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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. A defiant act of the colonies against the British government and its tea trade agreement with East India - which was causing colonial tea merchants to go bankrupt. Protesters dumped an entire shipment of tea into the Boston Harbor.






2. A treaty in which the parties agree not to attack each other unless attacked first.






3. 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






4. The political position that opposes abortion.






5. Found in the 10th Amendment - it provides that any powers not specifically given to the central government or specifically denied to the state governments by the Constitution are powers that the states are granted. For example - the power to develop






6. The term denoting the ongoing military battle of the US and its allies against terrorism - first used by George W. Bush when addressing a joint session of Congress following the terrorist attacks on September 11 - 2001.






7. 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.






8. 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






9. Progressive-era reform that created a mechanism for voters to approve or reject legislation placed on the ballot. It was designed to weaken the power of entrenched political machines.






10. Political party organizations that run cities and are often associated with corruption and undemocratic practices. The most notorious example was New York's Tammary Hall Democratic club of the Gilded age.






11. The policy of supplying government support for corporations when they are in severe financial trouble. The Chrysler Corporation - for example - got a $1.5 billion bailout in 1980 - and the savings and loan banks received at least $159 billion during






12. Critical term for the owners of the big business of the Gilded Age who accumulated great wealth and power.






13. The exodus of white - middle-class families from cities to suburbia following WWII - partially caused by the migration of African Americans to urban centers.






14. A type of colony controlled by the king. The crown chose the governor to run the colony.






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






16. The generation of children born between the end of WWII and 1964.






17. Sensationalist - lurid - and often falsified accounts of events printed by newspapers and magazines to attract readers.






18. Opposition to communism. Extreme anti-communism was manifested in the "Red Scare" of the 1920s and McCarthyism of the 1950s.






19. A term used to describe a person who believes that the Consitution must be interpreted word by word. Thomas Jefferson believed in strict construction of the Constitution.






20. People who illegally manufactured - sold - or transported alcoholic beverages during the Prohibition period.






21. A type of colony that was settled by a group of investors and in which the governor of the colony was chosen by the proprietors.






22. A skilled worker who had learned a trade from a master as an apprentice. Shoemakers - bakers - blacksmiths. and carpenters were artisans.






23. The political position advocated by Jerry Falwell - Pat Robertson - and other conservative Republicans emphasizing a life of religious observance along with no drugs - no divorce - no abortions - no homosexuality - no working mothers - and no sex bef






24. Progressive political reform in the early 1900s that enabled voters to introduce legislation.






25. An economic system in which a colony exists for the good of the mother country. The colony's role is to provide raw materials for the mother country (especially products that the mother country cannot produce itself) and serve as a market for the goo






26. The practice of victorious candidates distributing government jobs to friends and supporters rather than to the most qualified people. Andre Jackson gave his supporters the spoils of victory - whereas John Quincy Adams by and large did not.






27. Coins or gold and silver money - also called "hard money."






28. The name used by the administration of President Lyndon B. Johnson to describe its domestic programs.






29. Agricultural labor system in the South following the era of slavery wherein a sharecropper could farm a piece of land in return for giving the landowner a share - usually half - of the crop.






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






31. A tax placed on imports; its purpose is to make domestic goods cheaper to keep out foreign goods.






32. 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.






33. The building of canals - railroads - and turnpikes at state or federal expense. These were part of the American Plan - which became an important part of the Whig program of the 1830s. Internal improvements were also supported by the National Republic






34. Techniques used in industry to produce large quantities of goods using interchangeable parts and moving assembly lines. Elements of mass production were developed in the 19th century; the process was perfected by Henry Ford in the 1910s.






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






36. Technique of the labor movement in the 1930s that entailed stopping work but not leaving the factory floor - as owners were not able to hire replacement workers so long as the workers occupied the shop floor.






37. The belief that the United States should not be involved in world affairs.






38. A form of educational protest at universities. The practice began in 1965 at the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor - when professors and students analyzed US foreign policy and debated with each other and-only in the earlier days of the war-with go






39. Hit and run tactics combined with hiding and ambushing the enemy. The soldier would live off the land and population in an area so that he or she need not carry many supplies. The Americans learned this from the Indians in colonial times and used it






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






41. The railroad route connecting the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans that was completed in 1869.






42. A country whose affairs are partly controlled by a stronger country. The US established several protectorates - such as Cuba - in the 20th century.






43. A slogan used by President Lyndon B. Johnson to describe his goal of ending poverty in the United States.






44. 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






45. An invention of the 1870's - barbed wire enabled farmers to enclose land and prevent the long cattle drives that cowboys conducted.






46. President Roosevelt's (FDR) attempt in 1936 to push a judicial reform bill through Congress that would allow him to appoint six new Supreme Court justices sympathetic to his New Deal.






47. Those who were pro-Vietnam war in the 1960s.






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






49. A system of government in which the power to rule comes from the people.






50. A machine that separates seeds from the cotton. The short-staple cotton that grew inland in the South's Black Belt could be cleaned profitably only with the cotton gin. The invention of the cotton gin allowed cotton cultivation to spread - enabling s