What is the significance of the adoption of a standard gauge for all railroads?
A) It allowed all rails to be built of steel instead of inferior quality metal.
B) It allowed trains to travel on all tracks, thus integrating the entire system.
C) It kept all trains running to coordinate their schedules.
D) It allowed tracks to be built on both government and private lands.
E) It kept the trains from derailing so often and so disastrously.
The primary objective of the Alliance movement was to ________.
A) form a social organization for farmers
B) organize and politicize the American farmer
C) ensure equal distribution of wealth
D) elect Democrats and Republicans who represented farmers
E) protect farmers against greedy cattle ranchers
What was true about the sectional quarrel between North and South during the 1840s
and early 1850s?
A) It was primarily expressed in political terms.
B) It was entirely expressed in legal, constitutional terms.
C) It had little impact on the common man.
D) It was increasingly seen in cultural and intellectual terms.
E) It had reached an uneasy but peaceful stalemate by 1860.
How was the role of the United States in foreign affairs changing in the years
immediately before the outbreak of World War I?
A) The United States continued to grow as an international power.
B) The United States had become the most powerful country in the world.
C) The United States was no longer an imperialist power.
D) The United States was no longer a colonial power.
E) The United States first entered global affairs.
American businesses began paying attention to size, speed, organization and marketing
because ________.
A) new laws required reforms to ensure worker safety and a safe work environment
B) strikes were putting many companies out of business
C) profitable companies needed to mass produce goods quickly using unskilled labor
D) old factories had to be rebuilt to produce the goods demanded by consumers
E) unskilled workers demanded a good working environment and higher pay
Which of the following is the best characterization of the three presidents who held
office in the early 1900s?
A) Roosevelt was the most progressive of the three: conserving more land, instituting
more social reforms, and busting more trusts.
B) Wilson was the most progressive of the three: conserving more land, instituting more
social reforms, and busting more trusts.
C) Although Roosevelt and Wilson were more progressive, all three worked to regulate
business, conserve land, and institute social reforms.
D) Taft was the most progressive of the three: conserving more land, instituting more
social reforms, and busting more trusts.
E) They all worked on similar conservative programs: bank regulation, tariffs, and
income taxes.
Kennedy’s failed 1961 covert operation to overthrow Cuba’s Fidel Castro was
________.
A) the Monroe Affair
B) the Cuban Missile Crisis
C) the Bay of Pigs invasion
D) Operation Castro
E) the Havana Project
The election of 1894 was noteworthy because ________.
A) the Republicans became the majority party
B) it swept Grover Cleveland out of office
C) it brought about the end of the Populists
D) it led to a massive defeat for the Democrats
E) it was a triumph for proponents of silver
The society created by Puritans in New England ________.
A) copied the social order they had left behind in England
B) was modeled on contemporary Dutch society
C) represented a near-total rejection of traditional English ways
D) was quite similar to that of the Chesapeake region
E) adapted to include slavery
What was the most important result of the domestication of maize (corn), beans, and
squash by some Native American groups?
A) moving from nomadism to a settled lifestyle
B) no longer hunting mammals
C) the evolution of Indians into a single continental cultural unit
D) the disappearance of the Anasazi culture
E) a general move to the coasts
Historian Herbert G. Gutman noted that industrialization transformed the “culture of
work.” Which of the following best explains this?
A) Industrialization dramatically increased leisure time.
B) Workers eagerly adopted new technology because it made their work easier.
C) The new technology required difficult and even demeaning changes to work
patterns.
D) Low pay led to frequent worker resistance, especially ‘sit-down” strikes.
E) Many workers were able to rise from the bottom to the top of the social classes.
In which colony were African Americans most able to preserve their African identity?
A) New Jersey
B) South Carolina
C) Pennsylvania
D) New York
E) Virginia
What did the United States look forward to after its victory in World War II?
A) controlling post-war governments in Germany and Italy
B) breaking up the Soviet Union
C) seizing German resources
D) controlling western Europe
E) dominance in the Pacific
Like the earlier Federalist-Jeffersonian Republican split, Whigs and Democrats were
divided on
A) Indian education versus Indian removal.
B) unicameral versus bicameral legislatures.
C) alliance with France or Britain.
D) confederation versus a federal union.
E) states’ right versus federal power.
Which of the following lists events in the correct chronological order?
A) Republican policy to regulate industry; the Panic of 1893; Republican policy to
promote industry
B) Republican policy to promote industry; Republican policy to regulate industry; the
Panic of 1893
C) Republican policy to promote industry; the Panic of 1893; Republican policy to
regulate industry
D) the Panic of 1893; Republican policy to promote industry; Republican policy to
regulate industry
E) Republican policy to regulate industry; Republican policy to promote industry; the
Panic of 1893
The First Reconstruction Act of 1867 _______.
A) recognized southern state governments as legitimate
B) confiscated all property of ex-Confederates
C) guaranteed freedmen the right to vote in southern elections
D) supported the Black Codes
E) placed the South under military rule
Of the estimated 11 million African slaves carried to the Americas, the great majority
were sent to ________.
A) Brazil and the Caribbean
B) British North America
C) Chile
D) Argentina
E) Central America
What finally pushed President McKinley to ask for a declaration of war against Spain?
A) He was a weak and indecisive leader, who was forced into war.
B) The conflicting national interests of Spain and the United States left few alternatives.
C) He hoped that a war would bring him political power and the country territorial
gains.
D) Spain was unwilling to accede to any of the demands of the United States.
E) The Cuban people appealed to him directly and asked for his help.
Chief Justice John Marshall believed in judicial review, which is ________.
A) a professional journal read by lawyers and judges
B) the power of the courts to determine the constitutionality of legislation
C) a system whereby all legislation passed by Congress must be approved by the
Supreme Court before it can take effect
D) a job-performance appraisal system for federal judges
E) a process for evaluating the qualifications of candidates for federal judgeships
George Kennan’s “containment” policy proposed _______.
A) a long-term neutrality for the United States with respect to European affairs
B) a series of aggressive maneuvers against the Soviet Union
C) efforts to stop the expansion of communism and Russian control
D) a return to pre-war isolationist policies
E) a coup to replace communism with democracy in Europe and Asia
What did President Kennedy do to help South Vietnam in 1961?
A) He praised its government but took no action.
B) He sent money and advisers.
C) He sent combat troops.
D) He threatened North Vietnam.
E) He badgered Europe into sending aid.
The Fair Employment Practices Committee (FEPC) was a federal agency designed to
protect _______.
A) children from abusive working conditions
B) workers in wartime industries from harsh conditions
C) women from discrimination in the workplace
D) minorities from prejudice in war industries
E) the elderly from discrimination in the workplace
Whose career demonstrated the tie between revivalism and abolitionism?
A) Lewis Tappan
B) Theodore Dwight Weld
C) Charles G. Finney
D) Elizabeth Cady Stanton
E) Harriet Tubman
What was the significance of Thomas Paine’s Common Sense?
A) Widening popular support for revolution.
B) It acknowledged the sovereignty of the monarch.
C) It persuaded colonial elites to sever their ties with Great Britain.
D) It had little immediate popularity among the colonists.
E) It did not criticize all monarchs, just George III.
Which best describes the South’s goal in seceding from the Union?
A) to create a slave empire based on reactionary ideals
B) to slowly get rid of slavery and exist as an independent nation
C) to recreate the government of the British Isles
D) to recreate the Union as it had been before the Republican Party
E) to form a powerful nation that would eventually take over the North
The most serious consequence of the 1970s oil shocks for America was ________.
A) the collapse of several Arab states that were friendly to the United States
B) the loss of international respect for Americans
C) the decline of the automobile culture in the United States
D) the beginning of the mass exodus from American suburbs
E) the rampant inflation they fueled in the larger economy
The first president to attack racial discrimination seriously was _______.
A) Harry Truman
B) Franklin Roosevelt
C) Theodore Roosevelt
D) John F. Kennedy
E) Herbert Hoover
Which of the following statements describes a social problem during World War II?
A) Couples had fewer children, which meant a surplus of teachers and daycare centers.
B) There was insufficient housing for workers in cities with wartime industries.
C) Fewer couples were getting married due to the uncertainties of wartime.
D) Middle-aged, married women were edged out of the workforce by single women.
E) California’s economy almost collapsed because it lacked wartime industries.
How did the Soviet Union approach disarmament discussions after World War II?
A) with a plan to gradually reduce the number of weapons of mass destruction
B) with a plan to give atomic bombs to all the countries in the United Nations
C) with a plan to destroy all existing atomic bombs and ban the production of new ones
D) with a plan to have the United States serve as an international peacekeeping force
E) with a plan to give the Soviet Union possession of the world’s only atomic weapon
Which famous battle occurred just days after Texas declared itself a republic?
A) the battle of the Nueces
B) the battle of Matamoros
C) the battle of the Alamo
D) the battle of Veracruz
E) the siege of Mexico City