Concepts and Vocabulary
A legal member of a country who owes loyalty to its government and is entitled to its protection.
What is a citizen?
America's weak first government system led leaders to gather in Philadelphia to revise it.
What are the Articles of Confederation?
A form of government ruled by a single monarch, such as a king or queen.
What is a monarchy?
Signed in 1215, this English document limited the power of the king for the first time.
What is the Magna Carta?
Before toilet paper was commercially produced, early American colonists and delegates had to wipe with whatever was handy—most commonly using this leftover core of a popular farm crop.
What is a corn cob?
The term for a legislature that is divided into two separate houses (such as the Senate and House of Representatives).
What is bicameral?
The city where delegates met in 1787 for the Constitutional Convention.
What is Philadelphia?
A system of government where citizens elect representatives to make laws and govern on their behalf.
What is a representative democracy (or republic)?
Written in 1620, this agreement established direct democracy and self-government for the Pilgrims.
What is the Mayflower Compact?
Contrary to the famous myth that George Washington's fake teeth were made of wood, they were actually made of gold, lead, hippopotamus ivory, and this gruesome real human material.
What are teeth bought from enslaved people?
An official, periodic counting of a population.
What is a Census?
The proposal favored by large states that wanted representation in Congress based entirely on population.
What is the Virginia Plan?
A government in which a small group of wealthy or powerful people holds control.
What is an oligarchy?
Enlightenment thinker who argued that all people are born with natural rights to life, liberty, and property.
Who is John Locke?
Alexander Hamilton got so heated during debates over government power and political rivalries that he ended up dying in 1804 after participating in this illegal, high-stakes ritual against Vice President Aaron Burr.
What is a pistol duel?
A form of government in which citizens elect representatives to make laws and govern on their behalf.
What is a representative democracy (or republic)?
The agreement that solved the representation debate by creating a bicameral (two-house) legislature.
What is the Great Compromise (or Connecticut Compromise)?
A form of government controlled by one or more religious leaders who claim to rule on behalf of God or the gods worshipped in their country.
What is a Theocracy?
The concept that an unwritten agreement exists between citizens and their government, where citizens give up some freedom in exchange for protection.
What is the social contract?
Because the water on the Mayflower went bad and was dangerous to drink, kids and teenagers drank this alcoholic beverage every single day with breakfast, lunch, and dinner.
What is beer/cider?
A system of government where power is divided between a national government and state governments.
What is federalism?
The compromise that settled how enslaved people would be counted toward a state's population for taxation and representation.
What is the Three-Fifths Compromise?
A form of government where one person rules with complete and absolute power.
What is a dictatorship? (Dictator)
French philosopher Baron de Montesquieu proposed this concept to prevent any single branch of government from becoming too powerful.
What is separation of powers?
To protest British taxes before the Revolution, a group of colonists took a local tax collector, stripped him, poured hot tar over his body, and covered him in this animal material, which ruined his skin and clothes.
What are feathers (Tarring and Feathering)?