Deck 12: Antebellum Culture and Reform

Question 1

Transcendentalists

A) rejected European intellectuals.
B) regarded reason to be the most important human faculty.
C) argued that emotional responses inhibited the internal development of individuals.
D) believed all individuals should develop their intellectualism.
E) argued for the liberating potential of "understanding."

Answer 1

regarded reason to be the most important human faculty.

Question 2

One of the most enduring of the pre-Civil War utopian colonies was

A) Oneida.
B) New Harmony.
C) Brook Farm.
D) Walden.
E) Nauvoo.

Answer 2

Oneida.

Question 3

The transcendentalist Henry David Thoreau

A) was more conventional in his thinking than Ralph Waldo Emerson.
B) felt every individual should balance society's expectations with one's own instincts.
C) argued that being part of society helped individuals to transcend their egotism.
D) established a college for transcendentalism at Walden Pond.
E) argued Americans had a moral right to disobey the laws of the United States.

Answer 3

argued Americans had a moral right to disobey the laws of the United States.

Question 4

Which of the following features was NOT a characteristic of the Hudson River School?

A) canvases that tended to be very large in size
B) an assumption that America was a land of greater promise than Europe
C) a belief that democracy was the best source of wisdom and spiritual fulfillment
D) a sense of nostalgia for a kind of nature that might be disappearing
E) portraits of some of the nation's most spectacular and undeveloped areas

Question 5

In redefining gender roles,the experimental 1840s Oneida Community

A) put women in charge of all major aspects of the community.
B) was a controversial experiment in "free love."
C) demanded celibacy from all its participants.
D) carefully monitored sexual behavior in order to protect women.
E) put fathers in charge of child-rearing and taking care of the home.

Question 6

In the mid-nineteenth century,the general European attitude toward American art and literature

A) was one of growing respect and admiration.
B) was that American artists had little to offer Europe.
C) included praise for American artists for defining a new set of national virtues.
D) included criticism of American artists for ignoring romanticism.
E) was that it had been hopelessly corrupted by the ideology of unfettered capitalism.

Question 7

The writings of Edgar Allan Poe were

A) primarily sad and macabre.
B) mostly ignored during his lifetime.
C) largely focused on southern society.
D) acclaimed by many American writers in his time.
E) completely ignored in Europe after his death.

Question 8

All of the following people helped create a distinct American literature EXCEPT

A) Walt Whitman.
B) Herman Melville.
C) James Fenimore Cooper.
D) Edgar Allan Poe.
E) Sydney Smith.

Question 9

Southern writers such as AugustusB.Longstreet,JosephG.Baldwin,and Johnson J.Hooper

A) focused on the lives of aristocrats.
B) romanticized the institution of slavery.
C) brought a robust, vulgar humor to American literature.
D) developed a realist tradition that focused on the lives of ordinary people.
E) None of these answers is correct.

Question 10

Who among the following was NOT a participant in American communal living?

A) Nathaniel Hawthorne
B) Walt Whitman
C) George Ripley
D) John Humphrey Noyes
E) Robert Owen

Question 11

The transcendentalist writer Ralph Waldo Emerson

A) believed American thinkers should be allied with European intellectuals.
B) asserted that through nature, individuals could find personal fulfillment.
C) was a leading critic of the American political system.
D) asserted that organized religion served no useful purpose in society.
E) remained a deeply religious clergyman throughout his life.

Question 12

The goal of the 1840s community experiment known as Brook Farm was partly to

A) create a society where individuals did not have to work.
B) allow individuals to live without any social limits on their behavior.
C) eliminate social sexual discrimination through the practice of celibacy.
D) help individuals link the world of the intellect to the world of instinct and nature.
E) show that communal living was more efficient and productive than family life.

Question 13

Herman Melville's most important literary work was

A) Leaves of Grass.
B) Moby Dick.
C) The Deerslayer.
D) "The Raven."
E) Uncle Tom's Cabin.

Question 14

The transcendentalist movement

A) anticipated the environmental protection movement of the twentieth century.
B) understood the interconnectedness of species.
C) made the first scientific studies on behalf of preserving the natural environment.
D) understood the interconnectedness of species and made the first scientific studies on behalf of preserving the natural environment.
E) None of these answers is correct.

Question 15

All of the following painters were associated with the Hudson River School EXCEPT

A) James Whistler.
B) Thomas Cole.
C) Frederic Church.
D) Albert Bierstadt.
E) Asher Durand.

Question 16

Walt Whitman

A) intensely disagreed with the American transcendentalists.
B) rejected much of romanticism.
C) celebrated the liberation of the individual.
D) was a strong critic of American democracy.
E) became a strong defender of southern institutions, especially slavery.

Question 17

The most important and popular American paintings of the first half of the nineteenth century set out to

A) make realistic depictions of rural white American life.
B) show scenes of American aristocracy at play.
C) depict the Founding Fathers hard at work.
D) celebrate the achievements of the American military.
E) evoke the wonder of the nation's landscape.

Question 18

The Hudson River School of painters emphasized in their work the importance of

A) democratic ideals.
B) the yeoman farmer.
C) natural beauty.
D) realism.
E) the founding fathers.

Question 19

Through novels such as The Last of the Mohicans,James Fenimore Cooper examined the significance of

A) the disorder of America's westward expansion.
B) the American free-enterprise system.
C) religious spiritualism in America.
D) racism in America.
E) slavery in the democratic mind.

Question 20

Reform movements emerged in America in the mid-nineteenth century in part because of a

A) pessimistic assumption of the natural weakness of individuals.
B) desire for social stability and discipline in the face of change.
C) belief that society needed to break free from its old traditions.
D) fear that civil war was going to engulf the nation.
E) declining importance placed on religious piety.

Question 21

In the 1840s in the United States,an initial understanding of germ theory was developed by

A) Edward Jenner.
B) William Morton.
C) Oliver Wendell Holmes.
D) James Warren.
E) Ignaz Semmelweis.

Question 22

The Massachusetts reformer who built a national movement for new methods of treating the mentally ill was

A) SusanB. Anthony.
B) Elizabeth Cady Stanton.
C) Lucretia Mott.
D) Angelina Grimke.
E) Dorothea Dix.

Question 23

The 1848 Seneca Falls,New York,convention on women's rights

A) issued a manifesto patterned after the Declaration of Independence.
B) asserted that women should have a place in society distinctly different from that of men.
C) refused to allow men to attend.
D) called on the government to treat both genders and all races with equality.
E) shied away from demanding female suffrage, as this was too radical at the time.

Question 24

In the early nineteenth century,the American Colonization Society

A) was founded by white Virginians opposed to slavery.
B) called for an immediate end to slavery.
C) opposed the idea of compensation for owners who freed their slaves.
D) carried out a large-scale resettlement of freed slaves.
E) was strongly supported by American blacks.

Question 25

In the 1840s,the organized movement against drunkenness in the United States

A) linked alcohol to crime and poverty.
B) grew largely out of immigrant communities.
C) was actively opposed by a large majority of Americans.
D) remained a minor social movement.
E) spent much of its time and resources battling evangelical Protestants.

Question 26

Which of the following nineteenth-century leaders is primarily known for her pioneering work in the American feminist movement?

A) "Mother" Ann Lee
B) Harriet Tubman
C) Sojourner Truth
D) Rachel Eaton
E) Elizabeth Cady Stanton

Question 27

In the 1830s and 1840s,cholera epidemics in the United States

A) were transmitted to humans by fleas living on rats.
B) led many cities to build water treatment facilities.
C) were diminished, as physicians gained a basic understanding of bacteria.
D) typically killed more than half of those who contracted the disease.
E) None of these answers is correct.

Question 28

Which statement about Mormonism is FALSE?

A) Its founder was murdered.
B) It developed a very fluid, loose social structure.
C) Early Mormons practiced polygamy.
D) The first Mormons were generally marginally poor.
E) Early Mormons met with much persecution from their neighbors.

Question 29

Prior to 1860,prison reform in the United States

A) included the practice of solitary confinement.
B) led to widespread calls to end capital punishment.
C) focused on punishment, not on rehabilitation.
D) began largely in the West and spread to the East.
E) decried the racial bias of the judicial system.

Question 30

According to the nineteenth-century "science" of phrenology,what could be discerned from the shape of an individual's skull?

A) life expectancy
B) likelihood of succumbing to infectious diseases
C) future earning potential
D) chances of having children
E) character and intelligence

Question 31

Prior to the Civil War,the religious denomination most active in feminism was the

A) Baptists.
B) Quakers.
C) Presbyterians.
D) Unitarians.
E) Methodists.

Question 32

In 1840,one catalyst for an American feminist movement was a London convention that dealt with

A) woman suffrage.
B) prostitution.
C) the abolition of slavery.
D) temperance.
E) prison reform.

Question 33

Mormonism

A) believed in human perfectibility.
B) emphasized individual liberty.
C) was founded by Brigham Young.
D) began in the Midwest.
E) always rejected polygamy.

Question 34

The nineteenth-century reformer Horace Mann believed that education should promote

A) capitalism.
B) democracy.
C) racial equality.
D) economic equality.
E) Christianity.

Question 35

Shaker societies

A) asserted that God was female.
B) established most of their communities in the South.
C) saw women exercise more power than men.
D) first began in the United States in the 1840s.
E) were eventually forced to move to Utah.

Question 36

During the nineteenth century,the largest obstacle to improved medical care in America was the

A) absence of regulations in the medical profession.
B) absence of basic knowledge about disease.
C) low social status of medical professionals.
D) difficulty of medical experimentation.
E) apathy of the general population towards preventive health.

Question 37

Which of the following was arguably the most distinctive feature of Shakerism?

A) the admittance of women only
B) communal raising of children
C) polygamy
D) free love
E) complete celibacy

Question 38

Prior to 1860,public education in the United States

A) did not exist.
B) gave the nation one of the highest literacy rates in the world.
C) was legally denied for all non-whites.
D) was funded by the federal government.
E) emphasized independence and creativity.

Question 39

Nineteenth-century Protestant revivalists such as the New Light revivalists

A) sought to revive the ideals of Calvinism.
B) believed that no individual could control his or her personal salvation.
C) took the lead in the cause to end slavery.
D) argued that personal salvation could be achieved by individual effort.
E) believed temperance was detracting from other, loftier reform movements.

Question 40

The nineteenth-century practice of placing American Indians on reservations was partially designed to

A) integrate Indians with white society.
B) create sovereign nations within U.S. territory so that Indians could negotiate with other nations.
C) allow Indians to develop to a point where they would not need to assimilate into white society.
D) allow them to develop to a point where they could assimilate into white society.
E) None of these answers is correct.

Question 41

In the 1830s,abolitionists in the United States constituted

A) a small percentage of the national population.
B) approximately one-quarter of the national population.
C) the majority of the population in the North.
D) the largest reform movement in the nation.
E) approximately one-third of the national population.

Question 42

Many of the Hudson River School artists expressed a nostalgic view of nature.

Question 43

Frederick Douglass

A) was born free but was sold into slavery as a youth.
B) wrote for William Lloyd Garrison's abolitionist newspaper.
C) spent years lecturing in England against slavery.
D) was an ordained minister.
E) argued that blacks wanted only an end to slavery, and not full social equality.

Question 44

Mark Twain was the leading writer in the southern romantic tradition.

Question 45

The black abolitionist who called for uncompromising opposition to and a violent overthrow of slavery in his 1829 pamphlet was

A) William Lloyd Garrison.
B) Frederick Douglass.
C) Elijah Lovejoy.
D) Benjamin Lundy.
E) David Walker.

Question 46

Edgar Allan Poe's writings focused on the bleak nature of the human spirit and emotions.

Question 47

Prior to the Civil War,the Liberty Party

A) supported the rights of slave owners.
B) opposed the admission of California into the Union in 1850.
C) promoted "free soil."
D) focused on strengthening the fugitive slave laws.
E) campaigned for outright abolition.

Question 48

The Supreme Court ruling in Prigg v.Pennsylvania (1842)

A) prohibited the interstate slave trade.
B) led to the passage of "personal liberty laws."
C) angered abolitionists.
D) abolished slavery in the District of Columbia.
E) forced state officials to assist in the capture of runaways.

Question 49

In the 1830s and 1840s,abolitionists were divided

A) by radicals and moderates within their ranks.
B) over whether or not to use violence.
C) by calls for northern and southern separation.
D) over the question of free-soil, colonization, or full emancipation.
E) All these answers are correct.

Question 50

Prior to the Civil War,free blacks in the North tended to be

A) deeply antagonistic toward William Lloyd Garrison.
B) indifferent to slavery in the South.
C) anxious to leave the United States.
D) in favor of the "back to Africa" movement.
E) strongly opposed to southern slavery.

Question 51

James Fenimore Cooper thought Americans should become more like Europeans.

Question 52

Hudson River School artists felt America had more promise than Europe.

Question 53

The American Colonization Society helped to transport blacks from the United States to

A) the Caribbean.
B) Liberia.
C) Angola.
D) England.
E) Canada.

Question 54

The effect of Uncle Tom's Cabin on the nation was to

A) spread the message of abolitionism to an enormous new audience.
B) reveal the ugly extent of the vicious slave trade to America.
C) ignite such anger in the South that several states soon seceded from the Union.
D) offer the first written history of American slavery.
E) help humanize southern slaveholders in the minds of northern readers.

Question 55

Above all,nineteenth-century reform movements in the United States promoted racial equality.

Question 56

William Lloyd Garrison believed the abolitionist movement should

A) stress the damage that slavery did to blacks rather than to whites.
B) seek the gradual elimination of slavery.
C) demand freedom for slaves, but deny them citizenship.
D) organize slave rebellions throughout the American South.
E) join forces with the more established American Colonization Society.

Question 57

Herman Melville was less exuberant in his celebration of the human spirit than was Walt Whitman.

Question 58

The romantic movement was invented by American intellectual circles.

Question 59

One leading abolitionist who was murdered for his activism was

A) William Lloyd Garrison.
B) Frederick Douglass.
C) Sojourner Truth.
D) Benjamin Lundy.
E) Elijah Lovejoy.

Question 60

In the 1840s,William Lloyd Garrison spoke against

A) equality for women.
B) defensive wars.
C) ending the asylum system.
D) northern disunion from the South.
E) extreme pacifism.

Question 61

Many reformers of the pre-Civil War period thought it was possible to rehabilitate criminals through solitary confinement.

Question 62

Henry David Thoreau favored the solitary life,but was publicly against civil disobedience.

Question 63

Both Brook Farm and New Harmony were essentially failures as communal experiments.

Question 64

Most early nineteenth-century American physicians opposed efforts to regulate the profession.They considered the licensing of physicians to be "undemocratic."

Question 65

American transcendentalists borrowed heavily from European thinkers.

Question 66

The Oneida Community sought to redefine gender roles and engage in "free love."

Question 67

Sylvester Graham encouraged people to eat more fruits and vegetables and less meat.

Question 68

The study of the human brain through phrenology was the origin of modern psychology.

Question 69

Nearly a quarter of the population of New Orleans died in 1833 as a result of a cholera outbreak.

Question 70

By 1860,public schools in the United States had failed to produce significant improvement in education.

Question 71

The Mormons were forced to abandon their settlement at Nauvoo due to persecution from neighbors.

Question 72

Ralph Waldo Emerson started as a minister and became a transcendentalist philosopher.

Question 73

By the beginning of the Civil War,the United States had one of the highest literacy rates of any nation of the world.

Question 74

Evangelical Protestantism was at odds with the reform spirit of the pre-Civil War period.

Question 75

The search for social discipline was particularly clear in the battle over prohibition laws,which pitted established Catholics against new Protestants immigrants,to many of whom drinking was an important social ritual and an integral part of the life of their communities.

Question 76

Reformers that supported the concept of Indian reservations believed them to be beneficial to both whites and Indians.

Question 77

Like other mid-nineteenth-century experiments in social organization,Mormons believed in human perfectibility.

Question 78

Both the Oneida Community and the Shakers were committed to celibacy.

Question 79

By the 1850s,the principle of tax-supported elementary schools had been established in every state.

Question 80

Horace Mann believed public education should promote both democracy and social order.