Q&A Hero

Q: Prior to the introduction of rice, the early colony of South Carolina was partially centered on a. the cultivation of cotton. b. small-scale manufacturing of firearms for use in raids against Spanish Florida. c. the export of Indian slaves to the Caribbean. d. shipbuilding. e. copper mining.

Q: The development of rice plantations in South Carolina a. occurred only after the colonys planters unsuccessfully attempted to cultivate tobacco, sugarcane, and indigo. b. required such large capital investments that Carolinas planters never became as wealthy as those in the Chesapeake region. c. would have proven impossible without the importation of thousands of European indentured servants to serve as a labor force. d. led the colony to become the first mainland colony with a black majority and caused a growing divide to exist between white and black. e. is considered by most historians to be the most important cause of the Yamasee War.

Q: In which of the following settings did slaves experience the greatest degree of freedom? a. frontier conditions b. small inland cities c. coastal cities d. rice plantations e. tobacco plantations

Q: Which of the following statements accurately describes the task system? a. It developed in New England among factory workers, especially child laborers. b. It allowed slaves time for leisure or to cultivate crops on their own if they completed daily jobs. c. It was not suited for rice plantations, only small farms. d. It was an organizational tool primarily used by merchants to keep track of their many responsibilities. e. It required no supervision because of the isolated aspect of the work involved.

Q: In South Carolina, a. the slave population was the smallest of all the southern colonies. b. sugar and tobacco were the main crops. c. most enslaved people did field work under the task system, whereby individual slaves were assigned daily tasks. d. rice plantations were generally much smaller than Virginia tobacco plantations. e. slaveowners were generally much less wealthy than slaveowners in other southern colonies.

Q: Why did the English government support the establishment of the Georgia colony? a. It wanted to ban slavery. b. The English feared a French invasion of the South. c. The English wanted a buffer between South Carolina and Spains Florida. d. It wanted a colony to grow rice. e. It wanted another colony that would focus on tobacco as a cash crop.

Q: Which of the following statements was true of Georgia? a. Colonists sought self-government to gain the right to introduce slavery. b. It was the only colony to maintain a ban on liquor until independence. c. The philanthropists who founded it wanted to exclude lower-class Englishmen. d. Its residents invaded Florida and took it from Spain in the War of Jenkins Ear. e. It was named for the most important British queen of the eighteenth century.

Q: Why was slavery less prevalent in the northern colonies? a. Northern whites were not as racist as southern whites. b. It was too expensive to transport slaves to the North. c. The small farms of the northern colonies did not need slaves. d. More reformers lived in the North. e. The northern colonies used Indian labor instead.

Q: Which of the following statements accurately describes slavery in the North in the eighteenth century? a. Slaves in the New England colonies were afforded significant rights, including the ability to testify against whites in court. b. Most upper-class families in New England owned five to ten slaves because they were vital to the economy. c. Slaves were forbidden from taking jobs in artisan shops, which were reserved for white apprentices. d. The slave population in New York City was never more than one percent of the white population. e. In urban areas, owning slaves was viewed as more economical than hiring wage labor and indentured servants.

Q: What was a result of the northern colonies lack of a cash crop? a. Slavery did not exist in Massachusetts and New York. b. More slaves existed in the northern colonies compared to southern ones. c. Slavery was banned in all of New England. d. Slavery was not as integrated into the northern colonial economy as compared to the South. e. The northern colonial economies struggled with trade and attracting settlers.

Q: Which statement is true about slavery in eighteenth-century New York? a. Hudson Valley farmers, landlords, and craftsmen never used enslaved peoples labor in the eighteenth century. b. Slavery was abolished after the English took the colony from the Dutch. c. New York City passed a law banning merchants from participating in the slave trade after 1730. d. In 1746, enslaved people made up one-fifth of the population of New York City. e. Slaves worked exclusively as domestic workers.

Q: By the 1750s, North American colonists possessed a dual identity: they were both British in their attempts at Anglicization and also distinctly American. What factors contributed to this dual identity? What reinforced both the British and American identities? How did people in Great Britain view the identity of their colonists? Be sure to discuss political, cultural, social, and economic aspects of society.

Q: Explain how and why tobacco planters in the Chesapeake region came to rely on African slaves rather than European indentured servants over the course of the seventeenth century. At what point did the Chesapeake become a slave society rather than merely a society with slaves?

Q: The line between slavery and freedom was more permeable in the seventeenth century than it would become later. Explain how slavery was treated in the seventeenth century by discussing the laws, customs, and liberties extended to slaves. What contributed to the hardening of the line between slavery and freedom?

Q: Explain why the colonies had fewer people in poverty than England. What economic and social conditions were at the root of this difference? For those who were in poverty in the colonies, what led to this condition increasing in the eighteenth century, and what was life like for them?

Q: As a result of the transatlantic slave trade, what European products became especially popular in Africa? a. textiles and guns b. wine and gold c. sugar and tobacco d. lumber and fish e. cotton and books

Q: Which of the following is a true statement about the Atlantic slave trades effect in West Africa? a. It had little effect in West Africa, because more than 90 percent of enslaved people came from East Africa. b. It helped lead to the rise of militarized states in West Africa, whose large armies preyed upon their neighbors in order to capture slaves. c. It encouraged the expansion of West Africas domestic textile industry, which supplied clothing for slaves. d. It led to an increase in West Africas population during the 1700s, as slave traders encouraged women to have more children who would then be sold into slavery. e. It successfully united West African nations to resist European slave traders, who reluctantly ended the trade by 1763.

Q: What was the significance of Ashanti and Dahomey? a. Portugal controlled these trade ports in Asia. b. Europeans controlled these African cities. c. These African states became powerful through the slave trade. d. These port cities refused to participate in the slave trade. e. Olaudah Equianos father was chief of these kingdoms.

Q: Which of the following was a result of Europeans selling weapons to West African leaders? a. Wars between West African societies depleted the availability of slaves. b. West African societies fell under the total control of powerful European traders. c. Militarized states arose that used European weapons to capture slaves. d. West African militias began violently resisting attempts by Europeans to purchase slaves. e. Most West African tribes became impoverished due to the high cost of weapons.

Q: What was the Middle Passage? a. the journey from East Africa to West Africa b. the third leg of the triangular trade route; it primarily went to Europe c. a voyage across the Pacific Ocean to America d. the second leg of the trans-Atlantic trade e. the voyage taken by indentured servants

Q: Which one of the following statements describes conditions experienced by those aboard ship during the Middle Passage? a. Slave traders lives were more at risk than the lives of the enslaved due to the high frequency of slave revolts during the journeys. b. Slaves were immediately put to work performing the many duties required to take a sailing vessel across the Atlantic. c. Slaves were separated by gender and locked into pens above deck, with no refuge from the weather. d. Slaves were inhumanely crowded into very small spaces and often chained to the deck. e. Slaves regularly exercised and were well fed so that they would arrive at markets in the New World looking strong and healthy.

Q: In the Chesapeake region, slavery a. was geographically restricted to the Tidewater area until transportation improved in the nineteenth century. b. rapidly became the dominant labor system after 1680. c. was the labor system preferred by planters as early as the 1620s. d. allowed planters to make vast profits from cotton and rice as well as from tobacco. e. was so widely practiced that nearly three-fifths of white households in 1770 included a slaveowner.

Q: What proportion of white Virginia families owned at least one slave in 1770? a. nearly 10 percent b. nearly 50 percent c. nearly 75 percent d. nearly 1 percent e. nearly 90 percent

Q: What differentiated slavery in New England and the Middle Colonies from slavery in the Southern colonies? a. Whereas most Protestant churches in New England and the Middle Colonies promoted slavery, Protestant churches in the South condemned the practice. b. Whereas New England and the Middle Colonies only had indentured servants as laborers, the South predominantly had slavery. c. Whereas New England and the Middle Colonies had nonplantation-based slavery, slavery in the South focused on the tobacco- and rice-based plantation systems. d. Whereas New England and the Middle Colonies only had slaves who worked in homes, the South only had slaves who worked on large plantations, not on small farms. e. Whereas New England and the Middle Colonies had laws in place regarding slavery, the South had no laws regulating the status of slaves.

Q: Tobacco plantations in the Chesapeake region a. were so profitable that by the mid-eighteenth century their owners became the wealthiest people in British North America. b. did not have any slaves on small farms. c. helped make the Chesapeake colonies models of mercantilism. d. were far less successful than tobacco plantations that developed in the lower southern colonies. e. were known throughout the world as models of how slaves should be treated.

Q: Liberty of conscience, wrote a German newcomer in 1739, was the chief virtue of British North America, and on this score I do not repent my immigration. Explain what he meant by that remark. What did immigrants find attractive about the British colonies? What liberties and freedoms were available to the newcomers?

Q: North America at mid-eighteenth century was home to a remarkable diversity of people and different kinds of social organization. In a thoughtful essay, defend this statement, touching on each of the colonies, the various groups of people living in those colonies, and the freedoms and liberties extended to them.

Q: Many perceived Pennsylvania to be the best poor mans country.

Q: The cities in British North America by the mid-eighteenth century had small populations.

Q: Most colonists did not complain about the British regulating trade through the Navigation Acts.

Q: Anglicization meant that the colonial elites rejected all things British.

Q: The British colonists tended to define themselves in opposition to groups such as Spanish and French Catholics, Indians, and enslaved Africans.

Q: Charleston was the richest city in British North America.

Q: Many colonial planters fell into debt because of purchasing luxuries such as extravagant home furnishings.

Q: Wealthy colonists tended to view the poor as hardworking colonists who were simply victims of horrible circumstances.

Q: The work of farmers wives and daughters often spelled the difference between a familys self-sufficiency and poverty.

Q: In a North American English colony, a person was less likely than someone in Europe to be a landowner and voter.

Q: Discuss the major social and political crises that the English colonies of North America experienced in the late seventeenth century. What were the sources of these crises, and how did they affect the inhabitants of the colonies?

Q: Various groups in this period of colonial history seized on the language of freedom to advance their goals. Analyze how these groups defined freedom and used its language. How successful were they in achieving their goals?

Q: William Penn called his colony a holy experiment. Chronicle the development of Pennsylvania, with particular attention to the advantages that the colony offered to settlers. What liberties were guaranteed and to whom? Why and how did conflicts with the Indians start?

Q: The Glorious Revolution solidified the notion that liberty was a birthright of the Englishman. Explain how the Glorious Revolution contributed to this idea and how it subsequently affected the colonies. Did all of the colonists react to the Glorious Revolution in the same way? If there were differences, what were they? How was the language of liberty used?

Q: Benjamin Franklin in his Observations Concerning the Increase of Mankind believed the Germans were an asset to the English colonies.

Q: Indians benefited from the Walking Purchase, gaining more access to land in Pennsylvania than they anticipated.

Q: Race and racism are modern concepts and had not been fully developed by the seventeenth century.

Q: When compared to Native Americans, slaves from Africa were more likely to die from contagious diseases.

Q: Slavery flourished in Brazil and the West Indies in the seventeenth century because of tobacco.

Q: As in the Spanish empire, British North America developed a distinctive mulatto, or mixed-race, class.

Q: Bacons Rebellion was caused by a conflict between blacks and whites in Virginia.

Q: A consequence of Bacons Rebellion was a consolidation of power among Virginias elite.

Q: Parliament enacted a bill of rights upon the completion of the Glorious Revolution.

Q: The Glorious Revolution was ultimately a failure in the eyes of the British aristocrats who had orchestrated it because the English monarchy was retained.

Q: Following the Glorious Revolution, the Massachusetts colony had to abide by the Toleration Act.

Q: The English Toleration Act of 1689 benefited non-Puritans, allowing them much more participation in the colonial government.

Q: In 1692 the majority of people accused of witchcraft in Salem, Massachusetts, were women.

Q: In the eighteenth century, efforts began to stop emigration from England, except that convicts were still sent to bolster the Chesapeake labor force.

Q: German immigrants greatly enhanced the ethnic and religious diversity of Britains colonies.

Q: The primary cash crop of Carolinas large plantations was sugar.

Q: William Penn received land in both what would become Pennsylvania and what would become Delaware.

Q: The freedom William Penn was particularly concerned with was the right to worship freely.

Q: By the eighteenth century, colonial farm families a. almost always owned at least three slaves. b. were in decline as cities such as Philadelphia expanded. c. saw freedom as depending on their political rights, not their ownership of property. d. viewed land ownership almost as a right, a precondition of freedom. e. engaged in arranged intermarriages.

Q: What was one reason for the high birth rate in farm families during the eighteenth century? a. The independence of the small farmer depended to a great degree on the labor of children in his family. b. Infant mortality was extremely high, and only through near-continuous births could any living offspring be assured. c. Women were becoming increasingly independent and bolstered their power by rearing numerous children. d. Polygamy gained popularity, allowing multiple wives to be pregnant at any given time. e. The popularity of celibacy was on the decline, due to an increase in religious toleration.

Q: As English colonial society became more structured in the eighteenth century, what were the effects on women? a. They received more legal rights, such as the right to own property in their own names. b. Womens work became more clearly defined as tied closely to the home. c. Their workloads decreased thanks to technological advances such as the spinning wheel and to declining infant mortality rates. d. Women were permitted to practice law. e. Women bore so few children that population levels slightly declined in the 1740s, then stabilized until the American Revolution.

Q: For an eighteenth-century middle-class colonial woman, what would have been the top priority in daily life? a. helping her artisan husband make his product b. taking to market corn harvested by her husband c. cooking the family meals d. teaching her children to sing and dance properly e. keeping a family journal

Q: Which of the following statements accurately describes North America in the mid-eighteenth century? a. The British colonies remained untouched by the demand for consumer goods due to a struggling economy. b. British colonists experienced exceedingly low birth rates and life expectancy rates due to poor quality of life. c. Slavery had reached its height, from where began a steep decline before it ended with the Civil War. d. Free white colonists enjoyed perhaps the highest per capita income in the world. e. The British colonies had a much smaller population base when compared to the French colonies.

Q: ___ 1. Nathaniel Bacon ___ 2. Benjamin Franklin ___ 3. William Penn ___ 4. William of Orange ___ 5. Anthony Johnson ___ 6. Duke of York ___ 7. Jacob Leisler ___ 8. James II ___ 9. King Philip ___ 10. William Berkeley ___ 11. Edmund Andros ___ 12. Myer Myers a. established a Committee of Safety in New York b. was a Protestant who became king of England c. was also known as Metacom d. was the governor of New York who formed the Covenant Chain with the Iroquois e. was an elite planter who called for reform in Virginia f. was governor of Virginia during Bacons Rebellion g. was a Catholic who became King of England h. was a printer who became a renowned statesman and said He that hath a trade, hath an estate i. was the proprietor of Pennsylvania who envisioned it as a place of spiritual freedom j. was a successful Jewish silversmith who lived in colonial New York City k. was overthrown in the Glorious Revolution l. was a slave who became free and later owned slaves himself

Q: ___ 1. Charter of Liberties ___ 2. mercantilism ___ 3. Royal African Company ___ 4. Anglicization ___ 5. Bacons Rebellion ___ 6. Toleration Act ___ 7. King Philips War ___ 8. Navigation Act ___ 9. West Jersey Concessions ___ 10. Quakers ___ 11. Covenant Chain ___ 12. Maryland Act Concerning Negroes and Other Slaves a. refers to elites in America becoming more culturally English b. allowed Protestant Dissenters to worship freely in England c. government regulation of the nations economy (to ensure national power) d. made all black servants in the corresponding colony slaves for life e. had a monopoly on the slave trade f. was a very liberal frame for government g. was demanded by the English over their former Dutch rulers h. agreement between New York and the Iroquois i. believed in the equality of all persons j. law that regulated the shipping and selling of colonial products k. conflict in which the poor of Virginia demanded change l. conflict between New Englanders and Indians that resulted in more land for New Englanders

Q: Englands terms of surrender with New Netherland eliminated religious toleration because the English leaders believed it inhibited economic growth.

Q: New Netherland never became an important or heavily populated colony in the Dutch empire.

Q: In the first fifty years of the Charleston port, more Indian slaves were exported than African slaves imported.

Q: Which of the following was a result of the physical isolation of the British colonies from Great Britain? a. The colonial elite experienced Anglicization. b. The wealthy rejected British culture. c. The British refused to send luxury goods to the colonies. d. Elites and poor farmers alike quickly forgot about British culture. e. Indian dress and art came to dominate the homes of the wealthy.

Q: How did the planter elites who lived in Charleston tend to view colonial society? a. They saw taking care of impoverished workers as their duty. b. They prized everyone in society playing a role in governance. c. They saw themselves as aristocrats who knew how best to run South Carolina. d. They believed that English liberty granted voting privileges to all white males. e. They were so elitist that they were reluctant to bring slaves into their homes.

Q: How did the colonial elite view their role in society? a. Social obligations demanded that they give everyone the same liberties they enjoyed. b. It meant the power to rulethe right of those blessed with wealth and prominence to dominate others. c. They should enjoy their wealth but not parade it by dressing differently or by living in homes that were more elaborate than those of a lower status. d. They should work hard, because that is how they would make more money. e. They felt that they had no role and that those beneath them should just take care of themselves.

Q: In 1750, taking the English American colonies as a whole, the richest 10 percent of the population owned a. 10 percent of the wealth. b. 50 percent of the wealth. c. 90 percent of the wealth. d. 20 percent of the wealth. e. 75 percent of the wealth.

Q: Which of the following statements about poverty in eighteenth-century English America is accurate? a. The colonial attitudes about poverty mirrored the attitudes in England, with the rich tending to blame the poor. b. In colonial cities, the income of propertyless wage earners steadily increased. c. The idea of rural communities and cities providing assistance or work for the poor did not yet exist. d. The refusal of Indian tribes to trade with colonists was a primary reason for the increase in poverty overall. e. The gap between rich and poor decreased rapidly in the eighteenth century.

Q: Which of the following was true of poverty in the colonial period? a. Poverty was greater in the colonies than it was in Great Britain, which had more economic activity. b. The percentage of colonists living in poverty was great because the northern colonists considered slaves poverty-stricken. c. Limited supplies of land, especially for inheritance, contributed to poverty. d. Colonists differed greatly from the British back in England in how they viewed poverty and those living in poverty. e. It declined in the cities because of the rise of consumer markets.

Q: During the colonial era, Philadelphia a. became the financial, cultural, and commercial center of British North America. b. was one of the empires least successful seaports. c. was large by European standards. d. was populated almost entirely by wealthy citizens. e. came under the almost dictatorial control of Benjamin Franklin.

Q: English American cities a. were much larger than Spanish American cities. b. served mainly as sites of factory production. c. were home to large populations of successful artisans. d. contained 90 percent of the colonial population. e. contained a steadily decreasing number of poor, propertyless wage earners.

Q: The Atlantic World refers to a. Britain and its American colonies. b. an interdependent web in which diverse people, ideas, and goods of several empires and continents flowed back and forth across the Atlantic. c. trade among the English American colonies that took place along the Atlantic coast. d. the name of a plan devised by the Spanish and Portuguese to exclude Britain from transatlantic trade. e. a plan by the Dutch to recapture New York and control its trade with Europe.

Q: Over the course of the eighteenth century in colonial America, the a. percentage of landowners increased in urban areas. b. economic rights of slaves increased. c. wealthy wanted to spread the wealth to decrease poverty. d. percentage of those owning land was lower than in England. e. rich became richer.

Q: Which of the following was true of the colonial elite? a. The colonial aristocracy was far more powerful and wealthier than Englands nobility. b. Nearly every Virginian of note achieved prominence through family connections. c. The gap between rich and poor was nearly nonexistent. d. Few spoke English as a first language. e. Mercantile success was dependent on business talent as opposed to personal connections.