Historian Barbara Fields states: "If a single event caused the war, it was the establishment of the United States ...with slavery still a part of its heritage." The Constitution of the United States recognized this heritage with a clause stating:
A. slavery was a positive good.
B. that certain specific northern states should be free, and certain specific southern states slaveholding.
C. each slave should be counted as 3/5 of a person when deciding how many seats a state should have in the House of Representatives.
D. that there should be no limitation on the importation of slaves.
ANSWER: C

The cotton gin was
A. an alcoholic beverage favored by planters in Louisiana.
B. a textile industry invention that enabled bolts of cloth to be processed cheaply and quickly, thereby creating a huge demand for cotton.
C. a fungus that infected cotton plants, requiring much slave labor to harvest nearly-ripe bolls in a great hurry.
D. a machine that enabled cotton to be extracted from its seeds easily and swiftly, making the crop far more profitable.
ANSWER: D

An abolitionist was a person who
A. thought slavery would gradually disappear.
B. opposed slavery, but also opposed any drastic action that might disrupt the political unity of the nation.
C. demanded an immediate end to slavery.
D. sought to make slavery more tolerable by bringing religion to the slaves.
ANSWER: C

Elijah Lovejoy was shot because he
A. ran an antislavery newspaper in Illinois.
B. led a slave uprising in Southampton county, Virginia, in 1831.
C. was South Carolina's leading secessionist.
D. was a British journalist who traveled in the South and reported on the conditions in which slaves lived.
ANSWER: A

John Brown was
A. a leading manufacturer of firearms in New Haven, Connecticut.
B. an ardent foe of slavery willing to kill advocates of the institution to further the antislavery cause.
C. Abraham Lincoln's first-term vice president.
D. a white-haired Virginia fanatic who rallied his neighbors in support of secession.
ANSWER: B

Harriet Beecher Stowe
A. understood her fellow woman writer, Mary Boykin Chesnut, and was sympathetic to the difficulties a planter's wife faced.
B. wrote one of the world's most influential novels, a book that helped bring about major social reform.
C. was a former slave who risked recapture to help dozens of other slaves escape.
D. was the wife of an overbearing but able antislavery senator from Wisconsin.
ANSWER: B

James Buchanan was
A. so distraught over the secession crisis that he became the first American president to resign the office.
B. a morally obtuse president who, not grasping the gravity of the risk of war, turned his attention to foreign affairs.
C. a stubborn president, so rigidly antislavery that he was unable to compromise to save the Union.
D. the lame duck president who, in 1861, hoped in vain that president-elect Abraham Lincoln would join him in an action to save the Union.
ANSWER: D

In his first inaugural speech, Abraham Lincoln
A. begged his "dissatisfied countrymen" not to start a civil war.
B. declared that if war must come, it must be a crusade against slavery.
C. pronounced "malice toward none."
D. declared that he would defend Fort Sumter at all costs-.
ANSWER: A

The Confederate States of America consisted of
A. all the slaveholding states.
B. no state with territory north of the Mason-Dixon line.
C. eleven states governed by a constitution closely patterned on the Constitution of the United States.
D. a federation of eleven slaveholding states formally recognizing states' rights to be the governing principle of the new nation.
ANSWER: C

When General McClellan wrote to his wife that he had seen the "original gorilla" he was referring to:
A. a powerful animal brought from Africa and, despite the war, displayed to curious crowds at the Smithsonian Institution.
B. General Gustav P.T. Beauregard, whom he could see through his telescope when the Confederate general had his headquarters across the Potomac River in the Custis mansion.
C. President Lincoln.
D. his Confederate-sympathizing father-in-law.
ANSWER: C

Which of the following men was not in Abraham Lincoln's cabinet:
A. William Henry Seward
B. George Templeton Strong
C. Salmon P. Chase
D. Edwin M. Stanton
ANSWER: B

The peninsula of the Peninsula Campaign was
A. the area of Maryland, encompassing Washington, D.C., that stretched south and along the Potomac River.
B. the area between the James and York rivers south of Richmond.
C. the high country leading toward Richmond over which it should have been easy for McClellan to take the city.
D. a swamp so difficult to cross as to preclude any advance by McClellan.
ANSWER: B


During the battle of Shiloh, Albert Sidney Johnston
A. was shot by his own men.
B. was blamed by Jefferson Davis for the defeat at Shiloh.
C. died from loss of blood because he had sent his surgeon to aid a wounded federal soldier and no tourniquet was applied to his wound.
D. was scornful of southern honor and the virtues of southern women.
ANSWER: C

The Confederate Conscription Act was
A. the first military draft in American history.
B. a law authorizing calling up slaves to fight for the South.
C. a way of building morale by having women work in munitions factories while men were at the front.
D. a way of drafting men for the army that demonstrated the remarkable equality of an who fought for the southern cause.
ANSWER: A

When Frederick Douglass spoke of an "irrepressible conflict," he meant a quarrel that could be ended only when
A. political unity was totally secure.
B. slavery was abolished.
C. the South was made to confess to the error of its ways.
D. the "terrible swift sword" of the Union armies had triumphed.
ANSWER: B

New Orleans
A. with its fine port and huge supply of cotton, was the bulwark of Confederate strength.
B. fell to Admiral David Farragut's fleet and was in Union hands from April 1862.
C. was the southern city with the greatest pro-Union sentiment.
D. prevented the North from gaining control of the Mississippi until the battle of Vicksburg.
ANSWER: B

"Emancipation" meant
A. freedom for all slaves, once the war was won.
B. freedom for any slave willing to fight for the Union.
C. a gradual working-out of the slavery question.
D. that white southerners could be assured of a postwar labor force, provided they ceased fighting.
ANSWER: A

Thomas J. "Stonewall" Jackson can best be described as
A. a flamboyant champion of southern honor.
B. a pious, determined soldier who, despite poor horsemanship and a habit of sucking lemons, was a relentless fighter.
C. one of the greatest of Confederate cavalrymen.
D. "our strongest pillar" which, as Jefferson Davis said when Jackson died, "had been broken."
ANSWER: B

Union General Benjamin Franklin Butler was
A. so tolerant of secessionists in New Orleans that President Lincoln had to remove him from command of the occupying force.
B. so tolerant of black refugees that President Lincoln was forced to amend his attitude towards escaping slaves.
C. so tolerant of other generals that General Grant decided that political generals who, like Butler, had not been to West Point, could be trusted.
D. so tolerant of the women volunteers in the hospitals that he is a hero to feminist historians.
ANSWER: B

According the Joseph Johnston, initially, on taking command outside Richmond, Robert E. Lee's greatest asset was that
A. he had the confidence of Jefferson Davis and his administration.
B. he had commanded in the prewar army of the United States and had firsthand understanding of its key officers and their strategies.
C. he was fighting in his native Virginia, whose countryside he knew well.
D. his engaging manner appealed to soldiers eager for a leader they could identify with.
ANSWER: A

Julia Ward Howe's Battle Hymn of the Republic is
A. the most poignant antiwar song to come out of the Civil War.
B. one of the greatest musical appeals to martial valor ever written.
C. a haunting anthem that suggests a deep feminist concern for humane values.
D. a song sung today by people of all political persuasions that similarly rallied troops on both sides during the Civil War.
ANSWER: B

When, in the summer of 1862, Abraham Lincoln decided to issue the Emancipation Proclamation, his cabinet responded with
A. immense relief and joy.
B. the warning that such an action, unless accompanied by a military victory, would look like an act of desperation.
C. a discussion of the problems that would arise during Reconstruction when the nation had to decide how freed slaves would fit into the American society.
D. fear that European powers, seeing the move as a last ditch effort to save an already fatally weakened Union, would come into the war on the side of the Confederacy.
ANSWER: B

Antietam was
A.  the clear-cut victory that not only made it safe to issue the Emancipation Proclamation but ensured its acceptance.
B. a gruesome battle in which neither side gained any important advantage.
C.  the only major battle of the war in which true tactical skill was on display in both armies.
D.  yet another battle that the Confederates won, despite being outnumbered by Union forces.
ANSWER: B

Early in the war, European nations
A. championed the cause of the Union as the only means for ending slavery.
B. arranged for diplomatic recognition of the Confederate States of America.
C. ignoring slavery, saw the southern rebellion as similar to European nationalist stirrings.
D. urged the South to hold cotton off the market in order to force textile mill owners in need of raw materials to champion the Confederate cause.
ANSWER: B