Deck 13: A House Divided, 1840-1861

Question 1

When Mexico won its independence from Spain in 1821:

A) it was much smaller in area than the United States at the time.
B) California became a major American trading partner within half a decade.
C) its Indian population was relatively large compared to its non-Indian population.
D) its leaders founded new missions in California to assure continued Catholic power.
E) Americans immediately began settling in California in large numbers.

Answer 1

its Indian population was relatively large compared to its non-Indian population.

Question 2

When Democrats demanded the "reannexation" of Texas in 1844, they:

A) implied that Texas had once been part of the United States through the Louisiana Purchase.
B) were consciously appealing to northern Whigs.
C) were seeking to take the slavery issue out of the presidential campaign.
D) neglected to say anything about the status of Oregon.
E) realized their stand would not be very popular in the South.

Answer 2

implied that Texas had once been part of the United States through the Louisiana Purchase.

Question 3

The Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo of 1848 provided for all of the following EXCEPT:

A) the transfer of California to the United States.
B) guaranteeing to male citizens in the Mexican Cession "their liberty and property."
C) payment of $15 million to Mexico by the United States.
D) U.S. control of all of the Oregon Country.
E) confirmation of the U.S. annexation of Texas.

Answer 3

U.S. control of all of the Oregon Country.

Question 4

Who wrote On Civil Disobedience as a response to the U.S. war with Mexico?

A) Abraham Lincoln
B) Ralph Waldo Emerson
C) David Walker
D) David Wilmot
E) Henry David Thoreau

Question 5

According to John L. O'Sullivan's Democratic Review, what was the key to the history of nations and the rise and fall of empires?

A) race
B) democracy
C) economic freedom
D) slavery
E) printing

Question 6

Presidents Andrew Jackson and Martin Van Buren rejected adding Texas to the United States because:

A) the Texas Republic's congress opposed joining the United States, preferring to stay independent.
B) the Mexican army's resounding victory at the Alamo made them fearful of antagonizing a powerful government.
C) the population of Texas was too small to justify it.
D) Henry Clay wanted to add it and, as the Whig leader, he was their sworn enemy.
E) the presence of slaves there would reignite the issue of slavery, and they preferred to avoid it.

Question 7

Which two political figures agreed to keep the issue of annexing Texas out of the 1844 presidential campaign if possible?

A) John Tyler and John C. Calhoun
B) Henry Clay and Daniel Webster
C) Henry Clay and Martin Van Buren
D) Henry Clay and James Polk
E) Andrew Jackson and John Quincy Adams

Question 8

During the Mexican War:

A) Mexican troops occupied much of Texas after winning at the Alamo.
B) the bulk of the fighting occurred in California.
C) for the first time, the U.S. troops occupied a foreign capital.
D) an American revolt in California led briefly to a monarchy.
E) Whigs strongly supported Polk's policies.

Question 9

"Fifty-four forty or fight" referred to demands for American control of:

A) Texas.
B) Oregon.
C) California.
D) Mexico.
E) Kansas and Nebraska.

Question 10

All of the following took place under the constitution and state laws of independent Texas EXCEPT:

A) protect slavery.
B) deny free blacks entrance to Texas.
C) deny civil rights to people of African heritage.
D) allow Native Americans equal rights.
E) allow the purchase of land by only whites.

Question 11

Who questioned President Polk's right to declare war by introducing a resolution to Congress requesting that the president specify the precise spot where blood had first been shed?

A) Daniel Webster
B) John C. Calhoun
C) Stephen Douglas
D) Abraham Lincoln
E) Charles Sumner

Question 12

The California gold rush:

A) actually had only a small impact on California's population because its rich farmlands already attracted thousands of new settlers each year.
B) attracted almost equal numbers of men and women.
C) resulted in laws that discriminated against "foreign miners."
D) made considerable wealth for average miners because gold mining demanded no real investment of capital.
E) hurt the development of San Francisco because gold discoveries shifted interest to areas outside of town.

Question 13

Why did slavery become more central to American politics in the 1840s?

A) The Methodist Church, the nation's largest denomination, called on all its members to free their slaves.
B) Territorial expansion raised the question of whether new lands should be free or slave.
C) Members of the abolitionist Republican Party, formed in 1844, insisted on debating slavery.
D) President John Tyler's antislavery policies caused a major proslavery backlash led by John C. Calhoun.
E) As the 1848 constitutional deadline for ending the African slave trade drew near, Americans became obsessed with slavery.

Question 14

With the exception of Alaska, what was the last piece of territory acquired by the United States toward the solidification of its present boundaries in North America?

A) The Mexican Cession
B) California
C) Oregon
D) The Gadsden Purchase
E) Texas

Question 15

James Polk had four clearly defined goals when he entered the White House. Which was NOT one of his goals?

A) Reduce the tariff.
B) Settle the slavery dispute.
C) Settle the Oregon dispute.
D) Bring California into the Union.
E) Reestablish the Independent Treasury system.

Question 16

In 1821, the opening of the Santa Fe Trail between Santa Fe and __________ led to a reorientation of New Mexico's commerce from the rest of Mexico to the United States.

A) Houston, Texas,
B) San Diego, California,
C) New Orleans, Louisiana,
D) Omaha, Nebraska,
E) Independence, Missouri,

Question 17

American settlement in Texas in the 1820s and 1830s:

A) took place without approval from the Mexican government.
B) did not exceed the Mexican population there until the United States annexed Texas in 1845.
C) led Stephen Austin to demand more autonomy from Mexican officials.
D) included no slaves, because Mexico had banned slavery in its territory.
E) was in communities whose American-born residents were called Tejanos by their Mexican neighbors.

Question 18

The term "Californios" referred in the 1830s and 1840s to __________ in California.

A) Mexican cattle ranchers
B) the Indian inhabitants
C) U.S.-born immigrants
D) any individual
E) American merchants

Question 19

The California gold rush turned __________ into perhaps the world's most diverse city.

A) San Diego
B) Los Angeles
C) Malibu
D) Sacramento
E) San Francisco

Question 20

Why did Mississippi politician Jefferson Davis object in the 1850s to the original design of the Statue of Freedom that now adorns the U.S. Capitol dome?

A) He disliked the fact that the sculptor was a former slave who had won acclaim for his talent, thus suggesting blacks were as gifted as whites.
B) The use of a soldier as the key figure made the nation appear too militaristic.
C) It portrayed "Freedom" as a nude woman, which he saw as inappropriate.
D) Its use of an ancient Roman liberty cap on "Freedom" raised a touchy matter about slaves' longing for freedom.
E) He believed using "freedom" in the statue's name was a subtle attack on slave states, so he preferred using "justice" instead.

Question 21

The Republican Party founded in the 1850s strongly endorsed the same policy about slavery in the territories that __________ had begun advocating in 1846.

A) David Wilmot
B) Stephen Douglas
C) John C. Calhoun
D) Roger Taney
E) Henry Clay

Question 22

Which of the following countries did NOT go through some kind of popular upheaval in 1848?

A) Hungary
B) Great Britain
C) France
D) Russia
E) Italy

Question 23

Stephen Douglas's motivation for introducing the Kansas-Nebraska Act was to:

A) boost efforts to build a transcontinental railroad.
B) spread slavery.
C) win the position of speaker of the House of Representatives.
D) pacify southerners who strongly supported the idea of popular sovereignty.
E) help Franklin Pierce win a second term as president.

Question 24

Which American naval officer negotiated a treaty that opened two Japanese ports to U.S. ships in 1854?

A) Oliver H. Perry
B) John Paul Jones
C) Alfred Mahan
D) Chester Nimitz
E) Matthew Perry

Question 25

The controversy over the arrest of Anthony Burns in 1854 shows:

A) the problematic nature of the Dred Scott decision.
B) that abolitionists were definitely declining in influence.
C) the unpopularity of the Fugitive Slave Act in parts of the North.
D) the popularity of the Whig Party in the South.
E) that the gag rule had serious consequences well into the 1850s.

Question 26

The Free Soil Party:

A) demonstrated that antislavery sentiment had spread far beyond abolitionist ranks.
B) cost Henry Clay the presidency by siphoning off votes from him in New York.
C) was powerful enough to convince James Polk not to seek reelection.
D) strongly opposed the Wilmot Proviso but agreed to let it pass as part of a compromise.
E) nominated Zachary Taylor for president.

Question 27

The Republican free labor ideology:

A) convinced northerners that Catholic immigrants posed a more significant threat than the southern slave power.
B) won Republicans significant support from non-slaveholders in the South in 1856.
C) owed its origins to Abraham Lincoln's reemergence in the wake of the Kansas-Nebraska Act.
D) accepted southerners' point that slavery protected their liberty, but explained that the economic benefits of free labor would outweigh the damage abolition would do to southern liberty.
E) led to the argument by Abraham Lincoln and William Seward that free labor and slave labor were essentially incompatible.

Question 28

From 1848 to 1860, most of the railroad construction was in which region?

A) Northeast
B) Southeast
C) Southwest
D) Midwest
E) West Coast

Question 29

Which of the following was NOT a provision of the Compromise of 1850?

A) California would enter the Union as a free state.
B) The slave trade would be abolished in Washington, D.C.
C) The Oregon Territory would be created.
D) A tougher fugitive slave law would be enacted.
E) Territories created from the Mexican Cession would vote on whether to allow slavery.

Question 30

The opponents of the Compromise of 1850:

A) included key Whig leaders Henry Clay and Daniel Webster.
B) received a boost from President Zachary Taylor.
C) were surprised when John C. Calhoun spoke in favor of the Compromise.
D) argued that California must become a free state, which the Compromise did not allow.
E) were thrilled to have the support of influential Vice President Millard Fillmore.

Question 31

What attracted voters to the Know-Nothing Party?

A) its desire to dissolve the Missouri Compromise
B) its move to annex Cuba for the expansion of American slavery
C) its call for immediate emancipation of all slaves
D) its opposition to the Dred Scott decision
E) its denunciation of Roman Catholic immigrants

Question 32

Which of the following is an example of the political impact of the Kansas-Nebraska Act?

A) A strong, united Whig Party won the White House in the next presidential election.
B) Nearly half of northern Democrats joined the patriotic American Party.
C) The Whig Party collapsed, and many disgruntled northerners joined the new Republican Party.
D) Stephen Douglas and Abraham Lincoln decided to become running mates for the presidential election of 1856.
E) The new Free Soil Party strongly endorsed the Act and won new congressional seats in several Upper South districts.

Question 33

During the 1850s, 80 percent of the world's gold came from two places that experienced gold rushes at about the same time, California and:

A) Canada.
B) Argentina.
C) South Africa.
D) Australia.
E) Congo.

Question 34

Which of the following statements related to ethnicity was true in California in the 1850s?

A) Thousands of Indian children were declared orphans and treated as slaves.
B) The state recognized more than 15,000 African-Americans as slaves of whites who had moved there.
C) Men of all backgrounds, except those from China, were allowed to vote and serve on juries.
D) Indian communities prospered by renting land and selling supplies to gold miners.
E) Wealthy Mexican landowners dominated the new state government and would do so until the 1880s.

Question 35

The Fugitive Slave Act of 1850:

A) won the grudging support of Ralph Waldo Emerson as a necessary compromise.
B) gave new powers to federal officers to override local law enforcement.
C) was declared unconstitutional in the Dred Scott case.
D) angered southerners by weakening an earlier law on fugitive slaves.
E) convinced Abraham Lincoln to retire briefly from political life.

Question 36

By 1856, the Republican Party included individuals who had been, until rather recently, members of each of the following political groups EXCEPT:

A) northern Whigs.
B) Free Soilers.
C) Know-Nothings.
D) antislavery Democrats.
E) Federalists.

Question 37

The caning of Charles Sumner by Preston Brooks:

A) showed the extreme violence of which northern abolitionists were capable.
B) actually helped the new Republican Party.
C) was denounced by most southerners as barbaric.
D) occurred because Sumner praised the attack on Lawrence, Kansas.
E) was unusual because both men were proslavery Democrats.

Question 38

In 1854, the Know-Nothings won all the congressional races as well as the governorship in:

A) Louisiana.
B) South Carolina.
C) Ohio.
D) Massachusetts.
E) Georgia.

Question 39

The Republican presidential candidate in 1856 was:

A) John Breckinridge.
B) Abraham Lincoln.
C) Charles Sumner.
D) John Frémont.
E) James Buchanan.

Question 40

In 1846, Congressman David Wilmot proposed to:

A) prohibit slavery from all territory acquired from Mexico.
B) allow voters to decide the status of slavery in new territories.
C) divide the Oregon Country between Great Britain and the United States.
D) annex Cuba in order to avoid southern secession.
E) allow slavery to expand into California and New Mexico.

Question 41

On matters related to citizenship, the U.S. Supreme Court declared in Dred Scott that:

A) free African-Americans could vote.
B) anyone that a state considered to be a citizen was a U.S. citizen.
C) free-born blacks were U.S. citizens, but those born into slavery and later freed could not be citizens.
D) citizenship was limited to males.
E) only white persons could be U.S. citizens.

Question 42

The 1860 Republican platform stated all of the following EXCEPT that:

A) the Dred Scott decision was invalid.
B) slavery should be abolished in the nation's capital.
C) slavery should not be allowed to expand.
D) the government should help build a transcontinental railroad.
E) the government should grant free homesteads in the West.

Question 43

Unlike most previous presidents, James Polk was not a slaveholder.

Question 44

In the 1860 election, how many different presidential candidates won electoral votes?

A) two
B) three
C) four
D) five
E) none, because the electoral college was suspended for that election.

Question 45

In the presidential election of 1860, the two candidates who received the most votes in the southern states were:

A) John Breckinridge and John Bell.
B) Abraham Lincoln and Stephen Douglas.
C) Abraham Lincoln and John Breckinridge.
D) William Seward and John Bell.
E) Roger Taney and Stephen Douglas.

Question 46

The Texas independence movement was sparked in part because the Mexican government, alarmed that its grip on the area was weakening, annulled existing land contracts and barred future emigration from the United States in 1830.

Question 47

During his debate with Abraham Lincoln in Freeport, Illinois, Stephen Douglas:

A) called for the free soil principle to determine the status of slavery in the West.
B) denounced popular sovereignty as a fraud.
C) praised the temperance movement and other key social reforms.
D) insisted that popular sovereignty was compatible with the Dred Scott decision.
E) argued that slaveholders had a constitutional right to take their slaves anywhere.

Question 48

The famous Lincoln-Douglas debates took place during the campaign for:

A) U.S. president in 1856.
B) U.S. president in 1860.
C) governor of Illinois in 1858.
D) a congressional seat from Illinois in 1856.
E) U.S. senator from Illinois in 1858.

Question 49

In spite of the controversy over the Statute of Freedom, Thomas Crawford refused to change his original design of the statue.

Question 50

The Dred Scott decision of the U.S. Supreme Court:

A) declared Congress could not ban slavery from territories.
B) endorsed the "free soil" policy of the Republicans.
C) backed the idea of "popular sovereignty."
D) freed Dred and Harriet Scott.
E) extended the Missouri Compromise line to California.

Question 51

The American Civil War began in April 1861, when:

A) Confederate forces fired upon and captured Fort Sumter.
B) U.S. naval vessels bombarded the city of Wilmington, North Carolina.
C) Confederate and Union cavalry clashed in disputed territory in Texas.
D) General William Sherman led Union soldiers on a devastating march through Georgia.
E) Confederate infantry attacked Gettysburg, Pennsylvania.

Question 52

In the 1850s, Tennessee-born William Walker became famous for:

A) creating a utopian community in northern California.
B) his proslavery novels that heightened sectionalism.
C) breeding the "Tennessee Walker," a horse prominent in westward expansion.
D) seeking to establish himself as ruler of a slaveholding Nicaragua.
E) defying fellow whites in his native region and becoming a prominent abolitionist.

Question 53

During the secession winter of 1860-1861, who offered the most widely supported compromise plan in Congress, which allowed the westward extension of the Missouri Compromise line?

A) Abraham Lincoln
B) John Crittenden
C) Jefferson Davis
D) Zachary Taylor
E) Andrew Johnson

Question 54

Which event sparked Abraham Lincoln to reenter politics?

A) Compromise of 1850
B) Mexican-American War
C) Dred Scott decision
D) Raid on Harpers Ferry
E) Kansas-Nebraska Act

Question 55

Which 1854 document called for the United States to seize Cuba?

A) The Monroe Doctrine
B) The Ostend Manifesto
C) The Wilmot Proviso
D) The Webster-Ashburton Treaty
E) The Frémont Manifesto

Question 56

The Democratic Party split in 1860 over the question of whether to:

A) renominate President James Buchanan for a second term.
B) protect slavery in the territories or allow popular sovereignty in them.
C) impeach Chief Justice Roger Taney for the Dred Scott decision.
D) endorse the acquisition of Cuba by the United States, thus increasing slave territory.
E) immediately bring Kansas and Nebraska into the Union as slave states.

Question 57

In 1860, which state became the first to pass an ordinance of secession and declare itself separated from the Union?

A) Virginia
B) Kentucky
C) Georgia
D) South Carolina
E) Tennessee

Question 58

The Lecompton Constitution was the:

A) antislavery constitution adopted in Nebraska.
B) proslavery constitution proposed for Kansas.
C) pro-secession constitution of North Carolina.
D) Missouri constitution preferred by Abraham Lincoln.
E) compromise offered in 1861 to end the secession crisis.

Question 59

Which of the following puts these events in the proper chronological order, from first to last? I. Virginia seceded from the Union.
II) Abraham Lincoln was elected president.
III) Confederate States of America formed.
IV) South Carolina seceded from the Union.

A) IV, I, III, II
B) III, I, IV, II
C) II, I, III, IV
D) I, II, III, IV
E) II, IV, III, I

Question 60

Who was responsible for the 1856 Pottawatomie Creek Massacre in Kansas and led the raid on the federal arsenal at Harpers Ferry, Virginia, in 1859?

A) Frederick Douglass
B) Joseph Lane
C) Robert E. Lee
D) Henry Ward Beecher
E) John Brown

Question 61

The Free Soil idea in the West appealed to racist northerners who worried about competing against black laborers.

Question 62

Abraham Lincoln opposed increasing economic opportunities for free blacks.

Question 63

It is ironic that the South supported the Fugitive Slave Act because that law gave enormous power to the federal government to override local authorities, which is something that the South had traditionally opposed.

Question 64

The development of railroads and economic integration of the Northeast and Northwest created the groundwork for the political unification of the Republican Party.

Question 65

The free labor ideology was based on the assumption that free labor could not compete with slave labor and so slavery's expansion had to be halted to ensure freedom for the white laborer.

Question 66

The explosive population growth and competition for gold brought cooperation among California's many racial and ethnic groups as they worked together for wealth.

Question 67

The Fugitive Slave Act provided for the return of runaway slaves to their owners.

Question 68

The Wilmot Proviso was an attempt to annex Cuba.

Question 69

Prior to becoming president in 1857, James Buchanan did not have much political experience.

Question 70

Matthew Perry led the contingent of U.S. warships that helped to open Japan to American trade in 1854.

Question 71

Moderate Republicans like Abraham Lincoln supported the Dred Scott decision.

Question 72

Nativism emerged as a major political movement in 1854, with the sudden appearance of the Liberty Party.

Question 73

The Appeal of the Independent Democrats was not a very effective piece of political persuasion.

Question 74

Stephen Douglas said during the Lincoln-Douglas debates, "A house divided against itself cannot stand. I believe this government cannot endure, permanently half slave and half free."

Question 75

As it divided over the issue of slavery, the Catholic Church broke into a northern and southern branch.

Question 76

Abraham Lincoln fully supported President Polk's justification for declaring war against Mexico in 1846.

Question 77

The city of Melbourne in Australia prospered because of a gold rush, much as San Francisco did, and at about the same time.

Question 78

The issue of Texas annexation was hotly linked to slavery and affected the nominations of presidential candidates in the 1840s.

Question 79

In California after the Mexican-American War, landowners of Spanish heritage had to adjust to a new identity as if they were immigrants.

Question 80

Many free blacks in the North that had escaped slavery by running away fled to Canada to avoid being caught and brought back to the South under the Fugitive Slave Act.