Civil War & Reconstruction
President Rutherford B. Hayes’s 1877 "First Annual Message" referenced the withdrawal of federal troops from the South, an event that marked the official end of this era.
Reconstruction
This type of corrupt local organization, such as Tammany Hall in New York, used bribery and favors for immigrants to control city politics during the Gilded Age. Boss Tweed is the most well-known.
Political Machines
This social and religious movement taught that wealthy individuals had a moral obligation to help the poor and fix urban problems.
Social Gospel Movement
President Woodrow Wilson initially opposed certain provisions of the Treaty of Versailles because he feared they would weaken this country's economic recovery.
Germany
This 1930s cultural movement significantly broadened public interest in African-American culture through art and music.
Harlem Renaissance
During WWII, the U.S. government promoted "Victory Gardens" to reduce the effects of food shortages caused by this mandatory practice.
Rationing
This 1944 legislation, while providing mortgage and education benefits to veterans, inadvertently reinforced systemic inequality because its benefits were often denied to Black veterans by local authorities.
G.I. Bill
This specific medium was central to changing American public opinion about the Vietnam War by bringing battlefield scenes into people's living rooms.
Television
These three constitutional amendments were collectively passed to abolish slavery, define citizenship, and protect the voting rights of former slaves.
13th, 14th, and 15th Amendments
This massive infrastructure project linked the Atlantic and Pacific coasts, drastically aiding the growth of U.S. business in the 19th century.
Transcontinental Railroad
Investigative journalists like Upton Sinclair and Ida Tarbell were given this nickname for exposing corruption in business and government.
Muckrakers
U.S. Secretary of State John Hay sent a diplomatic note in 1899 to world powers in order to secure equal economic and trading opportunities in China. What is the name of this policy?
Open Door Policy
Following the end of World War I, the United States moved toward this foreign policy, characterized by the refusal to join the League of Nations and the signing of the Kellogg-Briand Pact to avoid future entanglements.
Isolationism
Before officially entering WWII, the U.S. passed this 1941 act to provide military aid and supplies to any nation whose defense was deemed "vital to the defense of the United States."
Lend-Lease Act
This 1950s project was promoted for national security and drastically increased the movement of people and goods across the U.S.
Interstate Highway System
During the Vietnam War, this term was popularized to describe the growing public skepticism toward the federal government's optimistic reports versus the reality of the war.
Credibility Gap
During the early years of post–Civil War Reconstruction, this group of Republicans favored full citizenship rights for former slaves, while moderate Republicans supported only limited civil equality.
Radical Republicans
This 1882 federal law was the first significant legislation to restrict immigration based on a specific nationality.
Chinese Exclusion Act
This Progressive leader founded Hull House in Chicago to provide social and educational services to the urban poor and immigrants.
Jane Addams
The sinking of the USS Maine helped trigger this 1898 war, resulting in the United States becoming a major world power.
The Spanish American War
This 1935 New Deal law established a federal system of old-age benefits and unemployment insurance.
Social Security Act
These 1945–1946 legal proceedings were designed to promote international justice and prevent future "crimes against humanity."
Nuremberg Trials
This landmark 1954 Supreme Court case unanimously ruled that "separate but equal" in public education was unconstitutional.
Brown v. Board of Education
This 1968 military offensive by North Vietnamese and Viet Cong forces, though a tactical failure for them, turned many Americans against the war.
Tet Offensive
Passed in 1887, this federal law aimed to "Americanize" Native Americans by breaking up reservations and distributing land to individual owners.
Dawes Act
Unlike the first industrial revolution which relied on steam and water, this 19th-century innovation allowed factories to use new power sources and operate more efficiently at all hours.
Electricity
These multi-family urban dwellings were notorious for being overcrowded and unsanitary during the late 19th-century peak of immigration.
Tenements
This 1917 document from Germany to Mexico proposed a military alliance against the United States and was a final catalyst for U.S. entry into WWI.
Zimmerman Telegram
This environmental disaster of the 1930s was caused by severe drought and poor farming, leading many to migrate to California.
The Dust Bowl
This strategic military campaign in the Pacific involved capturing key islands to establish airbases for a final assault on mainland Japan.
Island hopping
Martin Luther King Jr. delivered his "I Have a Dream" speech during this massive 1963 demonstration for civil and economic rights.
March on Washington
This 1964 resolution gave President Lyndon B. Johnson the authority to take "all necessary measures" to repel armed attacks against U.S. forces in Southeast Asia, leading to escalation in Vietnam.
Gulf of Tonkin
These discriminatory laws were passed by Southern states immediately after the Civil War to restrict the freedom of African Americans and maintain a cheap labor force. (Do not confuse with the ones after Plessy v.Ferguson).
Black Codes
This 1890s political party was formed by farmers and laborers to fight for economic reforms like the "free coinage of silver."
Populist (People) Party
Founded in 1874, this organization focused primarily on banning alcoholic consumption to correct social injustices.
Woman's Christian Temperance Union
This addition to the Monroe Doctrine asserted that the United States would act as an "international police power" in the Western Hemisphere.
Roosevelt Corollary
This 1920s trial reflected the cultural conflict between traditional religious fundamentalism and modern scientific theories like evolution.
Scopes "Monkey" Trial
This executive order authorized the forced relocation and internment of Japanese Americans living on the West Coast during the war.
Executive Order 9066
This U.S. foreign policy, introduced by Harry Truman, aimed to stop the global expansion of communism through economic and military aid.
Truman Doctrine or Containment
This 1970s political scandal, which involved illegal surveillance of political opponents, eventually led to the first-ever resignation of a U.S. president.
Watergate Scandal