USU 1300 – American Institutions

Study Questions Chapter 7

-Can you briefly distinguish between the three different forms of republicanism?
1.

2.

3.

-What did Americans want to replace with whatever kind of republic they chose, and from your
notes, what was the one thing they saw as being the key element in the success of any republic?

-What was it that the first American artists, playwrights, and authors wanted to capture, portray,
or produce in their works?

-What two major reforms came to education in America after independence?

1.
2.

-“Remember the ladies”.........? Who said that, and in what context?

-When it came to slavery, or the freeing of slaves after independence, what form of emancipation
did most states favor?

-Upon what three notions did white slave owners base their racist theory in post-Revolutionary
America?
1.

2.

3.

-With what did framers of state constitutions concern themselves in regards to government
power?

-What is Popular Sovereignty?

-What were the Articles of Confederation and in what year did the Continental Congress send
them to the states for ratification?

-The Articles of Confederation (1) described the United States as a “league of friendship,” (2)
allowed states to retain land claims from original charters, but had a great weakness,
(3)…….

-What posed the most persistent problem for the Confederated Congress?

-What did Spain do on the Mississippi in 1784?

-When the Northwest Territory was established in 1785, along with its attendant Northwest
Ordinance of 1797, what did Congress say about slavery there?

-How did the Miami, Shawnee, and Delaware Indians living within the Northwest Territory react
to its formation?

-What was the Annapolis Convention and its outcome?

-Who presided over the Constitutional Convention and why was James Madison so important to
that process?

-Delegates to the Constitutional Convention differed on what three key questions as a precursor
to forming a constitution at all, and how were their differences settled?
1

-How does a person count for just three-fifths of a person in the voting schemes of the early
United States?
-From your notes: what is the Electoral College and what does it do?

-Explain the Separation of Powers and how they work?

-On what date did Congress accept the new Constitution?

-During the ratification process for the Constitution, what did federalist and anti-federalists each
stand for?

-Name some Federalists Name some Anti-Federalists

-What did Thomas Jefferson and other Anti-Federalists not like about the original Constitution?

-When was the Constitution finally ratified by the minimum 9 states?

-What is The Federalist, who wrote it and why?

USU 1300 – American Institutions
Study Questions Chapter 8

-What four immediate tasks did Congress have on its plate when it convened in the spring of
1789?
1
2
3
4

-Can you briefly tell what each of the 10 Amendments in the Bill of Rights puts into place?
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9 & 10

-According to the Right of Presidential Appointment, once approved by the Senate, heads of
executive departments are solely responsible to whom?

-What did the Judiciary Act of 1789 put into place?

-From your notes, the 11th Amendment to the Constitution did what for the States?

-What post did Alexander Hamilton hold in the new government and what was the overall aim of
Hamilton’s fiscal policies?

- What did Hamilton hope to accomplish when he proposed that the federal government assume
state debts left after the Revolutionary War?

-What is a strict-constructionist vs. broad-constructionist view of the Constitution, and what did
that argument have to do with banking in the U.S.?
-What message was sent in Washington’s response to the Whiskey Rebellion?

-From where did the idea of Federalists and Republicans come? Can you name several
supporters of each entity?

-Why did the French Revolution create problems for the United States?

-What were Democratic Societies all about? How did President Washington view them?

-Why was the Jay Treaty so important to the United States?

-Explain the “Right of Executive Privilege.”

-What did Thomas Pinckney do in 1795 that was so vital to the United States?

-What two things did President Washington warn the United States against in his farewell
address?
1.

2.

-What was politically curious about the election of President Adams and Vice-President
Jefferson in 1796?

-What was the XYZ Affair and what did Congress do as a result?
-As a result of the Quasi-War with France, what advantage did the United States gain in the
Caribbean area?

-What famous treaty came to an end in the Convention of 1800?

-From your notes, what did all the controversy surrounding the Quasi-War with France do to the
presidency of John Adams?

-What is Indian Sovereignty, established in the Treaty of Greenville in 1795?

-Can you explain the election of 1800 fiasco, the part the Electoral College played in it, and how
it all was solved?

-What did the 12th Amendment change or do?

USU 1300 – American Institutions
Study Questions Chapter 9

-President Jefferson wanted to have what kind of government; what did he believe it would
foster?

-Who were the Democratic-Republicans?

-What really is meant by Separation of Church and State? Is this phrase actually found in the
Constitution of the United States? If not, from where did they come?

-What did Jefferson do with John Adams’ midnight appointees to federal office? Why?

-From your notes, why did President Jefferson want so badly to kill the Judiciary Act of 1801,
passed during the Adams administration?

-Who was John Marshall and what did he do for the US Supreme Court?

-What is Judicial Review, how did it come about, and what does it have to do with the United
States Supreme Court?

-What is the story behind Aaron Burr shooting Alexander Hamilton?

-Spain gave Louisiana back to France in 1801, and just prior to making that transfer, what did
Spain do regarding Pinckney’s Treaty of 1795?

-Can you briefly tell the story of the Louisiana Purchase? How much did it cost? What did it do
for the size of the United States?

-From your notes, what is meant by the president’s Implied Powers (Article I Section 8 US Constitution)?
How did Jefferson use them and why?
-Can you briefly tell what Louis and Clark did, when, and why?

-Who were Tecumseh and Prophet? What happened at the Battle of Tippecanoe, when, and why?

-What was the First Barbary War all about? How did it end?

-When the Napoleonic wars between France and England picked up in 1803, why did it cause
problems for the new United States?

-Can you explain impressments and their connection to the USS Chesapeake?

-What happened to the International Slave Trade in America in 1808?

-From your notes, what new style of campaigning entered into politics around 1800?

-Who won the election of 1808?

-What brought about the outbreak of the War of 1812, and why was it so unnecessary?

-The British burned Washington D.C. in Aug. 1814, why?

-What famous verse of song was written during the siege of Ft. McHenry in 1814?

-Was the Battle of New Orleans essential to the outcome of the War of 1812? Why or why not?
-How did Napoleon’s defeat in Europe help bring an end to the War of 1812 and what did the
combatants settle for in the Treaty of Ghent?

-What did the War of 1812 reaffirm for America?

-What impact did the War of 1812 have on Native Americans?

-What was the Hartford Convention and what became of the Federalist Party as a result?

-What idea did the Federalist notion of the American System encourage.

-Who won the election of 1816?

-What is meant by “the era of good feelings” or the “one-party period”?

-John Quincy Adams was an absolutely wonderful Secretary of State; what can you tell about his
political dealings or writings listed below:

Rush-Bagot Treaty

Convention of 1818

Adams-Onis Treaty (1819)

Monroe Doctrine

-Can you tell the story of the slavery issue in Missouri and the Missouri Compromise of 1820?
USU 1300 — American Institutions
Study Questions Chapter 10

-When it came to wealth were the North and South more or less equal or was one section of the
US more affluent than the other?

-How did most clergy in the south feel toward slavery?

-In the Southern worldview, how did slave owners justify slavery?

-What was at the ‘heart’ of that argument?

-What was its deepest ‘root’.

-Briefly describe Southern expansion after the War of 1812.

-What did the Native Americans do to survive as their lands were encroached upon?

-Can you tell the story of the Indian Removal Act of 1830 and events leading up through 1838?

-Why was forced removal so devastating to Native Americans; how did it impact their culture?

-In 1842, when the removal effort was abandoned, what became of the Seminole Indians.

-By 1860, what percentage of southerners owned NO slaves?

-Briefly describe the life of a southern yeoman farmer.

-Briefly describe the life of a landless white in the South and contrast it with that of a free Black.

-What percentage of white Southerners were landless?

-Compare white class relations as it relates to land ownership and social positions in the South.

- What is ‘paternalistic’ planter ideology, and from your notes, what is “Noblesse Oblige”?

-In that paternalistic South, what was the place of women and what could they expect with
marriage?

-Describe the slave diet; were there any diseases that went with it (notes)?

-From the viewpoint of black slaves, what was the worst aspect of slavery?

-By the 1830s, what percentage of slaves were native-born Americans?

-What impact did the domestic slave trade have on black slave families?

-How did the Nat Turner revolt hurt slaves generally?

USU 1300 – American Institutions
Study Questions Chapter 11

-What is a “market economy” and how did it affect the self-sufficient farmer class in America?

-Can you link together the building of the early infrastructure in America….the roads, canals,
steamboats, and trains, and tell a bit about how they impacted one another?

-In what year was the telegraph invented and by when was it trans-continental?

-What do the American System of Manufacture, interchangeable parts and Ely Whitney have to
do with one another?

-With the emergence of labor unions in the U.S., what was the early understanding about strikes?

-What are the five parts of boom-and-bust cycles?

-From your notes: what is meant my “harvest of destruction” and what do the market economy
and boom-and-bust cycles have to do with it?

-What was one of the main reasons for the drop in size of American families in the early 1800s?

-During the urban boom, how did folks on the outskirts of large cities get into town to work, etc?

-What did the 1845-1850 potato famine in Ireland have to do with American immigration during
that time?
-What was the problem the American people saw with the huge influx of Irish immigrants in the
mid-1800s?

-In the early 1830s, Jim Crow was……..

USU 1300 — American Institutions
Study Question Chapter 12

-What was The Second Great Awakening and what did “personal conversion” and “self-
improvement have to do with it?

-The Second Great Awakening brought about moral reform, and how did this affect women, and
vise-versa?

-What was going on with education in the early 1800s and what was the goal of those working to
reform education?

-What connection was there between Brook Farm and the American Renaissance and who were
some of America’s most noted authors of that era?

-Briefly outline the history of the Mormons between 1830 and 1845.

-Did white abolitionists of the early 1800s have any help from free blacks and if so, who?

-From your notes: what was the Gag Rule?

-What was the Congressional Caucus and what was its purpose?

-Why did so many Democratic-Republicans run in the 1824 election? What happened?
-Did Andrew Jackson strengthen any one branch of government over the others?

-What is the Spoils System?

-What was the Kitchen Cabinet?

-What was the Nullification Crisis and why was Jackson’s response so important?

-What were Jackson’s thoughts on the Bank of the United States?

-What did Antimasonry have to do with the old caucus system for nominating presidential
candidates, and how did it play into the ending of the caucus system between 1824-1831?

-What was the Specie Circular, was it popular?

-What is a pocket veto?

-Who won the Presidency in 1836? Who won in 1840?

-How did John Tyler get to be president; what was his party affiliation?
USU 1300 — American Institutions
Study Questions Chapter 13

-In what two lights or aspects is the American West seen?

1.

2.
-Between 1829 and 1851, to where did Native Americans from the east move?

-How did Cyrus McCormick and John Deere facilitate settlement of the American mid-west?

-Briefly characterize the role the fur traders had in settling the West.

-What is South Pass; why was it so important to early settlers of the West?

-What was the Great American Desert and how does it tie into the 100th meridian?

-When did the U.S. government start up its Reservation System?

-What happened in Mexico in 1821? How did that affect United States trade?

-Briefly tell how the Lone Star Republic came to be.

-What were early Indian/White relations like along the Oregon and California trails?
-What is Manifest Destiny?
-What was the 54° 40' controversy all about?

-Can you tell the Texas annexation story from 1821 to 1845?

-What was the reaction of Mexico to the annexation of Texas?

USU 1300 American Institutions
Study Questions Chapter 14

-What did President Polk have to do with the 54°40' issue; how was it resolved?

-Briefly describe events precipitating war between the United States and Mexico in 1846.

-“Mr. Polk’s War” is officially known as…………

-Briefly tell the story behind Mormon colonization in the west, and how did they participate in
the war between Mexico and the United States?

-What is Guadalupe Hidalgo? What lands did the US gain as a result?

-How much money did the average Gold Rush prospector make? What occupation really did
well in California during the Gold Rush?

- Explain Slave Power. What did the gag rule have to do with it?

-What did the Wilmot Proviso propose?

-In 1850, State Sovereignty was seen as............

-Who won the election of 1848?

-What were the (5) points made in the Compromise of 1850?
1
2
3
4
5

-The Compromise of 1850 is said to have had two major flaws; they are...........
1

-What was Uncle Tom’s Cabin and what did it do? Tell its history.

-What was the Underground Railroad?

-What was President Pierce’s stance on the Fugitive Slave Act of 1850?

-Why were the Kansas-Nebraska Bill and popular sovereignty such problems when it came to the
idea of slavery in new territories, and how did it impact the Compromise of 1820?

-Where and why did the Republican party form, and in what year?

-What did the Republicans preach?

-What the dickens is “Bleeding Kansas?” Can you give dates, issues, players in a brief summary?

-Who was Dred Scott, and why was his case heard by the Supreme Court so important; what
three points came out of the Court’s decision?
-What was the Lecompton Constitution and for whom, if for anyone ever, did it stand?

-After his failed raid on Harper’s Ferry, what ominous prediction was voiced by John Brown?

-In the election of 1860, who won the Presidency?

-What happened on December 20, 1860?

- What dilemma faced President Lincoln in March of 1861?

-The outbreak of the Civil war came about where, on what date, and why?