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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. An English explorer sponsered by the Dutch East India Company. In 1609 - he sailed up the river that now bears his name - nearly reaching present-day Albany. His explorations gave the Dutch territorial claims to the Hudson Bay region.






2. Democratic president of the US from 1977 to 1981. He is best known for his commitment to human rights. During his term in office - he faced an oil crisis - a weak economy - and severe tension in the Middle East.






3. 1795 treaty which provided for the removal of British troops from American land and opened up limited trade with the British West Indies - but said nothing about British seizure of American ships or the impressment of American sailors. While the Amer


4. 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






5. 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






6. Founded in 1957 by Martin Luther King Jr. and other prominent clergymen. Fought against segregation using nonviolent means.






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






8. Passed by Congress in 1882 amid a wave of anti-immigrant sentiment among American workers. The act banned Chinese immigration for ten years.






9. 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.






10. Head of the FBI from 1924 until his death in 1972. He aggressively intestigated suspected subversives during the Cold War.






11. Defined the process by which new states could be admitted into the Union from the Northwest Territory. The ordinace forbade slavery in the territory but allowed citizens to vote on the legality of slavery once statehood had been established.






12. A leading member of the women's suffrage movement. She served as president of the National American Woman Suffrage Association from 1892 until 1900.






13. The final German offensive in Western Europe - lasting from December 16 - 1944 - to January 16 - 1945. Hitler amassed his last reserves against Allied troops in France. Germany made a substantial dent in the Allied front line - but the Allies recover






14. Theory of trade which stresses that a nation's economic strenght depends on exporting more than it imports. Britain's use of this policy manifested itself in the triangular trade and in a series of laws - such as the Navigation Acts (1651-1673) - aim






15. Andrew Jackon's 1832 veto of the proposed charter renewal for the Second Bank of the United States. The veto marked the beginning of Jackon's five-year battle against the national bank.






16. Was the leader of Iraq. In August 1990 - he lead an Iraqi invasion of Kuwait - sparking the Gulf War.






17. Founded in 1886 - this organization sought to organize craft unions into a federation. The loose structure of the organization differed from its rival - the Knights of Labor - in that it allowed individual unions to remain autonomous. Eventually the






18. Founded in 1895 - the league spearheaded the prohibition movement during the Progressive Era.






19. Industrialist Henry Ford installed the first of these while developing his Model T car in 1908 - and perfected its use in the 1920s. This type of manufacturing allowed workers to remain in one place and master one repetitive action - maximizing outpu






20. A leader of the Sons of Liberty. He suggested the formation of the Committees of Correspondence and fought for colonial rights throughout New England. He is credited with provoking the Boston Tea Party.






21. A French sailor who explored the St. Lawrence River region between 1534 and 1542. He searched for a Northwest Passage - a waterway through which ships could cross the Americas and access Asia. He found no such passage but opened the region up to futu






22. A series of investigations in 1987 exposed evidence that the US had been selling arms to the anti-American government in Iran and using the profits from these sales to secretly and illegally finance the Contras in Nicaragua. (The Contras were a rebel






23. Son of John Adams and president from 1825 to 1829. As James Monroe's secretary of state - he workerd to expand the nation's borders and authorized the Monroe Doctrine. His presidency was largely ineffectie due to lack of popular support; Congress blo






24. Nickname for the 1950s - when economic prosperity caused US population to swell from 150 million to 180 million.






25. Also the Compromise of 1820. Resolved the conflict surrounding the admission of Missouri to the Union as either a slave or free state. The compromise made Missouri a slave state - admitted Maine as a free state - and prohibited slavery in the remaind






26. An influential American writer in the early nineteenth century. His novels - The Pioneers (1823) - The Last of the Mohicans (1826) - and others - employed distinctly American themes.






27. The centerpiece of a congressional effort to restrict union activity. The act - passed in 1947 - banned certain union practices and allowed the president to call for an eighty-day cooling off period to delay strikes thought to pose risks to national






28. Ronald Reagan's economic philosophy which held that a capitalist system free from taxation and government involvement would be most productive. Reagan believed that the prosperity of the rich upper class would "trickle down" to the poor.






29. A dissenter who clashed with Massachusetts Puritans over the issue of seperation of church and state. After being banished from Massachusetts in 1636 - he traveled south - where he founded a colony in Rhode Island that granted full religious freedom






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






31. The partnership of Great Britain - France - and Italy during World War I. The alliance was pitted against the Central Powers of Germany and Austria-Hungary. In 1917 - the US joined the war on this side. During World War II - the coalition included Gr






32. 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.






33. During ratification - these people opposed the Constitution on the grounds that it gave the federal government too much political - economic - and military control. They instead advocated a decentralized governmental structure that granted the most p






34. US Cold War policy - developed in the 1960s - that acknowledged that both the US and the Soviet Union had enough nuclear weaponry to destroy each other many times over. This policy hoped to prevent outright war with the SU on the premise that any att






35. In March 1770 - a crowd of colonists protested against Boston customs agents and the Townsend Duties. Violence flared and five colonists were killed.






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






37. Written by Betty Friedan in 1963. This book was a rallying cry for the women's liberation movement. It denounced the belief that women should be tied to the home and encouraged women to get involved in activities outside their home and family.






38. A prominent transcendentalist writer. Two of his most famous writings are Civil Disobediance (1849) and Walden (1854). He advocatd living life according to one's conscience - removed from materialism and repressive social codes.






39. 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






40. Head of the Manhatten Project - the secret American operation to develop the atomic bomb.






41. Created in 1933 as part of FDR's New Deal. This administration controlled the production and prices of crops by offering subsidies to farmers who stayed under set quotas. The Supreme Court declared it unconstitutional in the Butler v US decision - in






42. President of the Russian Republic in 1991 - when hard-line Communists attempted to overthrow Mikhail Gorbachev. After helping to repel these hard-liners - he and the leaders of the other Soviet republics declared an end to the USSR - forcing Gorbache






43. 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






44. 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.






45. Issued in 1941 in response to German submarine attacks on American ships in the Atlantic ocean. The order authorized naval patrols to fire on any Axis ships found between the US and Iceland.






46. Written by Helen Hunt Jackson and published in 1881 - this work attempted to raise public awareness of the harsh and dishonorable treatment of Native Americans at the hands of the US.






47. 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.






48. President Eisenhower's philosophy of government. He called it this to distinguish it from the Republican administrations of the past - which he deemed backword-looking and complacent. He was determined to work with the Democratic Party rather than ag






49. 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.






50. 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.