-
One characteristic of Westward Expansion was the immense hardship that it put on Indian Americans life and culture. President Jackson reflected the idea that most Americans believed that Natives had no place in the White republic and his reputation and popularity rested in his firm commitment to remove Native residents from states in the South. The Indian Removal Act and displacement of various Native tribes backed up this vision of a White nation which became a symbol of the Age of Jackson.
-
In the spring of 1865, it had become clear to Robert E. Lee that the Confederacy couldn’t last much longer and Lee surrendered to Grant at Appomattox Court House and the Civil War came to an end. Now shifting into the Reconstruction Era, Lincoln was assassinated days after the Civil War ended which shifted focus away on trying to unite the North and the South after the Civil War. We had a country that was already fighting amongst itself while trying to restore the Union. -
The effort to remake the South triggered intense reactions among southern White people that were committed to preventing African Americans from gaining economic ground. Domestic terror organizations such as the Ku Klux Klan in which would ultimately lead to the collapse of the Reconstruction. Void of Lincoln's leadership, a more drawn out process to try to restore the Union led to Johnson being impeached. Johnson was the first president of only three in US history to be formally impeached. -
Post civil war: our country went from solely agricultural (cotton and tobacco) to expanding out to more manufactured goods that catered to more than just the upper class. Manufactured goods came mainly from the northern territories but we still needed the crops from the south and the south needed help from us as well. This boom of manufactured goods leads to muckraking.
-
Yellow journalism and other media outlets affected the intensity of the USS Maine incident within the Spanish-American War. It was used to sensationalize the stories in the competing newspapers. When an explosion destroyed the ship and killed over 250 American sailors, journalists acted on the headline and said that the explosion was a Spanish attack without being completely sure. -
Muckraking paved the way for various acts and laws that are still in place today due to exposing certain aspects of factories and businesses in the early 1900s. Upton Sinclair’s 1905 novel and exposé on the meatpacking industry, “The Jungle” caused Roosevelt to accelerate his priority to protect public health. He urged the passage of the Meat Inspection Act of 1906 and then the Pure Food and Drug Act of 1906. -
The Progressive movement was a time period of widespread social activism and political reform across the US. The main objectives of the progressive movement were addressing the problems caused by the rapid industrialization, urbanization, immigration and political corruption. Within this time in 1912, this was the first time that woman suffrage was supported at the national level by Theodore Roosevelt’s Bull Moose Party. -
The 16th amendment played a central role in building up the powerful American federal government by making it possible to enact a modern, nationwide income tax. Not long after, the income tax became the federal government’s largest source of revenue. On the other hand, the 17th amendment, which provided for the appointment of senators, reflected popular dissatisfaction within the corruption and inefficiency that had come to signify the legislative election of US senators in numerous states.
-
Austro-Hungarian Empire Archduke Franz Ferdinand murder is what sparked a chain of events that led to the outbreak of WWI. In 1919, Germany and the Allied Powers signed the Treaty of Versailles but tragically failed to try to build a post-war world that was safe from future wars at such an enormous scale. Furthermore, Woodrow Wilson’s dream of international peace-keeping organization faltered when put into practice as the League of Nations. -
The 19th amendment granted women the right to vote, which was a huge milestone achievement for women’s suffrage. Their protests and petitions began all the way back in the 1800s, and took them decades to be granted the right to vote. However, it wasn’t until 1965 that these voting rights were extended to African American women.
-
Despite the 1920s as known for rising wealth and entertainment, there were also a lot of things going on that could also put the word “nervous” next to this generation. Race issues were still very prevalent and African Americans were still facing a lot of hardship especially with the KKK. The Dyer Anti-Lynching Bill was introduced to Congress in 1918 was passed in the House in 1922 but ultimately failed. Many deaths were also prevailing at this time due to the Influenza Pandemic of 1918. -
Within the Great Depression, we can touch upon the stock market crash of 1929 and the Dust Bowl of 1930. It is important to understand that we were coming from a prosperous 1920s which gave a euphoric feeling within the middle class. As a result of the Federal Reserve, the money supply increased, which convinced more Americans of the safety of investing in schemes. The Dust Bowl of 1930 was an environmental and economic catastrophe which displaced so many people from their farms and livelihood. -
Under FDR, there were a series of federal programs and the creation of government agencies that were all designed to stimulate the economy and put Americans back to work. FDR’s popularity from pulling our country out of the Great Depression led to a 12 year presidency; the longest in US history. -
The bombing of Pearl Harbor under FDR’s final months in office thrusts the US into WWII. FDR’s Infamy Speech (Dec 8th, 1941):the day after the pearl harbor bombing, urged the American people to never forget what happened. The bombing galvanized the nation and stirred our level of patriotism and desire to protect democracy globally. Japanese Admiral Isoroku Yamamoto wrote in his diary response to his speech:“I fear all we have done is to awaken a sleeping giant and fill him with terrible resolve” -
The atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki had the desired effect of getting Japan to surrender and ultimately ending the War. The Soviet Union was given control of the northern half of the Japanese colony and the US was given control of the southern portion. People celebrated the end of the conflict and moving onto other things, but America’s use of the atomic bombs and other controversy surrounding the end of the war contributed to ongoing instability in the postwar time period. -
At the end of WWII, the United Nations was created as an International Organization comprising an assembly of all member nations/states to monitor global social and economic issues. Multiple countries were committed to maintaining international peace and security as well as developing friendly relations among nations to promote social progress and better human rights.
-
The demilitarized zone was formed with the purpose of stopping further invasions of North Korea into the South. On June 27, 1950, Truman ordered US military forces into South Korea to establish a defense line on the far southern part of the Korean peninsula near the town of Pusan. -
The 1960s was a decade of hope and change with a war that had a significant shift in American culture. We had so many influential faces and movements but what really hit hard was the deaths of President Kennedy, Martin Luther King, Jr. and Robert F. Kennedy. Kennedy envisioned a country characterized by the social and economic freedoms established during the New Deal Years, but these assassinations made it clear that America was not on the same page of a more inclusive democracy. -
During Nixon’s re-election campaign, he was so paranoid that he was going to lose against McGovern that he bugged the Watergate Hotel where the democratic national headquarters was in attempts to get intel. Because of this whole scandal, he resigned in 1974 being the only president to resign. Nixon’s resignation fed into growing suspicion of the government that many citizens felt. -
Fifty-two US hostages were held in Iran for 444 days. President Carter initially favored Secretary Vance’s policy of negotiation but was more receptive to a more confrontational stance by 1980. On the day of President Reagan’s inauguration, the US freed almost $8 billion in frozen Iranian assets and the hostages were released after 444 days.