APUSH Exam Collective Study Guide Flashcards
9/11 (2001)
Common shorthand for the terrorist attacks that occurred on September 11th, 2001, in which 19 militant Islamist men hijacked and crashed four commercial aircraft. Two planes hit the Twin Towers of the World Trade Center in New York City, causing them to collapse. One plane crashed into the Pentagon in Washington, D.C., and the fourth, overtaken by passengers, crashed in a field in rural Pennsylvania. Nearly 3,000 people were killed in the worst case of domestic terrorism in American history.
“10 percent” Reconstruction plan (1863)
Introduced by President Lincoln, it proposed that a state be readmitted to the Union once 10 percent of its voters had pledged loyalty to the United States and promised to honor emancipation.
100th meridian
A geographical, north-south line that bisects the United States from the Dakotas through West Texas, marking off the more humid, or well-watered eastern part of the North American continent from the arid landscapes of the West. Traditionally, the meridian was where Americans imagined that the “West” began.
ABC-1 agreement (1941)
An agreement between Britain and the United States developed at a conference in Washington, D.C., between January 29 and March 27, 1941, that should the United States enter World War II, the two nations and their allies would coordinate their military planning, making a priority of protecting the British Commonwealth. That would mean “getting Germany first” in the Atlantic and the European theater and fighting more defensively on other military fronts.
Abraham Lincoln Brigade
Idealistic American volunteers who served in the Spanish Civil War, defending Spanish republican forces from the fascist General Francisco Franco’s nationalist coup. Some 3,000 Americans served alongside volunteers from other countries.
abstract expressionism
An experimental style of mid-twentieth-century modern art exemplified by Jackson Pollock’s spontaneous “action paintings,” created by flinging paint on canvases stretched across the studio floor.
Abu Ghraib prison
A detention facility near Baghdad, Iraq. Under Saddam Hussein, the prison was the site of infamous torturing and execution of political dissidents. In 2004, during the U.S. occupation of Iraq, the prison became the focal point of a prisoner-abuse and torture scandal after photographs surfaced of American soldiers mistreating, torturing, and degrading Iraqi war prisoners and suspected terrorists. The scandal was one of several dark spots on the public image of the Iraq War and led to increased criticism of Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld.
Acadians
French residents of Nova Scotia, many of whom were uprooted by the British in 1755 and scattered as far south as Louisiana, where their descendants became known as “Cajuns”
Battle of Acoma (1599)
Fought between Spaniards under Jon Juan de Onate and the Pueblo Indians in present-day New Mexico. Spaniards brutally crushed the Pueblo peoples and established the territory as New Mexico in 1609
Act of Toleration (1649)
Passed in Maryland, it guaranteed toleration to all Christians but decreed the death penalty for those, like Jews and atheists, who denied the divinity of Jesus Christ. Ensured that Maryland would continue to attract a high proportion of Catholic migrants throughout the colonial period
Adams-Onis Treaty (1819)
Under the agreement, Spain ceded Florida to the United States, and the two nations agreed on the southwestern boundary of the Louisiana purchase. Spain retained the territory from Texas to California while abandoning its claims to the Oregon territory
Adamson Act (1916)
This law established an eight-hour day for all employees on trains involved in interstate commerce, with extra pay for overtime. The first federal law regulating the hours of workers in private companies, it was uphelp by the Supreme Court in Wilson v. New (1917)
Adkins v. Children’s Hospital (1923)
A landmark Supreme Court decision reversing the ruling in Muller v. Oregon, which had declared women to be deserving of special protection in the workplace.
Admiralty courts
Used to try offenders for violating the various Navigation Acts passed by the crown after the French and Indian War. Colonists argued that the courts encroached on their rights as Englishmen because they lacked juries and placed the burden of proof on the accused.
Affirmative action
Program designed to redress historic racial and gender imbalances in jobs and education. The term grew from an executive order issued by LBJ in 1956 mandating that projects paid for with federal funds take concerted action against discrimination based on race in their hiring practices. In the late 1960s, President Nixon’s Philadelphia Plan changed the meaning of affirmative action to require attention to certain groups, rather than protect individuals against discrimination
