History Vocab
Electoral College
The official body designated to choose the President under the new Constitution, which in 1789 unanimously elected George Washington.
2. Vice President
The constitutional office into which John Adams was sworn on April 30, 1789.
3. Secretary of the Treasury
The cabinet office in Washington's administration wast headed by a brilliant young West Indian immigrant who distrusted the people.
4. Funding
Alexander Hamilton's policy of honoring all federal bonds at face value to strengthen the national credit.
5. Assumption
Hamilton's policy of having the federal government pay the financial obligations of the
States.
6. Bill of Rights
The first ten amendments to the Constitution.
7. Political parties
Political organizations not envisioned in the Constitution and considered dangerous to national unity by most of the Founding Fathers.
8. French Revolution
Political and social upheaval was supported by most Americans during its moderate period
Beginnings in 1789, but the cause of bitter divisions after it took a radical turn in 1792
9. Amity and Alliance
An agreement signed between two anti-British countries in 1778 that increasingly plagued American foreign policy in the 1790s.
10. Miami Confederacy
The Alliance of eight Indian nations, led by Little Turtle, that inflicted major defeats on
American forces in the early 1790s.
11. Jay's Treaty
A document signed in 1794, whose terms favoring Britain, outraged Jeffersonian Republicans.
12. France
The nation with which the United States fought an undeclared war from 1798 to 1800.
13. Compact
The political theory on which Jefferson and Madison based their antifederalist resolutions was that the thirteen sovereign states had created the Constitution.
14. Nullification
The doctrine, proclaimed in the Virginia and Kentucky resolutions, that a state can
block a federal law it considers unconstitutional.
15. Great Britain
The nation to which most Hamiltonian Federalists were sentimentally attached and which they favored in foreign policy.
1. Pardon
Action Jefferson took toward Republican "martyrs" convicted under the Federalist Sedition Law.
2. Midnight Judges
Derogatory Republican term for Federalist judges appointed at the last minute by President Adams.
3. Marbury vs Madison
Precedent-setting Supreme Court case in which Marshal declared part of the Judiciary Act of 1789 was unconstitutional.
4. Judicial Review
The principle, established by Chief Justice Marshall in a famous case, is that the Supreme Court can declare laws unconstitutional.
5. Impeachment
Action voted by the House of Representatives against Supreme Court Justice Samuel Chase.
6. War Hawks
A branch of military service that Jefferson considered least threatening to liberty and most necessary to suppressing the Barbary states.
7. Santo Domingo
Sugar-rich island where Toussaint L' Overture's slave rebellion disrupted Napoleon's dreams of a vast New World Empire.
8. Oregon
Territory beyond Louisiana, along the Columbia River, was explored by Lewis and Clark.
9. 15 million
Price paid by the United States for the Louisiana Purchase.
10. Chesapeake
An American ship was fired on by the British in 1807, nearly leading to war between the two countries.
11. Embargo
Jefferson's policy of forbidding the shipment of any goods in or out of the United States.
12. Navy
Militantly nationalistic Western congressmen eager for hostilities with the Indians, Canadians, and British.
13. Tippecanoe
Battle in 1811 where Governor Harrison defeated the Indian forces under Tecumseh and
Tenskwatawa (the Prophet).
14. Mr Madison's War
Derisive Federalist name for the War of 1812 that blamed it on the Democratic-
Republican president.
15. Whiskey lax
Hamilton's economic measure repealed by Jefferson and Gallatin.
The Star SpenedBanner
Stirring patriotic song written by Francis Scott Key.
2. The Constitution
Famous American frigate that was larger and heavier than most British ships.
3. Hartford Convention
A gathering of prominent New England Federalists who considered secession.
4. The President's Mansion
A prominent Washington building was burned by the British in 1814.
5. The North American Review
An intellectual magazine that reflected the post-1815 spirit of American nationalism
6. American System.
Henry Clay's ambitious nationalistic proposal for tariffs, internal improvements, and expanded manufacturing.
7. Era of Good Feelings
Somewhat inappropriate term applied to the Monroe administrations, suggesting that this period lacked major conflicts.
8. Federalists
Once a prominent political party that effectively died by 1820.
9. Erie Canal
A major water transportation route was financed and built by New York State after President Madison vetoed federal funding.
10.36° 30 minutes
Line designated as the future boundary between free and slave territories in the Louisiana Purchase Territory under the Missouri Compromise.
11McColloch v Maryland
Supreme Court ruling that defended federal power by denying a state the right to
tax a federal bank.
12. Dartmouth vs Woodward
Supreme Court case in which Daniel Webster successfully argued that a state could not change a legal charter once granted.
13. Oregon
Territory occupied jointly by Britain and the United States under the Convention of 1818.
14. Monroe Doctrine
A presidential foreign-policy proclamation that might well have been called the "Adams Doctrine" or the "Self-Defense Doctrine
15. Lake Erie
One of the Great Lakes where Oliver Hazard Perry captured a large British Fleet