ORIGINS OF THE AMERICAN
NATION
THE YOUNG REPUBLIC
ANTEBELLUM AMERICA
U.S. HISTORY & GEOGRAPHY
CHAPTER 1
LESSONS 1 – 3 & CONSTITUTION HANDBOOK
PRE-COLUMBIAN AMERICA
 Mesoamerica (central/southern Mexico & Central America)
• Olmec – 1st American civilization
• Mayas & Aztecs – built temples/pyramids, trade networks
• Hohokam & Anasazi – North America’s Southwest – geometric
earthworks
• Mississippians – largest early American cities
NATIVE AMERICANS OF
NORTH AMERICA
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Apache – nomadic hunters – mostly buffalo
Navajo – farming village
Sioux – hunters
Pomo – small game/acorns
Inuit & Aleut – hunt sea mammals, polar bears, & caribou
EARLY MODERN EUROPE
 Renaissance & Reformation
 Overseas Exploration
• Christopher Columbus
• Amerigo Vespucci
NEW SPAIN
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Hernan Cortes – conquers Aztecs
Juan Ponce de Leon – Puerto Rico & Florida
Pedro Menendez de Aviles – St. Augustine
Francisco Vasquez de Coronado – explores Southwest
Searched for gold & converted Native Americans to Catholicism
NEW FRANCE
 Giovanni da Verrazano & Jacques Cartier – explore St. Lawrence
River
 Samuel de Champlain – Quebec, 1st permanent French colony
 Louis Jolliet & Jacques Marquette – Mississippi River
 Rene Cavelier de La Salle – Gulf of Mexico
 Mostly engaged in trading of furs
THIRTEEN COLONIES
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Roanoke – “Lost Colony”
Jamestown – 1st permanent colony; Virginia Company
John Smith – “He that will not work shall not eat”
Powhatan Confederacy – Pocahontas
John Rolfe – “brown gold” – tobacco
Labor – head right system; indentured servants
NEW ENGLAND
COLONIES
 Plymouth Colony – Pilgrims,
Mayflower Compact – created a plan
for self-government
 Massachusetts Bay Company –
John Winthrop, Boston, model
society focused on “god’
 Rhode Island – Roger Williams,
Providence, pay for land from
Native Americans
 Connecticut –Reverend Thomas
Hooker, Hartford
 Maine & New Hampshire – divided
territory claimed by
Massachusetts
John Winthrop
Roger Williams
MIDDLE COLONIES
 New Netherland – Henry Hudson, Dutch West India Company.
Eventually given to Duke of York by Charles II of England.
Renamed New York. Land from NY became known as New Jersey
 Pennsylvania – William Penn, Quakers escaping religious
persecution
SOUTHERN COLONIES
 Maryland – Chesapeake Bay, George Calvert, refuge for Catholics
 North & South Carolina – Charles II gave to key supporters; NC –
tobacco farms; SC – plantations, cash crop, Charles Towne
 Georgia – James Oglethorpe, colony for debtors
 Slave labor – Triangular Trade (Middle Passage)
 Purpose of Colonies: fulfill theory of mercantilism
 Navigation Acts: restrict colonial trade, tax
NEW IDEALS
 Enlightenment – intellectual
movement; reason & scientific
method
• John Locke – “natural
rights” – life, liberty,
property; social contract
theory – government
existed as long as citizens
allowed it to exist
 Great Awakening – religious
movement
FRENCH &
INDIAN WAR
 Ohio Valley
 George Washington’s defeat at Ft.
Necessity
 Treaty of Paris: Britain – Canada,
North America – east of
Mississippi River; Spain – west of
Mississippi River, New Orleans;
France – Newfoundland, West
Indies
 Proclamation of 1763 – no British
colonists could settle west of
Appalachian mountains
GROWING RIFT WITH
BRITAIN
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Devoted to competing with France
Salutary (beneficial) neglect of colonies
Britain expected colonies to pay for debt from war with France
England cracked down on Massachusetts, increasing troops, &
issuing random Writs of Assistance
 Sugar Act – halved duty on foreign-made molasses, placed duties
on imports never taxed, strengthened enforcement of law moving
trials to vice-admiralty courts
 “No Taxation Without Representation”
GROWING RIFT WITH
BRITAIN
 Stamp Act: purchase of special paper for every legal document,
license, newspaper, etc. “Stamp duties” on playing cards/dice
 Sons of Liberty – secret resistance group
 Stamp Act Congress Oct. 1765 – issues Declaration of Rights &
Grievances
 Townshend Acts 1767 – indirect tax on imported materials & $.03
tax on tea
STIRRINGS OF REBELLION
Official Royal Stamp
Patrick Henry delivering his speech against the
Stamp Act to members of Virginia’s House
of Burgesses
GROWING RIFT WITH
BRITAIN
 Boston Massacre – March 5, 1770 – fights over dock jobs between
colonists & British Redcoats. Crispus Attucks & 4 others are killed.
 Boston Tea Party 1773 – British East India Company devises Tea
Act allowing them to sell tea tax free.
 Intolerable Acts:
• Boston Harbor is closed
• Quartering Act
• Boston under martial law
 First Continental Congress – Sept. 5, 1774 – boycott British goods
Site of Massacre
Burial Site of those massacred
GROWING RIFT WITH
BRITAIN
 Minutemen stockpile arms & gunpowder
 Paul Revere, William Dawes, & Samuel Prescott – “sound the
alarm”
 “Lexington Green” – brief engagement with Redcoats
 Second Continental Congress: colonies form governments,
Congress could print $, deal with foreign nations, create
Continental Army. Send Olive Branch Petition
 Declaration of Independence: signed July 4, 1776, Thomas
Jefferson – “unalienable rights” life, liberty, pursuit of happiness;
government derives power from consent of the governed
Painting of Paul Revere’s Ride
Map of Paul Revere’s, William
Dawes’, & Dr. Samuel
Prescott’s route warning the
other cities of British march
to Concord
WAR FOR INDEPENDENCE
 Battle of New York – March 1776 – Britain won
 Battle of Trenton – December 1776 – Washington crosses Delaware.
Continental Army won
 Battle of Philadelphia – Spring 1777 – Britain won
 Battle of Saratoga – October 1777 – Continental Army won. Major
turning point of war
 Battle of Yorktown – October 1781 – General Cornwallis surrenders
to Continental Army
 Treaty of Paris 1783: guarantees American independence. Boundaries
– Atlantic to Mississippi River, Canada to Florida
Battle of New York
Map
Painting of Battle for Long
Island, NY
Battle of Trenton
Washington crossing
river
Map
Battle of Yorktown – October 1781
THE AMERICAN REPUBLIC
 Republic – power held by citizens; voting
 Articles of Confederation: 1st constitution; established by
Continental Congress 1777
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Each state got one vote
Single governing body (Congress0
Limited powers of negotiation
No power to regulate trade or impose taxes
 Weaknesses: lack of national unity, amendments, paying off
national debt, no control over interstate & foreign trade/relations
U.S. CONSTITUTION
Virginia Plan
• James Madison – bicameral legislature with representation in
lower house based off state’s population, these in turn elected
representatives to upper house. Both houses voted for the
country’s president & judges
New Jersey Plan
• William Patterson – unicameral legislature with each state
having an equal vote
The Great Compromise
• Roger Sherman – bicameral legislature with equal representation in the
Senate (upper house); House of Representatives (lower house) based on
a state’s population. The Senate members would be chosen by the state
legislatures. House members were chosen by voters of state
U.S. CONSTITUTION
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READ THE CONSTITUTION HANDBOOK – REQUIRED
Three-Fifths Compromise
Popular sovereignty – rule by the people
Federalism – delegated or enumerated powers, reserved powers
Separation of powers – executive, judicial, legislative branches
Checks & balances
Federalists vs. Anti-federalists – Federalist Papers
Bill of Rights
Delaware – 1st to ratify; New Hampshire – 9th; May 1790 – final
ratification
SETTING UP THE
GOVERNMENT
 Judiciary Act 1789 – sets up supreme court’s justices, 3 federal
circuit courts, & 13 federal district courts
 Executive Branch – 3 departments to assist president
• Department of State – foreign affairs (Thomas Jefferson
• Department of War – military (Henry Hudson)
• Department of Treasury - finance (Alexander Hamilton)
POLITICAL PARTIES
 Jefferson & Hamilton clashed constantly over the actual powers of
government
 Federalists – shared Hamilton’s view
 Democratic-Republicans – shared Jefferson’s views (ancestors to
Democratic Party today)
 Political parties were seen as a danger to national unity
 Election of 1800: Thomas Jefferson & Aaron Burr
• Tied in electoral votes
• House of Representatives did 6 votes
• Alexander Hamilton persuaded some Federalists to cast blank votes
 12th Amendment – states have to cast separate electoral votes for
President & VP
JEFFERSON IN OFFICE
 Judiciary Act of 1801
 Marbury vs. Madison – Chief
Justice John Marshall; declares
provisions of Judiciary Act
unconstitutional. Gives the
principle &
power of judicial review to
U.S. Supreme Court
 Jefferson simplifies
presidency & cuts government
expenditures
WESTWARD EXPANSION
 Battle of Fallen Timbers
 Louisiana Purchase
 Lewis & Clark Expeditions:
Meriwether Lewis & William
Clark aided by Sacajawea
WAR OF 1812
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Impressment
Chesapeake incident
President James Madison decides to go to war against Britain
Britain burns Capitol, White House, & most of Washington D.C.
Ft. McHenry survives bombing; “Star Spangled Banner” – Francis
Scott Key
 Treaty of Ghent: armistice
 Andrew Jackson – conquers British in New Orleans after treaty is
signed
ANTEBELLUM AMERICA
 Missouri Compromise : Missouri = slave state; Maine = free state;
36 Latitude is border – states north are free, south are slave
 Monroe Doctrine: warning to other nations not to create new
colonies or overthrow newly independent ones
 Second Bank of the United States (BUS)
 Tariff of 1816 – protective tariff
U.S. SUPREME COURT
 Gibbons v. Ogden: only federal government can regulate interstate
commerce
 Fletcher v. Peck 1810 & Dartmouth College v. Woodward 1819: limited
state powers
 McCulloch v. Maryland: state cannot overturn a law from Congress
INDUSTRIALIZATION
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Interchangeable Parts
Mass production
Textile industries
Lowell Factory
Transportation: roads, tolls. Erie Canal – joins Hudson River to
Lake Erie; National Road – Cumberland, MD to Vandalia, IL
LIFE IN THE NORTH
 Immigrants
 Factories 0 dangerous work conditions & constant wage battles
 Unions were seen as unlawful conspiracies
 Agriculture was still country’s leading economic activity
 Farmers went to specialization – cash crops
 Market Revolution
LIFE IN THE SOUTH
 “King Cotton”
 Cotton gin – Eli Whitney
 Slave trade outlawed in 1808 yet slaves were still needed. SEE
CHART ON PG. 54
 Slave codes
 Nat Turner’s Rebellion
JACKSONIAN DEMOCRACY
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Spoils system
Tariff of Abominations
“Pet Banks”
Panic of 1837
Indian Removal Act (1830)
Worcester v. Georgia (1832): Georgia was not entitled to Cherokee
lands
 Trail of Tears – forced removal of remaining Cherokee Indians
REFORMING SOCIEETY
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American Temperance Society
Dorothea Dix: aided mentally ill
Public Education – Massachusetts led the way; Horace Mann
Women’s Rights: Elizabeth Cady Stanton & Lucretia Mott; Seneca
Falls Conventions – “Declaration of Sentiments”
 Abolition – William Lloyd Garrison, Frederick Douglas, &
Sojourner Truth