Founding Era (Up to 1800)
This document includes the famous line, "We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal?"
The Declaration of Independence
This nearly doubled the size of the United States overnight (sort of), and is an early example of Manifest Destiny.
Louisiana Purchase
This document, issued by Abraham Lincoln, didn't free enslaved people overnight, but it did get the ball rolling on the final end of slavery.
Emancipation Proclomation
This law, the first national immigration law, was passed due to a mixture of racism and anxiety about jobs. It targeted a specific group of immigrants who had come to the United States in large numbers in the decades before.
The Chinese Exclusion Act
During World War II, the United States was a member of this group, which also included Great Britain and the Soviet Union.
The Allied Powers
This act of protest, where colonists shouted slogans like "No Taxation Without Representation!," turned violent when British soldiers opened fire into the crowd.
Boston Massacre
This supreme court decision stated that African American people could never become citizens and that the government had no authority to limit slavery in any way.
Dred Scott v. Sandford
This amendment to the Constitution, arguably the most important in our history, guarantees equal protection under the law and birthright citizenship.
14th Amendment
The United States went to war with and later occupied this nation, a former ally, in a prime example of imperialism.
The Philippines
This intercepted message from Germany to Mexico was the event that finally convinced the United States to enter World War I (though economic reasons were most likely a bigger factor).
The Zimmerman Note
This was added to the US Constitution after the Constitutional Convention in order to appease Anti-Federalists.
Bill of Rights
This abolitionist disagreed with other abolitionists who advocated for disunionism.
Frederick Douglass
This practice exploited a loophole in the 13th Amendment that abolished slavery. It meant that, in the words of legal scholar Bryan Stevenson, slavery did not end, "it simply evolved."
Convict Leasing
Its completion led to a boom in America's overall economic position, as businesses were now able to quickly and efficiently send goods around the entire country.
Transcontinental Railroad
Issued by President Roosevelt, this led to the internment of Japanese-Americans in violation of their constitutional rights.
Executive Order 9066
This Puritan leader famously implored his followers to create a "City Upon a Hill," a metaphor Americans still commonly used when discussing the United States.
John Winthrop
John Brown remains a controversial figure in American history. He was fiercely anti-slavery and had incredibly modern views on race. But he also committed violent act during his Raid at Harper's Ferry, and this violent attack in Kansas.
Pottowotamie Massacre.
This movement led to the creation of many of America's Confederate monuments, and it influenced the way in which the Civil War was discussed in schools for the next 100 years.
The Lost Cause
This event, which resulted from the violation of the First Treaty of Fort Laramie, was one of America's ugliest and most shameful incidents of racial violence.
The Sand Creek Massacre
This New Deal agency put millions of Americans to work, mostly on infrastructure projects.
Works Progress Administration
This event, organized in response to the British victory in the French & Indian War, is an early example of the idea of Pan-Indianism.
Pontiac's Rebellion
In this Supreme Court case, the court ruled that Native Americans in the Southeast could not be forcibly removed from their lands. Andrew Jackson ignored this ruling when he carried through with the "Trail of Tears."
Cherokee Nation v. Georgia
This man became America's first African American governor in 1873. America's second African American governor, Douglas Wilder of Virginia, was not elected until 1989.
Pinckney B.S. Pinchback
This person wrote the poem "The New Colossus," which contains the famous line "Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses yearning to breathe free."
Emma Lazarus
The New Deal was based on this theory, which states that a large amount of government spending is the best way to jumpstart an ailing economy.
Keynesian Economics