1. When President George Washington
picked heads for the Departments of War, Treasury, and State, he chose
a. his supporters.
b. only Federalists.
c. only men who shared his philosophical
views.
d. talented and experienced individuals.
The answer is d. Like most other
politicians of the time, Washington believed that partisanship was negative and
destructive. As a result, he chose men he thought were qualified, regardless of
their philosophical differences.
2. George Washington worked hard to
establish the image of the presidency by
a. encouraging pomp and ceremony.
b. remaining aloof and dignified.
c. Neither of the above.
d. Both a and b.
The answer is d. George Washington
believed the president should place the public good over his own private
interests; he cultivated an aloof and dignified persona in order to display his
own political integrity and virtue. Washington also aimed to create respect for
the office of the presidency by encouraging pomp and ceremony including hosting
formal balls and surrounding himself with uniformed servants.
3. As president, George Washington
held levees—weekly hour–long audiences—with
a. the other members of his cabinet.
b. regular American citizens who wanted to
share their ideas with him.
c. distinguished visitors including women.
d. all of the above.
The answer is c. Washington adopted
the convention of weekly levees from European monarchs. He met with
distinguished visitors—men and women—while dressed in black velvet with a
feathered hat and sword but managed to avoid the extreme of royal splendor.
4. The Bill of Rights did not
include
a. a guarantee of freedom of religion.
b. the right to be free from unwarranted
searches and seizures.
c. the right to vote.
d. the right to bear arms.
The answer is c. In the early
republic, it was left to the individual states to determine who was eligible to
vote. Not until much later did voting come to be seen as a fundamental liberty
that warranted constitutional protection.
5. Grain prices in Europe rose
sharply after 1793, when France and Britain entered a dozen years of
a. natural disasters.
b. economic depression.
c. war.
d. urbanization.
The answer is c. The French
Revolutionary and Napoleonic Wars went on for a dozen years and eventually
engulfed Europe and compromised grain production there. This motivated American
farmers to boost agricultural production for the export trade.
6. Alexander Hamilton’s
recommendation within the Report on Public Credit was
a. for the federal government to assume state
debts.
b. to consolidate federal power over the
states.
c. to add $25 million to the federal debt.
d. All of the above.
The answer is d. Hamilton wanted the
federal government to add the states’ wartime debts to the national debt. This
was a way of asserting and consolidating federal power by indebting states to
the federal government and also by requiring the federal government to exercise
stronger powers of taxation.
7. Alexander Hamilton’s unsuccessful
Report on Manufactures was designed to encourage
a. people to purchase European goods.
b. cottage industries in people’s homes.
c. the production of American–made goods.
d. greater agricultural output.
The answer is c. After years of
dependence on Britain, American manufacturing was underdeveloped. Hamilton,
believing that a balanced and self–reliant economy necessitated U.S. production
of iron goods, glass, wood products, textiles, and arms and ammunition, wanted
to encourage industrialization by granting subsidies to domestic manufacturers and
imposing modest tariffs on products from overseas.
8. When Alexander Hamilton realized
that the revenue yield from his newly enacted whiskey excise tax was far less
than anticipated, he
a. tightened up prosecution of tax evaders.
b. abandoned the law.
c. modified the law.
d. imposed martial law.
The answer is a. Hamilton’s tax was
a serious political mistake and deeply unpopular with many segments of the
voting public. However, he refused to back down; instead, he cracked down on
tax evaders, even convincing President Washington to march at the head of the
nationalized Pennsylvania militia to put down an incipient tax rebellion in
western Pennsylvania.
9. In the face of the strong desire
of settlers to move westward, General Arthur St. Clair’s mission was to
a. displace Indians to allow permanent
American settlement in Ohio.
b. displace British Indian agents in Ohio.
c. start a war with the Indians in Ohio.
d. teach Indians and American settlers in Ohio
how to coexist.
The answer is a. Several thousand
settlers a year moved down the Ohio River in the mid–1780s, and government land
sales in eastern Ohio commenced in the late 1780s, though actual settlement
lagged. General St. Clair, the military governor of the Northwest Territory,
had negotiated treaties with Indians for land in eastern Ohio in the 1780s, but
after General Josiah Harmar’s humiliating defeat at the hands of Miami and
Shawnee Indians in northwest Ohio in 1790, St. Clair led two thousand men north
from Fort Washington to displace the region’s Indians and make way for eventual
white American settlement.
10. The bargaining position of the
Indians who negotiated the Treaty of Greenville (1795) was weakened by their
recent defeat in the battle of
a. Fallen Timbers.
b. the Wabash River.
c. Fort Greenville.
d. Fort Washington.
The answer is a. In August 1794 around
eight hundred confederated Indians attacked General Anthony Wayne’s army; the
Indians were insufficiently armed, however, and their ranks were decimated by
Wayne’s troops. This major defeat sapped the Indians’ confidence and greatly
diminished their bargaining position in the subsequent negotiations that
produced the Treaty of Greenville.
11. The immediate catalyst for the
revolution in Saint Domingue was the
a. Whiskey Rebellion.
b. French Revolution.
c. American Revolution.
d. Jay Treaty.
The answer is b. Saint Domingue was
the French–controlled western part of the Caribbean island of Hispaniola. White
colonists on the island challenged the white royalist government in 1789 in an
attempt to link Saint Domingue with the new French government. This was
followed by an uprising of mixed–race planters and then of enslaved blacks,
leading to the birth of the Haitian Republic in 1804.
12. The Haitian Revolution sparked
a. American fears of a slave rebellion.
b. American slave rebellions.
c. black conspiracies in the United States.
d. a strong civil rights movement in the
United States.
The answer is a. News about Haiti
filtered into the United States with black and white refugees. Many white
Americans feared that the successful revolt would lead to slave rebellions in
the United States. However, none ensued.
13. By the time of the election of
1796, a party contest emerged around the issue of
a. slavery.
b. support for either France or England.
c. the national debt.
d. industrialization.
The answer is b. There were many sources
of contention among politicians in the 1790s, but the problem of Europe was the
most pressing in 1796. Most politicians agreed that political parties were
deplorable and that neutrality toward Britain and France was essential.
Nevertheless, two camps—one pro–British and one pro–French—crystallized toward
the end of Washington’s presidency.
14. Until the adoption of the
Twelfth Amendment in 1804, the vice president was
a. chosen by voters.
b. picked by the president.
c. the second highest vote–getter in the
electoral college.
d. appointed by caucus.
The answer is c. Until 1804, each
electoral college voter could cast two votes for any two candidates on one
ballot. The top vote–getter became president, and the second became vice
president. A lot of maneuvering was required to make sure that the chief rivals
for the presidency did not end up in the top two spots; in 1796, that
unfortunate circumstance arose, with John Adams winning the presidency and
Thomas Jefferson gaining the vice presidency.
15. Alexander Hamilton exercised a
great deal of influence in John Adams’s administration because he
a. was appointed secretary of the treasury.
b. was appointed secretary of state.
c. and Adams were political allies.
d. had influence over three of Adams’s cabinet
members.
The answer is d. Alexander Hamilton
returned to his private law practice in 1795, but he remained politically
active. He tried to influence the outcome of the 1796 election, agitating in
favor of Thomas Pinckney of South Carolina. Though Adams was elected instead,
Hamilton maintained his influence in the federal government by privately
advising three of Adams’s cabinet members.
16. France responded to the Jay
Treaty by
a. accepting it graciously.
b. attempting to work with pro–French elements
in the American government.
c. seizing American ships carrying British
goods.
d. declaring war on the United States.
The answer is c. The French saw the
Jay Treaty as a document that made the United States a British satellite. They
retaliated by abandoning the terms of the 1778 wartime alliance with the United
States and allowing French privateers to grab American ships transporting
British goods.
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