and Maryland

  • Tobacco farming (also trading on the coast)

• Southern Colonies

  • Plantation-based (small # of elite plantation owners)

    • More small farmers

  • Labor-intensive staple crops

    • Rice, indigo, cotton

Unique Colonial Identities

• Virginia Company established Jamestown for economic gain

  • “Starving time” northing to eat 1607

  • John Rolfe introduced tobacco

• Massachusetts Bay - Pilgrims on Mayflower settled in Plymouth

  • Separatists wanted to make a “city on a hill”

    • According to John Whinthrop

• Maryland - religious toleration for Christians

• Rhode Island - Roger Williams separation of church and state

• Pennsylvania - Quakers tolerant of religions

  • Better relations with natives

  • Pacifists, abolitionists

Colonial Governments

• Trend = loosely controlled by Britain; experiment with self-government

  • Usually all have restrictions on voting based on gender, property, religion

• Virginia House of Burgess

• Mayflower Compact

• Fundamental Orders

• Mercantilism

  • Economic theory

    • Favorable amount of trade generates wealth

  • Governments should endure by implementing protective laws and tariffs

    • Gold and Silver are very important

• From Salutary Neglect to Navigation Acts

  • Did not enforce trade regulations until the Navigation Acts

Slavery

• Trends: indentured servants more numerous then slaves until after Bacon’s Rebellion (1676)

  • Servants were rebelling because of work problems

• More slaves important to Indies & South America than to North America

  • Labor crops required many people

    • Ex. Sugar, rice, tobacco

• Middle Passage

  • Les to the death of ⅕ of slaves

• Stone Rebellion

  • Slave revolt put down harsh slave codes

  • Backfired

Great Awakening

• Challenged tradition, hierarchy, and led to a democratic way of thinking

• Jonathan Edwards and George Whitefield

  • Preached more personal, emotional religion

  • Openair sermons attract thousands of believers

Unit 3

1754-1763

• Seeds of disunity in the colonies begin here

  • Wanted westward land

  • Promised natives land to themselves

• Wars are expensive-cast spread unequally

  • Series of taxations

  • Colonists don’t feel equal

  • “No taxation without representation”

  • Colonists would rather die than be 2nd class

    • Borrowed ideas from the Enlightenment

    • Human rights can’t be taken away

  • Social contract is formed in the colonies

  • Separation of Powers 

• Great Empire vs. the Colonies

  • Fighting for survival in the colonies

  • Greater cause

  • Alliance with the French who are enemies with britain

    • After battle of Saratoda, France jumps in to help

  • Better Military leadership

Establishing Gov

• Articles of Confederation

  • Very rigid, could not be amended (needed unanimous)

  • Had no ability to raise taxes

    • Infrastructure

  • No military or army

    • Need to defend independence

• Constitutional Convention

  • Feds vs. Anti feds (no anarchy)

    • Both have opposite ideals

  • Threw away AOC, created a constitution

  • Make Bill of Rights

• Great Compromise, ⅗ compromise 

  • Issue of slavery not touched for 25 years

• George Washington

  • Elected unanimously by the people

  • The precedents he left behind helped everyone

  • Established using military to uphold the law

  • Constitution also upheld

  • Greatest threat is political disunity

  • Foreign Policy

Unit 4

The Revolution of 1800

• Adams peacefully transitions power to Thomas Jefferson

  • Solidified faith in America’s political system

• The Judiciary Acts of 1801

  • Creates 16 new federal judgeships

    • Makes sure that federalists have a hold judicially

  • Accused of court packing with these midnight appointments

• Marbury vs. Madison (1803)

  • Establishes judicial review

  • Supreme Court had finally say to determine constitutionality

• McCulloch v. Maryland

  • Defends loos construction of constitution and implied powers of government

  • Federal government words trumps state government words

• First Dem-Rep President Jefferson

  • Limites size, expenses

  • Louisiana Purchase

    • Doubled the size of the US for 15 million dollars

    • Problem, loose vs strict constructionism

    • Sends Lewis and Clarke to explore

      • Reached Oregon by help of Sacagawea

  • Re-elected 1804

    • Vision: small government, low taxes, small military, downsize navy

  • Foreign Policy

Foreign Policy

• Threats to neutrality

  • Barbary pirates

    • Impressment of US sailors to work for them

  • Napoleonic wars →orders in council

  • British fires on US ship Chesapeake

• Embargo Act of 1807 (failed)

  • Make peace of France and Britain

  • Replaced with Non-Intercourse Act of 1809

  • Acts failed, stimulated American industry and led to Federalists revival

  • War hawks demand confrontation of Brits and Native Americans

War of 1812 “Mr. Madison’s War”

• Tecumseh and the prophet organized Native Allies with Brits

• War hawks chant “on to Canada” 

• War brought vitality and pride to the US, increase nationalism

  • New England opposed war, relied on them for trade

• Draw vs. Win: Treaty of Ghent

  • “Not one inch of territory lose or ceded”

  • Morality Victory

• Effects of the War

  • Hartford Convention (1814)

    • Radicals spoke of succession (came from Feds first)

      • But it was moderate

    • End of the Federalist party

  • US gained recognition and respect globally

  • Nationalist continuously on the rise

The “Era of Good Feelings

• Besides tariffs, banks, internal improvements, slaves, section, and Panic of 1819

• One part and sweeping victory of Monroe

• “1820” Missouri Compromise replace Tallmadge Amendment

  • Missouri = Slave State, Maine = Free state

  • Divides at the 36 30 line

• Monroe Re-elected

• Florida Purchase Treaty (Adam-Onis Treaty)

• Monroe Doctrine

  • Warn Europe to not interfere in Western hemisphere

  • Self-Defense

The American System and America in the Mid-19th century

• Henry Clay’s three pronged system

  • Strong banking system

  • Protective tariffs for east manufacturers

  • Internal Improvements

• Jacksonian democracy

• Moving West

• The development of a market economy

End of the Era of Good Feelings

• 1824 Corrupt Bargain

  • No electoral majority

  • JQA appointed Clay as Secretary of State

  • House makes Adam president

• 1828 Adams and the Tariff of Abominations

  • Nullification Crisis

    • Raised the price of manufactured goods and showed increase of federal government power

  • John C. Calhoun helps South Carolina make a doctrine of nullification

• Andrew Jackson

  • Spoils system

    • He appoints political supports to positional based on loyalty vs. talent and experience

  • Bank War

    • Believed rechartering the national bank would have been harmful to the nation

    • Bank was unconstitutional

    • Withdrew deposits, charter expires in 1836

      • He won the “bank war”

    • States began printing money not backed by gold

  • Continued debate about the role of government

• Indian Removal

  • Broke previous treaties

  • Jackson’s 1830 Indian Removal Act

    • Provided for transportation of all NA tribes

      • East of the Mississippi

      • Moved to newly established territory

      • Where they'd be permanently free of white encroachment

    • Some were forcibly removed because of:

      • Trail of Tears 1838-1839

Political Changes

• “New Democracy” based on universal white manhood suffrage

• The Whigs

  • Favored a renewed national bank, protective tariffs, internal improvements, public schools, and moral reforms

  • More Wealthy

  • Eastern

• Democrats

  • Liberty of the Individual

  • States rights and federal limitations in social/economic affairs

  • Humble, poor

  • South and West

Moving West

• Transportation Revolution

  • Steamboats, roads, canals

  • Develop unified continental economy

    • Steamboats (Robert Fulton) → Canal boom →more cities along canal routes

  • 6 states admitted 1815-1821

• Mexico

  • After Independence, Mexican government made deal with Stephen Austin

  • 1835 - Santa Anna starts army to suppress Texas

    • “Remember the Alamo”

    • America rejects shift to authoritarianism

  • 1836 - Sam Houston leads Texans to victory

    • At battle of San Jacinto

  • Many texans want to be apart of Union

    • Slavery issue blocked them from joining

  • Independent republic of Texas (1836-1845)

Forging the National Economy

• Immigration

  • Influx of German and Irish (1840s potato famine)

    • Irish take low paying factory jobs in NY and Boston

  • Politician, Tammany Hall helped immigrants find jobs and food

  • Nativism grows, Know-Nothing party

    • “Order of the Star Spangled Banner”

      • Feared political influence of foreigners

• Mechanization

  • Eli Whitney - Cotton gin, interchangeable parts

  • Samuel Slater - father of factory system

  • Textiles - links northern factories and Southern Cotton plantations

  • Samuel Morse - telegraph replace pony express

  • Factories

    • Working conditions improves

    • Better house, wages, conditions, education, ban of imprisonment for debts

  • Market Revolution - purchase consumer goods by transportation revolution

• Women in the 19th Century

  • “Cult of Domesticity” “Separate Spheres”

    • Regulated gender roles

  • Women outside of the sphere

    • Seneca Falls of 1848

      • Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Lucretia Mott

    • Dorothea Diz - travelled country for research on asylums

  • Temperance Movement

    • Led by Neil Dow, popular among women “Moral compass”

  • Lowell Factories employed young women in textiles

    • Rules and rigid schedules

• Reforms

  • Utopian communities created and failed

    • Robert Owen founded New Harmony

• Religious Movements

  • Second Great Awakening

    • Emphasis on feeling the presence of God

    • Begin evangelism with populist feel

    • Gospel of female worth

  • Mormonism founded by Joseph smith, succeeded by Brigham Young

• Tax supported-public education

American Literature

• Before most literature was from Britain

• Following war of 1812, boost

  • Wave of nationalist and romanticism

  • Washington Irving, Jaimes Fenimore Cooper

• Transcendentalist (1830s)

  • Knowledge transcense senses

    • Self-reliance, -culture, -discipline

  • Ralph Waldo Emerson

    • Forget European traditions

    • Write about American interests

      • Wrote the “American Scholar”

      • Intellectual declaration of independence

  • Henry David Thoreau

    • People should ignore bodily desires

      • Study and Meditation

      • “Walden Pond”

Unit 5 (1844-1877)

Manifest Destiny

• Divine right to settle from atlantic to the pacific

  • Imperialism

  • John O Sullivan created the term

  • James Poly advocate of Manifest destiny also the 11th president

• Motivation

  • Religion refuge (Mormons)

  • Natural and mineral resources (Cali Gold)

    • Necessary for industrialization

• Effects

  • Conflict - American Indians, Mexicans, internal divide

  • Expansion of west transportation and economic development

  • Closer ties to Asia

    • Opium Wars

The Mexican-American War (1846-1848)

• Causes

  • Manifest Destiny

  • Annexation of Texas

  • Border Dispute

    • Nueces River (Mexico), Rio Grande by US

• Effects

  • Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo

    • Border recognized as the Rio Grande

    • Southwest and Cali were bought for 15 million

  • Future conflicts

    • With natives and Mexicans

    • Slavery vs. Free soil

The Compromise of 1850

• By Henry Clay

• Cali was admitted as a free state

• Strengthened the Fugitive Slave Law

• Popular Sovereignty in Utah and New Mexico

• Abolition of slave trade in DC. 

• Federal Assumption of Texas’ debt

Sectional Conflicts and Regional Differences

• Increase immigration

  • Ireland, Germany, East, and China

• Enclaves

  • Ex. China Town

• Rise of Nativism

  • Rise of the Know-Nothing Party

• Opposition to Slavery

  • Incompatible to free labor market in the North

    • People in the North want wages not land

    • Need money to put back into the economy

    • LEADS to rise of the free soil movement

• Abolitionist Movement

  • Some white northerners and African Americans

  • Underground railroad

    • Secret route by which slaves escaped

  • Uncle Tom’s Cabin → Harriet Beecher Stowe

  • The Liberator

    • Newspaper that helped slaves and African Americans

    • William Lloyd harrison

  • Some advocated violence

  • Fredrick Douglas, Harriet tubman, Sojourner Truth, John Brown

Failure of Compromise

• Kansas-Nebraska Act → Popular sovereignty

  • Bleeding Kansas (1854-1859)

• Dred Scott Decision - If slaves were property, then they were not human beings

  • What even is a free state then?

• Breakdown of two-party system

  • Democrats split on regional lines, the North and the South

• Election of 1860

  • Abe Lincoln, republican; Stephen Douglas, democratic (north); John Bell, unionist; John Breck, democratic (south)

  • Democrats lose because of the divide between candidates

Civil War

• Union Strategy

  • Great Snake, superior navy, government, resources

  • Fought over conflict of slavery

  • North wanted the preservation of the union at first

• Government policies during the Civil War

  • Northing not fighting to abolish slavery

    • Not initially

    • To start it was the preservation of the union

  • Emancipation Proclamation of 1863 reshaped the war

    • End slavery and racism

    • Was strategic by Lincoln because it abolished slavery only in states with open rebellion

    • Was to maintain the border states

      • Slavery end in the south, slaves join the Union army

    • Ensured Britain wouldn’t get involved with the South

      • No foreign aid

  • Gettysburg Address

    • Unify country by foundational principles

Reconstruction

• Redefined relationship between federal government and states

• Led to debates about citizenship → rights of AA women and other minorities

• Reconstruction amendments

  • Abolition of Slavery 13th

  • Citizenship → protect constitutional act 14th 

  • Enfranchisement of AA men 15th

• Radical republicans & moderate republicans want power to be balanced in the executive and legislative branch

  • After Lincoln’s death, and Johnsons

  • Temporarily opened AA opportunities but it was short lived

• Failure of reconstruction

  • Economic Exploitation

    • Sharecropping

  • Segregation, Jim crow Laws

    • Plessy v. Furguson

• Violence

  • After the army withdraws from the South, domestic terrorism (KKK)

• Politically

  • Grandfather clauses, literacy tests, poll taxes, property requirements stripped away the right to vote

  • They were illiterate in states and so they couldn’t rebel

• The Compromise of 1877

  • Rutherford B. Hayes wins contested election

  • Promises to remove all federal troops in the South

    • Marking the end of reconstruction

Unit 6 (1865-1898)

Westward Expansion and Economic Development

• Causes

  • Improvements in mechanization

    • Barbed wire and steam power tractors

  • Increased consolidation of agricultural markets and dependence on railroad systems 

  • End of the civil war

    • Gov helps railroad companies

• Effects

  • Decrease in food prices

  • Farmers creating unions

    • Ex. Colored farmers Alliance, Farmers Alliance, the Orange

  • Created new communities, markets, and center of commercial activities

• Social and cultural Development

  • Migrants (former slaves)

  • Desire for self sufficiency and independence

  • Move to rural and boomtown areas in the west

  • Railroads, mining, farming, and ranching

  • Increasing migration populations + decimation of bison population

    • Increase competition between natives, whites, Mexican-Americans

• Natvies

  • Violate treaties with natives, confined them to reservations

  • Deny trivial sovereignty (Indian Appropriations Act)

  • Attempted to preserve culture that promo assimilation (Dawes Act)

  • Resulted in conflict

• The “New South”

  • South surpass the north east of textile in the US

    • Few cities industrialized

  • Economy based on agriculture

  • Sharecropping, tenant farmers

  • PLessy v. Ferguson (1896)

    • Upholds Jim crow laws, separate by equal

    • Reformers continued to push for economic and political equality

      • Ida. B. Wells, Booker T. Washington (economy not politics)

Technological Innovations

• Technology innovations + natural resources = increased production of goods

  • Ex. Bessemer process

• Leading industrial producer in the world by the end of the period

Rise of Industrial Capitalism

• Causes

  • Technological change (Thomas Edison)

  • Railroad

  • International communication efforts

  • Pro Growth government policies (laissez-faire economics)

    • Adam Smith - the father of capitalism

  • Growing labor force

• Effects

  • Business leaders consolidate corporations into large trust

    • American Sugar Company, Standard Oil

  • Horizontal Integration - take over the process

  • Vertical integration - take over companies

  • Titans of Industry Robber Barons, Andrew Carnegie, Rockefeller, J. O. Morgan

  • Transnational corporations

Labor in the Gilded Age

• Good

  • Prices of goods decreased

  • Real wages increased

  • Access to variety

  • Unions 

• Bad

  • Poor wages

  • Working conditions (sweatshops)

  • Child labor

  • Conflict between labor and industry

    • Gov backs up industry at the expense of laborers

Immigration and Migration

• Diversity of workforce

  • Internal migration North and West

  • Urbanization attracts immigrants

• Why?

  • Escape poverty

  • Religious persecution

  • Social Mobility

• Responses to immigration in the Gilded Age

  • Unions: immigrants were used as strikebreakers

  • Nativities: people who though American born should be favored

    • Led to the most racist act Chinese Exclusion Act

    • Chinese immigrants couldn’t come to the US unless they assimilated

    • Thoughts that immigrants were biologically different so they couldn’t assimilate

      • Social Darwinism - applied to society and the economy

• Women and Settlement Houses

  • Janes Addams/Hull House - helped immigrants assimilate

Development of a Middle Class

• White collar jobs promoted better access to higher education

  • Managers and clerical workers

• Growing leisure time, rise of consumer goods and spectator sports

  • Rise of entertainment (Coney Island)

• Reform in Gilded Age

  • Alternative visions for economy and society

    • Socialist → Eugene v. Debs (person not a court case) shows growing resentment

    • Agrarian - ppl thought this was better

    • Social Gospel

• Women promoted social + political reform

  • Temperance Movement

    • Carrie Nation and Women’s Christian Temperance Movement

      • Ended in Prohibition

  • Suffrage Movement

    • NWSA/Elizabeth Cady Staton/Susan B. Anthony