Key Dates and Periods in American History

c. 12,000 BC – First settlement of ‘Amerindians’/ Native Americans across the American continent.

They arrive from Asia across an ice bridge which links the two continents.

1492 – Christopher Columbus’s first journey to the Americas

1492-1607: European exploration and conquest

1607-1775: Colonial America (13 British colonies created on the East coast)

1607: Jamestown – first permanent English settlement in North America

1620: The Mayflower (ship) lands in Boston Bay bringing Puritan settlers (and others) from England.

1756-1763: The Seven Years War between Britain and France (with support from Native American

Indians)

1765 – The Stamp Act

1770 – The Boston Massacre

1773 – The Boston Tea Party

1774 – First Continental Congress held in Philadelphia

1775-1783: American War of Independence

April 1775 – The American War of Independence (between the American colonists and Britain)

begins at Lexington and Concord near Boston.

July 1776 – Declaration of Independence

September 1783 – The Treaty of Paris ends the War of Independence (Britain recognises the United

States)

1789 – US Constitution

1791 – The Bill of Rights

1861-1865: The US Civil War

1917-18: US involvement in the First World War

October 1929 – The Wall Street Crash

1941-1945: US involvement in the Second World War

1945-1989: The Cold War (confrontation with the Soviet Union)

1965-1973: Vietnam War (involvement of US ground forces)

Questions:

1. When does the history of the United States begin?

2. When does the history of America begin? Should it be the same date?

Choose your answers from the following dates:

12,000 BC 1492 1607 1620 1776 1789

3. What are the main national languages spoken in North and South America today?

Definition of American Exceptionalism:

American exceptionalism refers to the opinion that the United States is qualitatively different from other

nations. In this view, America's exceptionalism stems from its emergence from a revolution, becoming "the first

new nation”, and developing a uniquely American ideology, based on liberty, egalitarianism, individualism,

populism and laissez-faire. This observation can be traced to Alexis de Tocqueville, the first writer to describe

the United States as "exceptional.”

Source A: Christopher Columbus, writing to the king and queen of Spain, 1492:

‘[The natives] have no arms [=weapons/broń] and are without warlike instincts; they all go naked, and are so

timid [shy] that a thousand would not stand before three of our men. So that they are good to be ordered about,

to work and sow [zasiać], and do all that may be necessary, and to build towns, and they should be taught to

go about clothed and to adopt our customs.’

Questions: What does this letter tell you about European attitudes to native Americans? What were

Columbus’s plans?

Source B: an Englishman, Richard Hakluyt, writing in the 1500s:

‘The first and most important task is to spread the happy news of Jesus Christ to those who know nothing of

Him. The second is to teach the natives about our knowledge of farming. Finally, the aim is to see what islands

and ports you might find by sailing to the north-east, for it would be good that we should have control over our

own trade routes to India and China, and so bring ourselves great riches.’

Question: What reasons does Hakluyt give for English exploration of America?

Source C: King Charles II’s Grant of Land to William Penn, 1681

‘Our trusty subject, William Penn, who wishes to enlarge the British empire and encourage trade in goods

which may benefit to us and also wants to make the savage natives more gentle, with just manners and a love

of Christian religion, has humbly asked our permission to set up a colony in the parts of America not yet

cultivated and planted.’

Questions: Who will benefit from Penn’s colony in America? Why do you think he is creating a new colony?

In your opinion, what do you think were the most important reasons for the European exploration and

colonization of America?

Colonial America, 1607-1775

Key events and dates:

1585 – First English attempt to create an American colony at Roanoke Island

1587-1590 – Second attempt to create a colony at Roanoke fails in mysterious circumstances

1607 – First permanent English settlement at Jamestown by the Virginia company

1620 – The ‘Mayflower’ ship lands at Plymouth rock, in what is now Massachusetts

1624 – English government takes control of the Virginia company

1626 – The Dutch ‘buy’ Manhattan island from Native Americans and establish New Amsterdam

1664 – the English capture New Amsterdam from the Dutch and rename it New York

1681 – Pennsylvania colony established by an English Quaker, William Penn

1691 – Massachussetts colony formed by combining the Boston and Plymouth colonies

1733 – the Georgia colony is established, closely linked to the control of the British king (Georgia was

the last of the 13 colonies that eventually formed the United States after 1776)

Key words:

a Puritan (Puritanism) – Protestants who followed the teachings of Calvin. They believed in hard work,

wearing simple, plain clothes, and leading ‘godly’ lives. Reading the Bible was very important to them. Both

King James I and Charles I persecuted Puritans in England

Quakers - a Christian group called the Society of Friends, which does not have formal ceremonies or a formal

system of beliefs, and which is strongly opposed to violence and war

a plantation - a large farm, especially in a hot part of the world, on which a particular type of crop is grown

tobacco - tytoń

cotton - bawełna

an indentured servant – a person whose journey to America was paid for, but in return they agreed to work

for between 2 to 7 years

Film recommendation: ‘New World’, directed by Terrence Malik

Useful website: David Reynolds, America, Empire of Liberty, BBC

http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio4/america/

Source 1:

‘They had no friends to welcome them, no houses. it was winter, and the winters of that country are

sharp and hard. What could they see but a desolate wilderness [empty, unwelcoming, wild

landscape], full of wild beasts and wild men? If they looked behind them there was the mighty ocean

as a gulf to separate them from all the civilised parts of the world.’

William Bradford, a Puritan settler writing in 1645 about the arrival of the first Puritans in 1620

1. Make a list of the problems and difficulties faced by the settlers:

2. What did Bradford mean by ‘the civilised parts of the world’? What is the opposite of ‘civilised’?

3. What do you think could make a person emigrate to a place like this? Why did they go there?

Source 2:

The Mayflower Compact (November 1620)

IN The Name of God, Amen. We, whose names are underwritten, the Loyal Subjects of our dread

Sovereign Lord King James, by the Grace of God, of Great Britain, France, and Ireland, King,

Defender of the Faith, &c. Having undertaken for the Glory of God, and Advancement of the

Christian Faith, and the Honor of our King and Country, a Voyage to plant the first colony in the

northern Parts of Virginia; Do by these Presents, solemnly and mutually in the Presence of God

and one another, covenant [promise] and combine ourselves together into a civil Body

Politick, for our better Ordering and Preservation, and Furtherance of the Ends aforesaid; And by

Virtue hereof do enact, constitute, and frame, such just and equal Laws, Ordinances, Acts,

Constitutions, and Offices, from time to time, as shall be thought most meet and convenient for

the general Good of the Colony; unto which we promise all due Submission and Obedience. In

WITNESS whereof we have hereunto subscribed our names at Cape Cod the eleventh of

November, in the Reign of our Sovereign Lord King James of England, France, and Ireland, the

eighteenth and of Scotland, the fifty-fourth. Anno Domini, 1620

This is the agreement that the settlers on the Mayflower made before they got off the ship. What have

they agreed to do? Why was this agreement significant?

Sources about the Causes of the War of Independence

Source A: Problems at the beginning of the Seven Years’ War

Background: John Campbell, Earl of Loudoun, commander of the British North American forces, arrived in

New York City on July 22, 1756. Upon his arrival he was met with an unfamiliar situation — provincial soldiers

(i.e. American colonial soldiers) under his command were challenging his authority. They held to “their rights

as Englishmen” and the “contractual agreement” on which they enlisted. Loudon complained about the

colonists in letters to the Duke of Cumberland:

The delays [problems] we meet with in carrying on the Service, from every parts of this

country, are immense [huge]. They have assumed to themselves, what they call Rights and

Privileges, totally unknown in...[England]....

Opposition to royal authority seems to come not from the lower [poor] People, but from the

leading People, who raise the dispute...by defending their Liberties, as they call them... I know

it has been said in London, that this is not the time [to change how the colonies are governed];

[but] if You delay it ...You will not have a force [any power] to Exert any British Acts of

Parliament here, for ...it is not uncommon, for the People of this Country to say, they would be

glad to see any Man, that dare exert a British Act of Parliament here.”

Q1. What are Loudon’s complaints? Q2. What is the warning that he is giving to the Duke of Cumberland?

Source B: Sam Adams on the proposed Sugar Act [a tax on sugar] (1764):

‘For if our Trade may be taxed why not our Lands? Why not the Produce of our Lands & every thing

we possess or make use of? This we apprehend annihilates our Charter Right to govern & tax

ourselves – It strikes our British Privileges, which as we have never forfeited them, we hold in

common with our Fellow Subjects who are Natives of Britain: If Taxes are laid upon us in any shape

without our having a legal Representation where they are laid, are we not reduced from the

Character of free Subjects to the miserable State of tributary Slaves.’

Q3. For Sam Adams, what does it mean for American colonists to be taxed without representation?

What conclusions does he draw?

Source C: The Stamp Act Congress of 1765 [a meeting of American representatives from the 13 colonies]

declared:

‘That the only Representatives of the People of these colonies are persons chosen therein [here, in the

colonies], by themselves, and that no taxes ever have been, or can be constitutionally [legally] imposed

[forced] on them, but [except] by their respective Legislatures [i.e. elected colonial assemblies].’

Source D: Samuel Adams, The Rights of the Colonists, 1772

Among the natural rights of the Colonists are these:

First, a right to life;

Secondly, to liberty;

Thirdly, to property;

together with the right to support and defend them in the best manner they can. These are

evident branches of, rather than deductions from, the duty of self-preservation, commonly

called the first law of nature.

All men have a right to remain in a state of nature as long as they please; and in case of

intolerable oppression, civil or religious, to leave the society they belong to, and enter into

another.

When men enter into society, it is by voluntary consent; and they have a right to demand and

insist upon the performance of such conditions and previous limitations as form an equitable

original compact [contract].

Q4. Sam Adams believes there are such things as ‘natural rights’. What are these and what do they give people the right to do?

Source E:

Association of the Sons of Liberty in New York; December 15, 1773

The following association is signed by a great number of the principal gentlemen of the city, merchants, lawyers,

and other inhabitants of all ranks, to testify [show or prove] their abhorrence to [hatred of] the diabolical project of

enslaving America.

It is essential to the freedom and security of a free people, that no taxes be imposed [forced] upon them but by

their own consent [agreement], or their representatives.

Therefore, to prevent [stop] a calamity [disaster] which, of all others, is the most to be dreaded [feared] -slavery

…- we, agree to associate together, under the name and style of the sons of New York, and engage our honour to,

and with each other faithfully to observe and perform the following resolutions [decisions]

1. Whoever shall aid or abet [help], or in any manner assist, in the introduction of tea from any place

whatsoever, into this colony, shall be deemed [viewed as] an enemy to the liberties of America.

2. Whoever shall be aiding, or assisting, in the landing, or carting of such tea, from any ship, or vessel, or shall

hire any house, storehouse, or cellar or any place whatsoever, to deposit the tea, subject to a duty as aforesaid, he

shall be deemed an enemy to the liberties of America.

3. Whoever shall sell, or buy, or in any manner contribute to the sale, or purchase of tea, shall be deemed

[viewed as] an enemy to the liberties of America.

4. Whether the duties [import taxes] on tea, imposed by this Act, be paid in Great Britain or in America, our

liberties are equally affected. …

Source F: Declaration and Resolves [decisions] of the First Continental Congress (October 1774)

...Whereas, since the close of the last war [in 1763], the British parliament, claiming a power of

right to bind the people of America by statute [law] in all cases whatsoever, hath, in some acts

expressly imposed taxes on them, and in others, under various pretenses, but in fact for the purpose of raising a revenue, hath imposed rates and duties payable in these colonies,

established a board of commissioners with unconstitutional powers, and extended the jurisdiction [power] of courts of Admiralty not only for collecting the said duties, but for the trial of causes merely arising within the body of a county.

Q5. What are the complaints of the colonists?

Source G: The British View of the American colonists

Royal Proclamation of Rebellion (August 23, 1775) We [meaning the king on behalf of the British government and people] have thought fit, to issue this Our Royal Proclamation [an announcement that is law] , hereby declaring that not only all Our Officers Civil and Military are obliged to exert their utmost Endeavours to suppress such Rebellion, and to bring the Traitors to Justice; but that all Our Subjects of this Realm and the Dominions [colonies] thereunto belonging are bound by Law to be aiding and assisting in the Suppression of such Rebellion, and to disclose and make known all traitorous Conspiracies and Attempts against Us, Our Crown and Dignity...

Q6. What does this actually mean?

The American Revolution, 1775-1789

Source A:

The Declaration of Independence, adopted on 2 July 1776

We hold these truths to be self-evident [obviously true], that all men are created equal, that they

are endowed [given] by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life,

Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted

[established] among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, That

whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the

People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such

principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect

their Safety and Happiness.

We, therefore, the Representatives of the united States of America... declare, That these United

Colonies are, and of Right ought to be Free and Independent States; that they are Absolved

[released] from all Allegiance [loyalty] to the British Crown, and that all political connection

between them and the State of Great Britain, is and ought to be totally dissolved...

1. What rights do ‘men’ have, and where do these rights come from?

2. What do you think ‘unalienable’ means? What are ‘unalienable Rights’?

3. What is the purpose of governments?

4. Where do governments get their power from?

5. When or why should people abolish or get rid of their own government?

6. What should be the basis for creating a new government? What are the most important

considerations when creating a new government?

Source B:

The US Constitution, 1787

We the People of the United States, in Order to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure

domestic Tranquility [peace], provide for the common defence, promote the general Welfare [good], and

secure the Blessings [benefits/advantages] of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity [the people who live

after them], do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America.

Article. I.

Section. 1. All legislative [law-making] Powers herein granted shall be vested [given to] in a Congress of the United States, which shall consist of a Senate and House of Representatives.

Section. 2. The House of Representatives shall be composed of Members chosen every second Year by

the People of the several States, and the Electors in each State shall have the Qualifications requisite for Electors of the most numerous Branch of the State Legislature.

Source C: The Bill of Rights, 1791

Amendments to the Constitution of the United States of America

1791-

Amendment I. Ratified December 15, 1791

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion [meaning there will be no official state

religion], or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or

the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.

Amendment II. Ratified December 15, 1791

A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and

bear Arms, shall not be infringed.

A. The Senate debate on the official title and form of address for the President (1789)

Suggested titles and forms of address:

His Majesty the President

His High Mightiness

President of the United States

His Highness, the President

His Esteemed Majesty, the President

His Excellency, the Supreme Commander-in-Chief

Question: Which of the 6 choices do you think is best? Explain why?

B. Jefferson’s idea of an Empire of Liberty:

We shall divert through our own Country a branch of commerce [trade] which the European States have

thought worthy of the most important struggles and sacrifices, and in the event of peace [ending the American

Revolution]...we shall form to the American union a barrier against the dangerous extension of the British

Province of Canada and add to the Empire of liberty an extensive and fertile Country thereby converting

dangerous Enemies into valuable friends.

Thomas Jefferson, 25 December 1780.

Question: Why did Jefferson want to extend America and create an ‘Empire of Liberty’?

C. Alexis de Tocqueville, Democracy in America:

Religion:

Moreover, almost all the sects[religions of the United States are comprised within the great unity of

Christianity, and Christian morality is everywhere the same. In the United States the sovereign authority is

religious, and consequently hypocrisy must be common; but there is no country in the whole world in which the

Christian religion retains a greater influence over the souls of men than in America, and there can be no

greater proof of its utility, and of its conformity to human nature, than that its influence is most powerfully felt

over the most enlightened and free nation of the earth.

The Americans combine the notions [ideas] of Christianity and of liberty so intimately [closely] in their minds,

that it is impossible to make them conceive the one without the other; and with them this conviction does not

spring from that barren traditionary faith which seems to vegetate in the soul rather than to live.

There are certain populations in Europe whose unbelief is only equaled by their ignorance and their

debasement, while in America one of the freest and most enlightened nations in the world fulfills all the outward

duties of religion with fervor.

Upon my arrival in the United States, the religious aspect of the country was the first thing that struck my

attention; and the longer I stayed there, the more did I perceive the great political consequences resulting from

this state of things, to which I was unaccustomed. In France I had almost always seen the spirit of religion and

the spirit of freedom pursuing courses diametrically opposed to each other; but in America I found that they

were intimately [closely] united, and that they reigned in common over the same country.

Races:

The first who attracts the eye, the first in enlightenment, in power and in happiness, is the white man, the

European, man par excellence; below him appear the Negro and the Indian. These two unfortunate races have

neither birth, nor face, nor language, nor mores [habits/customs] in common; only their misfortunes look alike.

Both occupy an equally inferior position in the country that they inhabit; both experience the effects of tyranny;

and if their miseries are different, they can accuse the same author for them.

Questions: What does de Tocqueville say about the role and importance of religion in America? What does he

say about racial hierarchy in America? Does he think that Black Americans and Native Americans have

anything in common?

D. The Idea of Manifest Destiny [‘manifest’ = obvious/clear] [Koncepcja "Boskiego Przeznaczenia"]:

And that claim is by the right of our manifest destiny to overspread and to possess the whole of the continent

which Providence has given us for the development of the great experiment of liberty and federated self-

government entrusted to us.

John L. O’Sullivan, 27 December 1845, New York Morning News. O’Sullivan was writing about the boundary

dispute with Britain in Oregon.

Questions: What is it that O’Sullivan believes America has a right to do? What reasons does O’Sullivan give to

justify this right? Look carefully at the painting (from the 1870s) of ‘Manifest destiny’ and describe what it

shows.

The American Civil War

The Gettysburg Address, 1863

Four score and seven [i.e. 87] years ago [i.e. 1776] our fathers brought forth on this

continent a new nation, conceived in liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal.

Now we are engaged in a great civil war, testing whether that nation, or any nation, so conceived and so dedicated, can long endure [last or survive]. We are met on a great battle-

field of that war [Gettysburg]. We have come to dedicate a portion of that field, as a final resting place for those who here gave their lives that that nation might live. It is altogether

fitting and proper that we should do this.

But, in a larger sense, we can not dedicate, we can not consecrate, we can not hallow [make holy] this ground. The brave men, living and dead, who struggled here, have consecrated it,

far above our poor power to add or detract. The world will little note, nor long remember what we say here, but it can never forget what they did here. It is for us the living, rather, to be dedicated here to the unfinished work which they who fought here have thus far so

nobly advanced. It is rather for us to be here dedicated to the great task remaining before us—that from these honored dead we take increased devotion to that cause for

which they gave the last full measure of devotion—that we here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain—that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom—and that government of the people, by the people, for the people,

shall not perish from the earth.

President Abraham Lincoln, 19 November 1863.

1. What is the main message of Lincoln’s speech? What do you think was his main point?

2. Why do you think this short speech has been remembered by Americans and is so important to them?

Polish version:

Lat temu osiemdziesiąt i siedem nasi ojcowie wznieśli na tym kontynencie nowy naród, poczęty z wolności i oddany w

przekonaniu, że wszyscy ludzie zostali stworzeni równymi.

Teraz toczymy wielką wojnę domową, której celem jest odpowiedź na pytanie, czy ten naród lub jakikolwiek naród poczęty w

takim duchu ma szanse na przetrwanie. Przyszło nam spotkać się na wielkim polu bitewnym tej wojny. Przybyliśmy tu, aby

poświęcić część tego pola, jako miejsce ostatniego spoczynku ludzi, którzy oddali tu życie za życie naszego narodu w poczuciu

wolności. I oni, i my znaleźliśmy się tu w słusznej sprawie, ale to naszą powinnością jest oddanie czci jej obrońcom.

Jednakże, w szerszym znaczeniu, nie możemy się oddać — nie możemy się udzielić konsekracji — nie możemy poświęcić —

tej ziemi. To dzielni ludzie, żywi i polegli, którzy tu walczyli, uświęcili ją bardziej, niż może to uczynić nasza nędzna władza

dawania i odbierania. Świat ani nie zwróci uwagi, ani nie zapamięta słów wypowiedzianych tu, lecz nigdy nie zapomni tego, co

oni tu zrobili. To raczej nam, żyjącym, jest nakazane poświęcić się tu tej niedokończonej sprawie, którą ci, którzy tu walczyli,

tak szlachetnie wspierali. To raczej nam jest nakazane być oddanym wielkiemu zadaniu, które oczekiwało na nas — że od tych

poległych bohaterów winniśmy zaczerpnąć oddanie sprawie, której oni całkowicie się poświęcili — że postanowimy, iż śmierć

tych poległych nie mogła być daremna; że ten naród doczeka się odrodzenia idei wolności; i że rządy narodu, przez naród i dla

narodu nie znikną z powierzchni ziemi.

Amendments to the Constitution of the United States of America

Amendment XIII. Ratified December 6, 1865

Section 1. Neither slavery nor involuntary servitude, except as a punishment for crime whereof the

party shall have been duly convicted, shall exist within the United States, or any place subject to their

jurisdiction.

Section 2. Congress shall have the power to enforce this article by appropriate legislation.

Poprawka XIII

§1. Nie będzie w Stanach Zjednoczonych lub jakimkolwiek miejscu podległym ich władzy ani niewolnictwa,

ani przymusowych robót, chyba jako kara za przestępstwo, którego sprawca został prawidłowo skazany.

§2. Kongres ma prawo zabezpieczyć wykonanie niniejszego artukułu przez odpowiednie ustawodawstwo.

Amendment XIV. Ratified July 9, 1868

Section 1. All persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction

thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the State wherein they reside. No State shall

make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States;

nor shall any State deprive [take away from] any person of life, liberty, or property, without due

process of law; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws. …

§1. Każdy, kto urodził się lub naturalizował w Stanach Zjednoczonych i podlega ich zwierzchnictwa, jest

obywatelem Stanów Zjednoczonych i tego stanu, w którym zamieszkuje. Żaden stan nie może wydawać

ani stosować ustaw, które by ograniczały prawa i wolności obywateli Stanów Zjednoczonych. Nie może też

żaden stan pozbawić kogoś życia, wolności lub mienia bez prawidłowego wymiaru sprawiedliwości ani

odmówić komukolwiek na swoim obszarze równej ochrony prawa.

Amendment XV. Ratified February 3, 1870

Section 1. The right of citizens of the United States to vote shall not be denied or abridged by

the United States or by any State on account of race, color, or previous condition of servitude.

Section 2. The Congress shall have power to enforce this article by appropriate legislation.

Poprawka XV

§1. Ani Stany Zjednoczone, ani żaden stan nie może pozbawić ani ograniczać praw wyborczych obywateli

Stanów Zjednoczonych ze względu na rasę, kolor skóry lub poprzednie niewolnictwo.

§2. Kongres ma prawo zabezpieczyć wykonanie niniejszego artykułu przez odpowiednie ustawodawstwo.

Questions: These three amendments (or additions) to the constitution were made in 1865, 1868 and 1870.

(a) What do you think was the point of each amendment? What did each amendment try to do?

(b) Why do you think amendments 14 and 15 were needed? Why wasn’t the 13th amendment enough?

Cornerstone Speech

Alexander H. Stephens (Vice President of the Confederacy) - March 21, 1861, Savannah, Georgia

…

The new [Confederate] constitution has put at rest, forever, all the agitating questions relating to our

peculiar institution, African slavery, as it exists amongst us, the proper status of the negro in our form of

civilization. This was the immediate cause of the late rupture [split/division] and present

revolution. Jefferson in his forecast, had anticipated this, as the "rock upon which the old Union would

split." He was right….. The prevailing ideas entertained by him and most of the leading statesmen at the

time of the formation of the old constitution [ in 1787], were that the enslavement of the African was in

violation [against] of the laws of nature; that it was wrong in principle, socially, morally, and politically….

Those ideas, however, were fundamentally wrong. They rested upon the assumption of the equality of

races. This was an error.

Our new [Confederate] government is founded upon exactly the opposite idea; its foundations are laid, its

cornerstone rests, upon the great truth that the negro is not equal to the white man; that slavery

subordination to the superior race is his natural and normal condition. This, our new government,

is the first, in the history of the world, based upon this great physical, philosophical, and moral truth.

John Brown's Body – a popular Union song (a number of versions closely similar to this published in 1861)

John Brown's body lies a-mouldering in the grave; [to moulder – rozłożyć]

His soul is marching on!

(Chorus)

Glory, glory, hallelujah! Glory, glory, hallelujah!

Glory, glory, hallelujah! his soul is marching on!

He's gone to be a soldier in the army of the Lord!

His soul is marching on!

(Chorus)

John Brown's knapsack is strapped upon his back!

His soul is marching on!

(Chorus)

His pet lambs will meet him on the way;

They go marching on!

(Chorus)

They will hang Jeff Davis to a sour apple tree!

As they march along!

(Chorus)

Now, three rousing cheers for the Union;

As we are marching on!

American Civil War Still Being Fought from The Guardian website -- December 20, 2010

Professor Eric Foner, Columbia University, New York

One hundred fifty years ago, on December 20, 1860, the South Carolina secession convention officially

dissolved the state’s connection with the American Union. The secession of South Carolina set in motion a

crisis that culminated in four years of civil war, the preservation of national unity, and the destruction of the

largest slave system the modern world has known.

Contemporaries had little doubt about the reasons for secession. With no support in the slave states, the

Republican party had just elected Abraham Lincoln president on a platform [political programme] committed to

halting slavery’s westward expansion. Lincoln himself had called slavery a “monstrous injustice” and had

declared that the nation could not exist indefinitely half-slave and half-free. In explaining its decision, South

Carolina’s convention warned that the ultimate result of Republican rule would be “the emancipation of the

slaves of the South.”

Within a few months, ten slave states had joined South Carolina in the Confederate States of America. Its

founders forthrightly announced that they had created a slaveholders’ republic. The new nation’s “cornerstone,”

declared Confederate Vice-President Alexander H. Stephens, was the principle “that slavery, subordination to

the superior race” was the “natural and moral condition” of black Americans.

Four years later, in his second inaugural address, Lincoln would affirm that slavery was “somehow” the cause

of the war. This is now an unquestioned axiom among historians. Yet many Americans today resist this basic

truth. They insist that differences over other issues – states’ rights, the tariff, constitutional interpretation – led

the nation into war.

What does it mean to say that slavery caused secession and the war? Not that the South was evil and the North

moral. In his second inaugural, Lincoln spoke of “American,” not southern slavery – his point being the

complicity of the entire nation in the sin of slavery. Few northerners demanded immediate abolition.

Abolitionists were a small and beleaguered minority. Sectional differences certainly existed over economic

policy, political power, and other matters. But in the absence of slavery it is inconceivable that these differences

would have led to war.

Rather, it means that by 1860, two distinct societies had emerged within the United States, one resting on slave

labor, the other on free. This development led inexorably to divergent conceptions of the role of slavery in the

nation’s future. Northern Republicans did not call for direct action against slavery where it already existed – the

Constitution, in any event, made such action impossible. But Lincoln spoke of putting slavery on the road to

“ultimate extinction,” and he and other Republicans saw his election and a halt to the institution’s expansion as

a first step in this direction. Secessionists saw it this way as well.

A century and a half after the Civil War, many white Americans, especially in the South, seem to take the idea

that slavery caused the war as a personal accusation. The point, however, is not to condemn individuals or an

entire region of the country, but to face candidly the central role of slavery in our national history. Only in this

way can Americans arrive at a deeper, more nuanced understanding of our past.

This very famous poem appears on a plaque [tablica] inside the Statue of Liberty:

The New Colossus

Not like the brazen giant of Greek fame,

With conquering limbs astride from land to land [i.e. the Colossus of Rhodes];

Here at our sea-washed, sunset gates shall stand

A mighty woman with a torch [i.e. the Statue of Liberty], whose flame

Is the imprisoned lightning, and her name

Mother of Exiles. From her beacon-hand

Glows world-wide welcome; her mild eyes command

The air-bridged harbor that twin cities frame [New York and Brooklyn].

"Keep, ancient lands, your storied pomp!" cries she

With silent lips. "Give me your tired, your poor,

Your huddled masses yearning [desperately wanting] to breathe free,

The wretched refuse [śmieci] of your teeming [niezliczony/nieprzebrany] shore [brzeg].

Send these, the homeless, tempest-tost [storm-tossed] to me,

I lift my lamp beside the golden door!"

Emma Lazarus, 1883

Questions:

1. What is the poet’s view of immigration to America? Is it generally positive or negative? Give

reasons for your answer.

2. What reasons for emigration to America are suggested in the poem? Why did Europeans emigrate

to America?

Who migrated to the USA? When did they (mostly) migrate to the

USA?

Why did Europeans emigrate to the USA between the 1840s and 1920s?

Pull factors (positives about the USA)

Push factors (negatives about Europe)

Enabling factors (how did they manage to get to the

USA?)

US Foreign Policy, 1898-1945

Chronology:

1823: The Monroe Doctrine

1898: Spanish-American War. The USA defeats Spain in 10 weeks. The USA becomes an Imperial power in the Pacific territories (Philippines, Puerto Rico, Guam; also Hawaii and temporary control over Cuba).

1917-18: US involvement in WW1. In April 1917 the USA joined the First World War on the Allied side fighting against Germany and Austria-Hungary.

January 1918: Wilson’s Fourteen Points. US President, Woodrow Wilson, makes a speech in which he sets out his plans for the post-war world.

1920: The US Congress rejects the peace treaty (Versailles Treaty) with Germany, which means the USA does not join the League of Nations.

1935-1939: A series of US Neutrality Acts are passed by the US Congress.

March 1941: Lend Lease Agreement. USA agrees to supply Britain with war equipment and materials, which can be paid for after the war.

August 1941: The Atlantic Charter. Roosevelt and Churchill meet to set out the principles for post-war peace.

7 December 1941: Japanese attack on the US naval base at Pearl Harbor, Hawaii. USA enters WW2.

May 1945: end of WW2 in Europe

August 1945: US drops atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Japan surrenders. End of WW2 in Pacific.

Twentieth-century US Presidents:

25. William McKinley, 1897-1901 (Republican)

26. Theodore Roosevelt, 1901-9 (Republican)

27. William Howard Taft, 1909-13 (Republican)

28. Woodrow Wilson, 1913-21 (Democrat)

29. Warren Gamaliel Harding, 1921-23 (Republican)

30. Calvin Coolidge, 1923-29 (Republican)

31. Herbert Clark Hoover, 1929-33 (Republican)

32. Franklin Delano Roosevelt, 1933-45 (Democrat)

33. Harry S Truman, 1945-53 (Democrat)

34. Dwight David Eisenhower, 1953-61 (Republican)

35. John Fitzgerald Kennedy, 1961-63 (Democrat)

36. Lyndon Baines Johnson, 1963-69 (Democrat)

37. Richard Milhous Nixon, 1969-74 (Republican)

38. Gerald Rudolph Ford Jr , 1974-77 (Republican)

39. James Earl Carter, 1977-81 (Democrat)

40. Ronald Wilson Reagan, 1981-89 (Republican)

41. George Herbert Walker Bush, 1989-1993 (Republican)

The USA, c.1900-1941

Important US Presidents:

Theodore (‘Teddy’) Roosevelt (Republican) 1901-1909

Woodrow Wilson (Democrat) 1913-1921

Herbert Hoover (Republican) 1929-1933

Franklin D. Roosevelt (Democrat) 1933-1945

Chronology:

1917-1918: US involvement in the First World War

1920-1929: The Roaring Twenties (or, ‘The Jazz Age’). Continuous economic growth in the US.

October 1929: The Wall Street Crash. Panic selling and the collapse of share prices on the New

York stockmarket.

1929-1933/1941?: The Great Depression. Unemployment reached 13 million (more 20% of the

labourforce).

1933-1936: Roosevelt’s New Deal. Government agencies are created to spend money and create

jobs to bring down unemployment. The US economy recovers.

1937: short economic recession

1941-1945: US involvement in the Second World War

Key words:

stockmarket - giełda

stocks/shares - akcja

Franklin D. Roosevelt, campaigning for the Presidency in 1932:

‘Throughout the nation men and women, forgotten in the political philosophy of the Government, look to us

here for guidance and for more equitable [fair and equal] opportunity to share in the distribution of national

wealth... I pledge myself to a new deal for the American people. This is more than a political campaign. It is a

call to arms.’

A. Speech of Senator Joseph McCarthy, Wheeling, West Virginia, February 9, 1950:

Five years after a world war has been won, men’s hearts should anticipate a long peace—and men’s minds should be free from the heavy weight that comes with war. But this is not such a period—for this is not a period of peace. This is a time of “the cold war.” This is a time when all the world is split into two vast, increasingly hostile armed camps—a time of a great armament race.

The one encouraging thing is that the “mad moment” has not yet arrived for the firing of the gun or the exploding of the bomb which will set civilization about the final task of destroying itself. There is still a hope for peace if we finally decide that no longer can we safely blind our eyes and close our ears to those facts which are shaping up more and more clearly . . . and that is that we are now engaged in a show-down fight . . . not the usual war between nations for land areas or other material gains, but a war between two diametrically opposed ideologies.

The great difference between our western Christian world and the atheistic Communist world is not political, gentlemen, it is moral. For instance, the Marxian idea of confiscating the land and factories and running the entire economy as a single enterprise is momentous. Likewise, Lenin’s invention of the one-party police state as a way to make Marx’s idea work is hardly less momentous. …

The real, basic difference, however, lies in the religion of immoralism . . . invented by Marx, preached feverishly by Lenin, and carried to unimaginable extremes by Stalin. This religion of immoralism, if the Red half of the world triumphs—and well it may, gentlemen—this religion of immoralism will more deeply wound and damage mankind than any conceivable economic or political system.

Karl Marx dismissed God as a hoax, and Lenin and Stalin have added in clear-cut, unmistakable language their resolve that no nation, no people who believe in a god, can exist side by side with their communistic state.

Today we are engaged in a final, all-out battle between communistic atheism and Christianity. The modern champions of communism have selected this as the time, and ladies and gentlemen, the chips are down—they are truly down.

Questions: (1) In what ways does McCarthy think the USA and the Soviet Union are different? (2) In what

terms, and in what way, does McCarthy understand the Cold War?

B. The Pledge of Allegiance [przysięga lojalnośći ]

Official versions

1892

"I pledge allegiance to my flag and the republic for which it stands: one nation indivisible with liberty and justice

for all."

1954 to Present

"I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America, and to the republic for which it stands, one nation

under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all."

Historian James Truslow Adams popularized the phrase "American Dream" in his book Epic of America

(1931):

The American Dream is that dream of a land in which life should be better and richer and fuller for every man,

with opportunity for each according to ability or achievement. It is a difficult dream for the European upper

classes to interpret adequately, also too many of us ourselves have grown weary and mistrustful of it. It is not a

dream of motor cars and high wages merely, but a dream of social order in which each man and each woman

shall be able to attain to the fullest stature of which they are innately capable, and be recognized by others for

what they are, regardless of the fortuitous circumstances of birth or position.

…

The American Dream, that has lured tens of millions of all nations to our shores in the past century has not

been a dream of material plenty, though that has doubtlessly counted heavily. It has been a dream of being able

to grow to fullest development as a man and woman, unhampered by the barriers which had slowly been

erected in the older civilizations, unrepressed by social orders which had developed for the benefit of classes

rather than for the simple human being of any and every class.

Henry Luce, Life magazine, (February 1941):

Throughout the 17th century and the 18th century and the 19th century, this continent teemed with manifold

projects and magnificent purposes. Above them all and weaving them all together into the most exciting flag of

all the world and of all history was the triumphal purpose of freedom. It is in this spirit that all of us are called,

each to his own measure of capacity, and each in the widest horizon of his vision, to create the first great

American Century.

President Lyndon B. Johnson, (May 1964):

We are going to assemble the best thought and broadest knowledge from all over the world to find these

answers. I intend to establish working groups to prepare a series of conferences and meetings—on the cities, on

natural beauty, on the quality of education, and on other emerging challenges. From these studies, we will

begin to set our course toward the Great Society.

Martin Luther King’s speech at The March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom, Washington D.C., 28

August 1963:

Five score years ago, a great American, in whose symbolic shadow we stand today, signed the Emancipation

Proclamation. This momentous decree came as a great beacon light of hope to millions of Negro slaves who had

been seared in the flames of withering injustice. It came as a joyous daybreak to end the long night of their captivity.

But one hundred years later, the Negro still is not free. One hundred years later, the life of the Negro is still sadly crippled

by the manacles of segregation and the chains of discrimination. One hundred years later, the Negro lives on a lonely

island of poverty in the midst of a vast ocean of material prosperity. One hundred years later, the Negro is still

languishing in the corners of American society and finds himself an exile in his own land. So we have come here today to

dramatize a shameful condition.

In a sense we have come to our nation's capital to cash a check. When the architects of our republic wrote the magnificent

words of the Constitution and the Declaration of Independence, they were signing a promissory note to which every

American was to fall heir. This note was a promise that all men, yes, black men as well as white men, would be

guaranteed the unalienable rights of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. …

I say to you today, my friends, so even though we face the difficulties of today and tomorrow, I still have a dream.

It is a dream deeply rooted in the American dream.

I have a dream that one day this nation will rise up and live out the true meaning of its creed: "We hold these

truths to be self-evident: that all men are created equal."

I have a dream that one day on the red hills of Georgia the sons of former slaves and the sons of former slave

owners will be able to sit down together at the table of brotherhood.

I have a dream that one day even the state of Mississippi, a state sweltering with the heat of injustice, sweltering

with the heat of oppression, will be transformed into an oasis of freedom and justice.

I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color

of their skin but by the content of their character. I have a dream today.

I have a dream that one day, down in Alabama, with its vicious racists, with its governor having his lips dripping

with the words of interposition and nullification; one day right there in Alabama, little black boys and black girls

will be able to join hands with little white boys and white girls as sisters and brothers. I have a dream today.

I have a dream that one day every valley shall be exalted, every hill and mountain shall be made low, the rough places will

be made plain, and the crooked places will be made straight, and the glory of the Lord shall be revealed, and all flesh shall

see it together. …

And if America is to be a great nation this must become true. So let freedom ring from the prodigious hilltops of New

Hampshire. Let freedom ring from the mighty mountains of New York. Let freedom ring from the heightening

Alleghenies of Pennsylvania!

Let freedom ring from the snowcapped Rockies of Colorado! Let freedom ring from the curvaceous slopes of California!

…

And when this happens, when we allow freedom to ring, when we let it ring from every village and every hamlet, from

every state and every city, we will be able to speed up that day when all of God's children, black men and white men,

Jews and Gentiles, Protestants and Catholics, will be able to join hands and sing in the words of the old Negro

spiritual, "Free at last! free at last! thank God Almighty, we are free at last!"