AP US History key terms

The transfer of plants, animals, people, and diseases between the Americas and Europe, Africa, and Asia after 1492; it reshaped diets and populations, and Eurasian germs killed most Native Americans.

Spanish colonial labor arrangement granting colonists the right to Native American labor and tribute; in practice it became forced labor, defended by missionaries as a means of Christianizing Indians.

A league of five later six Iroquoian nations in the Northeast, governing through a council, that played a central role in colonial diplomacy, the fur trade, and both sides' alliance calculations.

Economic doctrine holding that national power rests on accumulated wealth, so colonies should supply raw materials and buy the mother country's manufactures; it justified English laws restricting colonial trade.

Informal British practice before 1763 of loosely enforcing trade and colonial laws, letting colonies govern themselves; the resulting habits of self-rule made later imperial tightening feel like tyranny.

A 1676 Virginia uprising of frontier settlers and indentured servants against Governor Berkeley's Indian policy and elite favoritism; planters afterward relied more heavily on enslaved Africans to avoid a united lower class.

The forced sea voyage carrying enslaved Africans across the Atlantic to the Americas; crowded ships and high mortality made it the deadliest leg of the triangular trade.

A 1765 British law taxing printed paper such as newspapers, legal documents, and licenses in the colonies to raise revenue; it provoked the Stamp Act Congress and the cry of no taxation without representation.

The first U.S. constitution, in force 1781 to 1789, creating a loose league of states with a one-house Congress, no power to tax or regulate trade, and no executive; its weaknesses prompted the Constitutional Convention.

Eighty-five essays by Hamilton, Madison, and Jay published in 1787 and 1788 urging ratification of the Constitution; they argued that separation of powers and a large republic would control faction.

Constitutional agreement counting three of every five enslaved people toward a state's population for representation and taxes, increasing slaveholding states' power in Congress without granting enslaved people any rights.

Federalist laws of 1798 lengthening naturalization, permitting deportation of supposedly dangerous foreigners, and punishing criticism of the government; Republicans called them unconstitutional and answered with the Kentucky and Virginia Resolutions.

An 1803 Supreme Court ruling that denied William Marbury his commission but declared courts may strike down acts of Congress violating the Constitution, establishing the principle of judicial review.

An 1820 agreement admitting Missouri as a slave state and Maine as free, and barring slavery from the northern part of the Louisiana Purchase, temporarily quieting sectional conflict over slavery's expansion.

President Monroe's 1823 declaration that the Western Hemisphere was closed to new European colonization or intervention while the United States would stay out of European affairs; it became a cornerstone of foreign policy.

The early nineteenth-century transformation of the economy through canals, railroads, factories, and commercial farming, which linked distant regions and drew workers into wage labor and cash exchange.

An 1848 women's rights meeting in New York where Elizabeth Cady Stanton and others issued a Declaration of Sentiments demanding suffrage and equal legal standing for women.

Lincoln's January 1, 1863 order freeing enslaved people only in rebelling states; it did not free everyone but made abolition a Union war aim and allowed Black men to enlist.

Laws passed by southern legislatures after the Civil War restricting freedpeople's movement, labor contracts, and civil rights; their harshness pushed Radical Republicans toward a tougher Reconstruction policy.

The bargain settling the disputed 1876 election: Rutherford Hayes won the presidency in exchange for withdrawing federal troops from the South, effectively ending Reconstruction and leaving Black southerners unprotected.

A labor system in which landless farmers, often freedpeople, worked a landowner's fields for a share of the crop, usually leaving them in debt and dependent on the planter.

The application of survival-of-the-fittest ideas to society, used by late nineteenth-century business leaders and critics of charity to justify inequality and oppose labor reform and government aid.

State and local statutes in the South requiring racial segregation in schools, transportation, and public spaces; upheld in Plessy v. Ferguson, they disfranchised and subordinated Black Americans until the 1960s.

A farmers' party of the 1890s demanding free silver, government ownership of railroads, an income tax, and direct election of senators; it faded after 1896 but left lasting reform ideas.

The first federal law banning monopolies and combinations in restraint of trade, passed in 1890; courts first used it against unions rather than trusts, and enforcement stayed weak until the Progressive era.

The 1899 American proposal that all nations trade equally in China and respect its territorial integrity; it protected U.S. commercial access without acquiring colonies and shaped Pacific policy.

Franklin Roosevelt's programs of relief, recovery, and reform from 1933 to 1939, including Social Security, the Wagner Act, and banking regulation, which enlarged federal responsibility for the economy and welfare.

A 1920s flowering of African American literature, music, and art centered in Harlem that celebrated Black culture, challenged racist stereotypes, and drew white patrons and audiences.

The movement of millions of African Americans from the rural South to northern and western cities between roughly 1910 and 1970, seeking jobs and escaping Jim Crow, reshaping urban politics and culture.

The Cold War strategy of blocking Soviet expansion through alliances, aid, and, where necessary, military force rather than rolling back existing communist states; it guided U.S. policy from Truman onward.

A U.S. program from 1948 to 1952 sending about thirteen billion dollars to rebuild Western European economies, aiming to prevent communist gains and open markets for American goods.

A unanimous 1954 Supreme Court decision holding that racially segregated public schools are inherently unequal, overturning separate-but-equal doctrine and energizing the civil rights movement.

Lyndon Johnson's 1960s legislation attacking poverty and racial injustice, including Medicare, Medicaid, Head Start, and the Civil Rights and Voting Rights Acts; it expanded federal social programs but met backlash over cost and scope.

President Reagan's approach of large tax cuts, reduced domestic spending, deregulation, and tight money to curb inflation; supporters credit renewed growth, while critics blame rising deficits and inequality.

A law passed after the September 11 attacks expanding government surveillance, wiretapping, and detention powers; supporters called it necessary for security while critics warned it threatened civil liberties.

The growing worldwide integration of economies, communications, and cultures since the late twentieth century, driven by trade agreements, technology, and migration, and debated for its effects on jobs and sovereignty.

Persistent American disputes since the 1980s over abortion, guns, religion in public life, gender, and sexuality, dividing voters along ideological and religious lines and shaping national elections.