AP Textbook Early Republic Questions

Question 1

1. Which of the following statements describes actions the first congressional government undertook in 1789?

Answer 1

D. George Washington established a cabinet and an administrative bureaucracy under the president’s control.

Question 2

2. Approval by Congress and ratification by the states of the Bill of Rights had which of the following outcomes?

Answer 2

c. An easing of Americans’ fears of an oppressive national government.

Question 3

3. Why was Hamilton’s financial plan so controversial?

Answer 3

A. It lined the pockets of wealthy investors and speculators.

Question 4

4. To win votes for his financial plan, Hamilton made which of the following concessions?

Answer 4

d. Proposing that the nation’s new capitol be built in the Upper South.

Question 5

5. The critical disagreement that led to the emergence of political parties in the mid-1790s was based on which of the following issues?

Answer 5

b. Hamilton’s financial plan.

Question 6

6. Thomas Jefferson’s vision for the future of the United States included which of the following ideas?

Answer 6

c. Western territories populated by independent yeomen farm families

Question 7

7. Which statement was true of George Washington’s 1793 Proclamation of Neutrality?

Answer 7

a. Earnings from shipping rose spectacularly as a result of it.

Question 8

8. Which of the following served as a catalyst for the 1794 domestic insurgency known as the Whiskey Rebellion?

Answer 8

c. An excise tax.

Question 9

9. Which of the following describes Jay’s Treaty of 1795?

Answer 9

b. It required the British to withdraw their troops from forts in the Northwest
Territory.

Question 10

10. Which of the following individuals would have been unlikely to gravitate toward the Republicans in the late 1790s?

Answer 10

b. Wealthy New York banker

Question 11

11. Why was Toussaint L’Ouverture a significant figure in the 1790s?

Answer 11

c. He led black Haitians in their fight to seize control of Saint-Domingue.

Question 12

12. Which of the following is true of the U.S. election of 1796?

Answer 12

d. John Adams won the vote and continued a pro-British foreign policy.

Question 13

13. Which of the following events was the Federalists’ response to the Republicans’ criticism of their policies in the 1790s?

Answer 13

a. The Alien and Sedition Acts

Question 14

14. The Naturalization, Alien, and Sedition Acts had which of the following outcomes in the United States in the 1790s?

Answer 14

a. It became illegal to publish insults or malicious attacks against Congress or the
president.

Question 15

15. The Kentucky and Virginia Resolutions, which were set forth in 1798, supported which of the following positions?

Answer 15

b. States’ right to judge the legitimacy of national laws

Question 15

16. Which of the following statements most accurately characterizes U.S. relations with France during the late 1790s?

Answer 15

b. The United States cut off trade with France and authorized Americans to seize
French ships.

Question 16

17. Why did Thomas Jefferson call his election to the presidency the “Revolution of 1800”?

Answer 16

d. The government changed peacefully despite bitter partisan conflict and foreign
crisis.

Question 17

18. The 1783 Treaty of Paris addressed Native Americans living in the Old Northwest in which of the following ways?

Answer 17

a. It stipulated that Native tribes would be supervised by the British until 1793.

Question 18

19. Washington’s Secretary of War, Henry Knox, favored which of the following approaches to Native Americans?

Answer 18

d. Assimilation

Question 19

20. Indians ceded much of Ohio and acknowledged American political sovereignty in which of the following treaties?

Answer 19

b. Treaty of Greenville

Question 20

21. Which of the following best characterizes the Native American response to whites’ assimilation efforts in the Midwest in the late eighteenth century?

Answer 20

a. Many Native Americans repudiated white missionaries and forced Christian
converts to participate in native rituals.

Question 21

22. Who led the conservative Senecas, who condemned assimilation and demanded a return to ancestral customs?

Answer 21

a. Chief Red Jacket

Question 22

23. The southern migrants who moved along the coastal plain toward the Gulf of Mexico between 1790 and 1820 originated in which of the following areas?

Answer 22

d. North and South Carolina

Question 23

24. Which of the following statements describes migrants who left New England during the 1790s?

Answer 23

a. They moved in family or community groups.

Question 24

25. Which of the following was true of New Englanders’ westward migration during the 1790s and 1800s?

Answer 24

b. New Englanders typically bought land in upstate New York from wealthy Dutch
owners who were partitioning their vast estates.

Question 25

26. In 1801, Jefferson responded to the Barbary States; threats against American shipping by

Answer 25

a. refusing tribute payments, retaliating against renewed Barbary attacks, then
working out a diplomatic solution involving much lower tribute payments.

Question 26

27. Jefferson’s administration demonstrated its disagreement with Hamilton’s philosophy by

Answer 26

a. ending the excise tax.

Question 27

28. Why was Pinckney’s Treaty of 1795 significant?

Answer 27

d. The treaty opened the Mississippi River and New Orleans to American trade.

Question 28

29. Which of the following statements characterizes federal land price policies in the Northwest Territory during 1790–1820?

Answer 28

c. Jeffersonian Republicans passed laws that made it easier for farm families to buy
land.

Question 29

30. Why did Thomas Jefferson decide to attempt to purchase New Orleans in 1801?

Answer 29

a. France refused to allow American farmers to ship their products through the port, in violation of the Pinckney Treaty.

Question 30

31. Which of the following took place in response to the Jefferson administration’s purchase of Louisiana?

Answer 30

b. Some New England Federalists devised a plan to secede from the Union and establish a northern confederacy.

Question 31

32. What was the immediate cause of the illegal duel in which Vice President Aaron Burr killed Alexander Hamilton in 1804?

Answer 31

d. Hamilton’s accusation that Burr was aiding a plot to destroy the Union

Question 32

33. Which of the following statements describes the Federalists’ response to the War of 1812?

Answer 32

d. Most Federalists strongly opposed the war and some in Massachusetts met to consider amending the Constitution to prevent future such wars.

Question 33

34. Why was the American victory at the Battle of New Orleans in 1815 significant?

Answer 33

c. It restored national pride and made Andrew Jackson an American hero.

Question 34

35. Which of the following was an outcome of the postwar election of 1818?

Answer 34

c. Federalists were soundly beaten, with the Republicans winning margins of
approximately five to one in both the Senate and House of Representatives.

Question 35

36. In which of the following actions did President James Madison contradict the traditional philosophy of Republicans?

Answer 35

d. Supporting the creation of the Second Bank of the United States

Question 36

37. Which of the following factors made the critical contribution to the Federalist Party’s downfall?

Answer 36

c. The adoption of many of their policies by Republicans

Question 37

38. Which of the following cases is properly paired with its corresponding decision?

Answer 37

b. Gibbons v. Ogden—national government controls interstate commerce

Question 38

39. For this question, refer to the following excerpt.

It is universally known that the causes for which we declared war are no obstruction to peace. The
practice of blockade and impressment having ceased by the general pacification of Europe, our
government is content to leave the principle as it was. . . .
We have no further business in hostility, than such as is purely defensive; while that of Great
Britain is to humble or subdue us. The war, on our part, has become a contest for life, liberty and
property—on the part of our enemy, of revenge or ambition. . . .
What then are we to do? Are we to encourage him by divisions among ourselves—to hold out the
hope of a separation of the states and a civil war—to refuse to bring forth the resources of the
country against him? . . . I did think that in a defensive war—a struggle for all that is valuable—that
all parties would have united. But it is not so—every measure calculated to replenish the treasury or
raise men is opposed [by New England] as though it were determined to strike the “star spangled
banner” and exalt the bloody cross. Look at the votes and proceedings of congress—and mark the
late spirit . . . that existed in Massachusetts, and see with what unity of action every thing has been
done [by New England] to harass and embarrass the government….
To conclude—why does the war continue? It is not the fault of the government—we demand no
extravagant thing. I answer the question, and say—it lasts because Great Britain depends on the
exertions of her “party” in this country to destroy our resources, and compel “unconditional
submission.”
Thus the war began, and is continued, by our divisions.
Hezekiah Niles, Niles’ Weekly Register, January 28, 1815.
The passage above best serves as evidence of

Answer 38

a. public debates about territorial expansion.

Question 39

40. For this question, refer to the following excerpt. Which of the following debates or movements in the nineteenth century and early twentieth century
    represents a parallel to the issues described in the excerpt above?

Answer 39

a. The considerable home front opposition faced by both the Union and the
Confederacy as they mobilized to wage the Civil War