Final Exam

Question 1

What led England and France to declare war on Germany, marking the start of World War II?

Answer 1

Germany invaded Poland, a country Britain and France had promised to protect.

Question 2

Why was the Battle of Midway the turning point of the Pacific naval war?

Answer 2

In the battle, four Japanese aircraft carriers were destroyed, providing a pivotal victory for American forces.

Question 3

What was the single largest battle ever fought by the U.S. Army?

Answer 3

The Battle of the Bulge.

Question 4

The Manhattan Project….

Answer 4

was a top-secret program in which American scientists developed an atomic bomb.

Question 5

What accounted for the tension between Great Britain and the United States at the Yalta conference?

Answer 5

Churchill and Roosevelt disagreed over the future status of Britain’s overseas colonies.

Question 6

How did the American public react to the dropping of the atomic bomb?

Answer 6

At first there was a general acceptance of the attack, but it was later criticized.

Question 7

Which of the following events are in the correct order?

Answer 7

Munich Agreement, Battle of Britain, Pearl Harbor, D-Day, Hiroshima.

Question 8

Why did Japan bomb Pearl Harbor in 1941?

Answer 8

Japan wanted a free hand to gain access to oil and other strategic resources.

Question 9

Which of the following occurred at the Potsdam conference?

Answer 9

The West recognized that eastern Europe would become a Soviet sphere of influence.

Question 10

Which theater of war in Europe suffered the most casualties?

Answer 10

Eastern Europe

Question 11

The Berlin Blockade was…

Answer 11

the Soviet Union’s reaction to the establishment of a separate currency in the western occupied zones.

Question 12

Emerging from World War II, what was the only nation that could rival the United States?

Answer 12

the Soviet Union

Question 13

Who was the general who led the counterattack at Inchon during the Korean War?

Answer 13

Douglas MacArthur

Question 14

The Truman Doctrine…

Answer 14

produced a language that helped Americans make sense of the Cold War.

Question 15

What does the Nuremberg trials refer to post-World War II events?

Answer 15

trials in which German officials were prosecuted for crimes against humanity

Question 16

Which long-held U.S. territory was granted independence in 1946?

Answer 16

the Philippines

Question 17

President Truman’s civil rights plan called for which of the following?

Answer 17

a permanent federal civil rights commission

Question 18

Which statement is true of the Korean War?

Answer 18

It signaled that the Cold War was a global conflict.

Question 19

Julius and Ethel Rosenberg were

Answer 19

executed due to an atmosphere of anticommunist hysteria.

Question 20

What was one permanent outcome of the Cold War in America?

Answer 20

the military-industrial complex

Question 21

Vice President Richard Nixon believed that American goods and popular culture were a more powerful vehicle of foreign influence than what traditional source of influence?

Answer 21

military intervention

Question 22

During the “Kitchen Debate,” what prediction made by Nikita Khrushchev would never become a reality?

Answer 22

The Soviet Union would outproduce Americans in consumer goods.

Question 23

What about the golden age of capitalism between 1946 and 1960 was most beneficial for Americans?

Answer 23

Most monetary gains reached ordinary citizens through rising wages.

Question 24

William Levitt, with the help of the GI Bill, gave many Americans the opportunity to…

Answer 24

become homeowners.

Question 25

How did the 1950s differ from previous eras regarding economic freedom and consumerism?

Answer 25

Americans became comfortable living in debt while using credit to buy consumer goods.

Question 26

During the 1950s, television...

Answer 26

became the most common source of information.

Question 27

This NAACP lawyer was instrumental in dismantling the legal basis for segregated schools in the Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka case.

Answer 27

Thurgood Marshall

Question 28

What helped to launch Martin Luther King Jr. as a civil rights leader?

Answer 28

He participated in the Montgomery Bus Boycott and spoke at protest meetings.

Question 29

In the postwar era, working women...

Answer 29

earned a fraction of what men earned.

Question 30

What role did Protestant and Catholic religious leaders play in shaping Cold War culture in America?

Answer 30

They preached messages that portrayed communism as a godless evil directed by Satan.

Question 31

In which part of the United States did the Freedom Rides take place?

Answer 31

the Lower South

Question 32

What event forced John F. Kennedy to take meaningful action in support of the civil rights movement?

Answer 32

King’s demonstrations in Birmingham

Question 33

What was the centerpiece of Johnson’s Great Society?

Answer 33

the War on Poverty

Question 34

Why was the Berlin Wall built?

Answer 34

to stop emigration from East to West Berlin

Question 35

The free speech movement...

Answer 35

began in Berkeley to protest a campus ban on political activism.

Question 36

In the 1964 election Barry Goldwater suffered a major defeat in the Deep South. What did this suggest?

Answer 36

There was a strong opposition among whites to the civil rights movement.

Question 37

By 1968, the number of U.S. troops in Vietnam...

Answer 37

exceeded half a million as the war became more brutal.

Question 38

Rachel Carson’s Silent Spring inspired the ________ movement.

Answer 38

environmental

Question 39

What did the Roe v. Wade Supreme Court decision do?

Answer 39

It created a woman’s constitutional right to an abortion.

Question 40

According to the textbook, what is one legacy of the 1960s?

Answer 40

The 1960s undermined public confidence in national leaders.

Question 41

“Vietnamization” was....

Answer 41

Nixon’s Vietnam strategy to have American troops gradually withdraw and South Vietnamese troops assume the fighting.

Question 42

What were the results of the U.S. invasion of neutral Cambodia in 1970?

Answer 42

The invasion destabilized the nation and ushered in a murderous regime.

Question 43

How did the War Powers Act of 1973 change the powers of the presidency?

Answer 43

It required congressional approval for the commitment of troops overseas.

Question 44

When they were arrested, the burglars at the Watergate apartment complex were breaking into

Answer 44

the Democratic Party headquarters.

Question 45

President Carter’s foreign policy emphasized...

Answer 45

human rights as a diplomatic priority.

Question 46

The “Second Gilded Age” ...

Answer 46

could describe the 1980s, a decade where making deals was more profitable for companies than making products.

Question 47

Geraldine Ferraro is best known as...

Answer 47

the first female candidate on a major-party presidential ticket.

Question 48

In which election year did a presidential candidate first claim he or she would “make America great again”?

Answer 48

1980

Question 49

Which statement is true of the war on drugs?

Answer 49

It grew out of public fear over crack use in urban areas.

Question 50

Neoconservative writer Jeane Kirkpatrick...

Answer 50

helped set a foreign policy agenda that stepped up U.S. interventions in foreign countries.

Question 51

What was the first post–Cold War international crisis?

Answer 51

the Gulf War

Question 52

What sparked the development of improved computer technology in the 1960s?

Answer 52

the space program

Question 53

Between 1990 and 2008, how did companies contribute to U.S. job growth?

Answer 53

Companies took manufacturing to other countries where labor was cheaper, causing the loss of American jobs.

Question 54

What was characteristic economically of the last two decades of the twentieth century?

Answer 54

The poor and the middle class became worse off, while the rich became significantly richer.

Question 55

Which of the following was a common destination for immigrants at the turn of the twenty-first century?

Answer 55

Miami

Question 56

What does the term “pay gap” refer to?

Answer 56

pay rates between men and women

Question 57

What made the war on terrorism different from previous wars?

Answer 57

The enemy was not clearly defined.

Question 58

Early in 2003, President Bush announced that the United States would go to war against Iraq...

Answer 58

because it was believed that Iraq had weapons of mass destruction.

Question 59

How did President Bush characterize the toppling of the Taliban regime in Afghanistan?

Answer 59

as only the beginning of the war on terror

Question 60

Operation Enduring Freedom was launched in October 2001...

Answer 60

against Afghanistan, because the nation was harboring Osama bin Laden.

Question 61

Which of the following did Barack Obama and Donald Trump’s presidential campaigns have in common?

Answer 61

Both appealed to the voters’ feeling that the country was moving in the wrong direction.

Question 62

Which of the following was a job category for which the Bureau of Labor Statistics predicted strong growth in 2012?

Answer 62

childcare

Question 63

How did Trump intend to promote American manufacturing?

Answer 63

by raising tariffs on imported goods

Question 64

Which of the following widespread changes in the late twentieth century and early twenty-first century did NOT occur in the United States?

Answer 64

a significant decline in infant mortality rates

Question 65

What are “subprime” mortgages?

Answer 65

risky loans made to home buyers who could not meet their monthly payments

Question 66

In what way did the United States differ from other developed countries in the early twenty-first century?

Answer 66

The United States lacks comprehensive social benefits like paid vacation, sick days, and maternity leave.

Question 67

What twenty-first-century development did both Obama and Trump use effectively in their presidential campaigns?

Answer 67

the Internet and social media

Question 68

According to Justice Kennedy in the Obergefell v. Hodges decision, where can new ideas about freedom arise?

Answer 68

pleas of protest

Question 69

What was former National Security Agency employee Edward Snowden charged with?

Answer 69

violating the Espionage Act

Question 70

What did the Great Recession reveal?

Answer 70

the lack of a social safety net in America compared to Europe