Free Practice Test: CLEP History of the United States I

Correct Answer: C. A centralized system based on trade and manufacturing and a system that relied on independent farmers and agriculture

Explanation: Like most Americans in the 1790s, Jefferson was a “country man”. He believed that the nation's future was with plain, farm folk and opposed any growth of business and manufacturing. Hamilton, on the other hand, wanted to expand the nation's economy and increase the nation's wealth by using the power of the federal government to promote business, manufacturing, and trade.

Correct Answer: A. Access to the Mississippi River

Explanation: Pinckney's Treaty, also known as the Treaty of San Lorenzo, was an agreement between the United States and Spain. No only did it declare that the 31st parallel would be the boundary between Spanish West Florida and the United States, but it also gave the people of the United States freedom of navigation of the Mississippi River through Spanish territory. It also granted Americans a tax-free deposit, or temporary storage of goods, in New Orleans. It also included that both sides would agree to protect both sides from Native American attacks within the borders, along with provisions respecting freedom of the seas.

Correct Answer: D. An industrial capacity to produce most of what it needed for the war

Explanation: The Northern states had numerous factories and industrial organizations, while the South depended on agriculture and slave labor. Before the Civil War began, the economy of the North was made up of industries like guns, textiles, pig iron, and boots that were sold in both the North and the South. In fact, when the war began, the South had no rifle factories to speak of. For this reason, while the Northern soldiers were supplied with the latest rifle technology, many of the men in the South went to battle using their own, personal weapons.

Correct Answer: A. Appomattox, Virginia

Explanation: Surrounded and with desertions mounting daily, on April 9, Lee sent a message to Grant announcing his willingness to surrender. On that day, arriving in his muddy uniform was Grant while Lee had cam in full dress attire, which included sash and sword. When Lee asked for the terms, Grant hurriedly wrote them out. The terms included were that all officers and men were to be pardoned, and they would be sent home with their private property, most importantly, the horses, which could be used for a late spring planting. It was also agreed that officers would we able to keep their side arms, and Union rations would be give to Lee's starving men.

Correct Answer: A. Common Sense

Explanation: Originally published anonymously, “Common Sense” is considered one of the most influential pamphlets in American history, advocating for the independence of the American colonies from Britain. “Common Sense” is credited with uniting the average citizens and the political leaders of Colonial America. He changed the way people thought by pointing out that the people of the colonies came from Europe, and not just Britain, to escape persecution, and by allowing British rule, that persecution was continuing.

Correct Answer: E. Economic turmoil

Explanation: After the Revolutionary War, the United States struggled to build a healthy economy due to the $52 million in total that was owed to the French and thousands of merchants, bankers, and citizens that had loaned Washington money during the war. Some American politicians wanted to renege on these debts, or only pay part of them off, but Washington and his Secretary of Treasury, Alexander Hamilton, recognized that in order to maintain integrity and credit internationally, the U. S. had to pay back the creditors all was owed to them.

Correct Answer: D. It led to a massive wave of Irish immigrants to the United States.

Explanation: Between 1845 and 1855 more than 1.5 million adults and children left Ireland and immigrated to America. The reason for the immigration was disease has devastated Ireland's potato crops, leaving millions without food, desperately poor, and many were suffering from starvation and disease. The Potato Famine killed more than 1 million people in five years and generated great bitterness and anger at the British for providing too little help to their Irish subjects.

Correct Answer: C. Permanent foreign alliances

Explanation: Because George Washington was a good student of history, he had seen how most of the wars in Europe and their colonies started out as a quarrel between two powers, but they quickly dragged in their allies into the fight, which had nothing to do with how it started. Washington did not want the United States to be dragged into someone else's wars every decade or so, like it had been during it's colonial status.

Correct Answer: D. Thomas Jefferson

Explanation: One of Jefferson's most notable achievements as president was the acquisition of the Louisiana Territory for the bargain price of less than three cents an acre. American expansion westward into the new lands began immediately. On April 30, 1812, exactly nine years after the Louisiana Purchase agreement was made, the first state to be carved from the territory, Louisiana, was admitted at the 18th state.

Correct Answer: E. Uncle Tom's Cabin

Explanation: Harriet Beecher Stowe wrote “Uncle Tom's Cabin” as a direct response to the passing of the Fugitive Slave Bill. The Fugitive Slave Bill established strict requirements for all states and territories to arrest runaway slaves and return them to the South. Infuriated by the Bill, abolitionists, like Stowe, were upset that they were forced to comply with something in which they opposed. The writing style and plot of the book were intensely emotional for contemporary audiences, leading to many people who had previously been apathetic and even hostile toward blacks and abolitionists to become more receptive towards antislavery views.