Many public school students are taught that the history of American culture is like a melting pot.  Diverse people come to this country and eventually become Americans.  But according to a video presented in class by your instructor, some historians have called the West the "melting pot" that wouldn't melt.  To support their claim, they provided evidence of the many groups in post Civil War Era that kept their distinctive ethnic language and practices without losing them over time.{TRUE}

The validity of Presidential or Congressional Reconstruction relies on the very definition of just what had occurred at the start of the Civil War.  Lincoln believed that the South had no right to secede, and that this violation was the work of individual state leaders.  Therefore, he assumed it was his job as President, with the Constitutional executive power to issue pardons, to be the authority during the Reconstruction Period.  Congress, on the other hand, believe the South had in fact seceded.  Now, as territories, it would be the role of Congress to use its Constitutional power to admit new states to the Union.  The Wade-Davis Bill, with its punitive treatment of the former rebels, is the best example of what came to be known as Presidential Reconstruction, while the 10% Plan would best describe the Radical Republican's plan for Congressional Reconstruction.{FALSE}

In the last 5 weeks of class, students should have  experienced all three strains of American nativism as presented by historian John Higham in his book Strangers in the Land.  This included racial nativism, as depicted by the treatment of the Chinese, Native Americans, and African-Americans.  The anti-radical strain of nativism became evident as some workers, attempting to organize unions, became too violent and were influenced by anarchists and socialists.  Even anti-Catholic nativism was evident with the involvement of Sunday beer drinking, non-Protestant ethnic groups and the labor strife of the late 19th Century.{TRUE}


BUFFALO

Estimations of the number of buffalo that were killed in the last half of the 19th Century vary widely.  From the Native American video point of view, the number is 60,000,000.  From a more "traditional" documentary on the West, and a former textbook used by your instructor, the number used was 15,000,000.  Even the internet comes in with a commonly accepted number of 40,000,000.  Regardless of the variance, the number do, in fact, present students with the dilemma of historical bias, with the effect being a greater tragedy if the higher numbers are believed to be accurate.{TRUE}