1. SOL REVIEW
GOVERNMENT

2. What agreement signed by the male settlers at Plymouth helped establish the notion of self-government in the Americas?
The Mayflower Compact

3. Where did the Puritans practice a form of direct democracy?
At Town Meetings

4. What was the first elected assembly (lawmaking body) in the New World?
The House of Burgesses

5. What did the Proclamation of 1763 do?
Forbid American colonists to move west of the Appalachian Mountains

6. What is the name of Great Britain’s lawmaking body?
Parliament

7. Who issued the Proclamation of 1763?
The British government
or King George III

8. Who wrote Common Sense?
Thomas Paine

9. What did Common Sense say?
Challenged the rule of the American colonies by the King of England

10. Who wrote the Declaration of Independence?
Thomas Jefferson

11. Who was John Locke? English political philosopher
Locke’s ideas influenced Thomas Jefferson

12. Who wrote that government should protect “Life, Liberty, and Property”?
John Locke

13. Who wrote that all men have the right to “Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness”?
Thomas Jefferson

14. John Locke Thomas Paine
Whose ideas did Thomas Jefferson borrow when he wrote the Declaration of Independence?
John Locke
Thomas Paine

15. What is a republic?
A representative democracy

16. What is the basic principle of republican government?
The people elect representatives who make the laws.

17. What was the first attempt at workable government in the United States?
The Articles of Confederation

18. What was wrong with the government under the Articles of Confederation?
It was too weak!

19. What does the legislative branch of a government do?
Makes the laws

20. What does the judicial branch of a government do?
Interprets or explains the meaning of the laws

21. What does the executive branch do?
Enforces the laws

22. What was the Virginia Plan?
A framework proposed by the Virginia delegation to the Constitutional Convention under which the national government would have a legislature consisting of two houses. Representation in both houses would be based on population. Big states would have more representatives.

23. What was the New Jersey Plan?
A framework proposed by the New Jersey delegation to the Constitutional Convention under which the national government would have a legislature consisting of one house. Under the New Jersey Plan each state had one vote. This plan benefited small states.

24. What was the Great Compromise or Connecticut Compromise?
A plan providing for a two-house Congress in which the people would be represented in a House of Representatives and the states in the Senate. In other words, the House of Rep. would be based on population, while each state would have 2 U.S. senators.

25. Which one became part of the Constitution: the Va. Plan, the N. J
Which one became part of the Constitution: the Va. Plan, the N.J. Plan, or the Great Compromise?
The Great Compromise

26. What was the Great Compromise or Connecticut Compromise?
A plan providing for a two-house Congress in which the people would be represented in a House of Representatives and the states in the Senate. In other words, the House of Rep. would be based on population, while each state would have 2 U.S. senators.

27. What is federalism?
The division of power in the United States between the national government and the state governments.

28. Who leads the executive branch of the federal government?
The President

29. Who leads the judicial branch of the federal government?
The Supreme Court

30. What is the name of the legislative branch of the federal government?
Congress

31. What are the two houses of Congress?
The House of Representatives
The United States Senate

32. How is a state’s membership in the Senate decided?
Two senators from each state

33. How is a state’s membership in the House of Rep. Decided?
By Population; States with large populations have more representatives than states with small populations.

34. What is separation of powers?
The division of power among different branches of government.

35. What is the checks and balances system?
A system of government by which each branch of government can check or stop the actions of the other branches

36. How many of the states had to ratify or approve the Constitution before it could take effect?9

37. What is the Bill of Rights?
The first ten amendments to the Constitution

38. What was the basic idea of the Virginia Declaration of Rights?
That government should not violate basic human rights.

39. Who wrote the Virginia Declaration of Rights?
George Mason

40. Who wrote the Virginia Statute of Religious Freedom?
Thomas Jefferson

41. What two documents did Madison consult when he was working on the Bill of Rights?
The Virginia Declaration of Rights and the Virginia Statute of Religious Freedom

42. What did the Virginia Statute of Religious Freedom do?
Outlawed the established church in Virginia
Supported the idea of freedom of religion

43. What rights does the First Amendment guarantee?
Freedom of speech, freedom of the press, freedom of religion, freedom of assembly, and the right of petition

44. What does the term ratify mean?
Approve

45. To what did the phrase “ratification of the Constitution” refer?
9 of the states approving the Constitution so that it would take effect

46. What First Amendment freedom allows people to gather at public meetings?
Freedom of Assembly

47. What First Amendment freedom allows Americans to make written requests to make changes in the government?
Freedom of Petition

48. On what document was the Bill of Rights based?
The Virginia Declaration of Rights

49. What is a constitutional amendment?
An addition to the Constitution

50. Define political party.
A group of people with similar beliefs about how to run the government.

51. Who led the Federalists?
Alexander Hamilton
John Adams

52. What were the beliefs of the Federalists?
Strong national government
Industrial economy (factories or manufacturing)

53. Who led the Republicans?
Thomas Jefferson
James Madison

54. What were the beliefs of the Democratic-Republicans?
Weak national government
Strong state governments
Agricultural economy (farming)

55. Who served as Chief Justice of the Supreme Court during the first 30 years of the 19th century?
John Marshall

56. Why were the Marshall court’s decisions important?
Made the federal courts a co-equal branch of the United States government

57. How did the Supreme Court rule in Marbury v. Madison?
Declared a federal law unconstitutional

58. What is the power of judicial review?
A court’s power to declare a law unconstitutional

59. What is the Supreme Court’s main check on the power of Congress?
Judicial Review

60. How did the Marshall court rule in McCulloch v. Maryland?
Forbid the states from taxing agencies of the federal government
Declared a Maryland state law unconstitutional

61. Who said “the power to tax is the power to destroy”?
John Marshall

62. Why was McCulloch v. Maryland important?
Established the power of the federal government over the states
Strengthened the federal courts’ power of judicial review

63. What is a republic? A Representative Democracy
The People elect representatives to make the laws

64. What is a bill?
A proposed law

65. What is an act?
A Law

66. What political party was formed in opposition to the Kansas-Nebraska Act?
The Republican Party

67. What was the Supreme Court’s decision in the Dred Scott case?

68. Since Dred Scott was a slave, he could not sue in federal court
African-Americans were not citizens of the United States
Since Congress had no power to prohibit slavery in the territories, the Missouri Compromise was unconstitutional

69. What did the Dred Scott decision say about the Missouri Compromise?
The Missouri Compromise was unconstitutional.

70. In Dred Scott v. Sandford did the Supreme Court rule that Scott should remain a slave or gain his freedom?
Remain a slave

71. What power did the Supreme Court use in Dred Scott v. Sandford?
The power of judicial review

72. By the end of the 1850s, what did Southerners argue states could do?
States could nullify laws passed by Congress
States could secede from the Union

73. What did it mean for a state to nullify a law?
Void it
Do Away with it

74. What did it mean for a state to secede?
Leave the Union

75. What did several Southern states do, when Lincoln won the 1860 presidential election?
Seceded from the Union

76. What constitutional debate did the Civil War involve?
Federal Power vs. States’ Rights

77. What country did the seceded Southern states form in 1861?
The Confederate States of America or
The Confederacy

78. What did it mean for a state to secede from the Union?
Leave the Union, or
Withdraw from the Union

79. What was the period when the federal government tried to rebuild the South and restore the Union after the Civil War?
Reconstruction

80. Define impeachment.
Bringing an official to trial for misconduct in office

81. The House of Representatives
Under the Constitution, which house of Congress can impeach the President?
The House of Representatives

82. Under the Constitution, which house of Congress sits as the jury at a President’s impeachment trial?
The Senate

83. Under the Constitution, which house of Congress can remove the President from office?
The Senate

84. What proportion of senators must vote to convict the President in order to remove him from office?
2/3

85. Which constitutional amendments are the Reconstruction amendments?
13th, 14th, 15th Amendments

86. Identify the 13th Amendment.
Freed the Slaves

87. Identify 14th Amendment. Granted citizenship to African-Americans
Forbid the states from denying any American “equal protection of the laws”

88. Identify the 15th Amendment.
Gave African-American males the right to vote

89. What are the key words to remember the Reconstruction Amendments?
13th = Freedom
14th = Citizenship
15th = Vote

90. What does one call the group of people who cast the official votes for president and vice president?
The Electoral College

91. How many electoral votes does each state have?
2 for senators + # of representatives in House

92. Identify the Compromise of 1877.
A political deal between Southern Democrats and northern Republicans
Democrats supported Rutherford Hayes’ election as President and Republicans ended the military occupation of the South

93. What was the 1862 Homestead Act?
Law that gave free public land to settlers in the western territories
Settlers promised to live on and farm this land for five years

94. What type of reforms were the 17th Amendment and anti-trust laws?
Progressive reforms on the national level.

95. What was the 17th Amendment?
Direct election of United States senators

96. Name a leader of the Women’s Suffrage Movement.
Susan B. Anthony

97. Which constitutional amendment gave women the right to vote?
19th Amendment

98. How did the Supreme Court rule in 1896 in the case of Plessy v
How did the Supreme Court rule in 1896 in the case of Plessy v. Ferguson?
Racial segregation was constitutional (legal).

99. What doctrine was established by the Supreme Court’s decision in Plessy v. Ferguson?
The “Separate But Equal” Doctrine

100. What is another word for the right to vote?
Suffrage

101. Who were the Muckrakers?
Progressive writers who wrote about social and political evils in late 19th and early 20th century America.

102. What legislative body ratifies treaties?
United States Senate

103. What vote is needed in the Senate to ratify a treaty?
2/3

104. What political scandal forced President Nixon to resign from office?
Watergate