Western Expansion & Populism
Civil Rights Movement
The Great Depression
Imperialism & World War 1
The Cold War
200
What is Manifest Destiny?
The 19th century belief that Americans should own all the land and resources between the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans.
200
What was the Montgomery Bus Boycott?
Name of the 1955 protest in held in Alabama by Rosa Parks and Martin Luther King Jr. among others protesting unfair segregationist policies for public transportation.
200
What was the Dust Bowl?
Natural disaster occurring in 1936 where prolonged drought conditions and loose soil caused massive dust storms?
200
What was imperialism?
Foreign policy where militarily strong nations expand, take over "weaker peoples," and use those people's resources to grow stronger and increase their wealth.
200
What is Containment?
Strategy of the US government to limit the spread of Communism during the late 1940s and early 1950s.
Offered financial assistance and military aid to pro-democratic countries trying to stop Communist aggression.
400
Who were the Populists?
Name for Grangers and other pro-farmer groups trying to obtain silver currency and reduced railroad rates.
400
What is Brown v. Board of Education, Topeka, Kansas?
Supreme Court decision enacted in 1954, which overturned the "separate-but-equal" segregationist doctrine established by the Plessy v. Ferguson decision (1898).
Led to the integration of the public education system
400
What was the Stock Market Crash of October 1929?
Led to millions of Americans losing their jobs during the Great Depression.
Caused by Americans buying stock on margin (for 10% of stock), by defaulting on these loans, and by artificially raising the prices of stocks (speculation).
400
What was trench warfare? Why did it make World War 1 last longer?
Name given to World War 1 defensive strategy that prolonged the war since troops were stuck in holes unable to move forward.
Designed to shelter troops from artillery and gun fire.
400
What is McCarthyism?
Name given to period of Cold War hysteria during the early 1950s when American feared Communist infiltration of the US government.
600
What is the Dawes Act?
Law that called allowed the US government to seize Indian land during the 1860s resulting in their eventual relocation to reservations.
600
What were two goals of the Civil Rights Act of 1964?
1) Banned discrimination based on race, gender, ethnicity, or nationality.
2) Prohibited racial discrimination regarding hiring.
600
What was the New Deal?
These were a series of government programs signed by Franklin D. Roosevelt beginning in 1933. They were designed to 1) get unemployed Americans back to work, 2) provide financial assistance to struggling Americans, and 3) reform the existing financial structure to prevent future depressions.
600
What was "the Big Stick" Policy?
Credited to Theodore Roosevelt, this imperialist policy focuses on the US offer economic incentives or threatening military intervention depending on the situation.
600
Why was the Cuban Missile Crisis so important to Cold War history?
The Cuban Missile Crisis of October 1962 was the closest the US and the Soviet Union ever came to nuclear warfare when the US navy blocked Soviet ships transporting missiles to Cuba.
US President John F. Kennedy and Soviet Premier Nikita Khrushchev negotiated a peaceful solution after 13 days.
800
What is the Transcontinental Railroad?
Responsible for "opening the west" to American settlement during the late 1870s. It also caused conflict with the Plains Indians.
800
Why did Congress pass the Voting Rights Act of 1965?
Removed restrictions on African American suffrage rights imposed as part of segregation.
Not part of the Civil Rights Act of 1964
Added after MLK Jr. led march from Selma to Montgomery, AL.
800
Who was Herbert Hoover?
Name of the President at the beginning of the Great Depression. Most Americans saw him as uncaring because he was slow to act and didn't offer direct assistance.
Many homeless named shanty towns after him.
800
What were the seeking of the Lusitania (1915) and the Zimmerman Telegraph?
President Woodrow Wilson declared war on Germany after these two major events resulting US giving up its neutrality.
800
Why did the US enter the Korean War?
The Korean War was a US-backed UN peacekeeping mission in 1950 whose purpose was to push the North Korean Army back across the 38 Parallel line out of South Korea?
US intervened because it believed that if one country fell to Communism, then all countries would fall. The war turned into a stalemate.
1000
Who is William Jennings Bryant?
Populist Democrat who ran for president and lost in 1896; argued for silver currency so that farmers could repay debts faster
1000
What was Nixon's "Southern Strategy?"
Policy enacted by Richard Nixon in the early 1970s to gain votes from southern whites by slowing down US enforcement of Civil Rights Act and Voting Right Act.
1000
What was the Bank Holiday?
Enacted by Franklin D. Roosevelt in 1933; shut down banks for a period of one-week in order to restore Americans' faith in the financial sector.
Helped stop bank closures and undue panic by keeping Americans from taking their money out of the banks.
1000
What was the Versailles Treaty?
Name of document that ended World War 1 and placed most of the blame on Germany resulting in a reduction of its military as well as forced payments of reparations.
1000
Why did Americans become disillusioned with the Vietnam War?
American youth in the late 1960s lost faith in the government and began protesting the Vietnam War
-Increased as number of deaths happened and when it became apparent that Lyndon B. Johnson and others lied about why America entered the war.
