I

1. What factors explain Western European expansion to the New World after 1492?
V. The European expansion to the New World began in late 15th century and contin
ued throughout
the 19th century. By 1492 Western European civilization seems to have been the o
nly civilization
ready and interested in territorial expansion overseas.
A. The Arabs, who were expanding in Africa and Southern Europe, controlled much
of the trade
between Asia and Europe; they were not interested in overseas conquests.
B. The African and most Asian nations were not ready for expansion yet. The Chin
ese, the only
Asian civilization that had the resources and may have been ready for exploratio
n, were not
interested.
2. What elements played a decisive role in the European conquest of the Americas
?
VI. The European conquest of the Americas was possible because Native Americans
were politically
and culturally fragmented, outnumbered, and technologically inferior to the Euro
peans.
A. The Americas were far more fragmented than Europe.
B. At the time of Columbus voyage Europe was relatively unified.
C. The European conquest was possible also due to the domino effect. The forces
that propelled
the Spanish across the Atlantic soon sent other European nations to the Americas
in search of
wealth and national prestige.
3. Compare Spanish, French and Dutch ventures in North America.
D. Spanish conquests were focused on Central America where the Spanish erected i
ts empire of
New Spain, stretching from the Caribbean and Mexico to the western part of South
America.
1. The military model the Spanish used for their colonial ventures was the conqu
est of the
Moorish province of Granada, completed in 1492. The colonization of the Americas
and
the subjugation of their native peoples were seen by the Spaniards as a campaign
to
vanquish infidels.
E. French conquests involved a colony of New France planted in the St. Lawrence
River region of
Canada.
2. The basis for the French empire in Canada was fur trade with the Abenakis, Hu
rons, and
other local tribes.
(1) Maintaining the trade required friendly relations with the Indians and also
a great deal
of diplomacy, especially that the French intruded upon a region where Indian tri
bes
were constantly fighting blood feuds called mourning wars.
F. The Dutch venture into North America resembled that of France. It began as a
trading
enterprise but was ended a government that was unwilling to make a significant i
nvestment in

a North American colony.

4. What are the

Folkways Thesis

and the

Cousins

Wars Thesis?

B. Another reason behind the Englishness of the United States is the history of
its early
colonization as described in the Folkways Thesis by the American cultural historia
n David
Hackett Fischer.
1. According to Fischer the American society is the product of the interaction o
f the four
British cultures that settled the present area of the US during the very long fo
rmative period
from 1629 to 1775.
VIII. The global expansion of the English-speaking people on both sides of the A
tlantic between
15th and 20th centuries can be examined in the light of the Cousins Wars Thesis pro
posed by the
American historian Kevin Phillips.
A. According to Phillips the rise of Anglo-America from a small Tudor kingdom to
a global
community and world hegemony was possible through a curious combination of relig
ious
fervor and militarism.
5. How can the knowledge of American history be useful to a modern person?
A. It provides context for understanding the modern world in which we live. To u
nderstand the
current world order based politically on the United Nations organization, econom
ically on the
World Bank, and militarily on American military bases, and to understand the Ame
rican world
hegemony one needs to know history of the United States.
B. It sheds light on the main political, economic and social ideas that inform o
ur world:
inalienable human rights that have become the cornerstone of modern democracy, t
he tripartite
separation of powers into executive, legislative and judicial, and above all the
idea that
governments are constituted by the people and for the people have all became model
s for the
modern society.
C. It helps juxtapose American history with history of Europe, pointing to simil
arities and
dissimilarities. To understand what is distinctive about historic and contempora
ry America and
what is not, one should study history of the US.
II
6. Describe English attempts to establish overseas colonies during the reign of
Queen Elizabeth.
I. England s search for an overseas empire began during the reign of Queen Elizabe
th I (1558-1603)
and continued through 19th century, when Britain dominated not only North Americ
a, but much of
the world as well. The first stage of English imperial venture lasted until 1603
.

A. English search for wealth and power overseas was inseparable from the religio
us impulse
tinged with fervent nationalism. In England, nationalism fused with a sense of r
eligious
mission so intense, and outrageous, that the English would insist that God is Eng
lish.
C. Elizabeth was unwilling to risk her treasury on North American adventures. Ye
t, she was
willing to let individual Englishmen try to poach on the Spanish, with whom the
English had
been at war since 1585. From 1585 to 1604, the English government issued license
s to state
sanctioned pirates, called privateers, sometimes as many as 100 per year.
D. English attempts to break into the Spanish-controlled slave and other trade i
n the Caribbean
failed, although they proved that the Spanish empire was vulnerable.
7. What was Roanoke and why it failed?
F. England s first colony in what became the US was Roanoke Island on the Outer Ba
nks of
modern North Carolina.
1. Roanoke was a military venture, supposed to be a resupply base for privateers
raiding in
the Caribbean.
2. The first attempt to establish a colony was made in 1585. The rowdy soldier-s
ettlers first
alienated the local Roanoke Indians whom they bullied for food, and then abandon
ed the
colony, hitching a ride back to England.
3. The second attempt to establish a colony at Roanoke was made in 1587. It was
doomed
from the start by the poisoned relations with the Indians, and the survival of t
he colony
depended upon continued support from England. By 1590 the colony was abandoned a
nd
the lost colonists were never heard of again.
8. What was the formula for a successful English colony discovered in Virginia?
C. The first Anglo-Powhatan war started in 1609 after Captain John Smith bullied
the Powhatans
into giving them some food and ended in 1614 with the marriage between Pocahonta
s and a
farmer John Rolfe.
1. Pocahontas helped John improve the quality of wild tobacco, and Rolfe s improve
d strain
of tobacco immediately found a ready market in England. Within a few years of Ro
lfe s
first cargo, Virginia experienced an economic boom as a place where large fortun
es could
in a few years.
2. To attract colonists and distribute land, the Company introduced the English
common law,
which guaranteed the colonists all the rights of the English people. These induc
ements
attracted 3500 settlers to Virginia in three years, three times as many as had c
ome in the
past ten.
3. By accident more than planning, Virginia had found the formula for a successf

ul English
colony. In order for colonists to be attracted 3000 miles across the ocean, they
would have
to be offered greater opportunities to make money and greater rights of self-gov
ernment
than they would have had at home.
9. When and why the southern colonies became economically based on slavery?
F. By mid 17th century Chesapeake society of Virginia and Maryland became slaveowning
economies.
1. The Chesapeake s greatest problem was securing laborers to produce tobacco. The
demand
for labor was almost insatiable.
2. Perhaps 90% of those who migrated to the Chesapeake in the 17th century came
as
indentured servants: bound by indentures or contracts to serve for a period of u
sually seven
years. Servants were worked to the point of death and half of them died before c
ompleting
their term of service.
3. Africans first arrived in 1619, when a Dutch ship sailing off its course sold
its cargo of 20
Africans to the Virginians. As long as life expectancy in the region was low, it
was more
profitable for a planter to purchase an indentured servant for a period of seven
years than a
slave for life, as the slave was much more expensive.
10. Who were Puritans and what colonies they settled?
III. All Puritan colonies of New England Massachusetts, Connecticut, Rhode Island,
and New
Hampshire grew out of two initial settlements: one at Plymouth in 1620, and one at
Massachusetts Bay in 1629.
B. Puritans were Protestants who embraced the Calvinist doctrine of predestinati
on and whose
religious convictions were more radical than those of Anglicans.
11. Who were the Pilgrims?
C. The first Puritan colony in North America was established in 1620 at Plymouth
, by a group of
Puritans known as the Pilgrims. The Pilgrims were Separatists who had given up a
ll hope of
changing the Church and instead were prepared to separate from it.
12. What was the Mayflower Compact?
2. Carrying 102 passengers, the Mayflower arrived at Plymouth, Massachusetts, in
November
1620, far north of its destination. Because the Pilgrims had landed in territory
to which the
Virginia Company had no legal claim, all the adult men on board signed a documen
t
known as the Mayflower Compact before disembarking. In this first political docu
ment
signed in North America the men bound themselves into a Civil Body Politic to make
laws and govern the colony and also to recognize the authority of the governor.

13. Explain the basic tenets of mercantilism.

IV. Throughout the 17th century, Britain s economic policies were guided by a theo
ry called
mercantilism. This theory held that the chief object of a nation s economy was to
serve the state,
rather than its inhabitants in general.
A. Mercantilism defined wealth exclusively as gold and silver. Since there was o
nly a finite
amount of gold and silver in the world, one nation s gain could come only by anoth
er s loss.
Mercantilism led naturally to rivalries with other nations.
B. The chief expression of mercantilism was the regulation of foreign trade. Bet
ween 1651 and
1696, the British government passed a series of trade regulations known as the N
avigation
Acts. These acts required that all goods shipped to England and to her colonies
be carried in
ships owned and manned by Englishmen, including colonists. In addition, all good
s going to or
from the colonies had to be shipped via Britain, where they could be taxed.
14. What new colonies were established in the second part of the 17th century?
A. In 1664 the English took over the Dutch colony of New Netherland wedged betwe
en their New
England colonies in the north and their southern colonies of Virginia and Maryla
nd in the
south. The territory of New Netherland was soon divided into new colonies: New Y
ork, East
Jersey, West Jersey (combined in a single royal colony called New Jersey in 1702
) and
Pennsylvania.
C. Further down south, below Virginia, a new colony of Carolina was established
in 1670.
15. What was the difference between the southern and other forms of slavery?
3. Unlike in other slave systems, Southern American slavery was racial reserved fo
r
Africans, some Indians, and their children and it made manumissions, the freeing o
f
slaves, very rare.
16. What was the importance of the Glorious Revolution for North American coloni
es?
A. The first important consequence of the Glorious Revolution for the American C
olonies was
that it restored to them self-government that had been denied in the past decade
.
B. The second important consequence was that the Revolution became a model of Co
nstitutional
government.
III
17. What factors explain the growth of the colonial population in the 18th centu
ry?

A. Much of this population growth was caused by immigration. Immigrants could be

free or
unfree: indentured servants (British immigrants who had to negotiate terms of th
eir indentures
or contracts in England), redemptioners (non-British immigrants who had to negot
iate terms of
their indentures upon arrival in America), convicts (British citizens whose sent
ences were
commuted to a term of service in the colonies) and African slaves.
C. The population of African slaves, victims of the transatlantic slave trade, g
rew from less than
3000 in 1660 to more than 300,000 in 1775.
D. For all these new arrivals, most of the increase in the colonies population ca
me not from
immigration or the slave trade but from natural increase.
18. What were consumer and industrious revolutions?
1. a consumer revolution: a slow and steady increase in the demand for, and purc
hase of,
consumer goods.
2. an industrious revolution: a process in which people organized their househol
ds to produce
goods that could be sold, so that they would have money to pay for the items the
y wanted.
19. What was a revolution of manners and how it relates to the creation of genti
lity?
B. Both of these processes introduced a revolution of manners, as plantation pro
ducts and
consumer goods once considered luxuries were becoming widely available. The resu
lt was the
creation of gentility.
1. By 1700, with the appearance of the dressing table and the full-length mirror
, people
became increasingly interested in how they appeared to others. Washing and fashi
oning
oneself became standard rituals for all who hoped to appear genteel.
20. What was the diversification of the colonies
entury?

economy that begun in the 18th c

C. The 18th century also saw the beginning of diversification of the colonies eco
nomy. The
plantation regions of the South, made such large profits from selling tobacco, r
ice, and indigo
that they purchased more land and more slaves to work it. Northern farmers, whos
e profits
from agriculture were low, had to look for other opportunities to make money, an
d they found
them in trade. The South was more prosperous, but the North was more economicall
y
diversified.
21. What were the shared aspects of the Enlightenment and the Great Awakening?
III. American religious, intellectual, and cultural life in the 18th century was
shaped by two significant

movements: the Enlightenment and the Great Awakening. Although these movements s
eemed
fundamentally opposed to each other, both criticized established authority, both
valued the
experience of the individual, and both contributed to the humanitarianism that e
merged at the end
of the century.
22. What was the Enlightenment and how it impacted the colonies?
A. The Enlightenment was a transatlantic intellectual and philosophical movement
that held that
the universe could be understood and improved by the human mind. Rejecting revel
ation as a
guide, the Enlightenment looked instead to reason. It was interested in knowledg
e not for its
own sake, but for the improvements it could make in human happiness.
The Enlightenment spurred the creation of not only new political and economic th
eories,
but also of a number of institutions that embodied its principles, such as hospi
tals and
public libraries.
23. What was the Great Awakening and how it impacted the colonies?
B. The Great Awakening was a transatlantic religious and social movement that he
ld that all
people were born sinners, that all could feel their own depravity without the as
sistance of
ministers, and that all were equal in the eyes of God. The Awakening was a serie
s of religious
revivals that swept through the colonies between 1734 and 1745.
The Awakening increased religious toleration in
the colonies, and strengthened religion itself, as a general force, making the c
olonies
simultaneously the most Protestant and the most religiously diverse culture in t
he world.
24. What was the French and Indian War and what made it the most important war f
ought in North America in the 18th century?
B. The French and Indian War (1754-63) began from a quarrel between France and V
irginia, both
of which had claimed the Ohio River valley.
E. In the Treaty of Paris (1763), which concluded the war, France surrendered to
Britain all of
Canada except for two small fishing islands off the coast of Newfoundland.
25. What were the two rounds of imperial legislation through which, following th
e French and Indian War, the British government
attempted to draw American colonies more closely into the imperial system?
B. Even more vexing were the attempts of the British government to force the col
onists to pay a
portion of the sum needed to support a large standing army now stationed in Nort
h America.
Toward this aim, Parliament passed four pieces of legislation: the Sugar Act, th
e Currency Act
(both 1764), the Stamp Act and the Quartering Act (both 1765).
D. In the first phase of colonial opposition, 1763-75, the ideological bedrock o

f the colonists
resistance to imperial legislation was constitutionalism. It was a set of ideas
about the British
government that comprised two elements: the rule of law, and the principle of co
nsent (that
one could not be subjected to laws or taxation except by duly elected representa
tives).
E. The second round of imperial legislation began in 1767 when Parliament passed
The
Townshend Revenue Act. The Act levied duties on some imported goods. Again the c
olonists
resisted, boycotting imports, and forcing the British to repeal it by 1770.
26. What was the use the colonist patriots made of constitutionalism and republi
canism?
F. In resisting the Townshend Duties the colonial radical thinkers used a body o
f thought known
as republicanism: a set of doctrines that held that power is always grasping, al
ways dangerous.
According to a republican explanation, British actions were not acts of debatabl
e
constitutionality, but a carefully orchestrated plot to deprive the colonists of
their liberty. In
this way republicanism provided constitutionalism with a motive.
27. What were the Coercion Acts and why were they passed?
the Sugar Act, the Currency Act
(both 1764), the Stamp Act and the Quartering Act (both 1765).
Together, these acts were
known in Britain as the Coercion Acts and in the colonies as the Intolerable Act
s. The British
had thought that Massachusetts could be isolated.
28. What were the four objectives achieved by the First Continental Congress?
1. Firstly, after Massachusetts abandoned any discussion of offensive measures a
gainst the
British, Congress recommended passive resistance to the Intolerable Acts.
2. Secondly, it issued a call for a boycott of all trade between the colonies an
d Britain.
3. Thirdly, Congress adopted a Declaration of Rights: a document, which for the
first time
openly expressed the collective determination of every colony to stand by consti
tutional
arguments.
4. Finally, Congress agreed to reconvene in half a year, in 1775, unless the Int
olerable Acts
were repealed.
IV
29. What were the four important events in the course of escalating confrontatio
n between the colonies and Britain before the Declaration of Independence?
A. The new governor of Massachusetts, General Gage, sought to isolate and crush
the colonial
revolutionary elite. In April 1775 Gage determined to seize the colonists militar
y supplies,

stored at Concord. On their way to Concord, British regulars met and engaged loc
al militias.
These scuffles, battles of Lexington and of Concord, were the first battles of t
he war for
independence.
B. Following Lexington and Concord, about 20,000 New England men converged on Bo
ston and
fortified Breed s Hill in Charlestown, a town across the Boston harbor. In June 17
75 Gage sent
2,400 soldiers to take the hill and succeeded but at terrific cost. In a battle
that ensued the
British casualties amounted to 1092, compared to 370 casualties among the coloni
sts.
C. The Second Continent Congress
D. In August the king declared the colonists to be in rebellion. Although Congre
ss neither
declared war nor asserted independence, the Revolution had begun. The Continenta
l Army
marched on Canada, hoping to seize it from the British. The assault was a disast
er and the
remnants of the expedition retreated back to New York in the spring 1776.
30. What were the four decisions of the Second Continental Congress?
C. The Second Continent Congress, in session since May 1775, acknowledged that m
ilitary
preparations were necessary and made four decisions:
1. It voted to create a Continental Army under the leadership of George Washingt
on;
2. It decided to attack Canada and defeat the British there;
3. It adopted the Declaration of the Causes and Necessities of Taking up Arms to j
ustify its
actions;
4. It petitioned the king one more time by issuing the Olive Branch Petition.
31. What elements in the Declaration of Independence were borrowed and what elem
ents made it truly original?
C. The Declaration of Independence borrowed ideas from a number of British and E
uropean
sources, including constitutionalism, republicanism, Enlightenment thought, and
millennial
Christian thought. When millennialism was fused with these other strands of revo
lutionary
thought, it gave Americans a sense of optimism and mission.
D. Although it drew from many sources, the Declaration of Independence was truly
original. It set
out a clear vision not only of government but also of society, a vision based on
three core
ideas: the principle of human equality, the belief in a universal human nature a
nd human
rights, and the belief that government should represent the people and protect t
heir rights.
32. What were the Articles of Confederation?
A. The first proposal for a legitimate national government and a confederation o
f the states with a
written constitution was formulated in the Articles of Confederation. The Articl
es came into

effect in 1781 and served as the basis for the national government until the rat
ification of the
Constitution in 1787.
33. What developments marked the first phase of the war?
B. Between 1775 and 1780, each of the thirteen states adopted a new, written con
stitution and
created state governments, where the new ideas about liberty, equality, and gove
rnment were
put into practice.
34. What Polish volunteers fought in the revolution and what was their contribut
ion?
1. Pulaski whose cavalry charge saved Washington s army from being wiped out at the
battle of the Brandywine River in 1777 became the first commander of the horse in th
e
Continental Army but was killed in 1779, in Savannah, GA.
2. Kosciuszko was an engineer and tactician. He built West Point, planned and ov
ersaw the
construction of forts and fortifications, and participated in several battles. K
osciszko s
contribution to American independence is recounted in Alex Storozynski s The Peasa
nt
Prince: Thaddeus Kosciuszko and the Age of Revolution (2009).
35. What international alliances the United States entered into during the war a
nd to what effect?
G. In 1777, after the American victory at Saratoga, the French entered into a fo
rmal alliance with
the American colonies. The entry of the French tied down the British in other pa
rts of the
world and brought America more than $8 million in aid.
36. What were the terms of the Treaty of Paris, and when was it signed?
D. Under the terms of the Treaty of Paris, signed in 1783, Britain recognized Am
erican
independence, and the US acquired the territory between the Appalachians and the
Mississippi
and south of the Great Lakes.
37. What were the three most important consequences of the war?
VI. The three most important consequences of the war were social and population
changes resulting
from the departure of the Loyalists; changes in the colonies economy; and dispute
s over rights
and freedoms, which eventually let to the creation of the American Constitution,
central
government, and its policy in the West.
A. The Departure of about 80,000 loyalists (from a group of about half a million
) was perhaps the
most immediate consequence of the war. Since the loyalist exiles came disproport
ionately
from the top tier of American society, their departure enhanced democratizing te
ndencies of

the Revolution in two ways.

B. The economic consequences of the war were highly disruptive. Trade with Brita
in and the
British West Indies was cut off and remained so after the war, ruining many merc
hants and
devastating commerce. The search for solutions to the postwar depression produce
d two
contrasting visions for the US political economy.
C. The dispute about how best to preserve the gains of the Revolution that devel
oped between the
moderates and the radicals also involved social and political issues. It centere
d on three large
questions about the rights of women, slaves, and Indians each of which challenged th
e preRevolutionary social order.
38. In what way the post-war dispute about the rights of women challenged the pr
e-Revolutionary social order?
D. By the end of the war the disfranchisement of women seemed to many at odds wi
th the
egalitarian ideals of the Revolution. Although Congress eventually denied vote t
o women, the
revolution expanded Americans views about women s intellectual and political capabi
lities.
39. Explain how the revolution changed the institution of slavery in America.
E. Even more at odds with the revolutionary ethos was slavery. A combination of
revolutionary
ideals of freedom and African-American activism presented a significant challeng
e to white
Americans, and they were able to meet it in part. Slavery was eliminated in the
North,
forbidden in the West, and questioned in the upper South. Yet, it survived in ev
ery state south
of New Jersey.
40. What was the Northwest Ordinance and what were its four key points?
2. Soon after the war, in the Northwest Ordinance of 1787, slavery was prohibite
d in the
Northwest Territory the future states of Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, Michigan, and Wi
sconsin.
41. What facts do you remember about the American Cosntitution?
VIII. The American Constitution was ratified by Congress in 1787, by the states
in 1788, and came
into effect from 1789. It is the oldest and the shortest (4,400 words) written c
onstitution of any
government in the world. It was forged in a debate between the nationalists who
wanted to create a
stronger central government, and the localists who feared that it would subvert
liberty.
A. The Constitution was written and ratified by an amazingly young group, with m
ost delegates in
Congress in their thirties and forties. It was the creation of a small group of
men who thought
nationally. Yet, it had to be ratified by a nation that still thought about gove

rnment in wholly
local terms.
42. Who were federalists and antifederalists and what was the difference between
them?
C. As the Federalists had to explain the Constitution in terms that would make s
ense to skeptical
Americans, and as the Antifederalists tried to explain what they thought was wro
ng with it, a
new understanding of what American government should be was crafted.
D. Although Federalists shared many of the beliefs of the Antifederalists especial
ly the rights of
individuals and suspicion of unchecked government the differences between the Fede
ralists
and Antifederalists were profound.
1. As a rule, the Antifederalists were more rural and less involved in the marke
t than the
Federalists. They fought in militias and were old-line republicans, who continue
d to use
the language of corruption, tyranny, and enslavement to discuss government. They
were
localists who believed passionately in the local community and were committed to
individual rights, which they enshrined in the Bill of Rights.
2. The Federalists, by contrast, were more urban, with experience in the market
economy of
the 18th century. They served as officers in the Continental Army and members of
the
national government during the Revolution. Unlike the Antifederalists, who denie
d power,
the Federalists divided it: they believed that government power must be strong b
ut
controlled. The separation of powers and elaborate series of checks and balances
that the
Constitution created, as well as the system of federalism itself, reflects their
fear of
unchecked government.
V
43. Who were Democratic Republicans and what were their ideas about the governme
nt?
B. Coalesced around James Madison and Thomas Jefferson, Democratic Republicans s
ought to
defend republican interests of ordinary people against controlling ambitions of
a central
government. Like most free, hard-working Americans, they believed that the succe
ss of the
republic depended on the political virtue of its republican citizens: those who
were not too
wealthy and not too poor, and whose lives balanced personal ambition and an abid
ing interest
in the common good. Democratic Republicans were motivated by the love of liberty
.
44. Who were Federalists and what were their ideas about the government?
C. Centered around Alexander Hamilton and George Washington, Federalists believe
d that a

strong central government is necessary and unavoidable. Supported by large lando

wners and
merchants, Federalists believed that the success of the republic depended on how
effective its
central government will be in dealing with economy and politics on the national
and
international scale. Federalists were motivated by the love of order.
45. Describe the central paradox of Washington s Indian policy.
E. Washington s Indian policy was twofold.
1. On the one hand, it sought to bring consistency and a greater degree of fairn
ess to Indian
policy, advocating that the US meet its moral and legal obligation by purchasing
Indian
claims to the disputed lands.
2. On the other hand, it did not recognize an ultimate right of Native Americans
to refuse to
negotiate or sell their lands.
3. This double bind wrote into American policy one of the enduring paradoxes of
federal
relations with Indians: the linkage of a rhetoric of negotiation with a reality
of coercion.
46. What was the importance of the Louisiana Purchase?
II. In 1803, a Democratic Republican President Thomas Jefferson doubled the terr
itory of the US
with the Louisiana Purchase, thus anticipating the trans-Mississippi expansion o
f the nation.
D. The Louisiana Purchase was a momentous transaction. In the South it supplied
new territories
for slavery s march west. In both the North and the South, it ensured that the Ame
rican assault
on Native American lands, communities and freedom would be projected across the
Mississippi.
47. Who was Tecumseh and what was his role in the history of Indian resistance t
o white settlement?
B. By 1805 the diffuse anger of Native Americans was coalesced into effective or
ganized
resistance by two Shawnee leaders, the warrior chief Tecumseh and his half-broth
er,
Tenskwatawa, known as The Prophet.
1. About 1808, Tecumseh and Tenskwatawa founded a village in present-day Indiana
on the
banks of the Tippecanoe River. The Prophet remained there, while Tecumseh travel
ed,
building a pan-Indian alliance.
2. By 1811, Tecumseh s widespread success alarmed the Americans. That fall, as Tec
umseh
made his way to the villages of the Cherokees and the Creeks, an army marched to
ward
Tecumseh s village in Indiana. Although cautioned by Tecumseh not to be drawn into
battle in his absence, The Prophet engaged American troops and was thoroughly de
feated.
3. In 1812, when war broke out between Britain and the US, Tecumseh amassed a hu
ge force
on the side of the British. His death in battle on Canadian soil in 1813 marked

the end of
organized Indian resistance east of the Mississippi.
48. What were the two victories and the two defeats of the War of 1812?
IV. The Second War with England (1812-14) broke as a result of British blockade
of Europe, in the
course of which since 1805 the British, and then the French, began seizing American
ships
traveling to and from Europe.
1. Three overland advances to invade Canada in the summer of 1812 failed.
2. In 1813 American honor in the North was saved by Commodore Perry s victory on L
ake
Erie, in which he forced the surrender of the entire British Great Lakes squadro
n.
3. By 1813 the British Navy had succeeded in blockading the American coast from
the
Chesapeake south through the Gulf of Mexico to New Orleans.
4. The British fleet pummeled the American cities and villages along the coast,
first
bombarding them from sea and then sending parties on shore to fire the ruins and
attack the
fleeing refugees. In 1814 the British troops invaded and laid waste to Washingto
n and then
Baltimore.
49. What was the Missouri Compromise?
A. The Missouri Compromise of 1820 was a political decision in response to a new
danger in the
settlement of the West: its power to tear the nation apart. In 1819, when Missou
ri applied for
permission to organize as a state, there were 22 states in the union, 11 free an
d 11 slave.
1. The question of Missouri was one of political power on the federal level: adm
ission of
Missouri would give the slave states domination in any purely sectional disputes
.
2. The firestorm was resolved when Maine applied for statehood as a free state.
The two bills
were linked in the Missouri Compromise, preserving the balance in the Senate.'
50. What was the Nullification Crisis?
B. The Nullification Crisis was the first attempt at secession by a southern sta
te. The nullification
was a decision, made in 1832 by South Carolina Radicals in a statewide conventio
n, that
federal tariffs of 1828 and 1832 are null and void in the state and will not be
collected.
51. Explain the source of tensions between Americans and Mexicans, and the steps
toward the creation of independent Texas.
C. The growth of tension with Mexico was the result of influx of Anglo settles t
o the territories of
northern Mexico and resulted in an uprising that separated Texas from Mexico as
an
independent country in 1836.
D. In 1832 the Anglos demanded the right to organize their own separate state wi

thin Mexico, and

in 1836 they declared Texas a free and sovereign republic.
1. Armed conflict broke out in 1836, when a huge Mexican Army, led by General Sa
nta
Anna, wiped out 187 Texas patriots barricaded in a mission called the Alamo.
2. A few weeks later the Texans scored a huge victory against the Mexicans. Barg
aining to
save his life, Santa Anna signed a declaration that Texas was a free nation.
3. Ecstatic Texans drew up a constitution, made Army commander in chief Sam Hous
ton
their first president, and called for annexation to the US as soon as possible.
52. Name the four effects of the migration of 1840s for the Indians of the plain
s and prairies.
1. The migration created a false stereotype of bloodthirsty Indians. In fact, of
the more than
250,000 settlers who crossed the plains between 1840 and 1860, fewer than 400 we
re
killed by Native Americans protecting their homes. More often white migrants and
Indians
merely passed each other silently on the trail or relied upon one another for fo
od.
2. The migration caused a shift in official US policy toward the Indians. Prior
to the massive
migration, it had been one of removal west to new tribal lands. After 1840s it w
as
resettlement with individual ownership of reservation lands. The goal was to mak
e Indians
live like white farmers.
3. The migration forced many tribes to shift from semiagricultural to more nomad
ic ways of
life. By 1840, the great northern grasslands and southern plains of central Nort
h America
supported a complex economy of hunting and foraging, at the center of which stoo
d the
buffalo. The way of life that had evolved on the plains by 1840s could survive u
nchanged
only as long as the buffalo survived.
4. The migration brought about the end of the buffalo. By 1848 recreational hunt
ing parties,
as well as bands of hunters wiped out the buffalo specifically to deprive Indian
communities of their support. This soon threw the Indians at the mercy of the go
vernment.
53. What was Manifest Destiny?
A. Manifest Destiny the phrase coined in 1845 by journalist John O Sullivan, but as
a concept
dating back to late 18th century was the belief that white Americans have a provid
ential right
to as much of the land of North America as they care to claim. Manifest Destiny
informed the
vast migration of Americans across the Mississippi River, into Texas and the Sou
thwest,
across the Great Plains into Oregon, and by ship and overland to California.
54. What were the US reasons for and goals in the war with Mexico?
VII. Between 1836 and 1845 Texas was doing everything in its power to be annexed

by the US.
The annexation was problematic not only because a strict adherence to the letter
and spirit of the
Constitution did not permit it, but also because Texas had come to embody the hi
ghly charged
issue of slavery. The annexation of Texas in 1845 was resented by Northerners an
d provoked a
war with Mexico in which even more land was transferred to the US.
VI
55. What were the changes that transformed the North between 1820s and 1860?
A. Between 1820s and 1860s the economy in the North changed in three important w
ays: it was
more productive, more populous, and more urban.
1. Thanks to impressive new inventions, northern farmers productivity quadrupled.
2. The US, predominantly the North, accepted five million immigrants. More than
two-thirds
of them were Irish or German, usually Roman Catholic. By 1855 a larger proportio
n of
Americans was foreign born than at any other time in the nation s history. By 1860
immigrants made up more than one-third of the residents in northern cities.
3. The society in the North was becoming more urban and industry was replacing a
griculture
as the driving economic force.
56. Why was the westward expansion of slavery so troubling for the north?
2. At the same time the slaveholders had come to believe that their own prosperi
ty depended
on the diffusion of the slave economy into the West. By 1850 slavery had expande
d more
than halfway across the continent of North America and white southerners grew
accustomed to viewing territorial expansion of slavery as a sign of progress.
57. What was the Compromise of 1850?
C. To rescue the compromise, senator Stephen A. Douglas from Illinois, broke the
omnibus
package up into five separate bills. Although proslavery and antislavery forces
in Congress
never once compromised on a single issue, the five bills were passed and came to
be known as
the Compromise of 1850. The Compromise of 1850 worked well in the short run.
1. One problem was that neither side saw it as victory, and to both it had the b
itter taste of
defeat.
2. Even worse, one feature of the compromise, the new fugitive slave law, provok
ed a
widespread opposition in the North.
58. What was the Fugitive Slave Act and why it provoked such anger in the north?
D. The Fugitive Slave Act of 1850 provoked an uproar because of four reasons:
1. It took jurisdiction over fugitive slave cases away from northern courts and
gave it to a
newly established cadre of US commissioners.
2. It bribed the commissioners to send captives into slavery (they were paid $10 i
f they

ruled that a black captive should be returned to slavery but only $5 if they rul
ed that the
captive was legitimately free).
3. It allowed commissioners to draft local citizens to assist slave catchers, th
ereby forcing
northerners against their wills to send their neighbors into slavery.
4. It seemed to be imposing southern laws and institutions onto the North, forci
ng northerners
into complicity with the slave regime.
59. Explain how the Kansas-Nebraska Act and the Ostend Manifesto fit in with the
debates that tore the North and the South apart.
F. The next milestone that revived the slavery debate was the Kansas-Nebraska Ac
t of 1854. The
Act explicitly repealed the Missouri Compromise by allowing slavery north of the
Missouri
Compromise line. As with other southern victories in the recent past, the Kansas
-Nebraska Act
only increased support for anti-slavery politicians in the North.
60. What key events between 1856 and 1860 provoked further flaring up of section
al tensions?
A. In the presidential election of 1856 the choice between the Republican and th
e Democratic
candidate meant that for the first time in their history, Americans were being a
sked to decide
whether the Union was worth preserving. The Republicans lost, but President Jame
s
Buchanan s efforts to silence the slavery issue proved a disastrous failure.
1. In 1857 sectional tensions were fueled by the Dred Scott decision. The US Sup
reme Court
declared that African Americans were not and never had been citizens. It also de
fined slave
ownership as a constitutional right, thereby threatening the power of states to
abolish
slavery within their borders.
IV. Lincoln s presidential election provoked the secession of some southern states
; others followed
after his decision to keep the Union by force of arms.
61. Describe the course of the secession from the Union in the spring of 1861.
E. By the spring of 1861 the eleven secessionists states had constructed an impr
essive political
apparatus. They had proclaimed the Confederate States of America, with Richmond,
Virginia,
as their nation s capital, and elected an experienced politician and Mississippi p
lanter,
Jefferson Davis, as their president.
62. What were both sides initial assumptions about the war and how the economic p
otentials of the North and the South impacted the course of war?
A. By 1862 Union commanders adopted the principle of unconditional surrender and
the
confiscation of supplies from southern civilians. Also the encounters were becom
ing
exceedingly bloody.

63. Describe the first phase of the war.

1. The battle of Shiloh, TN, (1862) ended with the Confederates defeat and an ast
ounding
23,741 casualties on both sides.
2. 1862 saw the first failed Confederate invasion of the North. At the Battle of
Antietam
Creek, MD, the Confederate forces led by General Robert E. Lee suffered staggeri
ng
casualties 22,800 on both sides and were turned back
64. What was the Emancipation proclamation, and how it changed the Civil War?
B. Lincoln took advantage of the Union victory at Antietam to announce an import
ant shift in
northern war aims. His preliminary Emancipation Proclamation promised to declare
free all
slaves held by masters in areas still in rebellion against the Union on January
1, 1863. When
the New Year arrived, Lincoln s final proclamation added another twist by sanction
ing the
enlistment of African Americans in the Union Army.
1. The proclamation transformed Union soldiers into an army of liberation. It wa
s an open
invitation for slaves to run away to Union lines, disrupting the Confederacy sti
ll further.
2. African-American Union troops were conclusive evidence that the Civil War had
become a
social revolution. By the war s end 186,000 African Americans had enlisted, two th
irds of
them recruited in the South.
65. What was the Gettysburg Address and it s meaning for the war?
3. In November, Lincoln spoke at the dedication of a military cemetery at Gettys
burg. His
Gettysburg Address articulated a profound justification of the Union war effort as
the
test of democracy, ensuring that government of the people, by the people, for the
people,
shall not perish from the earth.
66. Enumerate four out of five most important consequences of the Civil War.
E. The most dramatic consequence of the war was the emancipation of over four mi
llion slaves
and the destruction of southern slave society. In early 1865 Congress passed the
Thirteenth
Amendment, abolishing slavery in the US.
A. The Civil War was a vindication of the northern political economy based on fr
ee labor and
convincingly defeated the economy of slavery. In 1860 the North and the South ha
d identical
per capita incomes and nearly identical per capita wealth. By 1870 the North was
50% more
wealthy than the South and its per capita commodity output was 56% higher.
B. The Civil War redistributed political power. From 1787 until 1860 slaveholder
s and their allies

had controlled the Supreme Court, dominated the presidency, and exercised dispro
portionate
influence in Congress. The Civil War destroyed the slaveholding class and with i
t the
slaveholders political power. For the rest of the century the North and the West
would
dominate national politics.
C. The Civil War strengthened the advocates of a stronger, more centralized nati
onal government.
It created the nation, the United States in place of, as was the case until 1860, t
hese United
States. It also propelled the growth of the central government, beginning with un
precedented
control of the economy. Financial reforms designed to assist the Union war effor
t became a
permanent part of the nation s regulatory system. Greenbacks became legal tender and
the
National Banking Act set rules for state and local banks that forced them into a
standardized
national system.
D. The Civil War brought an immense loss of life. With 620,000 military dead and
uncounted
civilian losses, the Civil War took more lives that all American wars combined,
before and
after. Advances in military technology multiplied the casualties, and primitive
medical practices
did further damage: two out of three soldiers who died in the war were felled no
t by bullets but
by sickness and disease.
VII
67. What were the three proposals for the reconstruction of the south that emerg
ed during the Civil War?
A. The Banks Plan implemented during the war throughout the lower Mississippi Vall
ey
required African Americans to sign year-long contracts to work on their former p
lantations.
Workers would be paid for their labor, and would be provided with food and shelt
er. They
were forbidden to leave the plantations without permission.
B. Lincoln s Ten-Percent Plan promised full pardons and the restoration of civil r
ights to all those
who swore their loyalty to the Union and specified that when the number of loyal
whites in
any of the former Confederate states reached 10% of the 1860 voting population,
they could
organize a new state constitution and set up a new government. The only stipulat
ion was that
they recognize the abolition of slavery.
C. Complaining that Lincoln s Ten-Percent Plan was too kind to former Confederates
and that the
Banks Plan was too harsh on former slaves, Republican Radicals instead champione
d the
Wade-Davis Bill. This proposal stipulated that reconstruction could not begin un
til a majority
of a state s white men swore an oath of allegiance to the Union. In addition, the
Wade-Davis
Bill guaranteed full legal and civil rights to African Americans, but not the ri

ght to vote.
68. What was Presidential Reconstruction and what why Congress opposed it?
II. Presidential Reconstruction (1865-66) was an attempt of President Andrew Joh
nson to reconstruct
the south according to his own opinions and without consultation with Congress.
69. What was Congressional (or Radical) Reconstruction and what were its achieve
ments?
III. Congressional Reconstruction (1866-70) was a partly successful attempt of R
adical Republicans
who controlled Congress to reconstruct the south more radically than the Preside
nt envisioned it.
A. In 1866 Congress repudiated presidential Reconstruction and in 1867 it passed
two
reconstruction acts.
1. The First Reconstruction Act reduced the southern states to the status of ter
ritories and
divided the South into five military districts directly controlled by the US Arm
y. Before
the southern states could be readmitted to the Union they had to draw up new con
stitutions,
ratify the Fourteenth Amendment and allow African-American men to vote.
2. The Second Reconstruction Act established the procedures to enforce African-A
merican
suffrage by placing the military in charge of voter registration.
1. They funded the construction of hospitals, insane asylums, prisons, and roads
.
2. They established public school systems.
3. They abolished the Black Codes, and passed statutes giving African-American w
orkers
more control over the crops they grew.
70. Describe the system of labor called sharecropping.
1. In the sharecropping system an agricultural worker and his family agreed to w
ork for one
year on a particular plot of land while the landowner provided the tools, seed,
and the work
animals. At the end of the year the sharecropper and the landlord split the crop
, perhaps
one-third going to the sharecropper and two-thirds to the owner.
2. Sharecropping required landowners to break up their plantations into family-s
ized plots.
3. Sharecropping had advantages for landlords and for the workers too.
71. List the four ways, which distinguished big business from other forms of bus
iness activity.
D. Most big businesses were so big that no single individual or family could own
them, much less
run them. And because they were so big, they had to be kept in operation continu
ously even
during economic crises. By 1880s big businesses developed several strategies des
igned to
shield them from the effects of economic slumps and ruinous competition.
A. By 1880s railroads, the manufacturing and banking industries produced busines
ses that they

dwarfed their largest antebellum counterparts. The massive, complex bureaucracie

s of big
business were managed by professionals rather than owners. They were financed th
rough a
national banking system centered on Wall Street. They marketed their goods and s
ervices
across the nation and around the world. Finally, big business generated wealth i
n staggering
concentrations.
72. Describe the new social hierarchy of industrial America.
V. The most important social consequence of these economic transformations was t
he emergence of
new social classes: a new millionaire class and a new middle class.
1. The backbone of the new middle class were professionals architects, teachers, d
octors,
lawyers and other professionals who organized themselves into professional associa
tions,
and set educational standards for admission.
1. As a group America s millionaires had a lot in common. Most traced their ancest
ry to
Great Britain, most were Protestant, and were unusually well educated. Except in
the
South, this class voted Republican.
73. What were the strategies big businesses developed to shield themselves from
economic slumps and competition?
1. The most common strategy was Carnegie s vertical integration, the attempt to cont
rol as
many aspects of a business as possible, from the production of raw materials to
the sale of
the finished product.
2. The other strategy, devised by John D. Rockefeller, was the forming of trusts e
laborate
legal devices by which different producers came together under the umbrella of a
single
company that could police competition internally.
3. Soon the trust gave way to the holding company . By 1900 many of the largest ind
ustries
in America were dominated by one or two massive holding companies.
74. Explain how the economic transformation of the east affected the west?
VI. The economic transformation of the east and the south changed the West as we
ll. By the time the
director of the US census declared the frontier closed in 1890, the political econ
omy of the
American West was composed of railroad tycoons and immigrant workers, commercial
farmers
and impoverished Native Americans, industrial magnates and choking miners.
75. What was the origin and consequences of the reservations system?
D. In 1850s the government began to pursue a long-term solution to the growing p
roblem of
Native American-white relations in the trans-Mississippi West. The solution was
the
reservation system in which each tribe would be given a separate territory and gov

ernment
subsidies to entice the Indians to stay within their territories.
1. The reservation system was first proposed in Fort Laramie, Wyoming, in 1851 a
nd for the
rest of the century the government struggled to force the Indians to accept it.
2. From the start the reservation system was riddled with corruption and difficu
lt to enforce.
3. The flaws in the system led to wars that dragged on for many decades.
4. The breakthrough came with the extinction of the buffalo. Some 13 million bis
on in 1850
were reduced, by 1880, to a few hundred.
5. With their subsistence thus destroyed, the Indians surrender was only a matter
of time. In
1881, Chief Sitting Bull and his starving men finally gave up. The Sioux war end
ed in
1890 with a massacre of 200 Native-American men, women, and children at Wounded
Knee, South Dakota.
76. Why was the Dawes Severalty Act the most important piece of Indian legislati
on in the 19th century?
3. The reformers influence peaked in 1887 when Congress passed the Dawes Severalt
y Act,
the most important piece of Indian legislation in the century. Under the terms o
f the Act
land within the reservations was broken up into separate plots and distributed a
mong
individual Indian families on the reservation. Four out of five Indian landowner
s
eventually lost their property, and by the early 20th century there were virtual
ly no
reservations left except for a few parcels in the desert Southwest.
VIII
77. Who were the jingoes

and what were their objectives?

A. In 1867 the US purchased Alaska from Russia for $7.2 million.

B. Proponents of prosperity through foreign trade were called jingoes. They were A
merican
expansionists who believed the US needed to seize territories around the world f
or strategic,
religious, and economic reasons. The jingoes thought in terms of Social Darwinism
, believing
that nations and races were locked in a savage struggle for survival.
II. For the jingoes the ultimate prize to be won in the global contest for trade
and mastery was China.
However, the most likely immediate target was Spain that clung feebly to the rem
nants of its oncevast
empire, now reduced to Cuba, the Philippines, Guam, and Puerto Rico.
78. What books best expressed jingoes ideas about foreign conquests?
C. Jingoes ideas about subduing continents with cross, Constitution, and cannon w
ere expressed
in two seminal books:
1. Alfred Thayer Mahan s 1890 The Influence of Sea Power upon History, 1660-1783.
Mahan
argued that world leadership belongs to the nation that controls the sea and adv
ocated
establishing American naval bases along commercial routes.

2. Brooks Adams The Law of Civilization and Decay (1895). Adams asserted that the
US
would collapse unless it finds a new frontier in Asia where it can regenerate it
self through
economic competition.
79. What was the Open Door note and policy?
B. Since the approaching disintegration of China might mean the exclusion of Ame
rican trade, the
US government drafted an official letter known as the Open Door Note. Sent to ea
ch of the
imperial powers, it acknowledged the partitioning of China into spheres, and it
urged each of
the powers to declare publicly their intention to keep their concessions open to
the trade of the
other powers. The Open Door temporarily secured American access to China without
war or
partition.
C. The principle of the Open Door of encouraging free trade and open markets guided
American foreign policy throughout the 20th century. It rested on the assumption
that, in an
equal contest, American firms would prevail, spreading manufactured goods around
the world,
and American influence with them.
80. What were the consequences of the American-Spanish war?
III. The American-Spanish war of 1898 broke out after Spain ignored American ult
imatum demanding
independence for Cuba. The war had lasted only four months and was concluded by
the Paris
Treaty of 1898.
B. As a result of the war Cuba became independent. The US annexed Guam and Puert
o Rico as
naval bases, the island nation of Hawaii also as a naval base, and bought the Ph
ilippines from
Spain.
81. What was progressivism and what were its objectives?
IV. By 1890 the ills of an unregulated capitalist economy in the US produced a p
opular response
called progressivism. The movement rewrote the Democratic and Republican platfor
ms, giving
politics a new purpose.
A. Progressivism was new political tactics of the rising middle class of profess
ionals and
managers who sought to compel the government to deal with the problems of indust
rial
America.
B. Progressivism was a series of overlapping movements, campaigns, and crusades
that defined
the era from 1890 to 1920. Not a unified movement with an agreed-upon set of goa
ls, it was a
political style and a way of approaching problems.
C. Progressives shared an optimistic conviction that modern institutions could b
e made humane,
responsive, and moral. In choosing solutions, progressives relied on scientific
expertise and

they valued efficiency.

82. Explain in what ways President Theodore Roosevelt embodied both imperialism
and progressivism?
V. The first progressive president was Theodore Roosevelt, a politician who stoo
d at the center of the
two great movements of his age, imperialism and progressivism.
A. Roosevelt became president of the US in 1901, at the age of 42, and served tw
o terms until
1908. He was the youngest man to attain the presidency. In the White House he re
wrote the
president s job description, seizing new powers for the executive branch and turni
ng the
presidency into the administration.
83. Why was Roosevelt known as a trust buster?
B. Roosevelt believed that federal administrators should intervene in the econom
y to protect
citizens or to save business from its own shortsightedness. He challenged the
megacorporations, and soon gained a reputation as a trust buster.
84. Explain how Roosevelt extended progressivism beyond the borders of the US.
D. Roosevelt also extended progressivism beyond the borders of the US.
1. Under Roosevelt the US staffed permanent embassies in many Latin-American cap
itals.
2. Responding to poverty and unrest in the Caribbean states, in 1904 Roosevelt a
nnounced a
policy known as the Roosevelt Corollary. It stipulated that when chronic wrongdoi
ng or
impotence in a Latin-American country required intervention by some civilized nati
on
the US would do the intervening.
3. Roosevelt believed that the US had a moral duty to overthrow barbarian governme
nts
and even seize territory in such cases because it was acting in the interests of
the world as a
whole.
4. Roosevelt urged Congress to choose the Colombian province of Panama as the si
te for the
interoceanic canal, and negotiated a deal. The Panama canal opened in 1914.
5. By mediating the end of the Russo-Japanese War in 1905 the act that won him the
Nobel
Peace Prize and by brokering a compromise in the British-French-German dispute ove
r
Morocco, Roosevelt extended American stewardship to conflicts in Asia and Africa
.
85. What was the New Freedom?
VI. Woodrow Wilson was the president of the US from 1912 to 1920. He produced on
e of the most
coherent and far-reaching legislative programs ever devised by a president and s
teered the US
through World War I.
A. Wilson s legislative program was called the New Freedom. It advocated lower tar
iffs,
increased competition, and vigorous antitrust enforcement. The New Freedom broug

ht
predictability and civility to unruly markets. It linked liberal reform to indiv
idual initiative and
the free play of economy.
86. What factors made it difficult for the US to stay neutral in World War I?
B. Wilson s foreign policy was a combination of idealism and self-interest, humani
tarianism and
force. After the outbreak of World War I in 1914 Wilson did his best to appear c
ompletely
neutral. Yet, privately he believed that a German victory would be a catastrophe
for the world
and the US.
C. Although Wilson was concerned not to take sides, modern warfare and commerce
made true
neutrality difficult. Long before the US entered the conflict, the American econ
omy was
already in the war on the side of the Allies.
87. What was the Zimmerman Telegram?
E. In early 1917 British naval intelligence officers showed the US ambassador in
London an
intercepted telegram from the German foreign minister, Arthur Zimmermann, to his
ambassador in Mexico City. It instructed the ambassador in Mexico City that if t
he US joined
the war on the side of the Allies he should invite Mexican president Carranza to
form an
alliance with Germany. Together, Germany and Mexico would then fight to regain lo
st
territories in Arizona, California, and New Mexico.
F. The Zimmermann Telegram was the last drop that confirmed Americans darkest fea
rs about
the implications of a German victory. On Easter Sunday 1917 the US declared war
on the
Central Powers.
88. What were the Fourteen Points and what was their role in the US foreign poli
cy?
G. In urging Congress to vote for war, Wilson explicitly rejected the war aims o
f the Allies. He
claimed that the US must enter the war to be able to shape the peace agreement.
To this aim
Wilson assembled a special committee, known as the Inquiry, and assigned it to d
raft a peace
proposal based on American principles.
H. The Inquiry produced a set of fourteen recommendations. Wilson redrafted the
report and
presented it in an address to Congress as the Fourteen Points. The document outl
ined US
objectives, but more fundamentally suggested an entirely different basis for pea
ce than any
that had been proposed up to that point. It replaced imperial visions of total v
ictory with a
peace based on limited gains and struck among nations, instead of empires.
I. The Fourteen Points were grouped around four themes: national self-determinat
ion; freedom of
the seas; enforcement of peace by a league of nations; and open, instead of secr

et, diplomacy.
Wilson hoped the Fourteen Points would eliminate what he saw as the two leading
causes of
war: imperial and commercial rivalry. He also hoped they would dispel the new dr
eam of a
world socialist revolution.
89. Explain the meaning of CPI, WIB and AEF.
VII. Following the declaration of war, the US economy and society mobilized for
the war effort.
Army units erected camps outside of major cities, and young men lined up to enli
st. Also
businesses converted to war production. Accomplishing these tasks placed tremend
ous strains on
the American people and economy.
A. To overcome whatever was left of the public s indifference to war, the governme
nt created a
propaganda bureau, the Committee on Public Information. CPI made films, organize
d
speaking tours, and churned out a river of display ads, billboards, posters, lea
flets, and press
releases. It sold the war by telling Americans they were fighting to save their
own homes.
B. Mobilization of the economy came next. As the first prolonged conflict betwee
n industrial
nations, World War I was a total war, one in which all of the resources, manpower,
and
productive capacities of the combatants had been mobilized behind massive war ma
chines. On
January 1, 1918, Wilson nationalized the railroads. To supervise the economy on
a national
scale he created a War Industries Board (WIB) that set prices, regulated manufac
turing, and
controlled transportation.
D. Military mobilization began with a rush of excitement after the War Departmen
t laid plans to
place a million-man American Expeditionary Force (AEF) in Europe by the spring o
f 1918.
90. Why was the spring of 1918 such a dramatic time in Europe?
VIII. Although the Allies thought that funds, food, and ammunition were needed m
ore urgently than
the US army, the course of the war in Europe challenged these assumptions. The w
ar was fought
on three fronts: France, Italy, and Eastern Europe. By the spring 1918 the Centr
al Powers had won
the war in Italy and in Russia. The war became a race between the US and Germany
to see who
could place the most men on the western front in 1918.
91. Explain why and how the war had a different meaning for Europe and for the U
S.
IX. The war had a different meaning for Europe and for the US. The end of the co
nflict, as formulated
in the Treaty of Versailles, brought severe disappointment to the US.

A. While they fought on the same battlefields, Americans and Europeans fought tw
o vastly
different wars. The Americans war, swift and victorious, bore almost no resemblan
ce to the
European experience, a prolonged catastrophe that consumed an entire generation.
1. For Europeans the mental world of the prewar era, with its optimistic faith i
n modernity, in
the ability of science and democracy to create a better future, vanished forever
.
2. For Americans the war validated confidence in the virtues of their own civili
zation, while
reinforcing their suspicions of foreign systems and ideas.
92. What were the failures of the Versailles Treaty that made the US senate reje
ct participation in the League of Nations?
D. The Treaty of Versailles imperial land grabs and severe treatment of the vanqu
ished nations
betrayed the goals Americans had fought to attain. Few in Congress shared Wilson s
confidence that the League of Nations would prevent future wars. They felt inste
ad that it
might only guarantee that the US would be involved in the next conflict.
E. After his return to the US, Wilson overextended himself on a nationwide tour,
explaining why
the League is crucial. He was certain that if the nations of the world do not co
ordinate the
methods for peace, there will be another world war within two-three decades. Eve
ntually he
suffered a stroke; the Senate accepted the Treaty of Versailles but rejected US
participation in
the League of Nations. European governments organized the League of Nations with
out
delegations from the US or the Soviet Union.
IX
93. What were the long-term factors that enabled a dynamic growth of American in
dustrial economy in the 1920s?
I. The 1920s were a prosperous time for America. This prosperity was driven by t
he dynamism of
the evolving industrial economy, itself shaped by three long-term factors: new t
echnologies,
increased efficiency, a maturing automobile industry.
94. What were Fordism and Taylorism?
B. Another critical innovation, pioneered by the Ford Motor Company, was the sys
tem that
became known as Fordism or mass production.
1. Rather than have teams of workers move from one stand to another to do their
work, the
Ford plant started using conveyor belts and chains to send subassemblies past gr
oups of
stationary workers.
E. The modern business system changed the nature of work and the work force as w
ell. By late
1920s the US had already begun a long-term evolution from an industrial economy
based on
manual labor to a postindustrial economy based on white-collar work in sales and

service.
1. To speed up production, the managers at Ford and other factories had to contr
ol their
workers in the system of scientific management, called after its precursor Taylor
ism.
Laboring under ever tighter supervision, workers were pushed to work faster and
harder.
2. One result of simplifying and regimenting labor was less satisfying work and
less need for
factory workers.
95. Describe the foundational elements of a new culture that emerged in the 1920
s.
II. The 1920s saw the full emergence of a modern culture that extolled the virtu
es of modernity,
pleasure, leisure, and consumption. By the 1920s, Americans were invited to seek
gratification
through the consumption of goods and services. This philosophy of consumerism, t
aking shape for
decades, saturated American society by the end of the decade.
A. In addition to higher wages, many workers had more free time. Salaried, middl
e-class workers
were enjoying annual vacation. Following the introduction of a five-day workweek
and
shortened workdays, also blue-collar workers were spending less time on the job.
B. The advertising industry which boomed during the decade presented consumerism
as a kind of
therapy for Americans trapped in the drudgery of work. Along with advertising, b
usiness used
installment plans to encourage Americans to buy goods and services.
96. Explain how the modern culture changed sexual attitudes and gender ideals.
D. Along with such new pleasures as radio and movies, the modern culture offered
a new attitude
toward an old pleasure, sex. By the 1920s, Americans discreet silence about sex w
as replaced
by an openness that reflected the growing belief about sexual pleasure as a nece
ssary and
desirable part of human life, particularly of marriage.
1. The new view of marital sexuality helped to change attitudes toward contracep
tion. The
formerly obscene term birth control gradually became respectable and widely
practiced.
2. The shifting attitude toward sex was closely tied to new gender ideals.
(1) In 1920 the Nineteenth Amendment secured the vote for the women and within a
few
years Americans sense of what it meant to be female was changing markedly.
(2) The New Woman of the 1920s was now a fun-loving individual with desires of her
own, career plans, and a sexual life too.
(3) The most popular image of the American woman of the 1920s was the vivacious
young
flapper, with her short skirt, bound breasts, and bobbed hair.
3. Notions of masculinity were changing too. The ideal family man of the 1920s w
as not
supposed to be a distant, stern patriarch but a better companion to his wife and
a doting
friend to his children.

97. What were the four groups that produced a backlash against the modern cultur
e of the 1920s?
III. In spite of its rapid growth, the modern culture had clear limits in the 19
20s. 6 out of 10 American
families lived in poverty and for them much of the consumer lifestyle was out of
reach. Other
Americans were unwilling to define their lives in terms of the pursuit of consum
ption. The 1920s
thus witnessed a backlash from Americans troubled by the pace and character of c
hange. The
backlash came from The Lost Generation of intellectuals, fundamentalist Christians
,
immigration restrictionists, and the Ku Klux Klan.
98. What is meant by the term

the Lost Generation ?

A. The Lost Generation was a group of white, mostly male writers and artists who c
ame of age
during World War I and saw the conflict as a profound failure of western civiliz
ation. Feeling
alienated from the US of the 1920s, some among them such as Ernest Hemingway became
expatriates. Other authors, such as Francis Scott Fitzgerald stayed in the US, r
ecording the
sense of loss and emptiness in the lives of fashionable Flaming Youth and decadent
rich
people.
99. What was the Great Depression and what were its main causes?
IV. Although the modern culture survived the dissent of some Americans in the 19
20s, it did not
survive the sudden end of prosperity. The Great Depression began in 1929 and las
ted until 1934,
in some ways until 1939.
A. The Depression began on Black Tuesday, October 29, 1929, with the crash of the
stock
market. Stock values lost over 14 billion dollars, and within the month the mark
et stood at only
half its precrash worth. Hundreds of corporations and thousands of individuals w
ere wiped out.
The Great Depression was caused by numerous flaws in the national and internatio
nal
economic structure.
B. The blame on the American side lies in its rickety credit and financial syste
m, free from
government regulation and susceptible to inept and even criminal management.
C. The blame on the international side lies in WWI and the economic system of th
e Versailles
Treaty.
100. In what sense the economic system of the Versailles was responsible for the
onset of the Great Depression?
C. The blame on the international side lies in WWI and the economic system of th
e Versailles
Treaty.
1. Britain, France, and other allies had borrowed enormous sums from the US to f
ight the
war. Unable to repay their loans, Britain and France had demanded 33 billion dol

lars
reparations from Germany.
2. With the US serving the impoverished Europe as the only source of investment
capital,
Germany and Austria would borrow massive amounts of capital from the US, filter
it
through their economies, and pay it back to Britain and France as war reparation
s. Britain
and France, then, sent this money back to the US as loan payments.
3. Although it looked like debts were being paid and investments were being made
, this
financial merry-go-round circulated the same money and did not generate profit.
4. Following the crash in America, no more capital flowed to Europe, making the
payments
on reparations and loans impossible. The cycle reached its breaking point in 193
1, and the
international financial system came crashing down.
101. What was

the Dust Bowl ?

E. American farmers faced a double catastrophe of economic and environmental dis

aster.
1. Between 1929 and 1932, their income dropped by two-thirds. Then the drought s
truck.
2. Between 1930 and 1936, the rains all but stopped in large parts of the South,
the
Southwest, and the Great Plains. Exposed by decades of wasteful farming practice
s, the
earth dried up and blew away.
3. Spectacular dust storms carried topsoil hundreds of miles through the air, gi
ving a new
name the Dust Bowl to a large swath of the southern plains.
4. Dust and depression ripped thousands of farm families from the land in Texas,
Kansas,
Oklahoma, and Arkansas, sending these Okies, Arkies, and Texies off to California
in search of work.
102. What was the first New Deal and what it accomplished?
V. As the Depression reached its lowest depths in 1932, the Democratic candidate
Franklin D.
Roosevelt won the presidency. Since Roosevelt pledged to bring a new deal for the
American
people, the assortment of reforms enacted between 1933 and 1938 had come to be k
nown as the
New Deal. The programs came in two great waves, commonly referred as the first a
nd second
New Deals.
A. The first New Deal commenced with a Hundred Days a three-month burst of executi
ve and
legislative activity following FDR s inauguration and continued through 1934. In thi
s period
FDR first saved the ailing American banking system and then created a series of
federal
unemployment relief programs.
B. Newly created Federal Emergency Relief Administration (FERA) oversaw a number
of
massive federal programs, such the Civil Works Administration (CWA) and the Civi
lian
Conservation Corps (CCC). Both programs temporarily employed millions of men and

women, paying them to built or renovate roads, schools and public buildings, as
well as roads
and trails in the national parks.
103. What was the second New Deal and what it accomplished?
VI. Having lost patience with shortsighted businessmen and financiers who never
appreciated his
efforts, FDR responded to political criticism by keeping Congress in session thr
oughout the
summer of 1935 and producing another dramatic wave of reforms known as the secon
d New Deal.
The second New Deal began in 1935 and ended in 1938. It left a more enduring leg
acy than the
first New Deal.
A. The largest program of the second New Deal was the Emergency Relief Appropria
tions Bill
that provided nearly five billion dollars for the relief programs of the first N
ew Deal and
created a new Works Progress Administration (WPA). The WPA lasted for eight year
s and
WPS provided millions of Americans with a critical source of immediate relief fr
om the very
real prospect of hunger and misery.
B. In addition to short-term relief, the New Deal created a permanent system of
long-term
economic security. The Social Security Act of 1935 took a critical first step to
ward providing
basic protection from economic calamity and by 1939 every state had established
a program of
unemployment insurance and assistance to the elderly. The administration put in
place a social
security system that became the centerpiece of the American welfare state for th
e remainder of
the century.
104. What were the three important achievements of the New Deal?
B. The New Deal did not bring an end to the Great Depression, and this was its g
reatest failure.
Nevertheless, FDR s New Deal achieved other important goals.
1. It saved allowed Americans to survive the worst collapse in the history of ca
pitalism while
preserving the democratic political system.
2. It created a system of security for the vast majority of American people.
3. It stabilized the financial system, making it more secure to the benefit of i
nvestors,
depositors, and the economy as a whole.
X
105. What was autarchy and its implications for domestic and international polic
y?
A Except for impoverishing millions of individuals, the Depression had three oth
er international
consequences:
1 It destroyed the liberal international order based on free trade. Empires and
nations began to
restrict immigration, ration the flow of capital, and block the movement of good

s with tariff
walls.
2 It replaced free trade with autarchy, the pursuit of national self-sufficiency
. Autarchy was an
economic doctrine that favored the rise of nationalist, totalitarian systems: ea
ch country now
looked out for itself, hoarding its scarce resources.
(1) Autarchy was breaking the world into rival economic units and led to wars. T
o succeed,
each bloc needed to have within its borders the ingredients of industrial growth
or it
needed to take them from someone else.
(2) Autarchy exacted heavy demands on citizens, requiring them to sacrifice ever
ything for
the nation, and favored dictatorship rather than democracy. Autarchic regimes be
came
totalitarian systems.
106. What was the disagreement between Isolationists and Internationalists in Co
ngress?
B As the Axis threat grew, FDR pushed for a buildup of US forces, but Congress w
as dominated by
Isolationists who believed the US should stay out of war at all costs. Isolation
ist opposed aid to
the enemies of fascism, fearing that giving such aid would lead the US to become
involved in the
fighting. To this aim, in 1937, Congress passed Neutrality Acts that prohibited
loans and credits to
nations engaged in war.
C FDR and other internationalists believed the US should support the nations fig
hting Germany and
Japan while the war was still far from America s frontiers. They saw a free-tradin
g open-door
world economy as a solution to international conflict and America s own economic p
roblems.
107. What were Neutrality Acts and how dis FDR bypass them?
To this aim, in 1937, Congress passed Neutrality Acts that prohibited loans and
credits to
nations engaged in war.
E Determined to shore up this last line of defense, FDR used his powers as comma
nder in chief to
bypass the Neutrality Acts.
1 In 1940 he declared army weapons and supplies surplus so they could be sold to B
ritain.
2 In late 1940 British Prime Minister Winston Churchill informed FDR that Britis
h funds to buy
American arms on a cash and carry basis will last only two more weeks. Britain had
never
paid its WWI loans, and the Neutrality Act prohibited new loans.
3 In response to this crisis FDR came up with a plan called Lend-Lease: instead
of loaning
money, the US would lend arms and equipment. There would be a gentleman s obligati
on to
repay, but since there would be no loans, it would not violate the Neutrality Ac
t. Repayment
took the form of economic concessions.

108. What event drew the US into the war?

On Sunday morning, December 7, 1941, the Japanese hit US naval and air bases at
Pearl Harbor in
Hawaii. Next day Congress declared war against Japan. A few days later, Germany
and Italy,
honoring its alliance with Japan, declared war on the US.
109. What were some of the technological challenges the US faced in the course o
f the war?
C Besides manpower, the US faced the challenge of technology. During WWII weapon
s technology
advanced with blinding speed, and after 1943 the US gained a technological edge.
Some of the
innovative weapons included:
1 The M-l Garand rifle, the first semiautomatic infantry weapon in the war.
2 P-51 Mustang, a high-speed ultra-long-range fighter plane.
3 Four-engine bombers: the B-17 Flying Fortress, the B-24 Liberator, and the B-2
9
Superfortress.
110. What were the two strategies for the use of American power advocated by Sta
lin and Churchill?
III To reassure Britain and the Soviet Union, FDR adopted a Europe First strategy,
holding the line
against Japan while directing the main effort at defeating Nazi Germany. Yet Sta
lin and Churchill
each had their own opinions about how to use American power.
A As the Nazis closed in on the Soviet oilfields in 1942, Stalin pleaded with Br
itain and the US to
launch a cross-channel invasion of France. Churchill, by contrast, opposed the s
econd front in
France and urged FDR to attack the Axis from the Mediterranean. FDR accepted Chu
rchill s plan.
B A month after Pearl Harbor FDR had promised Stalin a second front this year. In
late 1942, he
postponed it to the spring of 1943. Finally, in 1943, he told Stalin it would be
1944. The delays
reinforced Stalin s suspicions that the capitalist powers were waiting for the USS
R s defeat.
111. Name important consequences of the economic transformation of the US during
the war.
IV To defeat regimented, totalitarian enemies, Americans had to gear their polit
ical economy for war.
The Roosevelt administration added a layer of war mobilization agencies to contr
ol prices, assign
labor, and gear up industry. Economic transformations had several important cons
equences.
A War contracts created 17 million new jobs and new job opportunities not only f
or white males but
for women, African-Americans and other minorities. The image of the glamorous in
dustrial
worker, laboring to bring her man home sooner, was Rosie the Riveter.
B Industrial production doubled. Output soared and entirely new industries such
as synthetic rubber
and lucite appeared overnight. The bulk of war contracts went to states in the S

outh and
Southwest and on the Pacific Coast, shifting industry s center of gravity down and
to the left.
C Major corporations became government s partners the business of national defense
; a
transformation that permanently divided the economy into separate government and ma
rket
sectors, each with its own rules and ways of dealing with Washington.
112. What were the two shameful developments of the war years in America?
D The two shameful developments of the war years were the Japanese internment an
d American
government s dismissal of the Holocaust as someone else s problem.
1 In the days after Pearl Harbor, panicky politicians and military authorities p
ushed FDR to
order the relocation of 112,000 Japanese Americans to 10 barbed-wire camps for t
he duration
of the war. In 1988 that President Ronald Reagan signed into law an official apo
logy for this
act, together with material compensation for their victims of the camps.
2 The other sad chapter of WWII was that the US might have saved more of the vic
tims of
Hitler s final solution had it chosen to do so. State Department erected a paper wal
l of
bureaucratic restrictions to keep refugees away, and War Department refused to b
omb
Auschwitz or the rail lines leading to it.
113. Briefly describe the course of the war in Europe from 1943 to 1945.
A In mid-1943, using North Africa as a base, the Anglo-American Allies attacked
northward into
Italy, knocking one of the Axis powers out of the war. By June 1944 American tro
ops were
halfway through Italy.
B The assault on France s Normandy coast began, called D-Day, began on June 6 and
created the
second front the Soviets had asked for in 1942. The landing Omaha beach was one
of the most
traumatic events for American soldiers, but within a month the US advance broke
through the
German defenses and chased the retreating enemy to the fortifications along the
German border.
C The last major battle of the war was Hitler s final desperate counterattack in t
he Ardennes Forest
in December 1944. The Battle of the Bulge lasted a month and resulted in more th
an 57,000
American casualties, but the German Army had lost the ability to resist.
114. What were the three pillars of a new world order that officials in Washingt
on
envisioned as necessary for American security and world peace after the world?
A FDR envisioned a strong organization that would work to disband empires and wo
uld be led by
the world s principal powers. In September 1944, delegates from 39 nations met in
Washington,
D.C., and sketched out a plan for a United Nations organization.
B To American leaders, the lesson of the 1930s had been that without prosperity

there can be no
peace. They wanted to create an open-door world, in which goods and money could
move freely,
eliminating the need or justification for conquest. In July 1944, 44 nations att
ended a conference
at Bretton Woods, New Hampshire, to make arrangements for global economic cooper
ation. The
conferees created a system to manage and stabilize the international movement of
money. The
Bretton Woods system created an International Monetary Fund, an International Bank
for
Reconstruction and Development, known as the World Bank, and gave rise to the wh
ole network
of regional development banks and international aid agencies that govern interna
tional finance
until today.
C The military planners were not ready to stake America s future security on trade
or international
organizations only. They also laid plans for a global system of military bases i
n Europe an around
the world.
XI
115. Explain the origin of the cold war.
I The origin of the Cold War lies in the difference between the political econom
ies of the Soviet Union
and the US, as well as in their military and political objectives during and aft
er WWII.
A Created as a result of the Russian Revolution of 1917, the Soviet Union was Co
mmunist country
with a socialist economy in which the state owned property. At home, the Soviet
Union limited
individual rights, including freedom of speech and religion. Abroad, the new nat
ion endorsed the
revolutionary overthrow of capitalism.
B The Soviets Communist ideology set them at odds with the US, with its capitalis
t economy,
dominance of private property, individualism, freedom of speech, freedom of reli
gion, and
democratic government based on free elections.
C During WWII the US and the Soviet Union were uneasy allies. For many Americans
, the lesson of
the war was that the US could not tolerate totalitarian dictatorships and in thi
s respect fascism was
no different than Communism.
1 Tensions between the US and the Soviet Union were promoted by wartime decision
s,
especially:
(1) the delay of the Allied invasion of France until 1944,
(2) withholding news of American secret atomic bomb project from the Soviets but
sharing
them with the British.
116. What decisions about the postwar world led to disagreements between the US
and the Soviet Union?
D Decisions about the postwar world led to trouble as well. At a conference in Y
alta in 1945, FDR,
Stalin, and Winston Churchill conflicting visions of the postwar world were made

apparent over
the critical issue of the future of Poland.
1 Stalin did not want to risk an independent Poland that might become the stagin
g area for
another invasion of the USSR.
2 Churchill and Roosevelt favored a self-governing Poland yet differed in their
perceptions of
how to make Stalin agree. Churchill favored forcing Stalin to allow independent
Eastern
Europe, while FDR hoped to transform Stalin into an honorable political player w
ho won t
try to annex anything and will work with me for a world of democracy and peace duh!
1 The US wanted Germany, safely controlled by the Allies, to become a healthy pa
rt of the
world economy.
2 Stalin wanted Germany formally divided and weakened forever.
3 In the end, the Big Three agreed that Germany would be temporarily divided int
o four
separate zones of occupation, administered by the US, the USSR, Great Britain, a
nd France,
and that eventually Germany would be reunified.
117. Who was George Kennan and what was his role in shaping American foreign pol
icy after WWII?
3 In late February 1946, an American diplomat in Moscow, George Kennan, sent to
the State
Department in Washington a 5,500-word long telegram outlining his proposal for h
andling
diplomatic relations with the Soviet Union. Arguing that at the bottom of the Kre
mlin s
neurotic view of world affairs is the traditional and instinctive Russian sense
of insecurity,
Kennan conceded that the Soviet threat to democracy can be resolved without war.
The main
element of any US policy toward the Soviet Union, he insisted, must be that of a l
ong-term,
patient but firm and vigilant containment of Russian expansive tendencies.
4 Truman s words and actions reflected Kennan s analysis. In 1946 Truman pressed the
Soviets
to remove their forces from Iran.
118. Explain the term containment.
III The cold war intensified almost as soon as it started. From 1947 (until the
fall of the Soviet Union in
1991) containment became American policy. To implement containment, Truman and h
is advisors
revolutionized the American policies on foreign aid, overseas alliances, and nat
ional defense.
Containment was a United States policy to prevent the spread of communism abroad
.
119. What were the Truman Doctrine

and the

Eisenhower Doctrine ?

5 In 1947 Truman took aggressive steps to counter Soviet expansionism in Turkey

and Greece.
To prevent Communist takeover in these countries, Truman convinced Congress to p
rovide
$400 million in aid to the Greek and Turkish governments. To persuade Congress T

ruman
announced what became known as the Truman Doctrine.
6 In Truman Doctrine the policy of the US is to support free peoples who are resist
ing
attempted subjugation by armed minorities or by outside pressures.
The term Eisenhower Doctrine refers to a speech by President Dwight David Eisenh
ower on 5 January 1957, within a "Special Message to the Congress
on the Situation in the Middle East". Under the Eisenhower Doctrine, a country c
ould request American economic assistance or aid from U.S.
military forces if it was being threatened by armed aggression from another stat
e.
In 1956 Britain, France, and Israel invaded Egypt to take back the Suez Canal. E
isenhower
forced them to withdraw, but given the Soviet threats to intervene, in 1957, he
also announced
what became known as the Eisenhower Doctrine.
3 The Eisenhower Doctrine stipulated that the US would intervene to help any Mid
dle Eastern
nation threatened by armed aggression supported by international Communism.
4 Although Eisenhower had helped to stabilize the Middle East for a time, he had
bought shortterm
stability at the cost of long-term trouble. During the 1960s and 1970s, the US w
ould have
to deal with his legacy in the Middle East, Vietnam, and the rest of the Third W
orld.
120. What was the Marshall Plan and what it achieved?
A Soon after the decision to help Greece and Turkey, the US had to confront the
slow recovery of
war-ravaged Europe. In 1947 Secretary of State, General George C. Marshall, prop
osed a
European Recovery Plan to help combat hunger, poverty, desperation and chaos and to
promote political and social conditions in which free institutions can exist.
1 The Soviets, declining an invitation to join, refused to allow Eastern Europea
n countries to
participate, but 16 European nations supported the Marshall Plan.
2 The Marshall Plan was the largest ever aid program initiated by any nation. It
lasted from
1948 to 1952, and pumped into Europe $13 billion. The funds ensured economic sta
bilization
and continuing growth of prosperity until early 1970s. Politically, the plan hel
ped stabilize
western European governments and tied western Europe more closely to the US.
121. Explain the objectives of such peacetime military alliance as NATO and SEAT
O.
Containment required making peacetime alliances that American leaders now saw as
a way of
preventing armed conflict.
1 The first peacetime military alliance of the US with Europe was the North Atla
ntic Treaty
Organization (NATO). Established in 1949, it joined 10 western European nations,
the US and
Canada in a pact wherein an attack on any member nation would be treated as an a
ttack on
every member nation.
D Throughout the 1950s the administration increasingly focused on the threat of
Communist

expansion in Africa, Asia, Latin America, and the Middle East.

1 In 1953, the US supported France s war to hold onto Vietnam and its other Southe
ast Asian
colonies.
(1) When the French were defeated, the Eisenhower administration worked to creat
e a
permanent anti-Communist Vietnam to counter Communist North Vietnam.
(2) To protect the new country, in 1954 the US and 7 other countries created the
South East
Asian Treaty Organization (SEATO).
122. Explain in what way McCarthyism expressed American fears in the 1950s.
4 Most of all, Americans feared disloyalty in their midst. The search for traito
rs quickly became
a panicky Red Scare, and soon the anti-Communist crusade began.
(1) The hunt for secret Communists was led by the House of Representatives Commit
tee on
Un-American Activities (HUAC) led, between 1951 and 1953, by Senator Joseph
McCarthy.
(2) McCarthyism search for Communists in the American society became a powerful
political force throughout the 1950s.
123. What were characteristic features of the consumerist culture of the 1950s?
IV In the 1950s American economy and culture was dominated by consumerism. Consu
merism defined
the good life in material terms and flourished thanks to prosperity and economic
boom.
B Economic prosperity greatly benefited big business and American workers alike.
1 By the 1950s the forty-hour work week was commonplace and Americans had more l
eisure
time.
2 For growing numbers of people, the good life lay outside the city. In the 1950
s much of
America moved to the suburbs.
3 Americans began spending money, much of it borrowed, on enjoyments and luxurie
s. 1950
saw the introduction of the credit card and consumer credits.
4 Pleasures were easier to find than ever before. Discount stores made shopping
simpler and the
shopping mall made it more attractive.
5 The 1950s were a time of ever-bigger cars. Studded with lots of shiny chrome,
they reflected
Americans new sense of affluence and self-indulgence.
6 Another cultural marker of the 1950s was television. By 1960 television became
a central part
of American life.
7 Yet another hallmark of American culture in the 1950s was a new openness about
sexuality.
The Playboy magazine, first published in 1953, presented sexuality as a consumer
product.
124. What factors suggested that the US was becoming a homogeneous society in th
e 1950s?
C The spread of consumerism reinforced a sense of sameness in America during the
1950s. It
seemed as if the US was becoming a homogeneous society whose members bought the
same

products, watched the same TV shows, worked for the same corporations, and dream
ed the same
dreams.
1 The homogeneity of American society was reinforced by the apparent decline of
class
differences, as the US was becoming a society devoted to middle-class values.
2 This homogeneity was further promoted by a resurgence of religion and family i
n national life.
(1) In the 1950s Americans went back to church and by 1960 Church membership dou
bled.
(2) Thanks to the baby boom of 1940s and 1950s the birth rate rose and by 1957 the
re were
3.2 children, on average, per family.
125. What factors ensured the survival of heterogeneous America in the 1950s?
D In spite of the many pressures toward conformity, American society remained he
terogeneous.
1 Racial differences mattered a great deal. Society continued to segregate and d
iscriminate
against African Americans, Native Americans, Puerto Ricans and Mexicans.
2 The survival of diversity in 1950s America was ensured by regional and cultura
l differences
between the states. In 1959, Alaska and Hawaii became, respectively, the forty-n
inth and
fiftieth states in the union.
3 The continuing diversity of the US was also exemplified by popular music. The
1950s saw a
bewildering proliferation of musical styles.
(1) Jazz split into different camps traditional, mainstream, and modern.
(2) Country music branched out into cowboy songs, Western swing, honky-tonk, and
bluegrass.
(3) A range of African-American musical forms became known as rhythm and blues or
just
R&B.
(4) R&B collided with country to create rock and roll.
(5) The biggest rock-and-roll sensation of all was a young white singer and guit
ar player,
Elvis Presley. His first commercial record, That s All Right, Mama, was released i
n 1954.
126. What were Eisenhower s foreign and national security policies?
V The Eisenhower Era was a period of the presidency of Dwight D. Eisenhower betw
een 1952 and
1960. Eisenhower was a charismatic military hero, especially suited to the polit
ics of 1950s America.
He was known affectionately by his boyhood nickname, Ike, Eisenhower was the qui
ntessential
Organization Man fit the dominant culture of the 1950s.
A At home Eisenhower advocated Modern Republicanism, a political program for Ameri
ca that
favored limited government and balanced budgets.
B Internationally, Eisenhower was committed to opposing Communism aggressively a
nd he even
spoke of rolling back Soviet power in Europe.
1 Eisenhower s new national security policy was one of instant, massive retaliation
with
nuclear weapons in response to Soviet aggression, nonnuclear as well as nuclear.
2 To support this threat, the Eisenhower administration adopted the New Look, a st

rategy
aimed to increase the US nuclear and conventional arsenal.
127. What movements disrupted the stability of the Eisenhower era?
VI While the Eisenhower administration managed crises abroad, American society c
onfronted challenges
at home. The stability of the Eisenhower era was upset by a rebellious youth cul
ture, the alienated
beat movement, and the divisive civil rights struggle.
A The emergence of a rebellious youth culture, built around such things as rock
and roll, customized
cars, comic books, and premarital sexual exploration, troubled many adults. In f
act, however,
youth culture exaggerated rather than rejected the values of adult, consumer soc
iety.
B A second group of rebels was the beat movement: smaller in numbers, but a bit
older and much
more critical of American society. Authors such as Allen Ginsberg, Jack Kerouac,
William
Burroughs, and others sought ways to break out of the consumer culture. The beat
movement was
a clear sign of budding dissatisfaction with consumer society, conventional sexu
al mores, and
politics as usual.
C The most challenging to the political status quo of the 1950s was the AfricanAmerican struggle
for civil rights. By the 1950s, the system of segregation was under increasingly
effective attack in
the courts and on the streets.
1 In 1954, in case of Brown v. Board of Education, Topeka, Kansas, the Supreme C
ourt ruled
that public school segregation was unconstitutional. African Americans and white
liberals
were jubilant, but the dismantling of school segregation proved harder than expe
cted.
2 In 1955, following the arrest of Rosa Parks in Montgomery, Alabama, local Afri
can-American
leaders challenged segregation in buses. Led by a 26-year-old pastor Martin Luth
er King, Jr.,
African-Americans began to boycott the city s bus system.
3 In 1956 the Supreme Court ruled Alabama s bus-segregation law unconstitutional.
Although
other forms of segregation continued, the bus boycott was a crucial victory for
the civil rights
movement.
128. What were the highlights of the civil rights struggle in the 1950s?
C The most challenging to the political status quo of the 1950s was the AfricanAmerican struggle
for civil rights. By the 1950s, the system of segregation was under increasingly
effective attack in
the courts and on the streets.
1 In 1954, in case of Brown v. Board of Education, Topeka, Kansas, the Supreme C
ourt ruled
that public school segregation was unconstitutional. African Americans and white
liberals
were jubilant, but the dismantling of school segregation proved harder than expe
cted.

2 In 1955, following the arrest of Rosa Parks in Montgomery, Alabama, local Afri
can-American
leaders challenged segregation in buses. Led by a 26-year-old pastor Martin Luth
er King, Jr.,
African-Americans began to boycott the city s bus system.
XII
129. What were the four areas of American uneasiness about their society in the
1960s?
I Americans uneasiness about their society, rather unfocused in the 1950s, became
increasingly
specific and passionate in the 1960s. During the decade, people realized that th
e prosperous consumer
economy had left millions in poverty, damaged the environment, and threatened th
e health and
welfare of all Americans. Meanwhile, the grassroots protests of African American
s dramatized the
persistence of racial inequality in a wealthy and segregated nation.
130. What was the new liberalism of the 1960s and what were its main tenets?
II Popular discontent created an opportunity for new ideas and new leaders in th
e 1960s. Out of power
during the 1950s, liberal intellectuals and politicians, mostly Democrats, now o
ffered a fresh agenda
that responded to the discontents of the consumer society, to the civil right mo
vement, and to the
continuing cold-war confrontation with Communism.
A The key to this new liberalism was a powerful faith in American economic growt
h. To meet its
domestic and international challenges, liberals argued, the US needed to expand
its economy more
rapidly. The liberals believed that economic growth had to be used to create a b
etter, more
satisfying life for all Americans. They felt they could intervene decisively in
the problems of the
world too.
131. What was the Great Society and what were its goals?
III JFK did not have time to accomplish much of the liberal agenda but his succe
ssor, Lyndon Johnson,
did. President between 1963 and 1968, Johnson continued federal government s attem
pt to create
what he called the Great Society and defined as a society of success without squalo
r, beauty
without barrenness, works of genius without the wretchedness of poverty.
A The abolition of poverty was one of the most basic and ambitious goals of the
Great Society.
Declaring its unconditional war on poverty, the Johnson administration embraced a
broad range
of liberal programs. By 1970 the percentage of people living below the poverty l
ine decreased to
13%.
B Another objective of the Great Society was to improve the quality of life for
all Americans. From
1964 the president proposed and Congress enacted measures affecting consumer pro
tection,
education, culture, protect the environment and individual rights of American pe

ople. The Great

Society also took a major step toward national health insurance when Congress cr
eated Medicare
in 1965. All these programs added up to an impressive effort to enhance the qual
ity of life for the
broad range of Americans, but they also brought a massive expansion of the size,
cost, power, and
intrusiveness of the federal government.
IV Of all the domestic challenges confronting the Great Society, none was more d
ramatic and more
difficult than civil rights. By the end of the 1960s the potent combination of A
frican-American
activism and federal power had won civil rights at least on paper.
A The civil rights movement did not win any easy victories in the South during t
he early 1960s. In
one location after another, attempts to break down segregation and promote Afric
an-American
voting met with stiff, often successful, white resistance.
B In 1962 JFK had to send 23,000 federal troops to end white riots against enrol
ling an AfricanAmerican student at the all-white University of Mississippi.
132. Explain how the combination of African-American activism and federal power
won the battle for civil rights by the end of the 1960s.
IV Of all the domestic challenges confronting the Great Society, none was more d
ramatic and more
difficult than civil rights. By the end of the 1960s the potent combination of A
frican-American
activism and federal power had won civil rights at least on paper.
A The civil rights movement did not win any easy victories in the South during t
he early 1960s. In
one location after another, attempts to break down segregation and promote Afric
an-American
voting met with stiff, often successful, white resistance.
B In 1962 JFK had to send 23,000 federal troops to end white riots against enrol
ling an AfricanAmerican student at the all-white University of Mississippi.
133. What was Flexible Response ?
V In fighting the cold war, JFK and Johnson shared commitment to containing Comm
unism. However
they modified defense and foreign policies.
A JFK believed the nation could afford to spend more money on the military. He a
bandoned the
doctrine of Massive Retaliation, and introduced a new defense strategy called Fle
xible
Response. A Flexible Response expanded US military alternatives and made it easie
r for the
president to choose different military options in dealing with the Soviets.
134. Describe the two strategies used by JFK and Johnson administrations to keep
Communism out of the Third World in the 1960s.
B More willing to intervene in international affairs, JFK used two, sometimes co
ntradictory
strategies to keep Communism out of the Third World in the 1960s.
1 The administration encouraged democracy and prosperity in developing countries
; to
encourage modernization, in 1961 JFK created the Peace Corps.

2 The administration frequently helped to thwart

mocracy in
the name of anti-Communism; the US intervened in
dly
independent countries, either through the CIA or
cially
dramatic example of a failed intervention in the
US failed to
dislodge Fidel Castro.

Third World independence and de

the domestic affairs of suppose
military interventions. An espe
Third World was Cuba, where the

135. What was the Cuban Missile Crisis?

2 In the Cuban Missile Crisis the US discovered that the Soviets were building l
aunch sites in
Cuba for offensive nuclear missiles that could strike much of the US. JFK forced
Soviets to
stop construction and withdraw the missiles in exchange for the removal of obsol
ete American
missiles from Turkey.
136. Explain why the Vietnam war was controversial and contested by many groups
in the US.
VI The war in Vietnam was a decisive episode for the new liberalism and the nati
on in the 1960s.
American participation in the conflict reflected the liberals most basic values a
nd assumptions their
determined anti-Communism and their almost limitless sense of national power and
responsibility.
A In 1961 JFK inherited the US commitment to protect South Vietnam and its regim
e from the
Communist North Vietnam. JFK provided financial aid and American advisers.
E The war in Vietnam had a major impact back home. An impassioned antiwar moveme
nt emerged
to condemn American policy. Pacifists were joined by students on college and uni
versity
campuses, for whom the Vietnam War epitomized the failings of the Great Society.
It was clear
that the US was backing an antidemocratic government in a brutal and apparently
unnecessary
war which was not even declared.
F Even as the antiwar movement developed, most Americans supported the war. To m
any people,
the antiwar demonstrators were unpatriotic. Hawks, mostly conservative Republicans
and
Democrats, wanted Johnson to fight harder.
G By the end of 1967 the war had put enormous strain on American economy. The US
budget was
no longer able to support both the Vietnam War and the Great Society.
137. Outline the history of the US involvement in Vietnam.
VI The war in Vietnam was a decisive episode for the
on in the 1960s.
American participation in the conflict reflected the
nd assumptions their
determined anti-Communism and their almost limitless
responsibility.
A In 1961 JFK inherited the US commitment to protect
e from the

new liberalism and the nati

liberals

most basic values a

sense of national power and

South Vietnam and its regim

Communist North Vietnam. JFK provided financial aid and American advisers.
B Picking up JFK s commitment, in 1965 Johnson sent 180,000 US troops to fight in
South
Vietnam. Armed with congressional resolution the Tonkin Gulf Resolution that gave hi
m the
power to protect American personnel in South Vietnam, the president did so witho
ut asking
Congress for a declaration of war.
C Johnson believed that the US could transform a weak, divided South Vietnam int
o a strong, united
modern nation that could eventually survive on its own. He believed that the nat
ion could afford
to fight a war abroad and build a Great Society at home at the same time. He was
wrong.
D By the end of 1967 American strategy for Vietnam to kill enough enemy soldiers t
o persuade
the North Vietnamese and the Viet Cong to give up failed to produce results. Despi
te sending
half a million US troops to Vietnam, the war was neither won nor lost.
138. What factors contributed to the collapse of the Great Society by 1968?
VII By 1968 the Great Society came apart, torn by the strain of the Vietnam War,
economic realities,
and new demands put forth by the Black Power movement, the youth rebellion, and
a reborn women s
movement.
139. What was the Black Power movement?
The emergence of Black Power was the most dramatic response to the fact that the
Great
Society s response to racial inequality was too slow and too weak.
1 Black Power was a movement that emphasized maintaining and celebrating a separ
ate
African-American identity.
2 Building on rejection of integration and nonviolence propounded by the Black M
uslims such
as Malcolm X, Black Power preached separation of the races and the self-reliance
of African
Americans.
3 The most radical Black Power group were the Black Panthers best known in the m
edia for
their aura of violent militance.
140. Outline the forms of the youth rebellion in the 1960s.
B The 1960s also saw several forms of youth rebellion against adult authority an
d expectations.
1 In its most widespread form the youth rebellion involved fairly mild demands f
or more
freedom, particularly social and sexual freedom, on campus.
2 More localized but also more shocking were the demands of a much smaller numbe
r of
students who saw the shortcomings of colleges and universities as symptoms of br
oader social
problems. These youths created the New Left, a radical movement best known from th
e
Berkeley Protests of 1964 that attempted to confront liberalism and create a more
democratic nation.

3 The third form of youth rebellion was an attempt to replace consumerism and co
nventional
morality with a counterculture, a new way of life.
(1) Counterculture was less politically oriented than the New Left. It challenge
d the
conformity, careerism, materialism, and sexual repression and rested instead on
the
enjoyment of rock music, drugs, and sexual freedom.
(2) The purest form of the countercultural lifestyle was created by the hippies.
Rejecting
materialism and consumerism, hippies celebrated free expression and free love. T
hey
wanted to replace competition and aggression with cooperation and community.
141. What was the second-wave feminism and what were its goals?
C The 1960s also witnessed the rebirth of another protest movement: the second-w
ave feminism.
Responding to their difficult, second-class roles in cold-war America, women pre
ssed again for
equal rights and opportunities, creating liberal and radical feminist organizati
ons.
1 In 1962 Helen Gurley Brown s Sex and the Single Girl rejected unequal sexual opp
ortunities
for women, both in and out of marriage.
2 In 1963 Betty Friedan s The Feminine Mystique described the housewife trap, the gr
owing
frustration of educated, middle-class wives and mothers who had subordinated the
ir own
aspirations for meaningful careers outside the home to the needs of men.
3 In 1966 male insensitivity and inaction pushed Betty Friedan and other women a
ctivists to
form the National Organization for Women (NOW) to campaign for solutions to wome
n s
problems.
142. What events contributed to make 1968 the most tumultuous year in American h
istory after WWII?
D In 1968 the stresses and strains of the Great Society came together to produce
the most
tumultuous year in the US since WWII.
1 Unexpected military events in Vietnam forced Johnson to reduce the American wa
r effort and
give up his plans for re-election.
2 Unable to pay for more Great Society programs, the president could not accommo
date the
demands of angry groups.
3 The tensions in the country produced demonstrations, riots, and two stunning a
ssassinations:
those of Martin Luther King, Jr., and of the Democratic nominee Senator Robert K
ennedy of
New York.
XIII
143. What were the causes of the American economic decline in the 1970s?
I In the 1970s Americans had to learn to live with less. Despite the programs of
the Great Society, the
federal government had not established racial harmony and equality. Despite its

vast military power,

the government had not won the Vietnam War. The evens in the 1970s only intensif
ied concerns
about the capacity of government to achieve national goals and serve the people.
A In the 1970s American economy stagnated. The combination of high unemployment
and high
inflation led to the coining of a new word stagflation to describe America s economic
predicament.
B There were several major reasons for American economic decline by the late 196
0s.
1 The US had been unable to produce all the oil needed to fuel its industrial ec
onomy. The oil
crisis of 1973-4 resulted in raising oil prices 400% and caused panic at the pum
p all across the
US.
2 The US was unprepared for international competition.
(1) By the 1970s billions of dollars in aid as well as the military protection p
rovided by the US
had allowed Japan, and western European countries to save money on defense and c
reate
efficient, up-to-date industries.
(2) In 1950, the US had accounted for 40% of the value of all the goods and serv
ices produced
around the globe. By 1970 that figure was down to 23%. The American share of wor
ld
trade dropped nearly by half.
(3) By the end of the 1970s, the US was importing more manufactured goods than i
t was
exporting.
3 American corporations and federal government operated in inefficient and somet
imes wasteful
ways.
144. How the economic decline of the 1970s changed the US?
C The impact of the decline was profound and reshaped life in the US.
1 As corporations closed factories and moved production overseas, Americans witn
essed the
deindustrialization of their country.
2 Economy in the US became service-centered.
3 America s regions changed as people and power moved from north to south and east
to west.
Northern Snowbelt became Rustbelt while the Sunbelt in the south boomed.
145. What was the Nixon Doctrine
II Confronting the decline, president Richard Nixon reshaped both domestic and f
oreign policy of the
US. By the end of his presidency, America and the American role in the world had
changed
considerably.
A The Nixon administration dealt most creatively with foreign policy. Nixon and
his National
Security advisor, Henry Kissinger, understood that the relative decline of Ameri
can power
dictated a new approach to the cold war. The twin pillars of the new foreign pol
icy were the
Nixon Doctrine and dtente.B The Nixon Doctrine, announced in 1969, repudiated the T
ruman Doctrine from 1947. Nixon
declared that the US cannot and will not be responsible all the defense of the f

ree nations of the

world.
146. What was dtente?
C Dtente, a French term for the relaxation of tensions, was Nixon s policy of easin
g tensions with
the Soviet Union and the People s Republic of China.
1 In 1972 the US recognized the legitimacy of the People s Republic of China and N
ixon
became the first American president to go to mainland China on a diplomatic visi
t.
2 Three months later, Nixon became the first American president to travel to Mos
cow where he
signed the Strategic Arms Limitations Treaty (SALT I) and Anti-Ballistic Missile
(ABM)
treaty. Both treaties symbolized the American and Soviet agreement that there is
no alternative
to peaceful coexistence.
147. Explain how the Nixon administration sought better relations with the Sovie
t Union and the People s Republic of China?
D Along with all the other motivations for dtente, the Nixon administration sough
t better relations
with the Soviet Union and the People s Republic of China to win their assistance i
n helping the
US end the Vietnam War. These hopes were not fulfilled.
1 Between 1969 and 1972 Nixon used all means, constitutional as well as unconsti
tutional, to
intimidate the North Vietnamese into making a deal for peace. The results were d
isastrous: the
Cambodian operation did not force North Vietnam to make peace. Instead, it anger
ed millions
of Americans, resulting in demonstrations and turmoil in the US.
2 In 1973 American, South Vietnamese, North Vietnamese, and Viet Cong negotiator
s signed a
peace agreement in Paris. The peace agreement did not guarantee South Vietnam s su
rvival
but ended US participation in the Vietnam War.
148. What were the two new and controversial means of promoting racial equality
in the 1970s?
III Despite economic meltdown, in the 1970s many Americans refused to settle for
less. As African
Americans and women continued their struggles other disadvantaged groups began t
o demand
recognition. By the end of the 1970s, American society was more committed to equ
ality for women
and minorities.
A African Americans struggle for racial justice continued after the assassination
of Martin Luther
King, Jr., in 1968. By the 1970s, national attention focused on two relatively n
ew and
controversial means of promoting racial equality.
1 Affirmative action required businesses, universities, and other institutions r
eceiving federal
money to provide opportunities for women and nonwhites. Opponents argued that af
firmative

action was itself a form of discrimination that reduced opportunities for white
people in
general and white men in particular.
2 School busing a mandatory practice in the south and in the north alike aimed to
integrate the
nation s schools was even more controversial. Most white Americans opposed the polic
y,
either because they did not want integration or because they did not want childr
en taken out of
neighborhood schools.
3 With busing and affirmative action, the civil rights movement seemed to have r
eached its
limits.
B By the 1970s second wave of feminism flourished but it too seemed to reach its
limits. The
women s liberation movement was diverse with liberal and radical feminist organizati
ons but
in all its forms focused on three public issues.
1 Equal treatment in schools and workplaces was won, partially, in 1972 with Tit
le IX of the
Higher Education Act, which required schools and universities receiving federal
funds to give
equal opportunities to women and men in admissions, athletics, and other program
s.
2 Access to abortion was secured in 1973 through a decision of the Supreme Court
.
3 The passage of the Equal Rights Amendment to the Constitution (ERA). Even thou
gh
Congress finally passed the ERA in 1972, it was endorsed by too few states and n
ever became
law.
149. What were the three goals American women fought for in the 1970s? How many
of them were attained?
B By the 1970s second wave of feminism flourished but it too seemed to reach its
limits. The
women s liberation movement was diverse with liberal and radical feminist organizati
ons but
in all its forms focused on three public issues.
1 Equal treatment in schools and workplaces was won, partially, in 1972 with Tit
le IX of the
Higher Education Act, which required schools and universities receiving federal
funds to give
equal opportunities to women and men in admissions, athletics, and other program
s.
2 Access to abortion was secured in 1973 through a decision of the Supreme Court
.
3 The passage of the Equal Rights Amendment to the Constitution (ERA). Even thou
gh
Congress finally passed the ERA in 1972, it was endorsed by too few states and n
ever became
law.
150. What was AIM?
E Another minority to struggle for their rights was Native Americans. Their popu
lation had grown
rapidly since WWII reaching nearly 800,000 by 1970.
1 Native Americans were divided into about 175 tribes and other groups.

2 They had the lowest average family income of any ethnic group in the US and we
re
stereotyped in television and other media as lazy and savage.
3 Beginning in the 1960s, a Native-American movement emerged to protest federal
policy,
combat stereotypes, unite tribes, and perpetuate their cultures.
4 The American Indian Movement (AIM) of the 1970s made few gains but it had forc
ed
American society to confront the inequitable treatment of Native Americans.
151. Explain what the Movement was and why it failed to live up to its promise.
IV By the end of the 1960s, as American society reverberated with protests, some
hopeful activists
believed the US would be torn apart and remade. They thought that all minority a
nd antiwar struggles
were creating a single, great coalition, known as the Movement. Yet, the hoped for
new American
revolution never took place.
A The Movement failed because key groups within it fell apart, because some prot
est movements
lost their targets, and because many people turned away from activism and politi
cal engagement
to focus on their inner needs. The 1970s were the Me-Decade : a decade in which Ame
ricans
had become self-absorbed and narcissistic.
152. What were white ethnics and what was their role in the 1970s?
B Perhaps the largest group that rejected the Movement was lower middle-class an
d working class
whites. Many among these Americans defined themselves as white ethnics those who too
k
renewed pride in the ethnic heritage that set them apart from other Americans.
1 The white ethnics were self-consciously German American or Irish American; the
y were
PIGS: Poles, Italians, Greeks, and Slovaks, most of them Catholic.
2 The white ethnics used their heritage to affirm an alternative set of values i
n 1970s America.
For them, ethnicity meant a commitment to family, neighborhood, and religion.
3 Although the ethnic revival did not accomplish much, the white ethnics called by
Nixon the
silent majority became an important part of a conservative counterattack against r
adicalism,
liberalism, and the Democratic Party.
154. What events counted as successes and what events as failures of the Carter
administration?
VI The presidency of Jimmy Carter (1977-1980) began with a
h a disappointment.
Carter responded more energetically and imaginatively than
roblems. Yet he
also came to be seen as a weak, uncertain leader who could
ss nor inspire the
American people. In the 1970s, it seemed that no president
ion s economic,
political, and diplomatic crises.
A Carter had to contend with increasing popular resentment
his presidency

promise and ended wit

Ford had to America s p
neither manage Congre
could resolve the nat
of government. During

many Americans believed that government regulation and taxation had gotten out o
f hand and
Carter was pushed to limit rather than extend government.
B Carter s most notable success in domestic affairs was his response to environmen
tal threats. The
Carter administration created a superfund of $1.6 billion to clean up hazardous wa
ste sites and
also took control of 100 million acres of Alaska to prevent damage from economic
development.
C Continuing Nixon s deescalation of the cold war, Carter focused more attention o
n supporting
human rights and building harmony around the world.
1 In 1978 Carter won Senate approval of a treaty yielding ownership of the Panam
a Canal to
Panama at the end of the century. The treaty signaled a new and more respectful
approach of
the US to Central and Latin America.
2 That same year Carter also mediated the first peace agreement between Israel a
nd an Arab
nation the so called Camp David peace accords. His Framework for Peace initiative
established a basis for future negotiations in a region torn by conflict for cen
turies.
3 Carter s foreign policy suffered from the eventual collapse of dtente. In Decembe
r 1979, the
Soviet Union invaded Afghanistan. Carter reinforced US forces in Europe and froz
e mutual
relationships with the Soviets.
4 In 1979 Carter was helpless to prevent the fall of the US ally, the Shah of Ir
an, who was
overthrown by the followers of a religious leader Ayatollah Khomeini. The Irania
n
revolutionaries overran the US embassy in Tehran, taking 60 Americans hostages.
5 In spring 1980, Carter ordered a secret military mission to rescue the hostage
s. The mission
failed. It demonstrated that the nation was no longer strong enough to protect i
ts own citizens
abroad that the American presidency was weak and ineffectual.
XIV
155. What was the Reagan Revolution and what were its four key markers?
A In 1980 a broad-based coalition elected a conservative Republican, Ronald Reag
an, to the
presidency. Reagan set out to recast the American political economy in what was
called the
Reagan Revolution. With Reagan s re-election in 1984, the new conservatism triumphed
.
B During the Reagan Revolution the decline of the American economy seemingly sto
pped.
Hopes for an economic revival were encouraged by
1 the rapid spread of technological innovations such as microwave ovens, pocket
calculators,
compact disc players, cordless telephones, and fax machines.
2 the spread of video-cassette recorders, remote controls, satellites, and cable
hook-ups.
3 the spread of desk top microcomputers offered by Apple (first Mac in 1977), an
d then by
IBM (first PC in 1981).
4 a wave of corporate takeovers and mergers.

156. Explain the connection between the Reagan Revolution and conservative, evan
gelical Christian churches.
D The Reagan Revolution drew strength from the ongoing transformation of religio
us life,
especially from conservative denominations and evangelical Christian churches.
1 By 1980 evangelical leaders had created a powerful political movement, the rel
igious right,
dedicated to spreading a conservative message aggressively across American cultu
re and
politics.
2 The most obvious indication of the growing power of the religious right was th
e
emergence of televangelists. Deeply conservative, the televangelists condemned man
y of
the social changes of the 1960s and 1970s: women s liberation, abortion, gay right
s, and
the liberal programs of the Great Society.
157. What was Reaganomics

and how it worked?

B Reagan s home policy meant a new approach to the federal government and the econ
omy. The
president offered a clear conservative alternative to the liberal policies of th
e New Deal and
the Great Society. In line with Reaganomics the president s economic policy the Reagan
administration worked to reduce federal functions and benefits, lower taxes, and
deregulate
business.
158. In what way Reagan s foreign policy rejected the main diplomatic approaches o
f the 1970s?
C Reagan s foreign policy, rejected the main diplomatic approaches of the 1970s Nixo
n s
dtente and Carter s support for international human rights. Instead, the Reagan Rev
olution
refocused American policy on the cold-war confrontation with Communism. The pres
ident
moved to restore American power in order to challenge the Soviet Union and stop
Communism in the Western Hemisphere.
159. Explain what was SDI and how it put pressure on the USSR.
In 1983 Reagan announced plans for the Strategic Defense Initiative (SDI), a spa
ce-based
missile-defense system. SDI pressed the USSR in two ways.
(1) First, the Soviets would have to expend scarce resources in order to develop
their own
version of the SDI.
(2) Second, SDI seemingly made the Soviet Union more vulnerable to nuclear attac
k.
160. Explain how the conservative agenda of the 1980s collided with disadvantage
d groups demands for
equal rights and opportunities. What was the result of this collision?
III For all of Reagan s success in the 1980s, the new conservatism met with consid
erable opposition,

especially in the area of social values. Many conservatives wanted to restore su

pposedly
traditional values and practices. Yet, the conservative agenda collided head-on
with one of the
chief legacies of the 1960s disadvantaged groups demands for equal rights and oppor
tunities.
A The new conservatism condemned feminism and lamented the changing role of wome
n in
America but it was unable to curtail the achievements of the women s rights moveme
nt.
B Conservatives strongly opposed the gay rights movement too. Although they coul
d block gay
rights, the battle over these took place against a tragic backdrop: the onset, f
rom 1981, of
AIDS. Since conservatives considered AIDS as God s punishment for the alleged sin
of
homosexuality, the Reagan administration did not fund research on AIDS for sever
al years.
C Conservatives were uneasy with still another legacy of the 1960s: the expansio
n of AfricanAmerican civil rights. Yet, as African Americans mobilized to fight for equality
and
opportunity in the 1980s, their activism made it difficult for the conservatives
to undo the civil
rights revolution.
161. What were the limits to conservatism revealed in a series of scandals in th
e late 1980s?
IV The stalemate over social values was not the only sign that there were limits
to conservatism. In
the late 1980s the new conservatism suffered from a series of scandals involving
leading political,
business and religious figures that had helped create the conservative climate o
f the decade.
A Scandals involving business and religious figures revealed that leading busine
ssmen and
televangelists cheated on taxes, lied, defrauded money, and engaged in adulterou
s liaisons.
162. What was Reagan s comeback and what factors made it possible?
D By 1987 the Reagan presidency, beset by scandals and economic troubles, was in
jeopardy.
But then Reagan began a comeback and by the end of his presidency, he had won hi
s
popularity back. Reagan showed a remarkable ability to withstand scandal and def
eat; he
benefited from economic recovery, but most of all from the transformation of the
Soviet
Union.
1 By the mid-1980s Mikhail Gorbachev s stunning reforms gave Reagan a politically
popular opportunity to thaw cold-war tensions.
2 Reagan met with Gorbachev in a series of summits starting in 1985.
3 In 1987 Reagan and Gorbachev signed the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces (INF
)
Treaty in which both countries promised to destroy all of their intermediate-ran
ge nuclear
missiles.
4 In 1988 the Soviets withdrew their troops from Afghanistan and began to ease t

heir tight
control over the Communist regimes of Eastern Europe.
5 As Reagan left office in January 1989, his comeback seemed complete, the econo
my was
growing, and the cold war was ending.
163. What were the successes of president George W.H. Bush in international affa
irs?
B Bush enjoyed more success in international affairs, but even these were the re
sult of larger
trends rather than his own efforts. As the cold war continued to wind down, Bush
built
cautiously on the initiatives of the second Reagan administration.
1 1989 saw the fall of repressive Communist regimes in Eastern Europe: in Hungar
y,
Poland, Bulgaria, Czechoslovakia, Rumania, and East Germany. The fall of the Ber
lin
Wall in 1989 came to symbolize the collapse of Communism.
2 Powerless to stop its allies from abandoning Communism, the Soviet Union could
not save
itself. In 1990 Russia chose a charismatic president, Boris Yeltsin, who quit th
e
Communist Party, supported independence for the republics, and challenged Gorbac
hev. In
1991, as one republic after another declared its independence, the USSR ceased t
o exist.
The US and its allies had clearly won the cold war and the US now stood as the s
ole
military superpower in the world.
164. Explain the term the

New World Order.

B The most powerful internationalist was President Bush himself. He argued that
the US had to
maintain its overseas commitments. With the help of other powerful countries, he
felt,
America should use foreign aid, military strength, NATO, and the United Nations
to maintain
a stable international system, a New World Order. Much like Woodrow Wilson and Har
ry
Truman before him, Bush mixed idealism and self-interest in his vision of the in
ternational
political economy.
C The New World Order was a broad, vague concept. Bush and other internationalis
ts had a hard
time explaining just what overseas commitments America needed to make.
1 It was unclear whether the US would need to intervene everywhere that stabilit
y was
threatened.
2 It was unclear what counted more order or democracy; whether the US was suppos
ed to
protect antidemocratic countries in the name of international stability and nati
onal
prosperity.
3 It was unclear how Bush s commitment to international cooperation fit in with th
e longstanding
tendency for the US to act alone in its own hemisphere.
4 It was unclear why the US had to pay for the New World Order that, like contai
nment

before it, would be expensive.

165. What were the cause, the course, and the outcome of the First Persian Gulf
War?
D The test of the New World Order came in August 1990 when Iraq, led by Presiden
t Saddam
Hussein, overran Kuwait, its wealthy but defenseless neighbor to the south. Entr
enched in
Kuwait, Iraq now threatened its much larger western neighbor, oil-producing Saud
i Arabia.
1 Hussein s actions jeopardized America s oil supply and its Saudi Arabian ally.
2 The Kuwaiti invasion also challenged Bush s calls for a stable New World Order o
f free
nations.
3 The president reacted by creating an international coalition opposing Iraq. By
the end of
1990 more than half a million US troops had joined with forces from more than 30
nations
in Operation Desert Shield to protect Saudi Arabia.
4 The Bush administration successfully pressed the United Nations to authorize f
orce if the
Iraqis did not withdraw by January 15, 1991. The president also obtained congres
sional
approval for the use of force.
5 When Hussein refused to pull back by the deadline, Operation Desert Shield bec
ame
Operation Desert Storm. On the night of January 17, coalition forces began an in
tensive air
attack against Iraq with planes and missiles.
6 Coalition forces, led by US General Norman Schwarzkopf, began a ground attack
against
the Iraqi Army. In just 100 hours, they swept into Kuwait, devastated the Iraqis
, and
pushed on into Iraq. Impressed by the results, Bush called a halt before the inv
asion
reached the Iraqi capital of Baghdad and toppled Hussein.
7 The Persian Gulf War seemed like a great victory for the US. It made the New W
orld
Order seem like a practical reality. American leadership and American power had
halted
aggression and restored freedom abroad.
XV
166. Explain what processes and hopes marked the transition from an industrial t
o a postindustrial economy in the US in the 1990s.
I Throughout the 1990s the US experienced sustained economic growth. The economy
was driven
more by the service sector than by manufacturing. The computer revolution and do
wnsizing were
two other factors that strengthened American economy in the period.
A The 1990s saw the transition from an industrial to a postindustrial economy. B
y 1994 the
service sector accounted for about 70% of American economic activity.
B The postindustrial economy was dominated by high technology, especially comput
ers.
167. In what ways the computer revolution of the 1990s seemed to be repeating th

e industrial revolution?
C The postindustrial economy spurred the dream that the computer would define th
e
postindustrial society, just as the factory had defined industrial America.
1 Many Americans envisioned postindustrial America as a prosperous information s
ociety,
sustained by the computerized e-commerce.
2 They came to believe that thanks to the computer and other electronic innovati
ons, they
would now process information instead of raw materials, produce knowledge and id
eas
instead of steel and cars, and buy online instead of in stores.
3 The computer revolution seemed to be repeating the industrial revolution.
(1) Like in the industrial revolution, corporations that took advantage of new t
echnologies
were pushing to the forefront of American capitalism.
(2) Like the industrial revolution, the computer revolution spurred a wave of co
rporate
mergers and acquisitions.
168. What was downsizing and what was remarkable about it in the 1990s?
3 In the 1990s, as a result of global competition, America s largest and most adva
nced
corporations adopted downsizing: stunning layoffs in order to cut costs and incr
ease
profits.
4 These corporate cutbacks were remarkable for a number of reasons:
(1) They came during a period of relative prosperity,
(2) They involved some of the largest and seemingly most stable American compani
es,
(3) They affected many white-collar workers.
169. What is meant by the phrase the political deadlock of the 1990s ?
II The economic dynamism in the 1990s was accompanied by a pervasive sense of a
political
deadlock. Reagan s successors in the White House were unable to use the presidency
as he had to
move politics and government off center. Neither conservatism nor liberalism dom
inated the
nation s politics and government.
170. In what ways Clinton s election marked a change in American political life?
In some ways, Clinton s election marked a change in American political life.
1 The first president born after WWII, Clinton was the first of the baby-boom ge
neration to
enter the White House.
2 His rise from modest origins to become the nation s youngest governor reassured
an
unsettled America that upward mobility was still possible.
3 His wife and fellow lawyer Hillary Rodham-Clinton was the first presidential w
ife with
her own professional career outside the home.
4 Clinton was a New Democrat and acted like one by balancing traditional liberal a
ctivism
with more conservative efforts to shrink government. He balanced the budget, cut
the size

of the federal work force and managed to reduce the size of the federal deficit.
171. What factors explain the fact that Clinton s presidency ended with a sense of
unfulfilled promise?
D The promise of the Clinton presidency was unfulfilled. In his first term it wa
s limited by the
resurgent power of the Republican Party. In 1994 Republicans took control of the
House of
Representatives and controlled both houses of Congress for the remainder of the
decade. Their
strength forced Clinton to make sometimes controversial compromises with conserv
atism.
E After re-election in 1996, Clinton no longer seemed like an agent of political
change.
Damaged by his compromises with conservatism, his reformist image was destroyed
by a
series of scandals, financial and sexual, that engulfed his second term.
F After Clinton clearly obstructed Justice in one lawsuit by covering up an alle
ged sexual
relationship with a young White House page, Monica Lewinsky, in 1998 the Republi
can
dominated House of Representatives voted two articles of impeachment. Clinton th
us became
the second president to go on trial in the Senate.
G Even though the Senate voted to acquit Clinton on both articles of impeachment
and Clinton
had held on to the presidency, he had lost the opportunity to make a major impac
t on public
policy in his second term. His presidency ended with a sense of unfulfilled prom
ise.
172. Explain how the events in Yugoslavia demonstrated American withdrawal from
the conception of the New World Order?
B That reluctance was apparent when violence followed the collapse of Communist
rule in
Yugoslavia in 1990. Faced with the worst mass brutality in Europe since WWII, fi
rst George
Bush and then Bill Clinton were unwilling to risk military involvement.
4 The three-month war killed between two and five thousand people, badly damaged
Yugoslavia s infrastructure, and forced Milosevic to accept a multinational peacek
eeping
force. The US had helped restore some peace to the former Yugoslavia, yet millio
ns had
suffered and thousands had died before a cautious America had been willing to em
ploy
even a minimum of force.
173. What was the connection between the rise of Middle Eastern terrorism and th
e attacks on WTC?
E Middle Eastern terrorism reached the US itself in 1993, when a car bomb explod
ed in the
underground garage of the World Trade Center. This first major international ter
rorist incident
inside the US was traced to followers of a radical Islamic spiritual leader from
Egypt, Sheikh
Omar Abdel-Rahman, who lived in New Jersey. By 1996 Rahman and over a dozen asso
ciates

were convicted for the World Trade Center bombing and other plots.
F In 1998, responding to terrorist bombings that killed at least 190 people and
wounded 5,000 at
US embassies in Kenya and Tanzania, the Clinton administration launched missile
attacks on
targets in Afghanistan and the Sudan linked to Islamic fundamentalist terrorists
funded by
Saudi businessman Osama bin Laden.
G On the morning of September 11, 2001, small groups of men hijacked four US pas
senger jets
soon after takeoff and aimed them at targets symbolizing American financial and
military
power in New York City and Washington, DC. Early evidence suggested that the att
acks were
organized by Osama bin Laden.
1 Two of the jets crashed into the upper floors of the Trade Center s twin towers,
killing and
wounding thousands of people.
2 The third Jet crashed into the headquarters of the Defense Department at the P
entagon,
killing and wounding hundreds.
3 The fourth let, apparently intended for a target in or near Washington, crashe
d in western
Pennsylvania.
174. What was meant by the phrase
ed?

War on Terror

and what main operations it involv

A From 2001 onwards the War on Terror came to denote a global military, politica
l, legal and
ideological struggle against organizations designated as terrorist and against r
egimes that were
accused of having a connection to terrorists or providing them with support or w
ere perceived
as posing a threat to the US and its allies in general.
B Since the election of Barack Obama in 2008 the term War on Terror is no longe
r officially
used by the US administration; with the killing of Osama bin Laden in May 2011,
the War on
Terror may be coming to a close.
C The two most important military operations of the War on Terror included Opera
tion Enduring
Freedom and Operation Iraqi Freedom official names used by the Bush administration
for,
respectively, the War in Afghanistan and the War in Iraq.
175. List basic facts about Operation Enduring Freedom.
D Operation Enduring Freedom was the first action of the War on Terror.
1 The operation began after the Taliban government of Afghanistan rejected presi
dent
Bush s ultimatum to turn over Osama bin Laden and al-Qaeda leaders operating in th
e
country.
2 In October 2001, American forces, with UK and coalition allies, invaded Afghan
istan to
oust the Taliban regime, seek out and destroy any al-Qaeda fighters or affiliate
s.
3 Although most of Afghanistan fell within the two months, the remaining al-Qaed
a and

Taliban remnants fell back to the rugged mountains of eastern Afghanistan, cross
ed over to
western Pakistan and regrouped.
4 From 2002 they began to unleash an insurgent-style offensive against Coalition
forces.
5 Even though the Taliban insurgency has not yet been destroyed, the war ravaged
the region
and since 2010 peace talks have been underway between Taliban affiliated fighter
s and
Coalition forces.
176. List basic facts about Operation Iraqi Freedom.
E The other major military action of the War on Terror was Operation Iraqi Freed
om, the
invasion of Iraq.
1 Iraq had been listed as a State sponsor of international terrorism by the US s
ince 1990.
After the Gulf War Saddam Hussein proved a continuing problem for the UN and Ira
q s
neighbors.
2 In 1998, president Clinton signed the Iraq Liberation Act, which called for re
gime change
in Iraq on the basis of its alleged possession of weapons of mass destruction, o
ppression of
Iraqi citizens, and attacks on other Middle Eastern countries.
3 In 2002 the Bush administration called for the United Nations Security Council
(UNSC) to
again send weapons inspectors to Iraq. It also called for a UNSC resolution.
4 The UNSC passed resolution 1441.
(1) The resolution offered Iraq a final opportunity to comply with its disarmame
nt
obligations or face serious consequences.
(2) The resolution did not authorize the use of force against Iraq even if it fa
iled to meet
UNSC demands.
5 In 2002 a large bipartisan majority in the US Congress authorized the presiden
t to use
force if necessary to disarm Iraq in order to prosecute the war on terrorism.
6 After failing to overcome opposition from France, Russia, and China against a
UNSC
resolution that would sanction the use of force against Iraq, the US assembled a
Coalition
of the Willing composed of nations that pledged support for the US policy of regi
me
change in Iraq. Of the 48 states on the list, only the UK, Australia and Poland
contributed
troops to the invasion force; An additional 37 countries provided some number of
troops to
support military operations after the invasion was complete.
177. What were most important criticisms of the War on Terror?
G Like other American wars in the second part of the 20th century, the War on Te
rror was
controversial and raised a wave of protests in the US and all over the world.
1 The controversy was largely caused by the vague meaning of the War on Terror p
hrase,
which the critics saw as a convenient way to attack anyone or anything under the
pretext of

combatting terrorism.
2 War on Terror was criticized as an excuse for the government to institute seve
re limitations
of personal and other freedoms that had always been cherished in the US.
(1) To critics of the Bush administration the most galling instance of governmen
tal abuse
was the US Patriot Act of October 2001.
(2) The act dramatically reduced restrictions on law enforcement agencies ability
to
search telephone, e-mail communications, medical, financial, and other records,
eased
restrictions on foreign intelligence gathering within the US, and broadened the
discretion of law enforcement and immigration authorities in detaining and depor
ting
immigrants suspected of terrorism-related acts.
(3) Following 9/11, in 2002 the Bush administration created a new cabinet level
agency
called the US Department of Homeland Security.
3 War on Terror was criticized as a framework for perpetual war; the announcemen
t of such
open-ended goals as the elimination of terrorism was criticized for producing a
state of
endless conflict, since terrorist groups can continue to arise indefinitely.
4 War on Terror was also criticized as inefficient and counterproductive. Accord
ing to critics
it has consolidated opposition to the US, aided terrorist recruitment, and incre
ased the
future likelihood of attacks against the US and its allies.
178. In what ways the election of Barack Obama filled the American people with h
ope and belief in the possibility of change?
C On November 4, 2008 Obama became the first African-American to be elected pres
ident.
1 Within days of his inauguration, he issued executive orders directing the US m
ilitary to
develop plans to withdraw troops from Iraq, he ordered the closing of the Guanta
namo Bay
detention camp as soon as practicable, authorized the State Children s Health Insu
rance
Program to cover an over 4 million currently uninsured children, and reversed a
Bush-era
policy which had limited funding of embryonic stem cell research.
2 By 2009 Obama pressed Congress to pass legislation reforming health care in th
e US. The
health care bill was signed into law in March, 2010.