APUSH Unit 2 Key Terms Flashcards
Tenancy
Rental of property.
Competency
Ability to keep households independent and pass down to next generation.
Household Mode of Production
Families swapped labor and goods.
Squatters
Settling illegally on land they hoped to acquire legally.
Redemptioner
Flexible form of indentured servitude that allowed families to negotiate terms upon arrival.
Enlightenment
Emphasized power of human reason to understand and shape the world.
Pietism
Christian movement that stressed individual’s personal relationship with God.
Isaac Newton
In “Principia Mathematica” (1687) explained movement of planets around sun and invented calculus.
John Locke
Major contributor to Enlightenment, English philosopher.
Natural Rights
Preserve the NATURAL RIGHTS to life, liberty, and property.
Benjamin Franklin
Fled to Philadelphia and founded “Pennsylvania Gazette” which became one of the colony’s most influential newspapers.
Deism
Way of thinking- not an established religion. Influenced by the Enlightenment.
Jonathan Edwards
Minister in Northampton, Mass., encouraged a revival; published “A Faithful Narrative of the Surprising Work of God.”
George Whitefield
English minister; transformed local revivals into The Great Awakening
Revival
Renewal of religious enthusiasm
Old Lights
Conservative ministers, disliked the New Lights.
New Lights
Pietists, allowed women to speak in public, and allowed themselves to be imprisoned by Old Lights.
Tanaghrisson
Native-American, killed a French officer in order to ensure war.
William Pitt
Master strategist; crippled France by seizing colonies, stopping French ships, and allying themselves with Native-Americans.
Pontiac
Ottawa chief, encouraged the French to return.
Consumer Revolution
Raised living standards, marked increase in consumption of goods in England 1600-1750.
Regulators
Landowning vigilantes; demanded Eastern controlled government to provide western districts with more courts, fairer taxation, and a greater representation in assembly.
Sugar Act of 1764
British law that decreased the duty on French molasses, making it more attractive for shippers to obey the law, and at the same time raised penalties for smuggling. The act enraged New England merchants, who opposed both the tax and the fact that prosecuted merchants would be tried by British- appointed judges in a vice admiralty court.
Vice-admiralty Courts
A maritime tribunal presided over by a royally appointed judge, with no jury.
Stamp Act of 1765
British law imposing a tax on all paper used in the colonies. Widespread resistance to the Stamp Act prevented it from taking effect and led to its repeal in 1766.
Virtual Representation
The claim made by British politicians that the interests of the American colonists were adequately represented in Parliament by merchants who traded with the colonies and by absentee landlords (mostly sugar planters) who owned estates in the West Indies.
Quartering Act of 1765
A British law passed by Parliament at the request of General Thomas Gage, the British military commander in America, required colonial governments to provide braces and food for British troops.
Stamp Act Congress
A congress of delegates from nine assemblies that met in New York City in October 1765 to protest the loss of American “rights and liberties,” especially the right to trial by jury. The congress challenged the constitutionality of both the Stamp and Sugar Acts by declaring that only the colonists’ elected representatives could tax them.
Sons of Liberty
Colonists — primary middling merchants and artisans — who banded together to protest the Stamp Act and other imperial reforms of the 1760s. The group originated in Boston in 1765 but soon spread to all the colonies.
English Common Law
The centuries-old body of legal rules and procedures that protected the lives and property of the British monarch’s subjects.
Declaratory Act of 1766
Law issued by Parliament to assert Parliament’s unassailable right to legislate for its British colonies “in all cases whatsoever,” putting Americans on notice that the simultaneous repealing of the Stamp Act changed nothing in the imperial powers of Britain.
Townshend Act of 1767
Colonist attempted nonimportation agreements three times: in 1766, in response to the Stamp Act; in 1768, in response to the Townshend duties; and in 1774, in response to the Coercive Acts. In each case, colonial radicals pressured merchants to stop importing British goods. In 1774 nonimportation was adopted by the First Continental Congress and enforced by the Continental Association. American women became crucial to the movement by reducing their households’ consumption of imported goods and producing large quantities of homespun cloth.
Committees of Correspondence
A communications network established among towns in the colonies, among colonial assemblies, between 1772 and 1773 to provide for rapid dissemination of news about important political developments.
Tea Act of May 1773
British act that lowered the existing tax on tea and granted exemptions to the East India Company to make their tea cheaper in the colonies and entice boycotting Americans to buy it. Resistance to the Tea Act led to the passage of the Coercive Acts and imposition of military rule in Massachusetts.
Coercive Acts
Four British acts of 1774 meant to punish Massachusetts for the destruction of three shiploads of tea. Known in America as the Intolerable Acts, they led to open rebellion in the northern colonies.
Continental Congress
September 1774 gathering of colonial delegates in Philadelphia to discuss the crisis precipitated by the Coercive Acts. The Congress produced a declaration of rights and an agreement to impose a limited boycott trade with Britain.
Dunmore’s War
A 1774 war led by Virginia’s royal governor, the Earl of Dunmore, against the Ohio Shawnees, who had a longstanding claim to Kentucky as a hunting ground. The Shawnees were defeated and Dunmore and his militia forces claimed Kentucky as their own.
Minutemen
Colonial militiamen who stood ready to mobilize on short notice during the imperial crisis of the 1770s. These volunteers formed the core of the citizens’ army that met British troops at Lexington and Concord in April 1775.
Second Continental Congress
Legislative body that governed the United States from May 1775 through the war’s duration. It established an army, created its own money, and declared independence once all hope for a peaceful reconciliation with Britain was gone.
Declaration of Independence
A document containing philosophical principles and a list of grievances that declared the separation from Britain. Adopted by the Second Continental Congress on July 4, 1776, it ended a period of intense debate with moderates still hoping to reconcile with Britain.
Popular Sovereignty
The principle that ultimate powers lies in the hands of the electorate.
George Grenville
“one of the ablest men in Great Britain”; in charge of raising money from the colonies; passed the Currency Act of 1764; also won parliamentary approval of the Sugar Act of 1764
John Dickinson
author of Letters from a Farmer in Pennsylvania (1768) urged colonists to “remember your ancestors and your posterity” and oppose parliamentary taxes; letters served as an early call to resistance; led to ideas of natural rights for slaves
Charles Townshend
in charge of the new government due to William Pitt being chronically ill; not sympathetic towards to America; strongly supported the Stamp Act; created the Townshend Act of 1767
Lord North
1770 became Prime Minister; witty man and skillful politician; convinced parliament to repeal most of the Townshend acts
Samuel Adams
one of the most outspoken patriots from Massachusetts;
Lord Dunmore
Virginia’s royal governor; organized a local militia; led his militia against the Ohio Shawnees (against both the crown and the House of Burgesses) fought a single battle which they won and claimed Kentucky for themselves
Thomas Paine
published Common Sense (1776) calling for independence and a republican form of government; assaulted the traditional monarchical order
Thomas Jefferson
The Declaration’s main author; mobilized resistance to the Coercive Acts with a pamphlet A Summary View of the Rights of British America (1774); proclaimed a series of “self-evident” proofs
Battle of Long Island (1776)
First major engagement of the new Continental army, defending against 32,000 British troops outside of New York City.
Battle of Saratoga (1777)
A multistage battle in New York ending with the surrender of British general John Burgoyne. The victory ensured the diplomatic success of American representatives in Paris, who won a military alliance with France.
Valley Forge
a military camp in which George Washington’s army of 12,000 soldiers and hundreds of camp followers suffered horribly in the winter of 1777-1778.
Philipsburg Proclamation
A 1779 proclamation that declared that any slave who deserted a rebel master would receive protection, freedom, and land from Great Britain.
Battle of Yorktown (1781)
A battle in which French and American troops and a French fleet trapped the British army under the command of General Charles Cornwallis at Yorktown, Virginia. The Franco-American victory broke the resolve of the British government.
Currency Tax
A hidden tax on the farmers and artisans who accepted Continental bills in payment for supplies and on the thousands of soldiers who took them as pay. Because of rampant inflation, Continental currency lost much of its value during the war; thus, the implicit tax on those who accepted it as payment.
Treaty of Paris of 1783
The treaty that ended the Revolutionary War. In the treaty, Great Britain formally recognized American independence and relinquished its claims to lands south of the Great Lakes east of the Mississippi River.
Pennsylvania Constitution of 1776
A constitution that granted all taxpaying men the right to vote and hold office and created a unicameral (one-house) legislature with complete power; there was no governor to exercise a veto. Other provisions mandated a system of elementary education and protected citizens from imprisonment for debt.
Mixed Government
John Adams’s theory from Thoughts on Government (1776), which called for three branches of government, each representing one function: executive, legislative, and judicial. This system of dispersed authority was devised to maintain a balance of power and ensure the legitimacy of governmental procedures.
Articles of Confederation
The written document defining the structure of the government from 1781 to 1788, under which the Union was a confederation of equal states, with no executive and limited powers, existing mainly to foster a common defense.
Northwest Ordinance of 1787
A land act that provided for orderly settlement and established a process by which settled territories would become the states of Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, Michigan, and Wisconsin. It also banned slavery in the Northwest Territory.
Shay’s Rebellion
A 1786-1787 uprising led by dissident farmers in western Massachusetts, many of them Revolutionary War veterans, protesting the taxation policies of the eastern elites who controlled the state’s government.
Virginia Plan
A plan drafted by James Madison that was presented at the Philadelphia Constitutional Convention. It designed a powerful three-branch government, with the representation in both houses of the government, with representation in both houses of the congress tied to population; this plan would have eclipsed the voice of small states in the national government.
New Jersey Plan
Alternative to the Virginia plan drafted by delegates from small states, retaining the confederation’s single-house congress with one vote per state. It shared with the Virginia Plan enhanced congressional powers to raise revenue, control commerce, and make binding requisitions on the states.
Federalists
Supporters of the Constitution of 1787, which created a strong central government; their opponents, the Antifederalists, feared that a strong central government would corrupt the nation’s newly won liberty
Antifederalists
Opponents of ratification of the Constitution. Antifederalists feared that a powerful and distant central government would be out of touch with the needs of citizens. They also complained that it failed to guarantee individual liberties in a bill of rights.
Federalist No. 10
An essay by James Madison in The Federalist (1787-1788) that challenged the view that republican government only worked in small polities; it argued that a geographically expansive national government would better protect republican liberty.
General George Washington
commanded the new continental army
General William Howe
ordered by Lord North to capture New York City; won the Battle of Long Island
General Horatio Gates
felled huge trees in Burgoyne’s path slowing him tremendously; later swarmed Burgoyne and forced his surrender
Baron von Steuben
former Prussian officer who joined the American cause and trained many of the soldiers
Judith Sargent Murray
argued that men and women has equal capacities for memory and that women had superior imaginations; led to the right for girls to have equal schooling rights
James Madison
insisted on increased national security; came up with the Virginia Plan