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SAT Subject Test: U.S. History

Subjects : sat, history
Instructions:
  • Answer 50 questions in 15 minutes.
  • If you are not ready to take this test, you can study here.
  • Match each statement with the correct term.
  • Don't refresh. All questions and answers are randomly picked and ordered every time you load a test.

This is a study tool. The 3 wrong answers for each question are randomly chosen from answers to other questions. So, you might find at times the answers obvious, but you will see it re-enforces your understanding as you take the test each time.
1. Germany and Austria-Hungary during World War I. This coalition fought against the Allies (Great Britain - France - Italy). In 1917 - the US joined the war effort against them.






2. Signed on Christmas Eve in 1815. Ended the War of 1812 and returned relations between the US and Britain to the way things were before the war.






3. A component of Lyndon B. Johnson's Great Society. This act established an Office of Economic Opportunity to provide young Americans with job training. It also created a volunteer network devoted to social work and education in impovershed areas.






4. A prominant publisher who bought the New York Journal in the late 1890s. His paper - along with Joseph Pulitzer's New York World - engaged in yellow journalism - printing sensational reports of Spanish activities in Cuba in order to win a circulation






5. The first ten amendments of the Constitution - which guarantee the civil rights of American citizens. Drafted by anti-federalists - including James Madison - to protect individuals from the tyranny they felt the Constitution might permit.






6. Crafted by Henry Clay and backed by the National Republican Party - this plan proposed a series of tariffs and federally funded transportation imporvements - geared toward acheiving national economic self-sufficiency.






7. Advocated isolationism and opposed FDR's reelection in 1940. Committee members urged neutrality - claiming that the US could stand alone regardless of Hitler's advances in Europe.






8. Fought in Maryland on September 17 - 1863. Considered the single bloodiest day of the Civil War - casualties totalled more than 8 -000 dead and 18 -000 wounded. Although Union forces failed to defeat Lee and the Confederates - they did halt the Confe






9. A reformer and pacifist best known for founding Hull House in 1889. Hull House provided educational services to poor immigrants.






10. Organized in 1966 in Oakland - California by Huey Newton and Bobby Seale. The group stressed black pride - economic self-sufficiency - and armed resistance to white oppression.






11. A radical Protestant group that sought to "purify" the Church of England from within. Persecuted for their beliefs - many of them fled to the New World in the early 1600s - where they established the Massachusetts Bay Colony in present-day Boston. Th






12. Trials of Nazi war criminals that began in November 1945. More than 200 defendants were indicted in the thirteen trials. All but thirty-eight of them were convicted of conspiring to wage aggressive war and of mistreating prisoners of war and inhabita






13. Passed in 1883. This act established a civil service exam for many public posts and created hiring systems based on merit rather than on patronage. The act aimed to eliminate corrupt hiring practices.






14. The nickname of the Progressive Republican Party - led by Theodore Roosevelt in the 1912 election. This party had the best showing of any third party in the history of the US. Its emergence dramatically weakened the Republican Party and allowed the D






15. After World War II - this organization workerd on developing more effective ways of usting nuclear material - such as uranium - in order to mass-produce nuclear weapons.






16. Passed in 1930. This act limited the right to strike in key industries and authorized the president to intervene in any strike - eroding the generally amiable relationship between the government and organized labor during World War II.






17. A series of raids coordinated by Attorney General A. Mitchell Palmer. Throughout 1910 - police and federal marshals raided the homes of suspected radicals and the headquarters of radical organizations in thirty-two cities. The raids resulted in more






18. Chartered in 1791 - the bank was a controversial part of Hamilton's Federalist economic program.






19. A religious zealot and an extreme abolitionist who believed God had ordained him to end slavery. In 1856 - he led an attack against pro-slavery government officials - killing five and sparking months of violence that earned the territory the name "Bl






20. Passed in March 1941. Allowed the president to lend or lease supplies to any nation deemed "vital to the defense of the US -" such as Britain - and was a key move in support ot the Allied cause before the US formally entered World War II. Was extende






21. Passed in 1918 as an amendment to the Espionage Act. Provided for the punishment of anyone using "disloyal - profane - scurrilous - or abusive language" in regard to the US government - flag - or military.






22. Signed by 12 Native American tribes after their defeat at the Battle of Fallen Timbers in 1794. The treaty cleared the Ohio territory of tribes and opened it up to US settlement.






23. Republican - vice president to Ronald Reagan - and president of the US from 1989 to 1993. His presidency was marked by economic recession and US involvement in the Gulf War.






24. The popular name for the Kansas Territory in 1856 after abolitionist John Brown led a massacre at a pro-slavery camp - setting off waves of violence. Brown's massacre was in protest to the recent establishment of Kansas as a slave state. Pro-slavery






25. The increase of available paper money and bank credit - leading to higher prices and less valuable currency.






26. Constructed by the USSR and completed in August 1961 to prevent East Berliners from fleeing to West Berlin. The wall cemented the poltical split of Berlin between the communist and authoritarian Eastand the capitalist and democratic West. The wall wa






27. In 1962 - a year after the failed Bay of Pigs Invasion - the US government learned that Soviet missile bases were being constructed in Cuba. President JFK demanded that the USSR stop shipping military equipment to Cuba and remove the bases. US forces






28. Chief Justice of the Supreme Court from 1953 to 1969. His liberal court made a number of important decisions - primarily in the realm of civil rights - including Brown v Board of Education of Topeka in 1954.






29. A political group active in aiding the leftist forces in the Spanish Civil War. Prominent American intellectuals and writers - including Ernest Hemingway and John Dos Passos - joined the group.






30. Delegates from five states met in Annapolis in September 1786 to discuss interstate commerce. However - discussions of weaknesses in the government led them to suggest to Congress a new convention to amend the Articles of Confederation.






31. The English government's policy of not enforcing certain trade laws it imposed upon the American colonies throughout the late seventeenth and early eighteenth centuries. The purpose of this policy was largely to ensure the loyalty of the colonies in






32. Formed in the absence of support form the British crown - these companies accrued funding for colonization through the sale of public stock. They dominated English colonization throughout the seventeenth century.






33. Passed in 1924. Established maximum quotas for immigration into the US. This law severely restricted immigration from southern and eastern Europe - and excluded Asians entirely.






34. Conducted during the summer and fall of 1940. In preparation for an amphibious assault - Germans launched airstrikes on London. Hitlers hoped the continuous bombing would destroy British industry and hurt morale - but the British successfully avoided






35. Founded in 1920 - this organization seeks to protect the civil liberties of individuals - often by bringing "test cases" to court in order to challange questionable laws. In 1925 - the organization challanged a Christian fundamentalist law in the Sco






36. Signed with Spain in 1795. This treaty granted the US unrestricted access to the Mississippi River and removed Spanish troops from American land.






37. Longtime government employee who - in 1948 - was accused by Time editor Whitaker Chambers of spying for the USSR. After a series of highly publicized hearings and trials - he was convicted of perjury in 1950 and sentenced to five years imprisonment -






38. Founded on the premise that the "perfect" human society could be achieved through genetic tinkering. Popularized during the Progressive Era - writers on this subject often used this theory to justify a supremacist white Protestant ideology - which ad






39. The series of French and American naval conflicts occuring between 1798 and 1800.






40. Early American fiction writer. His most famous work - The Scarlet Letter (1850) - explored the moral dilemmas of adultery in a Puritan community.






41. A 1836 executive order issued by President Jackson in an attempt to stabilize the economy - which had been dramatically expanding since the early 1830s due to state banks' excessive lending practices and over-speculation. It required that all land pa






42. Anarchist Italian immigrants who were charged with murder in Massachusetts in 1920 and sentenced to death. The case against them was circumstantial and poorly argued - although evidence now suggests that they were in fact guilty. It was significant -






43. A third-party candidate in the 1992 presidential election who won 19 percent of the popular vote. His strong showing demonstrated voter dissatisfaction with the two major parties.






44. Created in 1962. United college students throughout the country in a network committed to achieving racial equality - alleviating poverty - and ending the Vietnam War.






45. A Scottish immigrant who in 1901 founded Carnegie Steel - then the world's largest corporation. In addition to being an entrepreneur and industrialist - he was a philanthropist who donated more than $300 million to charity during his lifetime.






46. Religious revivals on the frontier during the Second Great Awakening. Hundreds or even thousands of people- members of various dominations- met to hear speeches on repentance and sign hymns.






47. A Frenchman who explored the Great Lakes and established the first French colony in North America at Quebec in 1608.






48. On June 3 and 4 - 1989 - China's communist army brutally crushed a pro-democracy protest here in Beijing. Diplomatic relations between the US and China significantly soured as a result of the attack.






49. Husband and wife who - in 1950 - were accused of spying for the Soviets. They countered the accusation on the grounds that their Jewish background and leftist beliefs made them easy targets for persecution. In a trial closely followed by the American






50. Although Andrew Jackson won the most popular and electoral votes in the 1824 election - he failed to win the requisite majority and the election was thrown to the House of Representatives. Speaker of the House Henry Clay backed John Quincy Adams for