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Historical Context: Mexican Americans and the Great Depression

Economics

9, 10, 11, 12, 13+

In February 1930 in San Antonio, Texas, 5000 Mexicans and Mexican Americans gathered at the city’s railroad station to depart the United States for settlement in Mexico. In August, a special train carried another 2000 to central Mexico. Most Americans are familiar with the forced relocation in 1942 of 112,000 Japanese Americans from the West Coast to internment camps. Far fewer are aware that during the Great Depression, the Federal Bureau of Immigration (after 1933, the Immigration and Naturalization Service) and local authorities rounded up Mexican immigrants and naturalized...
Classroom Resources

Study Aid: Reconstruction Amendments

Government and Civics

9, 10, 11, 12

Thirteenth Amendment Prohibited slavery in the United States Fourteenth Amendment Defined national citizenship Reduced state representation in Congress proportional to number of disfranchised voters Denied former Confederates the right to hold public office Fifteenth Amendment Prohibited denial of vote on grounds of race, color, or previous servitude White Democrats Regain Control of Southern Legislatures 1869 Virginia 1870 North Carolina 1871 Georgia 1873 Texas 1874 Alabama Arkansas 1875 Mississippi 1877 Florida Louisiana South Carolina
Classroom Resources

Guided Readings: Imperialism and the Spanish-American War

Economics, Government and Civics, Religion and Philosophy

9, 10, 11, 12

Reading 1 Up to our own day American history has been in a large degree the history of the colonization of the Great West. . . . The frontier is the line of most rapid and effective Americanization. . . . The frontier promoted the formation of a composite nationality for the American people. . . . The legislation which most developed the powers of the national government, and played the largest part in its activity, was conditioned on the frontier. . . . The pioneer needed the goods of the coast, and so the grand series of internal improvement and railroad legislation began,...
Classroom Resources

Guided Readings: Slavery and Abolition

World History

5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13+

Sid Lapidus Collection: Liberty and the American Revolution Introduction The campaign to end slavery was a prolonged struggle. In England and in America in the eighteenth century, some authors such as Daniel Defoe and Samuel Johnson in England depicted slavery as ugly and immoral. In the 1750s, Quaker groups in the colonies began taking public positions against slavery, yet they remained a minority as few colonists spoke out against slavery on religious grounds. In 1776 most White Americans either accepted slavery or actually enslaved people, while others participated in the...
Classroom Resources

Guided Readings: Sectional Conflict

Economics, Government and Civics

9, 10, 11, 12

Reading 1 I do not . . . hesitate to avow before this House and the country, and in the presence of the living God, that if by your legislation you seek to drive us from the territories of California and New Mexico, purchased by the common blood and treasure of the whole people, and to abolish slavery in this District, thereby attempting to fix a national degradation upon half the States of this Confederacy, I am for disunion . —Representative Robert Toombs of Georgia, December 13, 1849, Congressional Globe , 31st Cong., 1st Sess. 28 (1849) Reading 2 With the ever watchful eye...
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Guided Readings: Secession and the Civil War

Economics, Government and Civics

9, 10, 11, 12

Reading 1 The leaders and oracles of the most powerful party in the United States have denounced us as tyrants and unprincipled heathens through the whole civilized world. They have preached it from their pulpits. They have declared it in the halls of Congress and in their newspapers. In their school-houses they have taught their children (who are to rule this Government in the next generation) to look upon the slaveholder as the especial disciple of the devil himself. . . . They have established Abolition Societies among them for the purpose of raising funds—if other states...
Classroom Resources

Guided Readings: The Rise of the City

Economics, Government and Civics, Religion and Philosophy

9, 10, 11, 12

Reading 1 To-day, what is a tenement? . . . When last arraigned before the bar of public justice: “It is generally a brick building from four to six stories high on the street, frequently with a store on the first floor which, when used for the sale of liquor, has a side opening for the benefit of the inmates and to evade the Sunday law; four families occupy each floor, and a set of rooms consists of one or two dark closets, used as bedrooms, with a living room twelve feet by ten. The staircase is too often a dark well in the centre of the house, and no direct through...
Classroom Resources

Guided Readings: Reconstruction

Government and Civics

Reading 1 We hold it to be the duty of the government to inflict condign punishment on the rebel belligerents, and so weaken their hands that they can never again endanger the Union; and so reform their municipal institutions as to make them republican in spirit as well as in name. . . . We propose to confiscate all the estate of every rebel belligerent whose estate was worth $l0,000, or whose land exceeded two hundred acres in quantity. . . . By thus forfeiting the estates of the leading rebels, the government would have 394,000,000 of acres. . . . Give, if you please, forty...
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Guided Readings: Indian Policy

Geography, Government and Civics, Religion and Philosophy

9, 10, 11, 12

Reading 1 One [infantry] battalion...left Fort Lyon [Colorado] on the night of the 28th of November, 1864; about daybreak on the morning of the 29th of November we came in sight of the camp of friendly [Cheyenne and Arapaho] Indians...and were ordered by Colonel [J.M.] Chivington to attack the same, which was accordingly done....Going over the battle ground the next day I did not see a body of man, woman, or child but was scalped, and in many instances their bodies were mutilated in the most horrible manner--men, women, and children's privates cut out etc.; I heard one man say...
Classroom Resources

Guided Readings: Religion and Social Reform: Abolitionism

9, 10, 11, 12

Reading 1 Assenting to the “self-evident truth” maintained in the American Declaration of Independence, “that all men are created equal, and endowed by their Creator with certain inalienable rights” . . . I shall strenuously contend for the immediate enfranchisement of our slave population. . . . I am aware, that many object to the severity of my language; but is there not cause for severity? I will be as harsh as truth, and as uncompromising as justice. . . . Tell a man whose house is on fire, to give a moderate alarm; tell him to moderately rescue his wife from the hands of...
Classroom Resources

Statistics: The Growth of Cities

Economics, Geography, Science, Technology, Engineering and Math

9, 10, 11, 12

Urban Growth Number of Cities 1860 1900 100,000-499,999 7 32 500,000 or more 2 6 Percent of Total Population 1860 1900 100,000-499,999 4% 8% 500,000 or more 4% 11% Questions for Discussion What factors contributed to the growth of cities in the late nineteenth century? How does life in a very large city differ from that in smaller cities and towns? Deaths per 100,000 - Boston, New York, New Orleans, and Philadelphia Year / Cause of Death Tuberculosis Intestinal Disorders Diphtheria Typhoid Typhus Smallpox 1864-1888 365 299 123 66 53 1899-1913 223 196 58 19 25 Questions for...
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Guided Readings: Antebellum Social Reform

Government and Civics

9, 10, 11, 12

Reading 1: “The elementary schools throughout the state are irresponsible institutions, established by individuals, from mere motives of private speculation or gain, who are sometimes destitute of character, and frequently, of the requisite attainments and abilities. From the circumstance of the schools being the absolute property of individuals, no supervision or effectual control can be exercised over them; hence, ignorance, inattention, and even immorality prevail to a lamentable extent among their teachers.” “Report of the Joint Committees of the City and County of...
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Guided Readings: Origins of the Cold War: The Containment Policy

Economics, Government and Civics

9, 10, 11, 12

Reading 1 Soviet power...bears within itself the seeds of its own decay, and the sprouting of these seeds is well advanced...[If] anything were ever to disrupt the unity and efficacy of the Party as a political instrument, Soviet Russia might be changed overnight from one of the strongest to one of the weakest and most pitiable of national societies....This would...warrant the United States entering with reasonable confidence upon a policy of firm containment, designed to confront the Russians with unalterable counter-force at every point where they show signs of encroaching...
Classroom Resources

Presidential Election Results, 1789–2020

Government and Civics

5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12

Introduction The Electoral College consists of 538 electors, who are representatives typically chosen by the candidate’s political party, though some state laws differ. Each state’s number of electors is based on its congressional delegation (one for each member in the House of Representatives and one for each member in the Senate). Currently, a total of 270 electoral votes is required to win the presidency. Before the 1804 election the first runner-up became vice president, as spelled out in the US Constitution. As a result of the Election of 1800, the method of electing the...
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Reflections on the Great Depression and the New Deal

Economics, Government and Civics

Reading 1 I want to tell you about an experience we had in Philadelphia when our private funds were exhausted and before public funds become available. . . . One woman said she borrowed 50 cents from a friend and bought stale bread for 3 and a half cents per loaf, and that is all they had for eleven days except for one or two meals. . . . One woman went along the docks and picked up vegetables that fell from the wagons. Sometimes the fish vendors gave her fish at the end of the day. On two different occasions this family was without food for a day and a half. . . . Another...
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Statistics: The Changing Lives of American Women

Economics

9, 10, 11, 12, 13+

The Changing Family Age of First Marriage Average Household Size Male Female 1790 -- -- 5.79 1890 26.1 22.0 4.93 1900 25.9 21.9 4.76 1910 25.1 21.6 4.54 1920 24.6 21.2 4.34 1930 24.3 21.3 4.11 1940 24.3 21.5 3.77 1950 22.8 20.3 3.52 Age of Mothers at Various Stages of the Family Life Cycle 1880 1920 1950 Age of first marriage 22 21 20 Birth of first child 23 23 23 Birth of last child 34 31 30 Marriage of last child 55 54 51 Death of one spouse 56 65 66 Questions for Discussion Describe the basic changes that have taken place in the timing of key events of women's lives. How...
Classroom Resources

Study Aid: New Deal Legislation

Economics, Government and Civics

New Deal Legislation 1932 Reconstruction Finance Corporation Granted emergency loans to banks, life insurance companies, and railroads 1933 Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC) Employed youth in reforestation, road construction, and flood control projects Agricultural Adjustment Act Direct payments to farmers to reduce production Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA) Creates independent public corporation to construct dams and power projects National Industrial Recovery Act Establishes fair-competition codes; section 7a guarantees labor’s right to organize Public Works Administration...
Classroom Resources

Historical Context: The Post-World War I Red Scare

Economics, Government and Civics

9, 10, 11, 12, 13+

On May 1, 1919—May Day—postal officials discovered twenty bombs in the mail sent to prominent capitalists, including John D. Rockefeller and J. P. Morgan Jr., as well as government officials like Supreme Court Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes. A month later, bombs exploded in eight American cities. On September 16, 1920, a bomb left in a parked horse-drawn wagon exploded near Wall Street in Manhattan’s financial district, killing thirty people and injuring hundreds. The suspicion was that the bomb was the work of radicals who had immigrated from Europe. Authorities came up with a...
Classroom Resources

Historical Context: Birth of a Nation

Art, Geography, Government and Civics, Literature

9, 10, 11, 12, 13+

In 1915, fifty years after the end of the Civil War, D.W. Griffith released his epic film Birth of a Nation . The greatest blockbuster of the silent era, Birth of a Nation was seen by an estimated 200 million Americans by 1946. Based on a novel by a Baptist preacher named Thomas Dixon, the film painted Reconstruction, the period following the Civil War, as a time when vengeful former enslaved people, opportunistic White scalawags, and corrupt Yankee carpetbaggers plundered and oppressed the former Confederacy until respectable White southerners rose up and restored order. A ...
Classroom Resources

Statistics: Education in America, 1860-1950

Economics, Government and Civics, Literature

9, 10, 11, 12

Resources Invested in Education Spending on Education Spending Per Child 15-19 Percentage of GNP 1860 $60 $5.33 1.4 1900 $503 $20.53 2.9 Improvements in Education % Illiteracy 10 or older High School Graduates College Enrollment Total White Black 1870 20% 11 80 2.0 1.7 1900 11% 6 45 6.4 4.0 Proportion of Young Attending School Average Days Attended By Pupils Proportion of 17 Year Olds Graduating High School 1870 57 78 2 1890 69 86 3.5 1910 74 113 8.8 1930 81 143 29 1950 82 158 59 Percent of 18-21 Year Olds Attending College Percent of Adult Population Illiterate 1870 1.7% 20%...

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