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U.S. History: Reconstruction and Westward Expansion Vocabulary
This deck covers key vocabulary and concepts related to the Reconstruction era and Westward Expansion in U.S. history, including amendments, significant figures, and important events.
Reconstruction
returning the South back to the Union
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Key Terms
Term
Definition
Reconstruction
returning the South back to the Union
Freedmen's Bureau
A federal agency that helped freed slaves & relieve the South's immediate needs
Andrew Johnson
U.S. president after Lincoln, almost impeached by the Radical Republicans
Thirteenth Amendment
the constitutional amendment ratified after the Civil War that forbade slavery and involuntary servitude.
Radical Republicans
Political party that favored harsh punishment of Southern states after civil war
impeachment
The political equivalent of an indictment in criminal law, prescribed by the Constitution.
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| Term | Definition |
|---|---|
Reconstruction | returning the South back to the Union |
Freedmen's Bureau | A federal agency that helped freed slaves & relieve the South's immediate needs |
Andrew Johnson | U.S. president after Lincoln, almost impeached by the Radical Republicans |
Thirteenth Amendment | the constitutional amendment ratified after the Civil War that forbade slavery and involuntary servitude. |
Radical Republicans | Political party that favored harsh punishment of Southern states after civil war |
impeachment | The political equivalent of an indictment in criminal law, prescribed by the Constitution. |
Fourteenth Amendment | made 'all persons born or naturalized in the United States' citizens of the country |
Fifteenth Amendment | constitutional ammendment that gave specifically African American men the right to vote. |
Ku Klux Klan | founded in the 1860s in the south; meant to control newly freed slaves through threats and violence; other targets: Catholics, Jews, immigrants and others thought to be un-American |
De jure segregation | segregation by law |
Cash crop | a readily salable crop that is grown and gathered for the market (as vegetables or cotton or tobacco) |
Farmer's Alliance | A Farmers' organization founded in late 1870s; worked for lower railroad freight rates, lower interest rates, and a change in the governments tight money policy |
Civil Rights Act of 1875 | Prohibited discrimination against blacks in public place, such as inns, amusement parks, and on public transportation. Declared unconstitutional by the Supreme Court. |
reservation | land set aside for the Native Americans |
Sand Creek Massacre | an attack on a village of sleeping Cheyenne Indians by a regiment of Colorado militiamen on 29 November 1864 that resulted in the death of more than 200 tribal members |
Sitting Bull | American Indian chief, he lead the victory of Little Bighorn |
Battle of the Little Big Horn | 1876 - General Custer and his men were wiped out by a coalition of Sioux and Cheyenne Indians led by Sitting Bull and Crazy Horse. |
Chief Joseph | Leader of Nez Perce. Fled with his tribe to Canada instead of reservations. However, US troops came and fought and brought them back down to reservations |
assimilate | become similar to one's environment |
Dawes General Allotment Act | 1887 law that divided reservation land into private family plots |
vigilante | someone who takes law enforcement into his or her own hands |
Transcontinental Railroad | Railroad connecting the west and east coasts of the continental US |
land grant | land given by a government |
open-range system | property was not fenced in though ranchers claimed ownership and knew the boundaries of their property , cattle from any ranch grazed freely across those boundaries. |
Homestead Act | 1862 - provided free land in the west as long as the person would settle there and make improvements in five years |
Exodoster | African Americans who migrated from the South to the West fter the Civil War |
Redeemer | Southerners who wanted to return the South to the way it was before the Civil War |
Sharecropping | Poor people contracted with landowners to work the land and get a share of the crop |
Manifest Destiny | the belief that the United States was destined to stretch across the continent from the Atlantic Ocean to the Pacific Ocean |