NA Senior High School

I - II.       Map Study

Complete this assignment with care and accuracy.  Study what you have prepared.  Does it have meaning for you?  Could it be understood by others?

            - IN-CLASS PROJECT QUIZ AND DISCUSSION -

III.       Hibernians and Forty-Eighters

Text 308-311(all), 314-315 (first two paragraphs)

What difference is there between the Irish and the Germans who arrive at this time?  Are these differences reflected in how they are received?

IV.       American Invention and Ingenuity

Text 315, 318-322, 324 (top of 2^nd column); Spirit 324-326 (Brownson), 326 (Regulations)

What factors are responsible for American inventiveness?  Is it part of our “national character”, or is there something else at work?

V.        The Transportation Revolution

            Text 328-337

What transportation developments can you predict will lead to sectional strife over time?  Explain your observations.

VI.       Utopian Societies and the 2^nd Great Awakening

            Text 340 – 345 (top paragraph), 354 (Wilderness Utopias), 337-339 (Spalding, 343-344 (Channing), 358-359 (Brook Farm)

What is the relationship between the Second Great Awakening and the major movements of abolition, temperance, and women’s rights?

VII.     Higher Learning, Reform,  and Demon Rum

            Text 345-351(1/2 of 1^st column), 368; Spirit 345-346 (Dix), 346-348 (Arthur)

MODERATION

What opposition existed to the concept of public education?  What factors overcame this opposition?  Explain.

VIII.    The Flowering of American Culture

            Text 354-355, 358-360 (1^st column)

It has been said that America could not truly be independent of Britain until it developed its own fine arts.  Do you agree? Why or why not?

IX.       Our Manifest Destiny…

            Text 305-308

What factors during the first half of the 19^th century support O’Sullivan’s assertion that it is “Our manifest destiny to overspread the continent…”?

X.        Don’t Mess With Texas!

            Text 293-298 (first paragraph), 400-401 (first column)

John C Calhoun referred to Texas as “poison to us”.  What was poisonous about Texas?  Explain your response. Does the United States have a “casus belli” for conflict with England at this time?  Why or why not?

XI.       The Mexican-American War

Text 406-410 (first paragraph), Spirit 411-413 (Slidell), 413-414 (Mexico), 414-415 (Polk)

Does the United States have a “casus belli” for conflict with Mexico at this time?  Why or why not?

XII.     Winning and Losing in Mexico

Text 410-411 (all), 414; Spirit 419 (Daily National Intelligencer), 419-420 (Washington Daily Union), 421-422 (Mexico Remembers)

            MODERATION

Why did the victors agree to pay an indemnity to the vanquished as part of this peace accord?  Was it haste?  A sense of fair play?  Guilt?

XIII.    The Watershed Event: The Compromise of 1850

            Text 416-422 (first paragraph)

The Compromise of 1850 is often considered to be the event that starts the so-called “Decade of Crisis” that precedes the Civil War.  What predictions can you make regarding why this might be so?

XIV.    King Cotton

Text 379-386; Spirit 384-385 (Robinson), 385-386 (cartoon), 401-402 (Hammond)

What arguments did southerners use to justify and continue the institution of slavery?  Which are the strongest?

XV.     “I Will Be Heard!”: The Rise of Radical Abolitionism

            Text 386-387, 390-393; Spirit 390-391 (Garrison), 391-393 (manifesto)

Are the arguments of the abolitionists too extreme for their day?  Explain your position.

XVI.    Anti-slavery attack and the Southern Response

Text 437-440 (first paragraph), Spirit 399-400 (Helper), 400-401 (Bullock), 451-453 (Stowe), 453-454 (Southern Literary Messenger)

Which author – Stowe or Helper – was most damning of the southern way of life?  How so?

XVII.  Bleeding Kansas

            Text 433-435, 440-443 (1^st column)

            In what ways is the fighting in Kansas a harbinger of things to come? 

XVIII. The Election of 1860

Text 451 (bottom of 2^nd column - 459 (2^nd column)

Is Abraham Lincoln responsible for the secession of the South?  Explain your response.

XIX.    Shots at Sumter

            462-464; Spirit 473-474 (Ft. Sumter - North), 474-475 (Ft. Sumter – South)

Did President Lincoln make the right decision regarding the Sumter crisis?  Why or why not?

XX.     Laird Rams and the Irony of the Trent Affair

            Text 471-474

MODERATION

What reasons were there for the British and French to get involved in the Civil War?  For what reasons did they not do so?

XXI.    The Civil War “Homefront” and Lincoln’s Suspension of Civil Liberties

            Text 474-479 (1^st column), Spirit 484-485 (Vallandigham)

What Lincoln guilty of tyrannical acts during the Civil War?  Where these justifiable because of the situation, or should acts like these NEVER be justified?  Explain.

XXII. The Politics of War and the Aftermath of the Nightmare

            Text 499-501, 504-505, 508-509, Spirit 519-520 (Davis), 521 (Kentucky Editor)

Does Lincoln deserve CSPAN’s rating as “Best President”?  Why or why not? Can it be argued that the timing of Lincoln’s assassination has enhanced his historical reputation?  Explain.