Page 427 - American Stories, A History of the United States

Eastern Woodland Cultures Term given to Indians from the North- dependent they transported to the New World. It encouraged the recruitment
east region who lived on the Atlantic coast and supplemented farming with of a large servile labor force.
seasonal hunting and gathering. House of Burgesses The elective representative assembly in colonial
ecomienda system An exploitative system by Spanish rulers that granted Virginia.
conquistadores control of Native American villages and their inhabitants’ implied powers Powers the Constitution did not explicitly grant the
labor. federal government, but that it could be interpreted to grant.
Emancipation Proclamation On January 1, 1863, President Abraham indentured servants Persons who agreed to serve a master for a set num-
Lincoln proclaimed that the slaves of the Confederacy were free. Since the ber of years in exchange for the cost of transport to America. Indentured
South had not yet been defeated, the proclamation did not immediately free servitude was the dominant form of labor in the Chesapeake colonies before
anyone, but it made emancipation an explicit war aim of the North. slavery.
Embargo Act In response to a British attack on an American warship off Itinerant Preachers These charismatic preachers spread revivalism
the coast of Virginia, this 1807 law prohibited foreign commerce. throughout America during the Great Awakening.
Enlightenment Philosophical and intellectual movement that began in Jay’s Treaty Treaty with Britain negotiated by Chief Justice John Jay in
Europe during the eighteenth century. It stressed the use of reason to solve 1794. Though the British agreed to surrender forts on U.S. territory, the treaty
social and scientific problems. provoked a storm of protest in America.
enumerated goods Raw materials, such as tobacco, sugar, and rice, that Jim Crow laws Segregation laws enacted by southern states after
were produced in the British colonies and under the Navigation Acts had to Reconstruction.
be shipped only to England or its colonies. joint-stock company Business enterprise that enabled investors to pool
Era of Good Feeling A description of the two terms of President James money for commerce and funding for colonies.
Monroe (1817–1823) during which partisan conflict abated and federal initia- judicial review The authority of the Supreme Court to determine the
tives suggested increased nationalism. constitutionality of statutes.
Farewell Address In this 1796 document, President George Washington Kansas-Nebraska Act This 1854 act repealed the Missouri Compromise,
announced his intention not to seek a third term. He also stressed federalist split the Louisiana Purchase into two territories, and allowed its settlers to
interests and warned Americans against political factions and foreign entan- accept or reject slavery by popular sovereignty.
glements.
Federalists Supporters of the Constitution who advocated its ratification. Kentucky and Virginia Resolutions Statements penned by Thomas
Jefferson and James Madison to mobilize opposition to the Alien and Sedition
Fifteenth Amendment Ratified in 1870, it prohibits the denial or abridg- Acts, which they argued were unconstitutional. Jefferson’s statement (the
ment of the right to vote by the federal or state governments on the basis of Kentucky Resolution) suggested that states could declare null and void con-
race, color, or prior condition as a slave. It was intended to guarantee African gressional acts they deemed unconstitutional (see nullification).
Americans the right to vote in the South.
Ku Klux Klan A secret terrorist society first organized in Tennessee in
First Continental Congress At a meeting of delegates from 12 colonies in 1866. The original Klan’s goals were to disfranchise African Americans, stop
Philadelphia in 1774, the Congress denied Parliament’s authority to legislate Reconstruction, and restore the prewar social order of the South. The Ku Klux
for the colonies, condemned British actions toward the colonies, created the Klan re-formed in the twentieth century to promote white supremacy and
Continental Association, and endorsed a call to take up arms. combat aliens, Catholics, and Jews.
Fourteenth Amendment Ratified in 1868, it provided citizenship to ex- Lewis and Clark expedition Overland expedition to the Pacific coast
slaves after the Civil War and constitutionally protected equal rights under (1804–1806) led by Meriwether Lewis and William Clark. Commissioned by
the law for all citizens. Radical Republicans used it to enact a congressional President Thomas Jefferson, it collected scientific data about the country and
Reconstruction policy in the former Confederate states. its resources.
Freedmen’s Bureau Agency established by Congress in March 1865 to Louisiana Purchase U.S. acquisition of the Louisiana Territory from
provide freedmen with shelter, food, and medical aid and to help them estab- France in 1803 for $15 million. The purchase secured American control of the
lish schools and find employment. The Bureau was dissolved in 1872. Mississippi River and doubled the size of the nation.
French Revolution A social and political revolution in France Loyalists Colonists sided with Britain during the American Revolution.
(1789–1799). Manifest Destiny Coined in 1845, this term referred to a doctrine in sup-
Fugitive Slave Law Passed in 1850, this federal law made it easier for port of territorial expansion based on the belief that the United States should
slaveowners to recapture runaway slaves; it also made it easier for kidnappers expand to encompass all of North America.
to take free blacks. The law became an object of hatred in the North. Marbury v. Madison In this 1803 landmark decision, the Supreme Court
Gibbons v. Ogden In this 1824 case, the Supreme Court expanded the first asserted the power of judicial review by declaring an act of Congress un-
power of the federal government to regulate interstate commerce. constitutional.
Glorious Revolution Replacement of James II by William III and Mary II Mayflower Compact Agreement among the Pilgrims aboard the Mayflower
as English monarchs in 1688, marking the beginning of constitutional mon- in 1620 to create a civil government at Plymouth Colony.
archy in Britain. McCulloch v. Maryland This 1819 ruling asserted the supremacy of fed-
Great Awakening Widespread evangelical religious revival movement of eral power over state power and the legal doctrine that the Constitution could
the mid-1700s. It divided congregations and weakened the authority of estab- be broadly interpreted (see implied powers).
lished churches in the colonies. mercantilism An economic theory that shaped imperial policy throughout
Great Migration Migration of 16,000 Puritans from England to the the colonial period, mercantilism assumed that the supply of wealth was fixed.
Massachusetts Bay Colony during the 1630s. To increase its wealth, a nation needed to export more goods than it imported.
greenbacks Paper currency issued by the Union during the Civil War. Favorable trade and protective economic policies and colonial possessions
Hartford Convention An assembly of New England Federalists who rich in raw materials were important in achieving this balance.
met in Hartford, Connecticut, in December 1814 to protest President James Mexican–American War War between the United States and Mexico after
Madison’s foreign policy in the War of 1812, which had undermined com- the U.S. annexation of Texas. As victor, the United States acquired vast new
mercial interests in the North. They proposed amending the Constitution to territories from Mexico.
prevent future presidents from declaring war without a two-thirds majority Middle Ground A geographical area where two distinct cultures meet and
in Congress. merge with neither holding a clear upper hand.
headright System of land distribution in which settlers were granted a Missouri Compromise A sectional compromise in 1820 that admitted
50-acre plot of land from the colonial government for each servant or Missouri to the Union as a slave state and Maine as a free state. It also banned

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