Teacher Directions for 8th Grade DBQ District Common Assessment:
Day 1
Allow approximately 20-25 minutes for teacher-led DBQ Primary Source document reading
and viewing of photos. Allow 20 minutes for students to write in their DBQ Graphic Organizer.
1. Review DBQ Writing Assessment Direction sheet with students.
2. Pass out DBQ Primary Source Documents packet and the DBQ Graphic Organizer to each
student.
3. Teacher will allow approximately 3 minutes to view photos and/or to jot down notes.
Teachers should not explain/discuss the documents. Teachers should encourage
students to highlight or take notes on the material.
4. After document reading is finished, students will be instructed to complete the graphic
organizer provided.
5. Collect all reading materials and graphic organizer at the end of the hour.
Day 2
Allow the entire hour for the writing portion of the assessment.
1. Pass out to each student:
a. DBQ Primary Source Documents packet
b. DBQ Graphic Organizer
c. DBQ Answer Document
2. Review DBQ Writing Assessment Direction sheet with students.
3. Instruct students to complete the Writing Assessment portion of the DBQ District
Assessment using all of the provided materials.
4. Collect all reading materials, the writing assessment and graphic organizer at the end of
the hour.
Livonia Public Schools
8th Grade Social Studies
District Common Assessment
Document Packet
Topic
Constitutional Ideals
Historical Context
The United States Constitution is a plan for government that establishes a set of ideals for our nation. The
people of the United States are entitled to the rights and protection promised to them by the U.S.
Constitution. Yet, throughout our history groups of people have been denied the benefit of these ideals
from the Constitution.
Document-Based Question
How were groups of people excluded from the ideals promised by the U.S. Constitution and what impact
did this have on their lives?
Documents to Support Your Answer
Document 1: The Preamble
Document 5: Treaty of Fort Wayne
Document 2: Fugitive Slave Law
Document 6: John Burnett’s Story
Document 3: 3/5 Compromise
Document 7: Chief Joseph
Document 4: Dred Scott Case
Task Summary
Identify a group that has been historically excluded from the rights and protections of the United States
Constitution.
Describe how this group was impacted/affected.
Explain how the ideals of the Constitution were not met for this group.
Directions
1. Read all of the documents.
2. Select two documents that support your claim.
3. Using the two documents you have selected, complete the graphic organizer.
4. Using the information you collected on your graphic organizer, write a well-organized essay that
identifies, describes and explains how the ideals/goals in the Preamble of the Constitution were
not met in each example.
5. Your essay should include detailed information from at least two of the documents and your prior
knowledge.
6. Read and review the attached rubric to make sure your response includes all of the elements
listed.
Document #1
The Preamble
Document Information
The Preamble states the purpose of the Constitution it proposes a government based on the will
of the people governed by it.
The Preamble
We the people of the United States, in order to form a more perfect union,
establish justice, insure domestic tranquility, provide for the common defense,
promote the general welfare, and secure the blessings of liberty to ourselves
and our posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United
States of America.
https://www.google.com/search?q=preamble+to+the+constitution&source=lnms&tbm=isch&sa=X&ei=bn
X2UqmvA-Xp0AHGxoDAAg&sqi=2&ved=0CAcQ_AUoAQ&biw=1319&bih=555
Document #2
The Fugitive Slave Act 1850
Document Information
A poster displayed in Boston, MA warned African Americans to watch for slave catchers hunting
for fugitive slaves in the area. This notice, posted in Boston by an abolitionist (a person who
opposed slavery), reflects the new atmosphere in the North for African Americans, an
atmosphere of fear.
In the Compromise of 1850, Congress agreed to admit California to the U.S. as a free state; to
allow slavery in the new territories of New Mexico and Utah; to prohibit the slave trade in
Washington, D.C. and to pass the Fugitive Slave Law. The Fugitive Slave Law denied a jury trial
to anyone accused of escaping from slavery; gave marshals tremendous leeway to pursue slaves
into free states; and empowered the federal government to prosecute northerners who shielded
runaways.
____________________________________________________________________________
http://chnm.gmu.edu/lostmuseum/lm/307/
Document #3
3/5 Compromise
Document Information
During the Constitutional Convention of 1787, the northern states and southern states could not
agree on how slaves would be counted for taxes and establishing a number for representation to
Congress and state legislatures. Writers of the Constitution declared that slaves would be
counted as 3/5 of a person.
_____________________________________________________________________________
http://americanvision.org/3918/the-original-constitution-and-the-three-fifthsmyth/#sthash.PZZdEVj8.dpbs
Document #4
Dred Scott Case
Document Information
In March 1857 Dred Scott, a slave, sued for his freedom in Missouri, a slave state, after living in
Illinois, a free state. He claimed he should be free because he once lived on free soil.
The court declared the 1820 Missouri Compromise unconstitutional, permitting slavery in all of
the country’s territories. Dred Scott’s struggle for freedom hastened the beginning of the Civil
War and, in the end, led to freedom for all slaves.
____________________________________________________________________________
Judge Taney presided over the case. Below are remarks from the majority opinion written after
the trial. The decision was 7-2 against Dred Scott.
Statement 1
[Blacks] ”…had no rights which the white man was bound to respect; and that the negro might
justly and lawfully be reduced to slavery for his benefit. He was bought and sold and treated as
an ordinary article of merchandise and traffic, whenever profit could be made by it.”
Statement 2
“We think they [people of African ancestry] are not [citizens], and that they are not included,
and were not intended to be included, under the word “citizens’ in the Constitution, and can
therefore claim none of the rights and privileges which that instrument provides for and secures
to citizens of the United States.”
http://www.streetlaw.org/en/Page/545/Key_Excerpts_from_the_Majority_Opinion
Document #5
Treaty of Fort Wayne and Chief Tecumseh
Document Information
This treaty gave 3 million acres of Native American land in Indiana and Illinois to white settlers.
The treaty was negotiated by William Henry Harrison. The treaty led to a war with the United
States and Shawnee leader Tecumseh, called Tecumseh’s War.
_____________________________________________________________________________
Below is a statement by the Shawnee Chief Tecumseh:
“Brothers: Since the peace was made, you have killed some of the Shawnees, Winnebagos,
Delawares, and Miamis, and you have taken our land from us; and I do not see how we can
remain at peace if you continue to do so. You try to force the red people to do some injury; it is
you who are pushing them on to do mischief. You try to keep the tribes apart, and make
distinctions among them. You wish to prevent the Indians from uniting.”
Chief Tecumseh
The American Journey / http://beckysbridge.blogspot.com/2013/03/daughter-of-american-revolution.html
Document #6
John Burnett’s Story of the Trail of Tears
Document Information
The Indian Removal Act in May 1830 relocated Native Americans from their lands to unorganized
territory, in the area of present day Oklahoma. From 1831-1838, government troops moved
people from the Southeastern United States.
_____________________________________________________________________________
Below is an excerpt from a letter written by an American soldier who participated in relocating
the Native Americans west:
“One can never forget the sadness and solemnity of that morning. Chief John Ross led in prayer
and when the bugle sounded and the wagons started rolling many of the children rose to their
feet and waved their little hands good-bye to their mountain homes, knowing they were leaving
them forever. Many of these helpless people did not have blankets an many of them had been
driven from home barefooted.”
http://freepages.genealogy.rootsweb.ancestry.com/~tqpeiffer/Documents/Ancestral Migration Archives/
Document #7
Chief Joseph of the Nez Perce
Document Information
Throughout the 1800s, the United States government continued to try and move Native
Americans on to reservations and away from white settlers.
In 1877 the army ordered the Nez Perce to reservation lands, under their leader, Chief Joseph,
they began to move. However, a few warriors, bitterly angry about the relocation attacked and
killed several white settlers. The army came to punish the Nez Perce. Chief Joseph and his
people were captured while trying to seek safety in Canada.
_____________________________________________________________________________
Chief Joseph’s Surrender Speech, 1877
I am tired of fighting. Our chiefs are killed. Looking Glass is dead. Toohulhulsote is dead.
The old men are all dead. It is the young men who say yes or no. He who led the young
men is dead. It is cold and we have no blankets. The little children are freezing to death.
My people, some of them, have run away to the hills, and have no blankets, no food; no
one knows where they are -- perhaps freezing to death. I want to have time to look for
my children and see how many of them I can find. Maybe I shall find them among the
dead. Hear me, my chiefs, I am tired; my heart is sick and sad. From where the sun
now stands I will fight no more forever.
The Westward Movement, Junior Scholastic // http://www.historyplace.com/speeches/joseph.htm
DBQ Graphic Organizer
Directions: After examining the primary source documents, complete the graphic organizer below in
order to develop a thesis and organize your essay response.
Historically Excluded Group
Impact/Affects of Exclusion
Constitutional Ideals Not Met
Claim
Document 1
Document 2
Prior Knowledge 1
Prior Knowledge 2