US HISTORY 1

History 1301 Fall 2020 Online WRITTEN REPORT ASSIGNMENT Spellman

The Presidency

With the 2020 Election Day behind us, the American Presidency has been a significant issue for this

nation – its powers, its integrity, its impact both at home and abroad. So it seems appropriate to have

you write a brief report on the office within the context of our studies this fall in History 1301.

Utilizing the materials found in the film, “Executive Retreat, 1865-1901,” that is on your Blackboard

page, plus notes from the class lectures and outside research, you will write a paper on ONE of the

following topics:

The Controversial Election of 1876

President Ulysses S. Grant and his Administration, 1868-1876

The Issues and Conflict of President Andrew Johnson and the Republican Congress, 1865-1868

These three topics are discussed in the first 24 minutes of the film; that’s all you will need to watch.

Describe the personalities involved, the election campaigns and issues and results, and basically “tell

the story” of the topic you choose. You will want to use other information that is outside of the film,

whether it is my course lectures or outside research.

FORMAT: The report content is to be no longer than four pages in length (regular font and margin,

double-spaced); three pages is fine if it has all of the information. You may use MLA or other types of

formatting for your citations. Two or three citations should be plenty besides the lectures and the

film. There should also be a Title Page at the beginning and a Works Cited page at the end.

TURNING IT IN: The due date for the report is Friday, December 11, no later than 5:00 pm. You may

turn it in as an attachment to an email or to a Course Message.

The paper will be graded on a scale of 78 to 92 points, and the grade will be posted by Dec. 14.

If you have any questions, do not hesitate to message me. Dr S