1800-1860, more in depth

Question 1

What roles did state and national government play in the development of America’s
transportation networks?

Question 2

Did the Industrial and Market revolutions make America a more or less republican society?
Support your interpretation by reference to specific events & developments.

Question 3

Describe the different types of cities that emerged in the United States in the first half of the
nineteenth century. How do you explain the differences in their development?

Question 4

What were Andrew Jackson’s policies on banking and tariffs? Did they help or hurt the
American economy? Why?

Question 5

How did the policies of the U.S. government toward Native Americans change between the
1800s and the 1840s? Why did Jackson support Indian removal? Did removal help to
preserve, or to destroy, Native American culture? Explain your answer.

Question 6

How did the ideology of the Whigs differ from that of the Jacksonian Democrats?

Question 7

How did the constitutional interpretations of the Taney Court differ from those of the
Marshall Court? What changed as a result of the Taney Court’s decisions?

Question 8

Discuss the relationship between the growth of democracy and the emergence of disciplined
political parties in the period between 1810 and the 1840s. Were the two developments
necessarily linked? Or did they just happen at the same time? Explain your answer.

Question 9

What were the main beliefs of transcendentalism, and how did American writers incorporate
them into their work?

Question 10

Compare and contrast the rural communalism and urban popular culture that emerged in the
United States between 1820 and 1860. How did each reflect the changes that accompanied
the nation’s emerging market economy in this period? Which arrangement did more to
promote liberty for the Americans who adopted it?

Question 11

What was the relationship between the abolitionist and women’s rights movements? Why did
women’s issues suddenly become so prominent in American culture?

Question 12

Explain the relationship between religion and reform in the decades from 1800 to 1860. Why
did many religious people feel compelled to remake society? What was their motivation?
How successful were they? Do you see any parallels with social movements today?

Question 13

How did black social thought change over the first half of the nineteenth century? What role
did black activists play in the abolitionist movement?

Question 14

Explain the paradox of southern prosperity, which emerged as a significant phenomenon
between 1820 and 1860.

Question 15

Why did women’s issues rise to prominence in American culture in the antebellum period?

Question 16

Why did the South remain committed to the institution of slavery and its expansion in 1860,
even as the North was becoming an increasingly urban and industrial society?

Question 17

Eli Whitney

Answer 17

the inventor who invented the cotton gin and the concept of interchangeable parts

Question 18

spoils system

Question 19

nativist movement

Question 20

American System

Answer 20

thought up by Henry Clay
supported by Whigs

policies:
- Support for a high tariff to protect American industries and generate revenue for the federal government
- Maintenance of high public land prices to generate federal revenue
-Preservation of the Bank of the United States to stabilize the currency and rein in risky state and local banks
-Development of a system of internal improvements (such as roads and canals) which would knit the nation together and be financed by the tariff and land sales

Question 21

nullification

Question 22

Second Bank of the United States

Question 23

Indian Removal Act of 1830

Question 24

Trail of Tears

Question 25

transcendentalism

Question 26

abolitionist

Question 27

William Lloyd Garrison

Question 28

underground railroad

Question 29

Seneca Falls Convention

Question 30

chattel principle

Question 31

gang labor system

Question 32

religion, abolition, Jackson, canals