Government & Railroads
Which 1862 law offered settlers a claim to 160 acres of land?
The Homestead Act.
What name describes African Americans who moved from the South to places such as Kansas after Reconstruction?
Exodusters.
What term means a nation’s right to govern itself?
Sovereignty.
What kind of business raises money by selling shares of ownership to investors?
A corporation.
What term means giving money or resources to help others, such as funding public libraries?
Philanthropy.
Federal land grants and loans helped railroad companies build track. What term means this kind of government assistance?
A subsidy.
What name describes African American soldiers who served at western posts after the Civil War?
Buffalo Soldiers.
Which 1887 law divided communally held tribal land into individual allotments?
The Dawes Act.
A steel company owns iron mines, transportation routes, and steel mills.
Which business strategy does this describe?
Vertical integration.
What economic idea favors limited government interference in business?
Laissez-faire.
What kinds of learning did colleges supported by the Morrill Land-Grant Act emphasize? Name BOTH areas.
Agriculture and mechanical skills.
Give one PUSH factor and one PULL factor for Exodusters’ migration.
Push: racial violence in the South.
Pull: western farmland, safety, or economic independence.
At which 1876 battle did Lakota and Northern Cheyenne forces defeat Custer’s troops?
Little Bighorn.
An oil company buys competing oil refineries.
Name the strategy and explain its effect on competition.
Horizontal integration. Buying rivals reduces competition in the same industry.
“The man who dies thus rich dies disgraced.”
Andrew Carnegie, The Gospel of Wealth, 1889
What responsibility did Carnegie give wealthy people?
Use surplus wealth during their lives to benefit the public.
1862: Homestead Act offers land claims.
1862: Pacific Railway Act supports railroad construction.
How did these TWO policies work together to encourage western growth?
Land offers attracted settlers. Railroad support helped build transportation that carried settlers and their goods.
Cowboys drove cattle to railheads. Later, barbed-wire fences spread across the land.
How did barbed wire change ranching and cattle drives?
Fences restricted open-range cattle drives by blocking movement across land.
1868: Treaty promises protected Native land.
1874: Prospectors enter after gold is found.
1889: Congress divides the reservation and opens land.
What pattern continued across this timeline? Use TWO events as evidence.
Treaty protections gave way to pressure on Native land: prospectors entered in 1874, and Congress opened more land in 1889.
How did cheaper steel production AND investment money help corporations expand?
Cheaper steel supported more tracks, machinery, and buildings. Investment money paid for business expansion.
How did the Gospel of Wealth and Social Darwinism differ in their views of wealth and poverty?
The Gospel of Wealth urged the wealthy to help society. Social Darwinism treated wealth as success in competition and used that belief to justify inequality.
The government supported railroads with land and loans. Laissez-faire favored limited business regulation.
Why can BOTH statements be true?
The government could help businesses grow while placing few limits on how they operated.
Why did western growth create opportunity for newcomers but harm people already living there? Use TWO groups.
Settlers gained farmland or jobs. Native nations faced loss of land, resources, and independence.
Compare the Dawes Act and boarding schools. What goal did they share, and how did their METHODS differ?
Both promoted forced assimilation. The Dawes Act changed land ownership. Boarding schools pressured children to abandon Native languages and customs.
A Kansas farmer ships grain to buyers in eastern cities.
What economic development does this show? Explain how the railroad made it possible.
A national market. Railroads connected producers in one region with buyers in distant regions.
A factory owner funds a hospital while keeping workers on long shifts in unsafe conditions.
Explain why BOTH “captain of industry” and “robber baron” could describe this owner.
Funding a hospital supports the captain-of-industry label. Unsafe conditions and long shifts support the robber-baron label.