Unit 5 Vocab Flashcards
Oregon Trail
Overland Trail of more than 2000 miles that carried American settlers from the Midwest to new settlement in Oregon, California, and Utah
Tejanos
person of Spanish or Mexican descent born in Texas
Empresarios
agents who received a land grant from the Spanish or Mexican government in return for organizing settlements
Alamo
Franciscan mission at San Antonio, Texas that was the site in 1836 of a siege and massacre of Texas by Mexican troops
Mexican-American war
war fought between Mexico and the United States between 1846 and 1848 over control of territory in southwest North America
49ers
thousands of Goldminers to arrive in the California Gold Rush in 1849
Wilmot’s Proviso
The amendment offered by Pennsylvania Democrat David Wilmot in 1846 which stipulated that “as an express and fundamental condition to the acquisition of any territory from the Republic of Mexico… Neither slavery nor involuntary servitude shall ever exist in any part of the said territory”
popular sovereignty
A solution to the slavery crisis suggested by Michigan Senator Lewis Cass by which territorial residents, not Congress, would decide slavery’s fate
Lincoln-Douglas debates
series of debates in the 1850 Illinois Senatorial campaign during which Douglas and Lincoln staked out their different opinions on the issue of slavery
compromise of 1850
The four step compromise which admitted California as a free state, allowed the residents of the New Mexico and Utah territory to decide the slavery issue for themselves, ended the slave trade in the District of Columbia, and passed a new fugitive slave law to enforce the constitutional provision stating that a slave escaping into a free state shall be delivered back to the owner
fugitive slave law
part of the compromise of 1850 that require the authorities in the North to assist southern slave catchers and return runaway slaves to their owners
Kansas Nebraska act
law passed in 1854 creating the Kansas and Nebraska territories but leaving the question of slavery open to residents, thereby repealing the Missouri compromise
know-nothings
name given to the anti-immigrant party formed from the wreckage of the Whig party and some disaffected Northern Democrats in 1854
republican Party
party that emerged in the 1850s in the aftermath of the better controversy over the Kansas-Nebraska act, consisting of former Whigs, some Northern Democrats, many know-nothings
bleeding Kansas
violence between pro and anti-slavery forces in Kansas territory after the passage of the Kansas-Nebraska act in 1854
Dred Scott vs. Sanford
Supreme Court ruling, in a lawsuit brought by Dred Scott, a slave demanding his freedom based on his residence in a free state, that slaves couldn’t be US citizens and that Congress had no jurisdiction over slavery in the territories
Lecompton Constitution
proslavery draft written in 1857 by Kansas territorial delegates elected under questionable circumstances; it was rejected by to governors, supported by President Buchanan and decisively defeated by Congress
panic of 1857
banking crisis that caused a credit crunch the North; it was less severe in the South, where high cotton prices spurred a quick recovery
John Brown’s raid
New England abolitionist John Brown’s ill-fated attempt to free Virginia’s slaves with the raid on the federal arsenal at Harper’s Ferry, Virginia, in 1859
constitutional union party
National party formed in 1860, mainly by former whigs, that emphasized allegiance to the union and strict enforcement of all national legislation
confederate states of America
nation proclaimed in Montgomery, Alabama, in February 1861, after the seven states of the lower south seceded from the United States
legal tender act
act creating a national currency in February 1862
National Bank act
act prohibiting state banks from issuing their own notes and forcing them to apply for federal charters
Morill Tariff Act
acts that raised tariffs to more than double their prewar rate
homestead act
law passed by Congress in May 1862 providing homesteads with 160 acres of free land in exchange for improving the land within five years of the grant
Morill Land Grant Act
law passed by Congress in July 1862 forwarding proceeds from the sale of public lands to the states for the establishment of agricultural and mechanical colleges
Emancipation Proclamation
decree announced by President Abraham Lincoln in September 1862 and formally issued on January 1, 1863, freeing slaves and all confederate states still in rebellion
13th, 14th, and 15th amendments
13-all slaves are free
14-all born in the US are citizens
15-all adult men regardless of race or color are allowed to vote
copperheads
The term Republicans apply to northern war dissenters and those suspected of aiding the confederate cause during the Civil War
radical Republicans
A shifting group of Republican congressman, usually a substantial minority, who favored the abolition of slavery from the beginning of the Civil War and later abdicated harsh treatment of the defeated South
Freedmen’s Bureau
Agency established by Congress in March 1865 to provide social, educational, and economic services, advice, and protection to former slaves and destitute whites; lasted seven years
civil rights act of 1866
act the full citizenship to African-Americans
congressional reconstruction
name given to the period 1867-1870 when Republican-dominated Congress controlled because controlled Reconstruction-era policy
tenure of office act
act stipulating that any officeholder appointed by the president with a senate’s advice and consent could not be removed until the Senate had approved a successor
Ku Klux Klan
perhaps the most prominent of the vigilante groups that terrorized black people in the south during the reconstruction era, founded by the Confederate veterans in 1866
sharecropping
labor system that evolved during and after reconstruction whereby landowners furnished laborers with a house, farm animals, and tools and advanced credit in exchange for a share of the laborers’ crop
Carpetbaggers
Northern transplants to the south, many of whom are union soldiers who stayed in the south after the war
scalawags
Southern whites, mainly small landowning farmers and well-off merchants and planters, who supported the Republican Party during Reconstruction
slaughterhouse cases
Group of cases resulting in one sweeping decision by the US Supreme Court in 1873 that contradicted the intent of the 14th amendment by decreeing that most citizenship rights remained under state, not federal, control
Compromise of 1877
The congressional settling of the 1876 election that installed Republican Rutherford B. Hayes in the white house and gave Democrats control of all state governments in the south
reconstruction act
1877 act that divided the south into five military districts subject to martial law
Santa Fe Trail
a 900-mile trail open by American merchants for training purposes following Mexico’s liberalization for the formally restrictive trading policies of Spain
