Unit 2: From Making a Revolution to Making a Nation1776 to 1830s (Lessons 1-4)

Study Guide

The Unit Exam will consist primarily of multiple choice questions. The total value is 100 points. There are 25 questions each at 4 points. Most of the 25 questions consist of 4 or more possible questions in sets. Reminder: This Unit consists of Lessons 1-4. The word Lessons refers to Blackboard learning modules. Blackboard learning modules have a Table of Contents on the left that let you see all of the resources available so you can click on the one you want. All Lessons have links from your instructor and sometimes additional resources such as maps. Note:

·         8 of the 25 questions come from the Learning Quizzes (and those concepts in the Learning Quizzes help you understand the other content in the Unit)

·         17 of them come from below.  

 

The Unit Exam is available for 30 minutes, a time set by the Department. Unit exams have the password onetimeonly. They display one at a time and you cannot backtrack (return to an earlier question). The 5 Ws rule is a good guide to understanding the items below: you should know Who, What, When, Where, and Why—and sometimes How. The Instructor’s links provide visuals, frequently in tables, to help you compare facts to see similarities and differences.
If you need more than is in the Lessons on any specific issue listed here, just ask.

1.        War issues (Resource: instructor’s links in Lesson 1):

·         War for Independence, Patriot and British weaknesses and strengths

·         Saratoga, what it is and why is it significant including in what nations are fighting the British

·         Yorktown, what it is and why is it significant

·         British strategy of recruiting slaves as soldiers

·         Articles of Confederation, what is a confederation? How does it cause problems for the war effort?

·         Terms of the Treaty of Paris in 1783

2.        Post-war issues (Resource: instructor’s links in Lesson 2):

·         Views of religious freedom and development of state governments and state constitutions

·         Northwest Ordinance, its parts and significance

·         Shays’s Rebellion, its causes and the consequences

3.        Constitution (Resource: instructor’s links in Lesson 2):

·         Constitutional Convention and compromise (large state, small state issues; slavery and taxation and voting; electoral college, and creation of a republic)

·         Slaveholder/slave trade protection plus protection from state slave codes

·         Foreign policy and war, who does what

·         Federalists, who they are in 1789)

·         Federalist Papers, authors and purpose in ratification

·         Example: Madison’s # 10 provided in the primaries and a question

·         Anti-Federalists, who they are

·         Bill of Rights, what it is and how it happens

·         District of Columbia (DC), what and why it is

4.        The New Republic from 1788-1800,
Presidents Washington and John Adams (Resource: instructor’s links in Lesson 2)

·         Rise of political parties, Federalists and Democratic Republicans (AKA Republicans—but they are not like modern Republicans)

·         Party divisions on:
- National bank plus “implied powers”
- Alien and Sedition Act

·         Pinckney’s Treaty

·         Whiskey Rebellion, causes and suppression

·         Election of 1800 and the peaceful transfer of power

5.        President Jefferson (Resource: instructor’s links in Lesson 3)

·         Parties: Democratic-Republicans and Federalists

·         Louisiana Purchase

·         Ending of the slave trade (Slavery remains.)

6.         War of 1812  Issues In both of President Madison’s terms

·         Native Americans as allies with the British in their last attempt to get their land back, but it fails leading to removal of them in the North

·         Battle of New Orleans and how Andrew Jackson becomes famous

·         Hartford Convention, a secession attempt

7.        President Monroe – end of the Virginia dynasty

·         Era of Good Feelings

·         National bank and Panic of 1819

·         Monroe Doctrine, its purpose and author

·         Missouri Compromise (See the caution in the instructor’s link and see the primary in Lesson 3.)

8.        President John Quincy Adams

·         Election of 1824, so-called “corrupt bargain” and the decline of economic nationalism and John Quincy Adams

9.        Election of 1828, nominating convention and its victor

10.     President Andrew Jackson

·         The “spoils system”

·         Veto of the national bank (and subsequent recession)

·         Nullification crisis with South Carolina (and what makes the state volatile) – a prelude to a later secession attempt

·         Removal of Native Americans in the South and the Trail of Tears

 

Changes that develop and increase over time (See Lesson 3 and 4):

11.     Supreme Court, corporations, power of national government over states

·         Marbury v. Madison and judicial review

·         Chief Justice John Marshall, 1801-1835 and his decisions

12.     States decreasing property requirements to vote and increasing the number of white male voters (Begins in Jefferson’s time and escalates in Jackson’s. States vary; in the North some free blacks vote.)

13.     Political parties shifting to volatile nominating conventions, a method first used by the American Party (nativism)

14.     Immigration and rise of nativism as a political party

·         Irish mainly to the Northeast, type of work, their religion

·         Germans mainly to the new Northwest, type of work

15.     Developing technology and economy in the North and wealth but lack of diversification in the South

·         Cotton gin, inventor and role in the westward expansion of slavery

·         Cotton textile mills, Lowell Mills in New England (but British textile mills were the major purchasers of Southern cotton)

·         New internal improvements in transportation mainly in the North—canals, turnpikes (toll roads), and later railroad (Erie Canal - See Lesson 4.)

·         New means of transportation—Conestoga wagons, steamboats, steamships, clipper ships

·         New agricultural machinery—Deere plow, McCormick reaper