APUSH 1775-1800

Washington Crossing the Delaware, Emanuel Leutze, 1851

The painting is depiciting a crucial aspect of which Revoluitonary War battle?

• Battle of Yorktown (1781)

• Battle of Saratoga (1777)

• Battle of Bunker Hill (1775)

• Battle of Trenton (1776)

Washington Crossing the Delaware, Emanuel Leutze, 1851

In the above painting, the key to this battle’s outcome is...

• the timing of the attack

• the French navy

• the much larger Continental Army compared to the British forces

• that it was fought at sea

Washington Crossing the Delaware, Emanuel Leutze, 1851

The character of the American Revolution and earliest American government under the Articles of Confederation can most closely be attributed to

• America’s rejection of the ideals of the Enlightenment

• the colonies’ strong political ties to the British system of hereditary privilege.

• Americans’ commitment to establishing a very strong centralized government.

• America’s belief in the Enlightenment principles of limited government and individual liberty.

Washington Crossing the Delaware, Emanuel Leutze, 1851

America’s reaction to the French Revolution and the beginning of the Napoleonic Wars marks the beginning of a period characterized by

• the United States’ attempts at maintaining neutrality.

• the United States’ role as a global leader.

• the United States’ desire to intertwine with the affairs of Europe

• the United States’ military superiority.

“From decades of debate on the colonists’ right to self-government, popular sovereignty had emerged as the basic principle of legitimate government. But how was this principle to be realized in practice? ...Whig social contract theory specified that sovereignty resided in the will of the majority of the participants in the contract, limited only by the individual member’s right to life, liberty, and property. Applied to the colonies, the question was, who were the legitimate participants in the new polity based on contract?”

Willi Paul Adams, The First American Constitutions, 1980

What was generally accepted as a necessary qualification for the rights of citizenship in the first few decades of United States’ government?

• Participation in the American Revolution

• Ownership of property

• Having been born in territories of the United States

• Membership in the Federalist Party

“From decades of debate on the colonists’ right to self-government, popular sovereignty had emerged as the basic principle of legitimate government. But how was this principle to be realized in practice? ...Whig social contract theory specified that sovereignty resided in the will of the majority of the participants in the contract, limited only by the individual member’s right to life, liberty, and property. Applied to the colonies, the question was, who were the legitimate participants in the new polity based on contract?”

Willi Paul Adams, The First American Constitutions, 1980

Which of the following would have argued most energetically in support of a limited definition of the legitimate participants in government?

• Frontiersmen

• Enlightenment philosophers

• Thomas Paine

• The Federalist Party

“From decades of debate on the colonists’ right to self-government, popular sovereignty had emerged as the basic principle of legitimate government. But how was this principle to be realized in practice? ...Whig social contract theory specified that sovereignty resided in the will of the majority of the participants in the contract, limited only by the individual member’s right to life, liberty, and property. Applied to the colonies, the question was, who were the legitimate participants in the new polity based on contract?”

Willi Paul Adams, The First American Constitutions, 1980

Which of the following most directly contradicts the founding principles described in the passage?

• The development of the idea of “republican motherhood”

• The formation of political parties in response to controversy in the early republic

• The growth of slavery in the lower South

• The Constitution’s failure to resolve conflicts between American Indian tribes and the government

“...Is there one person of understanding & reflection among you who will not admit that every consideration of justice, humanity, and safety, forbids that any more Negroes should be brought into your state, and yet it is well known that the avarice of your citizens, and the rage for acquiring that property has broke through all legal restrictions,... Trust not on your Eastern friends for aid, if you do not enforce righteous measures for your own safety;... Already they begin to resist that principle in the Constitution which admits the Negroes of the Southern States to increase the number of Representatives in the Congress of the United States.”

William Few, Letter to Georgia Governor Edward Telfair, 1804

Which of the following best explains the impact of the United States’ Constitution on the issue addressed in the letter above?

• By addressing the needs of the slave-based Southern economies, the Constitution preserved the regional differences that had defined the colonial era.

• By severely limiting the rights of slaveholders, the Constitution attempted to abide by Revolutionary ideals of freedom without dividing the infant nation.

• By postponing a definite solution to the question of slavery, the Constitution established the grounds for conflict that would continue until resolved by the Civil War.

• By allowing the slave states to dominate the United States government, the Constitution encouraged the growth of the slave trade.

“...Is there one person of understanding & reflection among you who will not admit that every consideration of justice, humanity, and safety, forbids that any more Negroes should be brought into your state, and yet it is well known that the avarice of your citizens, and the rage for acquiring that property has broke through all legal restrictions,... Trust not on your Eastern friends for aid, if you do not enforce righteous measures for your own safety;... Already they begin to resist that principle in the Constitution which admits the Negroes of the Southern States to increase the number of Representatives in the Congress of the United States.”

William Few, Letter to Georgia Governor Edward Telfair, 1804

Which of the following debates reveals the continuation of the conflict addressed in the letter above?

• The debate over the rights of the Native Americans on the frontier

• The debate over the expansion of slavery into the territories

• The debate over the role of women in American society

• The debate over the ratification of the Constitution

“There is I think great danger that [the new United States government] will be [a failure] unless the tottering system shall be supported by arms...

What is the cause of this commotion [in Western Massachusetts]? [The farmers] just complained of commutation, of the weight of the public taxes, of the insupportable debt of the union, of the scarcity of money, and of the cruelty of suffering the private creditors to call for their just dues. ...The proportion of debtors run high in this State. Too many of them are against the government. The men of property, and the holders of the public securities are generally abettors of our present constitution.”

Benjamin Lincoln, letter to George Washington, 1786

The political and economic ideas of the farmers described in this passage were most likely developed because of

• the region’s reliance upon the credit from Great Britain.

• the cultural distinctiveness of the backcountry as compared to the urbanizing areas in the eastern part of the state.

• the farmers’ successful experience with utopian societies.

• the farmer’s good relations with the Native Americans.