united states history multiple choice questions

united states history multiple choice questions

Exploring Key Concepts in United States History Through Multiple Choice Questions

1. Introduction to the Study of United States History

History holds for people a certain fascination for the way in which it humanizes the record. No matter how mystical other planets or other worlds might be, there is something man-like about individuals who step from the pages of history. The famous and the little-known people who are part of the history of the United States all contributed something to the growth and development of the nation. Each person is remembered differently throughout history. Some are named George, Andrew, Thomas, or James. Others are named John or William. Because of this assassination at the moment of his father’s victory, we remember George Washington as the first President of the United States, and not as the first-born son of Mary Ball. But for different turns of events we might today sing ballads to the memory of George Washington the shepherd.

History is the study of change. It shows how change in one area influences that of other areas. The change process is always in operation; it is the story of life itself. The historian is one kind of scientist; he gathers the evidence. He also uses his imagination to interpret this evidence. The historian does not deal with the physical universe. He is not like the physicist who studies the atom; the biologist who studies the process of plant life, or the astronomer who searches the heavens for evidence of the Big Bang. The historian is concerned with life on the earth. His subject is the millions of people who have lived upon the earth in the various nations, both positive and negative.

2. Founding Documents and Key Events

The British policy of “salutary neglect” had allowed colonial self-government to evolve. Ignored by the British government, the colonies became used to solving their own problems. In particular, the need for levying money for the common defense led the colonies to establish self-government and taxation systems and to adopt the usage of representative assemblies. The colonists’ practice of sending representatives to the parliament opened a dangerous rift toward the mother country, whose official policy was no taxation without representation. The British government appeared not to realize that the colonists should have been colonized, not liberated. The respect (if not the actual application) of the principles of the Glorious Revolution made the conflict politically unsolvable, while the power imbalance between the empire and the colonies prevented a peaceful solution. Both the British and the British Americans came to their revolutionary positions unconsciously.

The British North American colonies formed some of the most liberal political communities in the world. Nonetheless, the status of the colonists within the British Empire was ambiguous. English political concepts, institutions, and customs had developed to fit the peculiar political situation prevailing in the three kingdoms of England, Scotland, and Ireland. Indian tribes, black slaves, and women did not possess the same rights—and in the case of the slaves, practically any rights. Nonetheless, these colonists believed in the principles of representative government, trial by jury, habeas corpus, a common-law tradition, and “the rights of Englishmen.” In the absence of direct British control, the colonies evolved toward becoming parts of an international maritime empire.

3. Social Movements and Civil Rights

The biggest criticism of the civil rights movement that was precipitated and intensified during the 1960s by the black power movement was the emphasis on: A) Non-violence. B) Legal means. C) No discrimination. D) Integration. E) Black identification and cultural togetherness.

In Plessy v. Ferguson, the United States Supreme Court: A) Held that state laws could not require separate facilities for blacks and whites. B) Upheld a Louisiana law requiring separate railroad facilities. C) Held that states could never require separate facilities for blacks and whites. D) Are correctly stating by none of the statements. E) Are correctly stating by a and c.

The civil rights movement was successful in achieving: A) The government dismantling the Jim Crow system in the South and guaranteeing constitutional rights through the Supreme Court and civil rights laws. B) The complete overthrow of capitalism and equal division of property. C) African Americans obtaining all the privileges and economic opportunities that white people in society achieved. D) African Americans obtaining the privileges of political power but not real economic and educational benefits. E) All of the above.

4. Economic Development and Industrialization

Between 1800 and 1830, the production of raw materials lay at the heart of the American economy. The most critical of these products was cotton—the nation’s leading industry. Cotton-growing sharply shaped America’s economic life and westward movement, having a great impact on native inhabitants, nearby industry, and the rise of American cities. Advances in transportation revolutionized American society, tying growing portions of the population closely together with canal, stagecoach, and railroad links. Along with their beneficial effects, these developments also had negative ones. When reliant raw-material producers collided with European manufacturers, major political conflicts resulted. Toward the close of the period, there were stirrings among working men about changing industrial technology. Andrew Jackson’s message to Congress contained the seeds of some future interventions in U.S. economic life. He disapproved of the Second Bank of the United States and federal preemption and urged the adoption of a constitutional amendment providing for federal budgets and the requirement of a high level of government revenues or the liquidation of any lengthy surplus of funds.

1. Early-nineteenth-century economic developments

5. Foreign Policy and International Relations

There are a number of units of time that we can use to attach to particular events, to put them in context. Which process took the longest, in terms of years? A) From the United States’ refusal to recognize the USSR to the establishment of diplomatic relations. B) From naval limitation treaties to the open disarmament of World War II. C) From the first sedition law in 1798 to the end of Barack Obama’s presidency in 2017. D) From the greatest hemispheric dissemination of communism to the end of the Cold War. E) From the onset of the Cold War to the recognition of the PRC in 1978.

In terms of international relations, the concept of “hemispheric unity” included all of the following except: A) the Good Neighbor Policy. B) the Neutrality Acts. C) support for Pan American air routes and other economic ties. D) insistence upon the United States being the dominant power. E) the concept that “all of the (Western) Hemisphere are American.”