Foundations: Background to American History

Alexis de Tocqueville A Frenchman who came to the US to study its prison system Wrote Democracy in America Some historians have identified 5 key characteristic of American democracy that Tocqueville believed set Americans apart from Europeans: – Liberty – Equalitarianism (equality) – Individualism – Laissez-faire – Populism

Other Key Individuals John Trumbull, Sr. – colonial governor who sided with the colonists against the British John Peter Muhlenberg – Clergyman who recruited soldiers to fight the British John Hancock – President of the 2 nd Continental Congress: signer of the Declaration Benjamin Rush – Father of American Medicine; signer of the Declaration John Witherspoon – Signer of the Declaration; President of New Jersey College (Princeton) John Jay – Helped write Federalist Papers; 1 st Chief Justice of the Supreme Court; negotiated a boundary treaty with England Charles Carroll – Signer of the Declaration

Evolutions of mid-19th Century Civil War – th Amendment – abolished slavery 14 th Amendment – guaranteed all citizens “due process” and “equal protection” of the laws from state governments 15 th Amendment – prohibited denying voting rights on the basis of race E Pluribus Unum – “out of many[comes] one” Several states have united to form one nation “In God We Trust” – found in the Star Spangled Banner; courts have ruled that it is ceremonial in meaning, not religious