Which of the following occurred in early 1895, when the Treasury’s gold reserves
reached a desperately low point?
A) President Cleveland devalued the dollar.
B) President Cleveland ordered twenty million dollars worth of silver dollars coined
even though this caused significant inflation.
C) President Cleveland took the country off the gold standard.
D) A banking syndicate headed by J. P. Morgan underwrote a new bond issue and saved
the government from bankruptcy.
How did the homicide rate changed between 1993 and 2014?
A) It increased dramatically.
B) It stayed the same, despite the incarceration of hundreds of thousands of violent
offenders.
C) It increased in rural districts, but fell in urban neighborhoods.
D) It dropped by half.
The Constitutional Union Party had their greatest support in the 1860 election in the
__________.
A) western states of Oregon and California
B) southern states of Texas, Louisiana, and Alabama
C) northeastern states of Massachusetts, Maine, and New Hampshire
D) border states of Kentucky, Virginia, and Tennessee
The religion of Maryland’s colonists was __________.
A) partly Protestant, but a large majority were Catholic
B) almost entirely Puritan
C) partly Catholic, but a large majority were Protestant
D) almost entirely Catholic
By the 1830s, New England textile mills had embraced a new labor force consisting
primarily of which of the following?
A) free blacks
B) young men from the countryside
C) Russian and Italian immigrants
D) Irish immigrants
The earliest British colonies were initially financed by __________.
A) Elizabeth I
B) joint-stock companies
C) James I
D) Protestant dissenters
During the 2000 campaign, George W. Bush endorsed the Powell doctrine that
American troops should __________.
A) only be used in cooperation with the United Nations
B) only be deployed when the military objective was absolutely clear and when they
could be disengaged safely
C) be used anywhere they could be of assistance in nation building
D) only be used in cooperation with NATO
In the late nineteenth century, Jay Gould, Henry Villard, and James J. Hill organized
which of the following?
A) complex, transcontinental railroad lines
B) the radical reform movement
C) the oil trust
D) huge open-range cattle operations
One of the worst massacres committed by white troops in the Indian Wars occurred in
1864 at __________.
A) Medicine Lodge
B) Sand Creek
C) Fort Sully
D) Horse Creek
In 1786 Massachusetts indebted farmers rebelled against the state government and were
defeated in armed conflict. The uprising became known as __________ Rebellion.
A) Bacon’s
B) Leisler’s
C) Paxton’s
D) Shays’s
Which of the following statements about slavery as an economic institution in the 1840s
and 1850s is true?
A) The price of slaves rose dramatically from 1820.
B) The domestic slave trade almost disappeared in these years.
C) The slave trade had little impact on slaves’ lives.
D) Ownership of slaves had become more widespread since 1820.
Which of the following accurately assesses the overall impact of the Great Society?
A) It was a remarkable outpouring of important legislation, but its achievements were
far short of what it had promised.
B) Because President Johnson persuaded Congress to pass only a few of his projects, it
was a considerable success under those circumstances.
C) It resulted in major new legislation, which significantly lowered unemployment by
job training for the poor.
D) It succeeded in its goal of reducing the size and scope of the federal government’s
domestic programs.
How can American imperialism in the post”Spanish-American War era be described?
A) short in duration
B) steadily increasing
C) non-existent
D) long-lasting
Which statement about the Rural Electrification Administration is true?
A) It invested billions of taxpayers’ dollars in beefing up the nation’s electricity grid.
B) It effectively regulated the rural electricity market, which was fraught with
corruption.
C) It committed the nation’s public works agencies to build electrical infrastructure in
the West.
D) It lent money to utility companies and farmer cooperatives to help them bring
electricity to the countryside.
What did “Oregon fever” refer to?
A) a common malady of the nineteenth century
B) a deep-seated hate for the Native Americans
C) the desire to go to Oregon
D) Christian attempts to convert the Native Americans
Stephen Douglas introduced the Kansas-Nebraska Act of 1854 partly because of his
__________.
A) plans for a transcontinental railroad
B) desire to embarrass President Pierce
C) dramatic religious conversion
D) desire to placate the South
The emphasis of Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr. on evolutionary change had a profound
impact upon twentieth-century __________.
A) education
B) jurisprudence
C) anthropology
D) medicine
Why did New York police arrest the patrons of the Stonewall Inn in 1969?
A) They had been rioting on the street.
B) They were suspected of dealing in illegal drugs.
C) They were arrested and harassed without any legal pretense.
D) They were arrested for the solicitation of illegal sexual acts.
How did President Hayes respond to the French attempts to build a canal across the
isthmus of Panama?
A) He laughed, knowing they could never accomplish this.
B) He was chagrined that the United States had lost the opportunity.
C) He was happy to see the French build the canal, but planned to annex it afterwards.
D) He warned that the United States would not permit a European power to control the
waterway.
Why did Columbus and other early explorers search for a direct all-water route to Asia?
A) They hoped to gain easier access to highly valued Asian goods.
B) They could help western Europe win the Crusades against the Muslims.
C) They could prove that the earth was round rather than flat.
D) They thought Japan and China were rich and not the poor countries Marco Polo
described.
In which states were Republicans particularly strong during the latter part of the
nineteenth century?
A) middle Atlantic
B) southern
C) far western
D) New England
What was the real name of the first great American realist, Mark Twain?
A) Mark Clement
B) Samuel L. Clemens
C) William Dean Howells
D) John Singer Sargent
How did African Americans respond to the assassination of Martin Luther King Jr. in
April 1968?
A) Angry and frustrated with the heavy price they were paying for progress, they rioted
in more than one hundred cities.
B) Steeled over the course of their struggle, they stoically carried him to his grave.
C) They used the political momentum of this tragedy to campaign for a “Martin Luther
King Jr. Day.”
D) They did not respond at all, as at this point assassination of civil rights leaders was
nothing new.
At the turn of the twentieth century, the so-called Boxer Rebellion took place in which
country?
A) Japan
B) China
C) the Philippines
D) Cuba
One of the main differences between Thomas Jefferson and Alexander Hamilton was
that Hamilton __________.
A) thought human beings were selfish
B) was a Republican
C) thought commercialization and centralization was best for the country
D) opposed the Alien and Sedition Acts
Why did many Puritans leave England around 1630 to settle in Massachusetts Bay?
A) Jamestown and Plymouth were economically successful.
B) Anglican cleric William Laud was removing ministers with Puritan sympathies and
tightening his centralized control of the church.
C) They read about the amazing fertility of the land and decided they would gain great
wealth overnight.
D) Anglican cleric William Laud ordered them to forfeit their property or leave.
What did Herbert Hoover say in defense of balancing the budget during the
Depression?
A) “The only thing we have to fear is fear itself.”
B) “This nation today is closer than ever to ending poverty.”
C) “Ask not what your country can do for you; ask what you can do for your country.”
D) “Prosperity cannot be restored by raids on the public Treasury.”
Why did the British under General Thomas Gage fight so hard to seize Bunker and
Breed’s Hill?
A) Those Boston neighborhoods held much of the armaments of the state of
Massachusetts.
B) The Massachusetts assembly and governor’s mansion were located there.
C) Control of these positions would have allowed the militia to attack British troops in
Boston.
D) These hills were the first step towards reclaiming the city of Boston from the patriot
militiamen.
In August 1942, Americans began their campaign in the Pacific by attacking which
island?
A) Eniwetok
B) Guadalcanal
C) Okinawa
D) Iwo Jima
What event pushed the 2008 presidential campaign out of the headlines just as things
were heating up?
A) the escalating violence in Iraq
B) a North Korean missile attack on South Korea
C) increasing evidence of Iranian nuclear capabilities
D) a meltdown in the U.S. financial system
What event precipitated the Great War?
A) The Austrians launched a massive offensive across Serbia in order to outflank and
surprise Russia.
B) Archduke Franz Ferdinand, heir to the Austro-Hungarian throne, was assassinated by
a Serbian nationalist.
C) The French invaded Germany to seek revenge for their humiliation in the
Franco-Prussian War.
D) The French and the Germans were unable to reach a peaceful settlement in their
dispute over control of the Alsace-Lorraine region.
Under the Waltham System, __________.
A) laborers performed the work in their own homes
B) laborers often fell heavily in debt to the company store because of easy credit
C) each laborer was responsible for training his own apprentice
D) young farm women worked and lived under strictly supervised conditions