Economics
Ways that the government can collect money from its citizens to pay for things that the people need, like schools and roads.
Taxes
A system the Government has where each branch is given the power to check on the other two branches to be sure that one branch does not become more powerful than the others.
Checks and Balances
the war of 1775–83 in which 13 British colonies in North America broke free from British rule and became the United States of America
American Revolution
An 1803 land deal that involved France selling the Louisiana Territory to the United States.
Louisiana Purchase
someone who remained loyal to the British during the American Revolution.
Loyalist
Amount the U.S. paid for the Louisiana Purchase
$15 million
a cruel, harsh, and unfair government in which a person or small group of people have power over everyone else.
Tyranny
A raid that took place in the Boston Harbor in 1773, during which American colonists dumped shiploads of tea into the water to protest a British tax on tea.
Boston Tea Party
a group of people who settle in a new territory but maintain ties to their home country.
Colony
A colonist who rebelled against British control during the American Revolution.
Patriot
unpaid slave labor, selling raw materials like cotton to the north and abroad
This branch is made up of the House and Senate, known collectively as the Congress. Among other powers, this branch makes all laws, declares war, regulates interstate and foreign commerce and controls taxing and spending policies.
Legislative Branch
The first constitution of the United States. It set up a confederation (group of states) in 1781.
Articles of Confederation
The idea that white Americans were divinely ordained to settle the entire continent of North America.
Manifest Destiny (racist!)
the year when the first enslaved Africans arrived in the British colony of Virginia.
1619
Souths reason for the Civil War
South was protecting their money (wanted to keep slavery) so they could continue making money off of unpaid labor. Didn't want the federal government making laws prohibiting slavery in the expanded territory.
This branch includes the Supreme Court and other federal courts. It evaluates laws by: Interpreting the meaning of laws. Applying laws to individual cases. Deciding if laws violate the Constitution.
Judicial Branch
A conflict between the French and the British, both of which had claimed lands in the Ohio River Valley.
French and Indian War
invasion of Mexico by the United States Army from 1846 to 1848. The war was driven by the idea of Manifest Destiny, the belief that America had a God-given right to expand its borders from sea to sea.
Mexican-American War
any group of people native to a specific region. In other words, it refers to people who lived there before colonists or settlers arrived, defined new borders, and began to occupy the land.
Indigenous
Norths reasons for the Civil War
North wanted to keep the U.S. as 1 country, prevent the south from separating. North wanted to limit the spread of slavery (mostly because of financial reasons - South was too rich) and some moral objections to slavery
This branch is responsible for carrying out and enforcing laws passed by Congress. The branch also includes the president, vice president, and Cabinet.
Executive Branch
Someone who believes in the type of political system in which states or territories share control with a central government. Alexander Hamilton was one.
Federalist
Amount by which the United States grew with the addition of the Louisiana Purchase.
The U.S. almost doubled in size after the Louisiana Purchase
A legal document designed to govern every aspect of the lives of enslaved and free African people under French colonial rule.
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