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SAT Subject Test: U.S. History Vocab

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. The idea that each member of the British Parliament represented all British subjects - regardless of location.






2. Philosophical movement - with deep roots in the United States - which holds that truth emerges from experimentation and experience rather than from abstract theory. it is associated with William James and John Dewey.






3. George W. Bush's belief in the propriety of using unilateral preemptive military strikes-essentially a preventive war- to fight terrorism.






4. A type of adjustable-rate mortgage - often requiring no down payment - offered to customers with risky credit ratings. The lending institution makes money by steadily increasing interest payments.






5. A term coined in the 1950s to describe illegal or undesirable behavior by teenagers.






6. Populists and "Silver Democrats" who in the 1890s argued in favor of an immense increase in silver coinage as a way of stimulating a faltering economy. See Bimetallists.






7. Trade that takes place between states. Under the US Constitution - the power to regulate interstate commerce is delegated to the Congress.






8. The promotion of products in various media. Modern advertising - employing psychology - expert testimony - and other innovations developed in the 1920s.






9. A body of advisers to a head of state. The US president's cabinet consists of the heads of the various departments plus other advisers.






10. The belief the the US should not be involved in world affairs.






11. The condition when all adults in a democracy are granted the right to vote.






12. A tax on imports (goods coming into a country). Tariffs were advocated by Alexander Hamilton in 1792 and favored by the supporters of the American System to pay for internal improvements and protect US industry. Tariffs were often a main issue in Jac






13. The principal that the Supreme Court has the power to review laws passed by Congress and actions taken by the president to determine whether or not they are consistent with the Constitution. The Supreme Court can declare a law or presidential action






14. An agricultural system in which farm workers supply their own tools - rent land - and have more control over their work than agrarian wage workers.






15. The political act of leaving the Union. The Southern states formed their own country during 1860-1861 after they seceded from the United States.






16. The movement to form labor organizations made up of skilled wokrers within a particular field.






17. The series of violent reactions to police brutality - poor living conditions - assassinations - and high unemployment from 1964-1968. The National Advisory Commission on Civil Disorders (Kerner Commission) called them a reaction to the rising expecta






18. The conflict between the Soviet Union and the United States from the end of WWII until the collapse of the Soviet Union (1991). It was characterized by harsh rhetoric - technological rivalry - an arms buildup - and proxy wars in developing countries.






19. Labor in which the worker can leave whenever he or she wishes (as opposed to slave labor). Wage labor or work for pay is free labor.






20. Worker organization formed to press for workplace demands - such as better wages and safer working conditions.






21. The political position that favors abortion on demand.






22. The British policy of the 17th century in which the British were lax in the enforcement of laws in the colonies - thereby allowing the colonies to develop without much interference from the British government. After the French and Indian War - this p






23. A political philosophy that promotes solving social issues through cooperation with private agencies rather than through direct government programs. It also stresses the personal responsibility and accountability as keys to success.






24. Also called "applied Christianity -" this reform movement - driven by Christian teachings - sought to relieve the suffering of the poor.






25. Cattle handlers who drove large herds across the southern Great Plains. The era of the cowboy lasted from 1870 to the late 1880s.






26. Government policy of noninterference in business practices and in individuals economic affairs; literally translated as "to let do."






27. Motion pictures with sound. The Jazz Singer (1927) was the first movie to use sound in a significant way.






28. A term used to describe an investment with a reward that can be great-if the investment is successful. It contributed to the stock market crash of 1929.






29. Laws passed in the Southern states immediately after the Civil War to restrict the movements and limit the rights of African Americans.






30. A form of nonviolent protest used by antiwar and antisegregation activists. Protesters would take over buildings - camp out in front of administration offices - or sit at lunch counters and demand to be served on an integrated basis. The first sit-in






31. Bundles of subprime mortgages that are traded like stocks.






32. The series of laws designed to create separation between the races. These were by and large Southern state laws made constitutional by the Supreme Court decision Plessy v. Ferguson in 1896.






33. An organization and discussion method employed by feminists in the late 1960s and early 1970s in which women would exchange experiences of discrimination - read radical analyses of oppression - and develop an understanding that the patriarchal or som






34. A conference attended by leaders of two or more nations.






35. Those who were against the Vietnam War in the 1960s.






36. A list - circulated among potential employers - of alleged "troublemakers" not to be hired.






37. Middle-class reform movement of the first decades of the 20th century which sought to widen political participation - eradicate corruption - and apply scientific and technological expertise to social ills.






38. The wave of immigration from the 1880s to the 1920s of Eastern and Southern Europeans - contrasted with the "old" immigration of Northern and Western Europeans.






39. Settlers who were granted plots in the West - usually of 160 acres - under the Homestead Act of 1862.






40. Historiography is the study of how history is written. Historians in the 1950s-consensus historians-in general argued that America was the world's great democracy that only did good in the world and had no conflicts at home. Largely due to the effort






41. The political events of the 1960s divided the country in many ways. There were pro-Vietnam hawks and anti-Vietnam doves - those who supported the counterculture of liberated sex and drugs and those who did not - those who favored American involvement






42. Cotton that grew inland in the Black Belt of the South - an area characterized by its dark soil. Short-staple cotton could not be grown profitably until the cotton gin was invented.






43. The reaction of some whites to the Civil Rights Movement and the urban riots of the 1960s. The formerly solidly Democratic South started voting Republican following the gains of the Civil Rights Movement in the 1960s - and many whites sent their kids






44. The Civil Rights Movement of the 1950s and 1960s was called the "Second Reconstruction" because the first Reconstruction in the 1860s and 1870s had not brought equality for blacks.






45. A practice used in colonial America in which a person entered into a contract for a specified period of time with another in exchange for the payment of his or her passage to the New World. The indentured servant was sometimes promised some land afte






46. A person who believes in the broad interpretation of the US Constitution; that is - that the Constitution does not have to be interpreted word by word. Alexander Hamilton supported this idea.






47. The characteristic of a federal system of government in which power is distributed between central and local governments. This distribution of power usually is established through some outside source - often a constitution - as is the case in the Uni






48. A policy developed by the Spanish in the 1500s in which the Spanish settlers in the New World were permitted to use Native American labor if the settlers promised to attempt to Christianize them. It led to the exploitation of the Native Americans






49. The mixed race of people that developed as a result of the intermarriage of the Spanish and Native American populations in the 16th and 17th centuries.






50. Derisive term for Northerners who went to the South during Reconstruction to promote reform or to profit from it.