ASSIGNMENT

Identification – Choose 15, and ONLY 15, to answer.

 

Example of what an identification answer should look like:

 

Nat Turner’s Rebellion – An F answer.

A slave who attempted to overthrow his white masters. Was executed.

 

Nat Turner’s Rebellion – An “I just really want this class to be over with” (C or D) answer.

Last major slave uprising in the Antebellum south in 1831. Nat Turner was a slave preacher who led his followers to kill some 60 whites before being caught and executed. Southern states then passed more restrictions on slaves.

 

Nat Turner’s Rebellion – An A answer.

Nat Turner was slave preacher who promoted slave rebellion. In 1831, after killing many whites, most of whom were women and children, he and his followers were caught by the Virginia militia. As evidence of how Turner justified the killing of whites, he asked the rhetorical question, “Was not Christ crucified?” It was to be the last large-scale slave rebellion in American history, but with a lot of repercussions. As whites all over the south feared another uprising, many innocent slaves were beaten or killed. It also opened the debate in Virginia state government about the possibility of gradual emancipation and removal of African Americans from the state. The effort failed and Virginia, as well as many other slave states, passed laws tightening restrictions on slaves.

 

1.      The American System

2.      Monroe Doctrine

3.      Missouri Compromise, 1820

4.      “corrupt bargain,” 1824

5.      “spoils system”

6.      Exposition and Protest, 1828

7.      Peggy Eaton Affair

8.      Nullification Crisis

9.      Panic of 1837

10.  Paternalism

11.  Underground Railroad

12.  American Colonization Society

13.  Denmark Vesey’s conspiracy

14.  Temperance movement

15.  Hurricane Plantation, Davis Bend

16.  Commodore Matthew Perry

17.  The Liberty Party

18.  Lecompton Constitution

19.  Free Soil Party

20.  Dred Scot Decision

21.  Harpers Ferry

22.  Contrabands

23.  Anaconda Plan

24.  Lieber Code, 1863

25.  The Sea Island Experiment

26.  Emancipation Proclamation

27.  “King Cotton Diplomacy”

28.  Presidential Reconstrution

29.  The 14th Amendment

30.  Ku Klux Klan

31.  Redeemers

32.  Bargain of 1877

 

Essay Questions – Choose THREE of the following to answer..

 

1.      Some reformers of the 1820s, ’30s, and ’40s pursued their objectives within the mainstream of American society and others withdrew into utopian communities. Compare these two strands of American reform. What characteristics did they share in common? In what ways did they tend to differ?

 

2.      American histories usually emphasize enslaved men and women’s production of cotton. Describe some of the other occupations enslaved peoples held and the levels of freedom some of those occupations afforded them.

 

3.       How was the Compromise of 1850 an attempt to balance the requirements of pro- and antislavery factions in the United States? Include a description of the major elements of the Compromise.

 

4.       To what extent did the Kansas-Nebraska Act of 1854 increase sectional tensions?

 

5.      Compare the arguments made by Americans for and against Polk’s war against Mexico. What were some of the key points made on each side? What values or assumptions seemed to underlie these points?

 

6.      President Lincoln’s policies on slavery and the status of blacks in America evolved dramatically over the course of the war. Identify three key shifts in his position on these questions. What factors prompted these shifts?

 

7.      Compare one or two advantages and disadvantages of the Confederacy and the Union in the Civil War. Was a Union victory inevitable? Why or why not?

 

8.      Explain the profound changes in the nature of citizenship, the structure of constitutional authority, and the meaning of American freedom in the Reconstruction Era.

9.      Briefly describe the different classes of whites in the Antebellum South. Who had the most political and social power?

 

10.  Describe Presidential Reconstruction and Congressional Reconstruction. Explain why Reconstruction ultimately failed.