Ms. Daniel
Ch. 3 Questions
U.S. History
The Birth of Modern America
Directions: Answer the following questions as you read each section of the chapter. Copy any charts, timelines, or graphs exactly as
you see them here. Always answer questions in complete sentences and be sure to restate the question.
3.1 Settling the West p. 236
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5.
(You may skim this section, but be sure you understand the content each question refers to.)
Add thought and detail when completing this table:
Resource/Government
How it Attracted New Settlers West
Impact on Native Americans
Measure
Discovery of gold, copper,
and silver
High prices for beef and
expansion of railroads
Homestead Act and railroad
companies sell land along
railroads for cheap
For what reason(s) was the Indian Peace Commission formed?
Describe the 1880s success and then 1890s failure of the Wheat Belt in your own words. Include a description of the term
Wheat Belt.
What does it mean to assimilate into a society? Why do you think many Native Americans failed to assimilate into American
society?
Imagine that you are the leader of a Plains Indian group in the 1800s, and although the U.S. government has agreed to pay
your people to live on a reservation, no payments have arrived and winter approaches. Write a short speech (3-4
sentences) you will give your people stating how the settling of your land by white men has affected your way of life, and
what you think of the U.S. government.
3.2 Industrialization p. 243
6.
In thorough notes, explain how each of the following led to industrialization in the United States:
Natural Resources
Large Workforce
Free Enterprise
New Inventions
Railroads
7.
8.
Define the following terms: gross national product (GNP), entrepreneur, laissez-faire
Define robber barons and explain how they gained their wealth.
9.
What are the two techniques corporations use to consolidate their industries (make their corporations larger and more
efficient)? Draw a rough sketch of each.
Who are Andrew Carnegie and John D. Rockefeller?
What specific problems did workers want to remedy (fix) by forming unions?
Why did attempts in the late 1800s to form
unions fail? (multiple reasons)
Copy the chart on the right and fill it in.
What were three goals of the American
Federation of Labor and its leader, Samuel
Gompers?
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Ms. Daniel
Ch. 3 Questions
U.S. History
3.3 Immigration and Urbanization p. 254
15.
Immigrant Groups:
Add specific ethnic groups to this
box
Europeans:
Push factors
(Reasons for leaving their home country)
Pull factors
(Reasons for coming to the United States)
Asians:
16. What are four reasons nativists opposed immigration?
17. Why do you think the Chinese Exclusion Act was passed, but other immigrant groups like Italians, Irish, and Germans were
not restricted?
18. Study the photographs and read the corresponding information on page 259 of the Brooklyn Bridge and Flatiron Building.
Why was it advantageous to construct taller buildings rather than purchase more land? What new technologies allowed
engineers to build taller buildings?
19. Describe living conditions of the upper-class, middle-class, and working-class in/around the city. Use the term tenement.
20. Fill in the diagram at the right with specific
information that illustrates the exchange
between political bosses and city dwellers
in the 1800s.
21. What problems could arise in cities in which
political machines controlled all services?
22. Who was William M. “Boss” Tweed?
3.4 Early Reforms in the Gilded Age p. 264
23. Why did Mark Twain call this period the “Gilded Age”?
24. What was the main idea of a “rags-to-riches” story? What does it have to do with individualism?
25. What would supporters of the following movements have to say on the following topics?
Add a
Social Darwinism:
Gospel of Wealth:
Social Gospel:
definition/description
in this top box 
Competition: What did
the movement believe
regarding competition
in business?
Poor: How did the
movement view the
poor of society?
Christianity: What
support or conflict did
the movement have
with Christianity?
26. Which of the three philosophies above do you most agree with? Why?
27. How did the United States try to Americanize immigrants? How could Americanization pose a problem for some
immigrants?
28. How did Booker T. Washington assist African Americans in accessing public education?
Ms. Daniel
Ch. 3 Questions
U.S. History
3.5 Politics and Reform p. 271
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32.
33.
Stalemate in Washington p. 272
“Stalwarts” were Republicans political bosses who supported the spoils system. Explain how the assassination of President
Garfield by Charles Guiteau relates to the problems of the spoils system and the Stalwarts. Then explain how the Pendleton
Act ended the spoils system.
What groups supported the Republicans in the 1870s and 1880s? Who supported the Democrats?
Give examples of how the personal morals of Grover Cleveland and James G. Blaine were attacked during the election of
1884.
What was the Interstate Commerce Act?
What was the effect of the Sherman Anti-Trust Act?
Populism p. 275
34. What was populism? It was formed to protect the interests of what group of people? Draw a sketch of a populist supporter.
Include accessories/details/labels to identify him.
35. Define: Grange and People’s Party.
36. What changes did the populists want to see made by the government? (List the Ocala Demands and the People’s Party
platform from 1892.)
The Rise of Segregation p. 279
37. Sketch a picture of a sharecropper leaving the South to migrate to Kansas. Add a thought bubble with his reasons for
leaving the South and hopes for his new life in Kansas.
38. Explain three ways that Southern states began disfranchising (taking away the right to vote) African Americans in the years
following Reconstruction.
39. How did Plessy v. Ferguson legalize segregation? Explain it in your own words.
40. Compare and contrast the different methods supported by Booker T. Washington and W.E.B. DuBois for reducing inequality
and discrimination.
Ms. Daniel
Ch. 3 Questions
U.S. History
Key Terms from Chapter 3
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Quartz mining
Placer mining
Vigilance committee
Open range
Homestead Act
Assimilate
Indian Peace Commission
Sitting Bull
Ghost Dance
Dawes Act
Wheat Belt
GNP
Entrepreneur
Laissez-faire
Corporation
Vertical integration
Horizontal integration
Monopoly
Marxism
Industrial union
Closed shop
Alexander Graham Bell
Thomas Edison
Pacific Railway Act
Andrew Carnegie
American Federation of Labor
Samuel Gompers
Nativism
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Tenement
Political machine
Graft
Chinese Exclusion Act
William “Boss” Tweed
Ellis Island
Individualism
Social Darwinism
Philanthropy
Settlement house
Americanization
Gilded Age
Social Gospel
Booker T. Washington
Stalwart
Populism
Inflation and deflation
Graduated income tax
Poll tax
Grandfather clause
Segregation
Jim Crow Laws
Pendleton Act
Interstate Commerce Act
Grange
People’s Party
Ida B. Wells
W.E.B. DuBois