APUSH Vocabulary Chapters 16 – 19
Chapter 16
Pacific Railway Act: The "Pacific Railroad Acts" were a
series of acts of Congress (from 1862 – 1866) that
promoted the construction of the transcontinental
railroad in the U.S. through issuing of government
bonds and grants of land to railroad companies.
Transcontinental railroad: Completed on May 10,
1869, it connected the Central Pacific and Union
Pacific lines, enabling goods to move by railway from
the eastern United States all the way to California.
Munn v. Illinois: An 1877 Supreme Court case
affirming that states could regulate key businesses,
such as railroads and grain elevators, if those
businesses were “clothed in the public interest.”
Gold standard: The practice of backing a country’s
currency with its reserves of gold. In 1873, the United
States followed Great Britain and other European
nations in following this practice.
“Crime of 1873”: A term used by those critical of a law
directing the U.S. Treasury to cease minting silver
dollars, retire Civil War–era greenbacks, and replace
them with notes backed by the gold standard from an
expanded system of national banks.
Homestead Act The 1862: act that gave 160 acres of
free western land to any applicant who occupied and
improved the property. This policy led to the rapid
development of the American West after the Civil War.
Morrill Act: A legislative act that set aside 140 million
federal acres that states could sell to raise money for
public universities.
Comstock Lode Immense silver ore deposit discovered
in 1859 in Nevada that touched off a mining rush,
bringing a diverse population into the region and led
to the establishment of boomtowns.
Long Drive Facilitated by the completion of the
Missouri Pacific Railroad in 1865, a system by which
cowboys herded cattle hundreds of miles north from
Texas to Dodge City and the other cow towns of
Kansas.
“Rain follows the plow”: An unfounded theory that
settlement of the Great Plains caused an increase in
rainfall.
Exodusters: African Americans who walked or rode out
of the Deep South following the Civil War. Many
settled on farms in Kansas in hopes of finding peace
and prosperity.
Yellowstone National Park: Established in 1872 by
Congress, 2 million acres in Wyoming was set aside as
the first U.S. national park, “a pleasure ground for the
benefit and enjoyment of the people.”
Dakota 38 : Starving and angry Dakota Sioux in
Minnesota killed nearly 400 white settlers. 307 were
tried and found guilty in a military court. Most were
pardoned by President Lincoln, but on Dec 26, 1862,
38 were hanged in the largest mass execution in U.S.
history.
Sand Creek Massacre: The November 29, 1864,
massacre of more than a hundred peaceful
Cheyennes, largely women and children, by John M.
Chivington’s Colorado militia.
Indian boarding schools: These were set up by
reformers who realized the most effective way to
assimilate Native Americans was to remove the
children from their families and immerse them in
white culture, language and religion.
Dawes Severalty Act: The 1887 law that gave Native
Americans severalty (individual ownership of land) by
dividing reservations into homesteads. It was a
disaster for native peoples, resulting in the loss of 66
percent of lands held by Indians at the time of the
law’s passage.
Battle of Little Big Horn: The 1876 battle begun when
American cavalry under George Armstrong Custer
attacked an encampment of Sioux, Arapaho, and
Cheyenne who resisted removal to a reservation.
Custer’s 7th Cavalry was annihilated.
Americans such as Sitting Bull in the spectacle.
Ghost Dance movement: Religion of the late 1880s
and early 1890s that combined elements of
Christianity and traditional Native American religion.
Plains Indians hoped that through the dance they
could resurrect the great bison herds and call up a
storm to drive whites back across the Atlantic.
Wounded Knee Massacre: The 1890 massacre of Sioux
Indians by American cavalry in South Dakota. Sent to
suppress the Ghost Dance, soldiers caught up with
fleeing Lakotas and killed approximately three
hundred on the banks of this creek.
Chief Joseph & the Nez Perce: In 1877 the federal
government forcibly removed this tribe from their
ancestral lands (Idaho, Washington, Oregon). Their
chief attempted to lead them on a 1,100 mile trek into
Canada. Just miles from the border, they were
captured by troops and sent to reservations in Indian
territory (Oklahoma).
Sitting Bull: This Lakota holy man led his people as a
tribal chief during years of resistance to U.S.
government policies. In 1890, he was killed by Indian
agency police on the Standing Rock Reservation during
an attempt to arrest him, at a time when authorities
feared that he would join the Ghost Dance movement.
George Armstrong Custer: This Lieutenant Colonel
was known as an effective leader during the Civil War.
After the war he was notorious for his ruthlessness in
dealing with Indians, often killing women and children.
In 1876, he led the 7th Calvary against Sitting Bull’s
camp, suffering the loss of all 210 troops at the Little
Big Horn River in Montana.
Dr. Charles Eastman: Born a Santee Sioux, originally
called Ohiyesa, he was a shining example of how the
Indian could be acculturated through the boarding
school process. He practiced medicine at the Pine
Ridge Reservation in South Dakota.
Buffalo Bill Cody: Famous for his “Wild West” show,
he entertained cheering crowds with displays of riding
and sharp-shooting. Claiming his shows were an
authentic representation of frontier life and the
conquest of the Indians, he employed Native
Frederick Jackson Turner: Historian whose 1893 essay,
“The Significance of the Frontier in American History”
asserted that the western frontier had shaped
American democracy and character. Using the most
recent census data, he also claimed that this moving
line between “civilization and savagery” had ceased to
exist in 1890
Chapter 17
Great Railway Strike: Beginning July 14, 1877 in West
Virginia, in response to 3rd cut of wages in a year by
the Baltimore & Ohio Railroad (B&O). The violence
became nationwide, especially in Pittsburgh where
strikers were bayonetted and shot by the militia. The
violence lasted 45 days, ending when President Hayes
sent federal troops to all cities involved.
Homestead lockout In 1892: Andrew Carnegie refused
to renew the union contract at this Pittsburgh steel
mill. Union supporters attacked the Pinkerton army
hired to keep them out. The National Guard was called
in to suppress this resistance and Homestead became
a non-union mill.
Management revolution: An internal management
structure adopted by many large, complex
corporations that distinguished top executives from
those responsible for day-to-day operations and
departmentalized operations by function.
Vertical integration: A business model in which a
corporation controlled all aspects of production, from
raw materials to packaged products. Industrialists such
as Gustavus Swift and Andrew Carnegie pioneered this
business form at the end of the Civil War.
Horizontal integration: A business concept invented in
the late nineteenth century to pressure competitors
and force rivals to merge their companies into a
conglomerate. John D. Rockefeller of Standard Oil
pioneered this business model.
Trust: A small group of associates that hold stock from
a group of combined firms, managing them as a single
entity. Rockefeller created this with his Standard Oil
Company.
Mass production: A phrase coined by Henry Ford, who
helped to invent this system based on assembly of
standardized parts. It accompanied the continued
deskilling of industrial labor.
Scientific management: A system of organizing work
developed by Frederick W. Taylor. It was designed to
get maximum output from workers who must “do
what they are told promptly and without asking
questions or making suggestions.
Chinese Exclusion Act: The 1882 law that barred
Chinese laborers from entering the United States. This
law continued in effect until the 1940s.
Greenback Labor Party: A national political movement
calling on the government to increase the money
supply in order to assist borrowers and foster
economic growth. Supporters also called for greater
regulation of corporations and laws enforcing an eighthour workday.
Granger laws: Economic regulatory laws passed in
some mid-western states in the late 1870s, triggered
by pressure from farmers and the Greenback-Labor
Party.
Knights of Labor The first mass labor organization
created among America’s working class. Founded in
1869, it peaked in the mid-1880s. It attempted to
bridge boundaries of ethnicity, gender, ideology, race,
and occupation to build a “universal brotherhood” of
all workers.
Anarchism The advocacy of a stateless society
achieved by revolutionary means. Feared for their
views, people who took this approach became
scapegoats for the 1886 Haymarket Square bombing.
Haymarket Square The May 4, 1886, conflict in which
both workers and policemen were killed or wounded
during a labor demonstration in Chicago, called by
local anarchists. The incident created a backlash
against all labor organization, including the Knights of
Labor.
Farmers’ Alliance A rural movement founded in Texas
during the depression of the 1870s that spread across
the Plains and the South. It advocated cooperative
stores and exchanges that would circumvent
middlemen, and it called for greater government aid
to farmers and stricter regulation of railroads.
Interstate Commerce Act: An 1887 act that created a
federal regulatory agency designed to oversee the
railroad industry and prevent collusion and unfair
rates.
Closed shop A workplace in which a job seeker had to
be a union member to gain employment. This
approach was advocated by craft unions as a method
of keeping out lower-wage workers and strengthening
their unions’ bargaining position.
American Federation of Labor: Organization created
by Samuel Gompers in 1886 that coordinated the
activities of craft unions and called for direct
negotiation with employers in order to achieve
benefits for skilled workers.
Producerism The argument that real economic wealth
is created by workers who make their living by physical
labor, such as farmers and craftsmen, and that
merchants, lawyers, bankers, and other middlemen
unfairly gain their wealth from such workers.
Andrew Carnegie: Scottish American industrialist who
led the enormous expansion of the American steel
industry in the late 19th century. Also known for his
“Gospel of Wealth” philosophy.
Gustavus Swift: He founded a meat-packing empire in
Chicago during the late 19th century. He is credited
with the development of the first practical ice-cooled
railroad car, which allowed his company to ship
dressed meats to all parts of the country and abroad.
John D. Rockefeller: He was a co-founder of the
Standard Oil Company, which dominated the oil
industry and was the first great U.S. business trust.
Henry George: Writer, politician and political
economist, who was the most influential proponent of
the land value tax and the value capture of
land/natural resource rents, an idea known at the time
as Single-Tax. Wrote Progress and Poverty.
equal,” were permissible according to the Fourteenth
Amendment.
Terence Powderly: Irish-American politician and labor
union leader, best known as head of the Knights of
Labor in the late 1880s. A lawyer, he was elected
mayor of Scranton, Pennsylvania for six years.
Samuel Gompers: English-born American cigar maker
who founded the American Federation of Labor (AFL).
He believed in a pure-and-simple unionism that
focused primarily on economic rather than political
reform as the best way of securing workers' rights and
welfare.
Sierra Club: An organization, founded in 1892,
dedicated to the enjoyment and preservation of
America’s great mountains and wilderness
environments. Encouraged by such groups, national
and state governments began to set aside more public
lands for preservation and recreation.
National Park Service: A federal agency founded in
1916 that provided comprehensive oversight of the
growing system of national parks.
Cornelius Vanderbilt: Known as “the Commodore,”
this American business magnate and philanthropist
built his wealth in railroads and shipping in New York.
Comstock Act: An 1873 law that prohibited circulation
of “obscene literature,” defined as including most
information on sex, reproduction, and birth control.
Eugene V. Debs:: He founded the American Railway
Union (1893), and later helped found the Industrial
Workers of the World (1905). Five times he was the
candidate of the Socialist Party of America for
President of the United States.
Atlanta Compromise: An 1895 address by Booker T.
Washington that urged whites and African Americans
to work together for the progress of all. Delivered at
the Cotton States Exposition in, the speech was widely
interpreted as approving racial segregation.
George Pullman: An influential industrialist of the
nineteenth century and the founder of the “Palace
Car” Company. His innovations brought comfort and
luxury to railroad travel in the 1800s with the
introduction of sleeping cars, dining cars, and parlor
cars.
Woman’s Christian Temperance Union: An
organization advocating the prohibition of liquor.
Advocating suffrage and a host of reform activities, it
launched tens of thousands of women into public life
and was the first nationwide organization to identify
and condemn domestic violence.
Pullman Strike: In 1894 George Pullman lowered
wages, eliminated jobs, and increased the number of
hours required of his workers. But he refused to lower
rents in his company town or prices in his company
store. The resulting strike became one of the most
serious labor revolts in American history ending when
President Cleveland sent in federal troops.
National American Woman Suffrage Association:
Suffrage organization created in 1890. Up to national
ratification of suffrage in 1920, this organization
played a central role in campaigning for women’s right
to vote.
J. P. Morgan: American financier, banker,
philanthropist and art collector who dominated
corporate finance and industrial consolidation during
his time
Natural selection: Charles Darwin’s theory that when
individual members of a species are born with random
genetic mutations that better suit them for their
environment—for example, camouflage coloring for a
moth— these characteristics, because they are
genetically transmissible, become dominant in future
generations.
Chapter 18
Plessy v. Ferguson: An 1896 Supreme Court case that
ruled that racially segregated railroad cars and other
public facilities, if they claimed to be “separate but
Social Darwinism: An idea, actually by British
philosopher and sociologist Herbert Spencer, that
human society advanced through ruthless competition
and “survival of the fittest.”
Eugenics: An emerging “science” of human breeding in
the late nineteenth century that argued that mentally
deficient people should be prevented from
reproducing.
American Protective Association: A powerful political
organization of militant Protestants that, for a brief
period in the 1890s, counted more than two million
members. In its virulent anti-Catholicism and calls for
restrictions on immigrants, it prefigured the revived Ku
Klux Klan of the 1920s.
remained a lifelong crusader for racial justice, exposing
and combating the evils of lynching in the South.
Mark Twain: America’s most famous writer of the
19th century, gaining success as a humorist with books
such as Tom Sawyer and Huck Finn. He became a
bitter critic American materialism and imperialism. He
coined the term “Gilded Age.”
Billy Sunday: A former professional baseball player, he
became a popular Protestant preacher and evangelist,
delivering fiery sermons denouncing alcohol,
Socialism, and unrestricted immigration.
Chapter 19
Social Gospel: A movement to renew religious faith
through dedication to public welfare and social justice,
reforming both society and the self through Christian
service.
Fundamentalism: A term adopted by Protestants,
between the 1890s and the 1910s, who rejected
modernism and historical interpretations of scripture
and asserted the literal truth of the Bible. They have
historically seen secularism and religious relativism as
markers of sin that will be punished by God.
John Muir: An ardent environmentalist, he founded
the Sierra Club in 1892, which was dedicated to the
preservation and enjoyment of America’s mountains.
A redwood forest national monument near San
Francisco is named for him.
Booker T. Washington: The leading voice of African
Americans in the early 20th century, his 1895 Atlanta
Compromise speech propelled him to national
prominence. He believed that blacks should appeal to
whites of good will, thus gaining economic
opportunity first, and later achieving social and
political equality.
Frances Willard: Leader of the Woman’s Christian
Temperance Union, her motto was “Home Protection.”
She blamed alcoholism for the domestic abuse of
wives and children, and advised her followers to
display “womanliness first” as they sought reform.
Ida B. Wells: A school teacher in Memphis, TN.
Outraged by the lynching of 3 friends, she moved to
Chicago to continue her reform activities. She
Mutual aid society: An urban organization that served
members of an ethnic immigrant group, usually those
from a particular province or town. They functioned as
fraternal clubs that collected dues from members in
order to pay support in case of death or disability.
Tenement: A high-density, cheap, five- or six story
housing unit designed for working-class urban
populations. In the late nineteenth and early
twentieth centuries, they became a symbol of urban
immigrant poverty.
Vaudeville: A professional stage show popular in the
1880s and 1890s that included singing, dancing, and
comedy routines; it created a form of family
entertainment for the urban masses that deeply
influenced later forms, such as radio shows and
television sitcoms.
Ragtime: A form of music that became wildly popular
in the early 20th century among audiences of all
classes and races and ushered in an urban dance craze.
It was an important form of crossover music,
borrowed from working-class African Americans by
enthusiasts who were white and middle class.
Yellow journalism: A derogatory term for newspapers
that specialize in sensationalistic reporting. It is
associated with the inflammatory reporting by the
Hearst and Pulitzer newspapers leading up to the
Spanish-American War in 1898.
Muckrakers: A critical term, first applied by Theodore
Roosevelt, to investigative journalists (such as Jacob
Riis and Upton Sinclair) who published exposés of
political scandals and industrial abuses.
such issues as fire hazards, unsafe machines, and
wages and working hours for women and children.
Political machine: A complex, hierarchical party
organization, such as NYC’s Tammany Hall, whose
candidates remained in office on the strength of their
political organization and their personal relationship
with voters, especially working-class immigrants who
had little alternative access to political power.
National Consumer League: Begun in New York, it
became a national progressive organization that
encouraged women, through their shopping decisions,
to support fair wages and working conditions for
industrial laborers.
National Municipal League: A political reform
organization that advised cities to elect small councils
and hire professional city managers who would direct
operations like a corporate executive. This approach
originated in Galveston, Texas after the city was
devastated by a hurricane that killed 6000 in 1900.
Progressives: A loose term for political reformers—
especially those from the elite and middle classes—
who worked to improve the political system, fight
poverty, conserve environmental resources, and
increase government involvement in the economy.
“City Beautiful” Movement: A turn-of-the-twentiethcentury movement that advocated landscape
beautification, playgrounds, and more and better
urban parks.
Social settlements: Community welfare centers that
investigated the plight of the urban poor, raised funds
to address urgent needs, and helped neighborhood
residents advocate on their own behalf. They became
a nationally recognized reform strategy during the
Progressive Era.
Hull House: One of the first and most famous social
settlements, founded in 1889 by Jane Addams and her
companion Ellen Gates Starr in an impoverished,
largely Italian immigrant neighborhood on Chicago’s
West Side.
Pure Food and Drug Act: A 1906 law regulating the
conditions in the food and drug industries to ensure a
safe supply of food and medicine.
Triangle Shirtwaist Fire A devastating fire that quickly
spread through a factory in New York City on March
25, 1911, killing 146 people. In the wake of the
tragedy, fifty-six state laws were passed dealing with
Jacob Riis: Danish-born journalist who included
photographs of tenement interiors in his very
influential 1890 book, How the Other Half Lives. He
took police commissioner Theodore Roosevelt on
tours of the NYC tenements to show him the
impoverished living conditions.
Jane Addams: A college-educated middle-class woman
who founded Hull House with Ellen Gates Starr. She
saw her work at the settlement house as a “bridge
between the classes,” a help to the poor and the
middle classes idealists who sought to bring social
change.
Margaret Sanger: Raised in a Catholic home, she
became a nurse, volunteering in a NYC settlement
house in 1911. She was indicted for violating obscenity
laws by promoting birth control in her newspaper
column, “What Every Girl Should Know.”
Upton Sinclair: Muckraking journalist who exposed
the exploitation of laborers and the appalling
conditions in Chicago’s meatpacking plants in his
novel, The Jungle.
Florence Kelly: A Hull House worker and former Illinois
factory inspector who founded the National Consumer
League to advocate for worker protection laws.
Scott Joplin: The son of former slaves who grew up
along the Texas-Arkansas border who introduced
ragtime music to national audiences at the Chicago
World’s Fair in 189