History of the United States of America: a special on the history and development of the United States, from its foundation to Clinton.
HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA
History of the United States of America.
America has only been in history for just four centuries and is the newest of the great nations . Despite its youth, the history of the United States is, from many points of view, the most interesting. In fact, most of the forces that created the modern world have acted on America: imperialism , nationalism , immigration , industrialism , science , religion , democracy and freedom .
America is today, despite its young age, the oldest republic and the oldest democracy, and is founded on the oldest written Constitution in the world, based on the principle of freedom of the individual.
Let’s see together the long historical process that led this immense territory to gradually take on the physiognomy it has today: from its origins to colonial settlement ; from the War of Independence to the Constitution ; from the Civil War to Clinton through the First and Second World Wars , the crisis of ’29 and theNew Deal … in short, the whole history of the United States of America summarized in a clear and concise way.
United States: the history of the American colonies
United States of America and the history of the 13 American colonies. Summary of American colonization and the causes of the conflict with England
UNITED STATES: THE HISTORY OF THE AMERICAN COLONIES
American colonies – Source: Istock
The formation of the United States , which became an independent nation at the end of the 18th century, has its origins in the geographical explorations started at the end of the 15th century with the travels of Christopher Columbus and Giovanni Caboto . At the beginning of the 16th century the first groups of European settlers , coming mainly from Spain , France and England , settled in the North American territories where groups of semi-nomadic indigenous lived. If we exclude the regions of present-day Mexico, which became a possession of the Spaniards, theEuropean colonization remained episodic until the end of the 16th century . The European wars between Spain and England had international repercussions when the British, pushed to contend with the Spanish for supremacy over the seas, under the impulse of Walter Raleigh promoted the formation of stable colonies in Virginia.
One more tip
SOS homework : subscribe to Facebook groups to help you study Literature , History and Summaries and topics !
THE FIRST SETTLEMENTS IN THE AMERICAN COLONIES
At the beginning of the seventeenth century the Company of Virginia , born from an association of London merchants , after having obtained privileges from the Crown for the exploitation of the Atlantic coast of North America, established at the mouth of the James River, in the Chesapeake Bay , the first permanent settlement, Jamestown. Almost at the same time French explorers proceeded to reconnaissance the territory that included the entire Mississippi River valley, laying the foundations for the control of the vast area between the Great Lakes region and the Gulf of Mexico, while Dutch colonists they settled on the coast, founding in 1624 the city of New Amsterdam (now New York). In the second decade of the seventeenth century, British colonization was favored by the emigration of people belonging to religious sects , mostly of Puritan orientation , who were looking for a place where they could freely exercise their worship and build a society tailored to their ideals. The voyage that the Pilgrim Fathers , members of a Calvinist congregation, made aboard the Mayflower in 1620 and the foundation of the colony of Plymouth , New England, would become constitutive events of the historical identity of the United States . The strong religious imprint, the free initiative of individuals united by common ethical values , the democratic form of the government of the colony , a notable autonomy from London, which materialized in forms of self-government, were the basic features on which the colonial model was built in the territory of New England.
HISTORY OF THE 13 AMERICAN COLONIES
During the eighteenth century, the peculiarities of the three great North American areas in which the English colonial states were inserted, rose to the number of thirteen : the southern one (Virginia, Maryland, South and North Carolina, and Georgia), in which the large estates dominated agricultural fields reserved for the cultivation of rice, tobacco and cotton; the central one (New York, New Jersey, Delaware and Pennsylvania), in which grain farming and naval trade were integrated; the northern one (Massachusetts, Connecticut, Rhode Island and New Hampshire), the heart of the first English colonization, also with a mixed economy , agricultural and manufacturing, which had its driving force in the port of Boston.
American war of independence: summary, causes and consequences.
Causes, events and consequences of the American Revolutionary War, which on 4 July 1776 led the United States to secede from England
WAR OF AMERICAN INDEPENDENCE
American Revolutionary War – Source: Istock
July 4th is officially remembered all over the world, but especially overseas, as one of the most important dates ever. It is in fact the day in which the United States of America declared its independence from England, their homeland, in what is remembered as the American War of Independence .
But how exactly did this victory come about? Let’s first look at the causes and developments.
One more tip
SOS homework : subscribe to Facebook groups to help you study Literature , History and Summaries and topics !
WAR OF AMERICAN INDEPENDENCE: CAUSES
The economic supremacy of England in world trade was sanctioned by territorial expansion in America, achieved with military victories against Spain before , in the War of the Spanish Succession (1701-1714) and then of France , in the Seven Years War ( 1756-1763), after which the British obtained Canada, Florida, eastern Louisiana.
Meanwhile, the thirteen American states acquired positions of strength in the relationship with the motherland, because the reasons for the commercial exchange turned in their favor: exports of timber, wheat, tobacco, cotton grew, and the number of ships manufactured in American shipyards, while decreasing importing goods from England. They were the first signs of a desire for independence. The population of the colonies had meanwhile risen from 250,000 in 1700 to over two million in 1770. Also on the political level the relationship between the colonies and the mother country changed and when the parliament English in 1764-65 imposed Sugar and Molasses Act(sugar tax) and the Stamp Act (tax on official acts) were born the first forms of resistance of the thirteen colonies , which decided to boycott English goods. We were moving towards American independence .
THE PROTEST AGAINST THE TAX ON TEA IN BOSTON
In Boston, in 1770 , an English contingent fired on the crowd demonstrating against new taxes, causing some deaths: the episode aroused strong emotion and contributed to aggravate the rift between the London government and the American colonists.
In the following years, positions radicalized on both sides, while the protest against the tea tax continued . In December 1773 the settlers, in protest against the concession of the monopoly of the sale of tea to the East India Company, sank three ships loaded with tea at anchor in the port of Boston ( Boston Tea Party ). Retaliation by the London government followed, to which the representatives of the thirteen states responded by strengthening their alliance and claiming self-government of the colonies in the first Continental Congress of 5 September 1774 .
AMERICAN DECLARATION OF INDEPENDENCE: SUMMARY
Shortly thereafter, the political conflict turned into an armed confrontation , initially undertaken by the state of Massachusetts and became a general choice at the Second Continental Congress (1775), when the thirteen states voted in favor of the recruitment of an army, which they entrusted to the command of George Washington : it was the beginning of the American Revolution that would bring the country’s independence. They also decided to issue an American currency and assumed the prerogatives of governing authority of the colonies. Overcoming the resistance of the moderates and loyalists, opposed to the separation from England, the most radical representatives fought until the approval of theDeclaration of Independence ( July 4, 1776 ), which represented the birth certificate of the United States .
WAR OF AMERICAN INDEPENDENCE: CONSEQUENCES
On the side of the American insurgents and after their victory at Saratoga Springs in 1777, France, Holland and Spain took the field: their military (especially French) and financial aid shifted the balance of the conflict. After five years of operations , marked by rare clashes in the open field, mostly concluded in favor of the Americans, and following the English defeat at Yorktown (1781), peace negotiations were entered into which, with the mediation of France, resulted in the signing of the treaty of Paris (1783) and in the independence of the American colonies.
American Civil War: Summary
Summary of the American Civil War: causes and consequences of the conflict between the United States of America and the Confederate States of America
WAR OF THE AMERICAN SECESSION: CAUSES – THE QUESTION OF SLAVERY
American Civil War (1861-1865) – Source: Istock
The issue of slavery became disruptive after the mid-nineteenth century, when the new Republican Party gave political representation to the anti- slavery forces, which included both bourgeois and workers of the Northern states, motivated by humanitarian reasons and the belief of the superiority of the free labor market. , both peasants and settlers from almost all the states that have recently entered the Union.
One more tip
SOS homework : subscribe to Facebook groups to help you study Literature , History and Summaries and topics !
THE DIFFERENCES BETWEEN NORTH AND SOUTH
The conflict between the abolitionist North and the slave South resulted in civil war , after the election as president of the United States (November 1860) of Abraham Lincoln , head of the Republican Party , in favor of a gradual abolition of slavery. In December 1860, eleven southern states broke away from the Union, forming an independent confederation under the presidency of Jefferson Davis and with its own capital, Richmond, Virginia , in the Confederate States of America (February 1861) . The Northhe responded with the mobilization of an army, which was opposed by the Southern forces led by General Robert Lee. In April there was the first armed clash of the civil war which was to be fought for four years with a great deployment of men and weapons. The mobilization of a large number of soldiers (almost five million between the two armies) and the use of new military technology – for the first time the repeating rifle, mines, machine guns, battleships, torpedoes were used, which made of this war the first of the industrial era – caused a very high number of victims (about 700,000) and very serious damage to the cities involved in the conflict.
WAR OF SECESSION: THE OUTCOME OF THE CONFLICT
Abraham Lincoln: the 16th President of the United States of America – Source: Getty-Images
The economic and demographic superiority of the North weighed on the outcome of the conflict , which ended on 9 April 1865 with the capitulation of the Southerners . On April 14, Lincoln was assassinated in a play by a Southern fanatic. On 6 December the abolition of slavery was decreed in all states of the Union with the 13th amendment of the constitution . Two successive amendments, the 14th (1868) and the 15th (1870), guaranteed blacks full civil and political rights .
WAR OF SECESSION: THE AGE OF RECONSTRUCTION
Andrew Johnson: 17th President of the United States of America – Source: Getty-Images
With the victory of the feds the country could be fully unified. Contrary to Lincoln’s political line, which wanted to implement a national reconciliation plan, Congress imposed on his successor, Andrew Johnson , a so-called ” reconstruction ” project that actually established a regime of military occupation in the Southern states . The scourge of unemployment affected over 3.5 million freed blacks, while cotton production dropped dramatically. In a climate that is anything but pacified, the extremist sectors organized themselves into clandestine groups, including the Ku Klux Klan , which began to practice forms of terrorism and acts of violence against the black population.
The capitalist forces took great advantage of the post-war reconstruction , which favored the full development of the industrial economy and the expansion of Eastern capital to the entire American territory. In half a century, the United States moved to first place in the world ranking of industrial production. Industrial and financial concentrations ( corporations ), as well as the great economic empires ( trusts ) connected to the dynasties of capitalists, such as the Rockefellers , Carnegies , Morgans , Harrimans , assumed a dominant position .
The railways , organizing the largest national market in the world, served to commercialize the agricultural production of the West and to bring the interests and mentality of the capitalists of the East to the countryside. The decisive factor was the construction, in just seven years, of the first American transcontinental line which, starting from Omaha in Missouri, reached San Francisco, on the Pacific. Thanks to the train, the great plains of the West were transformed from land of ranchers into land of stable farmers, because the growth potential of agriculture was increased by the possibility of getting foodstuffs to arrive in a short time from the places of production to those of consumption. .
The new phase of economic development was fueled by a further progression in demographic growth , also favored by the economic crisis facing Europe. Over ten million people moved from England , Ireland and Germany . A subsequent migratory current poured, between 1890 and 1914, into the United States about 16 million Scandinavians, Jews , Poles, Russians and Italians, as well as 4 million Asians. It was then that the United Statesconfirmed their historical peculiarity, that of representing a melting pot of ethnic groups and races (the melting pot ), an authentic nation of nations. The rate of demographic increase reached a record level of 171% (from 32 million inhabitants in 1860 to 92 million in 1910), certainly supported by immigration , but even more so by the high birth rates .
Constitution of the United States of America: basic principles.
= Summary and Explanation of the Constitution of the United States of America of September 17, 1787. The Fundamental Principles of the US Suppema Law
CONSTITUTION OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA
The Constitution of the United States of America – Source: Istock
We talked about the American Revolution and the American War of Independence , one consequence of the other.
Having obtained independence, it was necessary to define which form of government the former colonies intended to apply. Each state had its own specific identities, not easily integrated with each other, and political divergences were deep: for this reason the idea prevailed that each state was free to self-determine by adopting its own constitution . A very diversified range of general options was configured, ranging from the maintenance of ancient papers drawn up in colonial times to the adoption of modern constitutions (as in the case of Virginia) which sanctioned the principles of equality, freedom, division of powers and they refused slavery . A federal system was chosen, which reconciled the traditions of particularism and religious differentiation, which characterized the individual states, with the reasons of common interest, military defense, the impulse to development cemented by the war of independence .
One more tip
SOS homework : subscribe to Facebook groups to help you study Literature , History and Summaries and topics !
THE TEXT OF THE AMERICAN CONSTITUTION: SUMMARY
The text of the Constitution of the United States of America , drawn up in the Philadelphia Congress of 1787 , sanctioned the ideas of the federalists: it established a relationship of direct election between citizens and the central government and direct sovereignty of the latter over the former in the context of certain competences (finances, foreign policy, war), without prejudice to the guarantee of ample autonomy to individual states . The main organs of the central government were established in the Congress (constituted by the Chamber , elected by universal male suffrage and with a proportional system, and by the Senate , composed of two senators for each state), in the President , elected every four years with an indirect system and with strong executive powers, and in the Supreme Court , guarantor of the federal union.
FROM THE AMERICAN CONSTITUTION TO THE FIRST ELECTIONS: GEORGE WASHINGTON
George Washington, 1st President of the United States of America – Source: Getty-Images
In the first election, held on February 4, 1789, George Washington was elected president . The economic momentum that marked the formative years of the United States was favored by the colonization of new lands to the west , where the new states of Vermont, Kentucky, Tennessee arose at the end of the eighteenth century, followed in the early nineteenth century by Ohio, Indiana, Michigan and Wisconsin. Then began the advance of the frontier towards the Pacific , which gave the Americans a space that gradually became continental in size, an immense reservoir of land and agricultural and mineral resources.
HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: JEFFERSON’S ELECTION
Portrait of Thomas Jefferson – Source: Istock
The political debate, exacerbated by the echoes of the French Revolution and by the opposition to the sovereignty of federal power, saw the emergence of the republican party : to the latter belonged Thomas Jefferson , who, elected president in 1800 and reconfirmed in office in 1804 , interpreted the will of the great mass of small landowners ( farmers ), shifting the federal balance in favor of local self-government. The most important act of his presidency was the purchase of Louisiana , the annexation of which doubled the surface of the United States and directed its development towards colonization.
Between 1806 and 1809 Jefferson enacted a series of measures that prohibited trade with European countries ( Non-Importation Act, Embargo Act, Non-Intercourse Act ), in order to protest against the violations of the trade rights of neutral countries, made by France and England during the Napoleonic wars .
FROM THE AMERICAN CONSTITUTION TO THE CONFLICT WITH ENGLAND
During the presidency of James Madison , the growing tensions with Great Britain in 1812 led to the outbreak of the Anglo-American conflict , which lasted until 1814 with alternating fortunes, but without resolutive military operations: the Americans were unable to try to raise the Canada, remained loyal to the Crown, while the British managed to conquer Washington, being then blocked in Baltimore. In the Treaty of Ghent , which ended the conflict, the two countries undertook to return the territories they had conquered and to define the southern line of the Canadian border in subsequent talks. National sentiment emerged from that experience of the Americans, now convinced that their future should be completely free from European affairs.
History of the United States of America: territorial and economic development.
History of the United States of America: the entry of new states, the growth of the American economy and population in the post war of independence phase
The territorial development of the United States – Source: Istock
US HISTORY: STATES
In the first half of the nineteenth century the federal territory increased with the entry into the Union of the states of Louisiana (1812), Indiana (1816), Illinois (1818), Alabama (1819) and Florida ( 1819). In 1936, Texas, detached from Mexico, joined the Union; in 1846 the territory of the North-West, which the United States obtained following a treaty with Great Britain, and the vast South-West, obtained with the war against Mexico.
In the mid-nineteenth century the western border had reached the Pacific and there were more than thirty states adhering to the Union. A thriving and rapidly developing economy facilitated the early start of industrialization, which took root in the Atlantic states, particularly in those of the Northeast, where modern factories were built, at the forefront of technological development. The Americans were among the first to produce mechanically propelled boats and locomotives using steam and blast furnace technology . They then launched into the race to build railways so intensely that the American railway network in 1860 was the largest in the world. The new means of transportit accompanied and supported economic development, providing the infrastructural framework without which it would not have been possible to organize a space of that size. The speed of this development was most accentuated in the industrial sector, in which the United States ranked fourth in the world rankings by mid-century .
One more tip
SOS homework : subscribe to Facebook groups to help you study Literature , History and Summaries and topics !
American Revolution and birth of the United States of America: chronology, battles and protagonists
AMERICAN HISTORY 1800: DEMOGRAPHIC GROWTH
Equally exceptional was the population growth : the population jumped from 9.5 million inhabitants in 1820 to over 31 million in 1860, with a rate of increase that had no equal in history. The share of demographic development deriving from immigration was significant : a migratory flow , with an almost exponential growth, moved from Europe, mainly from Ireland , Germany and Scandinavia. Numerous Africans also arrived , deported into slavery to be exploited as a labor force in the cotton and tobacco plantations of the southern states. the immigrantswhites settled in part in the original thirteen states, in part they headed west, where a virgin and boundless territory offered an incessant reminder of the spirit of adventure of settlers and pioneers. The discovery of gold in California in 1849 prompted thousands of people to head west and populate the Pacific coast. This was the context in which the epic of the “Far West” (the “Far West”) was born, an epic at first of a peasant character, but soon personified by cattle breeders, artisans, traders, bankers, railway builders, came en masse to the call of the great business potential offered by the West. It was the indigenous peoples who paid for it,
HISTORY OF AMERICA IN BRIEF: ISOLATIONIST TRENDS
James Monroe, the 5th President of the United States of America – Source: Istock
After the war of 1812-1814 against the British, isolationist tendencies took root in American politics , favored precisely by Great Britain, convinced that America , protected from any European interference, would adapt to a position of economic dependence. The official proclamation of the isolationist line, summarized in the famous formula “America to the Americans” , goes back to the presidency of James Monroe . Under the presidency of Andrew Jackson (1829-1837), a leading exponent of the Democratic Party, the foundations of American democracy were laid, centered on widespread popular participation, on the expansion of suffrage (with the exclusion of blacks) and on the elective nature of many institutional offices. At the same time, party bipolarism stabilized : on the one hand the democratic party , with strong social settlement in the South, an expression of the libertarian and individualistic spirit of the men of the frontier, with radical streaks that placed it on the left; on the other, the Whig party , which appeared in 1834, an expression of the industrial and financial interests of the North.
HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT
Already at the end of the eighteenth century, economic and political differences appeared polarized by the contrast between the states of the North and those of the South , a contrast that for some time focused on customs tariffs: the southern states were in favor of free trade because raw materials their products, such as cotton and tobacco, were unrivaled on the international market. Commercial freedom was the condition for the prosperity of the agricultural economy of the large plantations of the South. The industrial states of the North, on the other hand, advocated protectionist measures to protect their goods from competition from English manufactures. The first threat of secession was launched precisely on trade issues when, in 1828, South Carolina declared itself ready to break away from the Union if a customs tariff was passed that was considered contrary to the interests of its farmers.
UNITED STATES OF AMERICA, THE CONTRAST BETWEEN NORTH AND SOUTH: TOWARDS THE SECESSION WAR
However, the fundamental cause of the conflict lay in slavery . The dividing line between slave states and anti-slavery states, defined by the Missouri Compromise (1820), ran between Missouri, Delaware, Maryland and West Virginia: slavery was prohibited in the north, legalized in the south . The issue affected some 4,000,000 Africans, over 12% of the population. The contrast intensified following the entry into the Union of the new statesTexas, Oregon and California, which challenged the Missouri Compromise, and then the Kansas and Nebraska Act, which established the principle that each state was free to decide on slavery, regardless of its location geographic. An abolitionist movement was formed in the 1930s to counter the traditions and interests of the slave front , which soon became a party-oriented political force, which took the name of Free Soil Party , a party of “free soil”, in favor of containing slavery in the ancient borders. From this nucleus the Republican Party was formed , in which a decidedly abolitionist current emerged.
