American History Final Exam Review
Mr. Pasternak
Civil Rights movement leaders generally advocated______as the most effective weapon against Jim Crow laws.
A. taking important cases to court
B. exercising the right to vote
C. petitioning the government
D. peaceful demonstrations
______provided the final push that made the United States declare war on Germany in 1917.
A. The sinking of the Lusitania
B. The publication of the Zimmerman telegram
C. The assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand and Archduchess Sophie
D. The execution of the Schlieffen Plan
______sets out the structure of the U.S. government and the individual rights of the citizens.
A. The Declaration of Independence
B. The Constitution
C. The Bill of Rights
D. The Treaty of Paris
The term Harlem Renaissance refers to ______during the Jazz Age.
A. a literary and artistic movement
B. urban renewal
C. desegregation
D. a voter registration drive
Which best describes the common thread that linked the writers of the “Lost Generation”?
A. the desire to expose corruption in government and big business
B. disillusionment with ideals such as chivalry and romance
C. celebration of the growth of African-American culture
D. the desire to provide lighthearted escapist fare to victims of the Depression
The development of ______gave the working class some leverage over business owners for the first time in history.
A. communism
B. steam power
C. the railway
D. labor unions
When Black Codes were passed throughout the old Confederacy after the Civil War, the U.S. government responded by ______
A. asking the Supreme Court to arbitrate the disagreement.
B. sending troops to occupy the South to supervise compliance with the law.
C. establishing the Freedmen’s Bureau.
D. establishing a federal program to encourage freedmen and women to move north.
Britain and France went to war in North America over conflicting claims to ______
A. the Ohio River Valley area.
B. the city of New Orleans, Louisiana.
C. territory west of the Mississippi River.
D. the colonies along the Atlantic coast.
Which major figure of the Enlightenment first suggested a government of multiple branches with checks and balances?
A. René Descartes
B. Baron de Montesquieu
C. Jean-Jacques Rousseau
D. Voltaire
The Confederacy was at a disadvantage in a war of attrition because
______
A. its army had smarter commanding officers.
B. it hoped for support from foreign allies.
C. it had a smaller population of able-bodied men.
D. it could not make use of its industry.
With which goal was the Republican Party formed in 1857?
A. to limit European immigration
B. to fight for women’s rights
C. to end the expansion of slavery
D. to encourage the settlement of the West
Henry Clay’s American System, proposed in the early 1800s, included all the following provisions except
A. a national bank.
B. going off the gold standard.
C. protective tariffs on imports.
D. a national transportation system.
How did their experiences with American Indians help the colonists in the Revolutionary War?
A. The American Indians had taught the colonists about democratic government.
B. The American Indians had helped the colonists manufacture bows and arrows.
C. The American Indians had showed the colonists how to fight like guerrillas.
D. The American Indians had taught the colonists the value of controlling the
high ground.
The Louisiana Purchase was important because ______
A. it led to the discovery of the Northwest Passage.
B. it doubled the size of the United States.
C. it established permanent friendship between the United States and the
American Indians.
D. it was the last time the United States purchased territory for a cash payment.
Which was the first nation to establish settled colonies in North America?
A. England
B. France
C. Germany
D. Spain
Iron Curtain nations refused to accept Marshall Plan aid because
______
A. they blamed Germany for destroying the European economy.
B. there was too much distrust between the former Allied and Axis nations.
C. they knew they would never be able to repay the United States.
D. Stalin refused to allow any ties between his satellites and his only strong
national rival.
Jim Crow laws in the South violated ______
A. the constitutional right to the equal protection of the laws for all citizens.
B. the “separate but equal” principle established by the Supreme Court.
C. the constitutional right of all citizens to peaceably assemble.
D. the principle of judicial review established by the Supreme Court.
______established the principle of “separate but equal”
facilities for black Americans.
A. Gideon v. Wainwright
B. Plessy v. Ferguson
C. Dred Scott v. Sanford
D. Brown v. Board of Education
On what grounds did the Supreme Court declare in 1857 that antislavery laws were unconstitutional?
A. the Fifth Amendment protection of rights to private property
B. the Second Amendment guarantee of the right to bear arms
C. the constitutional requirement that U.S. citizenship was limited to people
born in the United States, or born to U.S. citizens
D. the statement in the Declaration of Independence that all men were created equal
Which basic constitutional principle did Richard Nixon violate as president?
A. equality of all citizens under the law
B. executive privilege and the right to privacy
C. a ban on unreasonable search and seizure
D. the right to petition the government
______is notorious in American history for creating public
hysteria that forced the United States into declaring war on Spain in 1898.
A. Upton Sinclair
B. William Randolph Hearst
C. Ida B. Wells
D. Ida Tarbell
The era of Prohibition gave rise to all these new slang terms except
A. speakeasy.
B. muckraker.
C. bootleg.
D. bathtub gin.
What was the most important purpose of the Berlin Wall?
A. to prevent the Berlin Airlift from succeeding in its object
B. to prevent Iron Curtain nations from accepting Marshall Plan aid
C. to prevent West Germans and other Western Europeans from defecting to East
Germany
D. to prevent citizens of East Germany and other Iron Curtain nations from
defecting to the West
Panama gave the United States perpetual sovereignty over the Panama Canal Zone in exchange for ______
A. U.S. support in Panama’s war for independence.
B. a $10 million cash payment and a further annual payment of $250,000.
C. the promise of U.S. neutrality in the war between Panama and Colombia.
D. control of the shipping lanes that passed through the canal.
The Articles of Confederation failed for all these reasons except
A. they gave more power to the states than to the central government.
B. they created a legislature exactly like the British Parliament.
C. they did not create executive or judicial branches of government.
D. they did not give the central government the right to raise taxes.
The Monroe Doctrine, the Roosevelt Corollary, and the Good Neighbor Policy all relate to the relationship between the United States and
A. Western Europe.
B. Communist Eastern Europe.
C. Central and South America.
D. China and Japan.
In the days leading up to the American Revolution, the British Parliament singled out the colony of ______for punishment.
A. Massachusetts
B. Pennsylvania
C. Virginia
D. New York
After the Civil War, the primary goal of the old guard of the Confederacy was to ______
A. rebuild the southern economy along modern lines.
B. restore southern society to the way it had been before the war.
C. take revenge on the victorious North by any available means.
D. collaborate with black southerners in a major program of social reform.
One consequence of the War of 1812 was a lasting alliance between the United States and ______
A. Britain.
B. France.
C. Canada.
D. Mexico.
______is known to history as the father of the U.S.
Constitution.
A. George Washington
B. Benjamin Franklin
C. James Madison
D. John Adams
All these political leaders were victims of assassins’ bullets in the Civil
Rights/ Vietnam War era except ______
A. Martin Luther King, Jr.
B. Medgar Evers.
C. Malcolm X.
D. Lyndon Johnson.
The Gettysburg Address served as an important reminder of all these ideas except ______
A. that the United States was founded on the principle of the equality of all men.
B. that the U.S. government could function only by the consent of the people.
C. that the Union was fighting for the cause of human freedom.
D. that government compromises had caused the situation that led to the war.
Which European nation emerged from World War II as a great world power?
A. Britain
B. France
C. Poland
D. the Soviet Union
______was the central issue over which the Mexican War was fought.
A. Territorial rights
B. Indian rebellion
C. Protective tariffs
D. Slavery
The Black Panthers and the Black Power movement broke from the mainstream Civil Rights movement because their leaders did not support
A. peaceful resistance.
B. Great Society programs.
C. women’s rights.
D. the Democratic Party.
The government established the Department of Agriculture to help Plains farmers address the issue of ______
A. factory inspections.
B. tax regulations.
C. irrigation.
D. Native-American relations.
Parliament responded to the Boston Tea Party by passing
A. the Bill of Rights.
B. the Intolerable Acts.
C. the Stamp Act.
D. the Declaration and Resolves.
Which nation did not participate in the peace conference held at Versailles in 1919?
A. France
B. Germany
C. Italy
D. Russia
All these women played a significant role in the fight for women’s suffrage except ______
A. Alice Paul.
B. Susan B. Anthony.
C. Gertrude Stein.
D. Carrie Chapman Catt.
The Great Society programs achieved which of the following?
A. They ended segregation in the public schools.
B. They increased voter registration throughout the old Confederacy.
C. They raised millions of Americans’ incomes above the poverty level.
D. They provided government health insurance for all Americans.
Which accurately describes the U.S. textile-manufacturing industry between the Industrial Revolution and the Civil War?
A. The South grew cotton and shipped it north for spinning and weaving.
B. The South grew cotton, then spun and wove it into cloth in southern factories.
C. The North raised sheep, sheared them, and spun and wove their wool into cloth.
D. The North shipped southern cotton to Britain to be made into cloth.
The New Deal programs were designed to combat ______
A. organized crime.
B. isolationism.
C. Communism.
D. the Great Depression.
______was a notable figure in the U.S. Congress during the nineteenth century for achieving compromises on divisive issues.
A. John Quincy Adams
B. Henry Clay
C. Thomas Hart Benton
D. Lyndon B. Johnson
The term Viet Cong refers to ______
A. North Vietnamese fighters who supported Ho.
B. the Army of South Vietnam.
C. South Vietnamese fighters who supported Ho.
D. U.S. troops in combat in Vietnam.
What was the main purpose of the Monroe Doctrine?
A. to establish alliances between the United States and European powers
B. to express American support for European colonial ambitions in the West
C. to acquire colonies of its own in Central and South America
D. to imply that the United States would fi ght any further European attempt to
colonize in the West
John Brown’s goal is best described as ______
A. the abolition of slavery throughout the United States.
B. a halt to the expansion of slavery beyond the states where it already existed.
C. a reasonable compromise between the North and the South.
D. the secession of the free North from the slaveholding South.
The USSR and the United States nearly reached the point of nuclear war during ______
A. the Cuban Missile Crisis.
B. the Strategic Arms Limitation Talks.
C. the partition of Germany into four zones of occupation.
D. the signing of the Warsaw Pact.
American women age 21 and over gained the right to vote with the passage of the Nineteenth Amendment during ______
A. the 1910s.
B. the 1920s.
C. the 1930s.
D. the 1940s.
Congress repealed the Tonkin Gulf Resolution in response to
A. the bombing of Cambodia.
B. the Tet Offensive.
C. the fall of Saigon.
D. the press coverage of the Vietnam War.
On what grounds did the colonists oppose various acts of Parliament during the 1760s and early 1770s?
A. that the colonies were an independent sovereign nation
B. that the acts were aimed at specific individual colonies
C. that the acts were illegal attempts to regulate Colonial trade
D. that the colonists were not represented in Parliament
The Pentagon Papers are significant because they ______
A. disproved the theory that the Kennedy assassination was the result of a
conspiracy.
B. revealed that there was a tape-recording system in the Oval Office.
C. proved that the White House had lied to the public about the Vietnam War.
D. demonstrated that the presidential election of 1972 was rigged.
The doctrine of nullification states that ______
A. the Supreme Court has the power to determine whether a law is unconstitutional.
B. no state is bound to obey a federal law that it considers unconstitutional.
C. the federal government can force states to obey reasonable laws that apply
equally to all states.
D. if a certain number of states ratify a constitutional amendment, it becomes law.
During the Progressive Era, the Seventeenth Amendment made the system for electing ______more democratic.
A. the president
B. members of the Senate
C. members of the House
D. Supreme Court justices
______is historically significant for her multivolume autobiography dealing with westward migration and frontier life in the 1870s and 1880s.
A. Edith Wharton
B. Emily Dickinson
C. Zelda Fitzgerald
D. Laura Ingalls Wilder
The Iroquois changed sides during the French and Indian War
because______
A. the French army betrayed them.
B. the British army treated them with more respect.
C. the tide of war had turned in favor of the British.
D. the tide of war had turned in favor of the French.
During the French and Indian War, the British army alienated the colonists by
A. refusing to make much effort on the battlefield against the French and Indians.
B. failing to treat George Washington and the Colonial troops as comrades and allies.
C. not spending enough money to provide the necessary weapons and
reinforcements.
D. arguing in favor of a peace treaty that would have favored the French position in
North America.
Theodore Roosevelt coined the term muckraker to refer to
A. labor organizers.
B. factory workers.
C. investigative journalists.
D. combat veterans.
Why did the United States take part in the Korean War?
A. to contain the spread of Communism
B. to prevent the establishment of a strong, united Korea
C. to demonstrate American military power to the Soviet Union
D. to restore the Japanese to power in Korea
Eli Whitney is a notable historical figure for his
A. role in the creation of the Federal Reserve System.
B. invention of the cotton gin.
C. authorship of the Bill of Rights.
D. opposition to Jim Crow laws in the South.
The Alien and Sedition Acts of 1798 marked the first time that the U.S.
government had to decide between conflicting issues of
A. appeasement and aggression toward a foreign nation.
B. freedom and slavery.
C. proportional and equal representation.
D. individual liberty and national security.
Japan attacked the United States in 1941 with the goal of
A. annexing the United States.
B. reducing the United States to the status of a second-rate power.
C. retaking various U.S. colonies in the Pacific.
D. achieving revenge for the provisions of the Versailles Treaty of 1919.
The term Northwest Territory refers to an area including the present-day states of ______
A. Oregon and Washington.
B. Maine and Vermont.
C. North and South Dakota.
D. Ohio and Illinois.
The Farmers’ Alliance of the 1870s was similar to
A. a labor union.
B. a corporation.
C. a trust.
D. a monopoly.
______was the turning point in the war between the United States and Japan.
A. The bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki
B. The Battle of Iwo Jima
C. The Bataan death march
D. The Battle of Leyte Gulf
What did the Mayflower Compact and the Iroquois Confederacy have in common?
A. Both were peace treaties between American Indians and European settlers.
B. Both were exercises in representative government.
C. Neither was produced by a patriarchal society.
D. Neither contains democratic principles or ideas.
In 1890, Democratic presidential candidate William Jennings Bryan supported
A. the return of the United States to the gold standard.
B. the minting and circulation of silver coins.
C. the elimination of the income tax.
D. the elimination of regulation of big business.
At the end of the Cold War, the United States was left as
A. the world’s last superpower.
B. the world’s largest nation.
C. the world’s greatest creditor nation.
D. the world’s policeman.
The Federalist Papers urged the people and the state legislatures to support ratification of
A. the Fugitive Slave Act.
B. the Civil Rights amendments.
C. the Constitution.
D. the Bill of Rights.
In the 1870s, the Republican Party split into two factions over the issue of
A. protective tariffs.
B. Reconstruction.
C. civil-service reform.
D. women’s suffrage.
The term Great Awakening refers to ______
A. the proliferation of new technologies (elevator, typewriter, and so on) in he
late nineteenth century.
B. the backlash against communism behind the Iron Curtain in the 1980s.
C. the awareness in the British colonies that the time had come for independence
from Great Britain.
D. major Christian religious revivals that swept the United States in the late
eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries.
The Dutch founded the colony of ______, but lost it to the British in 1664.
A. Pennsylvania
B. New York
C. Delaware
D. Maryland
In what way were the 1980s economically similar to the 1920s?
A. Americans bought on credit and ended up in debt.
B. Both decades ended in massive economic depressions.
C. The White House operated the government on a balanced budget.
D. Prices and unemployment rose steadily.
The settlement-house movement began in the 1880s with the purpose of
A. marching and demonstrating to arouse support for women’s suffrage.