In 1973, members of the American Indian Movement occupied which site in South Dakota for 71 days?
Wounded Knee
✓
Fort Laramie
Little Bighorn
Sand Creek
Correct Answer
Wounded Knee
Wounded Knee, on the Pine Ridge Reservation, was the site of the 1890 massacre of Lakota people, so occupying it in 1973 drew attention to broken treaties and poverty. Fort Laramie is in Wyoming and was the site where treaties with the Lakota and other Plains nations were signed in 1851 and 1868. Little Bighorn is in Montana and was the site of the 1876 battle. Sand Creek is in Colorado and was the site of an 1864 massacre.
Category: Identity Movements
Question 2
Why are the 1969 Stonewall riots in New York City considered significant?
They ended the military's ban on gay service members
They sparked a more assertive movement for gay rights
✓
They brought nationwide legalization of same-sex marriage
They led Congress to pass a federal hate crimes law
Correct Answer
They sparked a more assertive movement for gay rights
When police raided the Stonewall Inn, patrons fought back, and the protests that followed inspired new, more militant groups such as the Gay Liberation Front. Ending the military's ban on gay service members did not happen until 2011. Nationwide legalization of same-sex marriage came through a Supreme Court ruling in 2015. A federal hate crimes law covering sexual orientation was passed only in 2009.
Category: Identity Movements
Question 3
What did Title IX of the Education Amendments of 1972 prohibit?
Race discrimination in the sale and rental of housing
Unequal pay for men and women doing the same job
Sex discrimination in federally funded education programs
✓
State laws that restricted access to abortion
Correct Answer
Sex discrimination in federally funded education programs
Title IX barred schools and colleges that receive federal money from discriminating on the basis of sex, which greatly expanded women's athletics; Representative Patsy Mink of Hawaii was a co-author. Race discrimination in housing was addressed by the Civil Rights Act of 1968. Unequal pay for the same job was targeted by the Equal Pay Act of 1963. State laws restricting abortion were struck down by the Supreme Court in Roe v. Wade in 1973.
Category: Identity Movements
Question 4
What happened to the Equal Rights Amendment by the ratification deadline of 1982?
It was ratified and added to the Constitution in 1977
It was struck down by the Supreme Court in 1975
It was vetoed by President Nixon
It fell short of the number of states needed
✓
Correct Answer
It fell short of the number of states needed
Ratification required approval by three-fourths of the states, but well-organized opposition from socially conservative groups stalled it, and it was still short even after Congress extended the original 1979 deadline to 1982. It was not ratified and added to the Constitution in 1977. The Supreme Court did not strike it down. Constitutional amendments go to the states, not to the president, so Nixon could not veto it.
Category: Identity Movements
Question 5
What milestone did Shirley Chisholm reach in 1968?
She became the first Black woman elected to Congress
✓
She became the first woman appointed to the Supreme Court
She became the first woman to serve as secretary of state
She became the founding president of the National Organization for Women
Correct Answer
She became the first Black woman elected to Congress
Chisholm won a seat in the House from Brooklyn, New York, and in 1972 she ran for the Democratic presidential nomination. The first woman appointed to the Supreme Court was Sandra Day O'Connor in 1981. The first woman to serve as secretary of state was Madeleine Albright in 1997. The founding president of the National Organization for Women was Betty Friedan.
Category: Identity Movements
Question 6
Whom did Richard Nixon mean by the "silent majority"?
Antiwar students who refused to vote in the 1968 election
Middle-class and working-class Americans who did not join protests
✓
Southern Democrats who voted for George Wallace
Civil rights activists who favored nonviolent tactics
Correct Answer
Middle-class and working-class Americans who did not join protests
Nixon appealed to ordinary Americans in the North and South who were tired of protest and disorder and who, he argued, quietly supported his policies. Antiwar students who refused to vote were among the protesters he contrasted with this group. Southern Democrats who voted for Wallace were a separate bloc he hoped to win over. Civil rights activists were not the audience of the phrase.
Category: Nixon's Politics
Question 7
Nixon's southern strategy aimed to win over White Southern voters mainly by doing what?
Promising faster enforcement of school desegregation
Calling for a stronger federal voting rights law
Opposing forced integration measures such as busing
✓
Pledging higher federal price supports for cotton
Correct Answer
Opposing forced integration measures such as busing
Nixon spoke out against court-ordered busing, which appealed to White Southerners who resented federal desegregation orders and helped pull White Southern Democrats toward the Republican Party. Promising faster enforcement of school desegregation would have pushed those voters away. Calling for a stronger federal voting rights law would also have alienated them. Pledging higher price supports for cotton was not the core of the strategy.
Category: Nixon's Politics
Question 8
Which description fits George Wallace's 1968 presidential campaign?
A Democratic nomination won after a bitter primary fight
An antiwar challenge to Johnson in New Hampshire
A Republican bid that lost the nomination to Nixon
A third-party run that carried several Southern states
✓
Correct Answer
A third-party run that carried several Southern states
Wallace, the segregationist former governor of Alabama, ran on the American Independent Party ticket and carried five Southern states. The Democratic nomination went to Hubert Humphrey. The antiwar challenge to Johnson in New Hampshire was led by Eugene McCarthy. Wallace was not a Republican and did not compete for that party's nomination.
Category: Nixon's Politics
Question 9
What did the term stagflation describe in the 1970s American economy?
Rising prices together with high unemployment
✓
Falling prices together with rising output
Rapid growth driven by very low interest rates
A sudden collapse in stock market prices
Correct Answer
Rising prices together with high unemployment
Economists had expected inflation and unemployment to move in opposite directions, so their rising together in the 1970s, worsened by the oil embargo of 1973 to 1974, was a new and frustrating problem. Falling prices together with rising output describe deflationary growth, the opposite of the 1970s pattern. Rapid growth driven by low interest rates does not describe the decade. A sudden collapse in stock prices describes a crash such as that of 1929.
Category: Nixon's Politics
Question 10
Why was Nixon's 1972 visit to the People's Republic of China significant?
It ended the Korean War with a formal peace treaty
It opened relations with the Communist government in Beijing
✓
It created a military alliance against the Soviet Union
It forced China to give up its seat at the United Nations
Correct Answer
It opened relations with the Communist government in Beijing
Nixon, a longtime anti-Communist, became the first American president to visit Communist China, opening the way to normal diplomatic relations and putting pressure on the Soviet Union. The Korean War had ended with an armistice in 1953, and no peace treaty followed. The visit did not create a formal military alliance. China kept its seat at the United Nations, which it had gained in 1971.
Category: Nixon Foreign Policy
Question 11
What was the goal of the SALT agreement that Nixon signed in Moscow in 1972?
To reunite East Germany and West Germany
To remove Soviet troops from Eastern Europe
To limit the growth of U.S. and Soviet nuclear arsenals
✓
To ban every kind of nuclear weapons test
Correct Answer
To limit the growth of U.S. and Soviet nuclear arsenals
The Strategic Arms Limitation Talks produced limits on missiles and antimissile defenses, a centerpiece of the easing of tensions called detente. Reuniting East and West Germany did not happen until 1990. Removing Soviet troops from Eastern Europe was not part of the agreement. Banning every kind of nuclear weapons test was not its aim; the 1963 treaty had banned only tests above ground and underwater.
Category: Nixon Foreign Policy
Question 12
What was Nixon's policy of Vietnamization?
Sending more American troops to win a quick military victory
Dividing Vietnam permanently at the 17th parallel
Holding national elections to reunite North and South
Turning combat over to South Vietnamese troops as U.S. forces left
✓
Correct Answer
Turning combat over to South Vietnamese troops as U.S. forces left
Vietnamization meant training and arming the South Vietnamese army to fight the war while American troops were gradually withdrawn. Sending more American troops was Johnson's approach, which Nixon reversed. Dividing Vietnam at the 17th parallel came from the Geneva Accords of 1954. Holding national elections to reunite the country was promised in 1954 but never carried out.
Category: Vietnam's End
Question 13
In May 1970, Ohio National Guard troops killed four students at Kent State University during campus protests against which action?
The American invasion of Cambodia
✓
The Paris peace agreement
The Watergate break-in
The Tet Offensive
Correct Answer
The American invasion of Cambodia
Nixon announced on April 30, 1970, that U.S. troops were entering Cambodia to attack North Vietnamese bases, which looked like a widening of the war and set off protests on hundreds of campuses. The Paris peace agreement came in 1973. The Watergate break-in happened in 1972. The Tet Offensive was a North Vietnamese attack in 1968, not an American action.
Category: Vietnam's End
Question 14
What did the Pentagon Papers, leaked by Daniel Ellsberg and published in 1971, reveal?
That Nixon's campaign had paid the Watergate burglars
That earlier administrations had misled the public about the war
✓
That the Soviet Union was building missile bases in Cuba
That North Vietnam had agreed to secret peace terms
Correct Answer
That earlier administrations had misled the public about the war
The papers were a secret Defense Department study of the war, and they showed that officials had deceived Americans about U.S. aims and progress in Vietnam; the Supreme Court refused to stop their publication. Payments to the Watergate burglars came to light later, during the Watergate investigations. Soviet missile bases in Cuba were the subject of the 1962 crisis. Secret peace terms with North Vietnam were not what the study contained.
Category: Vietnam's End
Question 15
On June 17, 1972, police arrested five men inside the Watergate complex while they were breaking into the offices of which organization?
Republican National Committee
Federal Bureau of Investigation
Democratic National Committee
✓
Committee to Re-Elect the President
Correct Answer
Democratic National Committee
The burglars were trying to plant listening devices and copy documents at the headquarters of the Democratic Party, and they were soon tied to Nixon's campaign. The Republican National Committee was Nixon's own party's organization. The Federal Bureau of Investigation later investigated the break-in. The Committee to Re-Elect the President was the Nixon campaign group that had paid for the operation, not its target.
Category: Watergate
Question 16
What was the Saturday Night Massacre of October 1973?
The shooting of student protesters by National Guard troops
The arrest of the burglars inside the Watergate complex
The House vote approving articles of impeachment
Nixon's order to fire special prosecutor Archibald Cox
✓
Correct Answer
Nixon's order to fire special prosecutor Archibald Cox
When Cox demanded the White House tapes, Nixon ordered him fired; Attorney General Elliot Richardson and his deputy resigned rather than carry out the order, and public outrage pushed the House toward an impeachment inquiry. The shooting of student protesters describes Kent State in 1970. The arrest of the burglars took place in June 1972. The House Judiciary Committee did not approve articles of impeachment until July 1974.
Category: Watergate
Question 17
What finally led Richard Nixon to resign in August 1974?
A Supreme Court order to release tapes showing his role in the cover-up
✓
A Senate vote that removed him from office after a trial
A federal grand jury indictment that charged him with burglary
A defeat in the 1972 election that ended his term
Correct Answer
A Supreme Court order to release tapes showing his role in the cover-up
In United States v. Nixon the Court ruled unanimously that he had to hand over the tapes, and one recording showed him ordering steps to block the investigation days after the break-in. His remaining support in Congress collapsed, impeachment and removal became nearly certain, and he resigned days later. The Senate never held a trial, because he resigned first. A grand jury named him only as an unindicted co-conspirator. Nixon won the 1972 election by a landslide.
Category: Watergate
Question 18
Why did Gerald Ford's pardon of Richard Nixon in September 1974 hurt Ford politically?
It required Ford to give up the vice presidency
Many Americans saw it as sparing Nixon from accountability
✓
It freed the convicted Watergate burglars from prison
It was overturned by the Supreme Court within a year
Correct Answer
Many Americans saw it as sparing Nixon from accountability
Ford said the pardon would end the national ordeal, but many voters believed Nixon should have faced the courts, and some suspected a deal, which hurt Ford in the 1976 election. Ford was already president, so giving up the vice presidency was not an issue. The pardon covered only Nixon and did not free the convicted burglars. The Supreme Court never overturned it.
Category: Ford and Carter
Question 19
The Camp David Accords negotiated by Jimmy Carter in 1978 laid the groundwork for a peace treaty between which two nations?
Syria and Israel
Iran and Iraq
Egypt and Israel
✓
Jordan and Lebanon
Correct Answer
Egypt and Israel
Carter hosted Egyptian President Anwar Sadat and Israeli Prime Minister Menachem Begin at the presidential retreat, and the two nations signed a peace treaty in 1979. Syria and Israel did not reach a peace agreement. Iran and Iraq went to war with each other in 1980. Jordan and Lebanon were not the parties at Camp David.
Category: Ford and Carter
Question 20
Iranian militants seized the U.S. embassy in Tehran in November 1979 after which event angered them?
The United States sent troops into neighboring Afghanistan
President Carter cut off all American oil purchases from Iran
The United States backed Iraq in a new war against Iran
The deposed shah was admitted to the United States for medical treatment
✓
Correct Answer
The deposed shah was admitted to the United States for medical treatment
Many Iranians resented decades of American support for the shah, and his admission to the United States convinced the militants that Washington might try to restore him, so they took the embassy staff hostage. The United States did not send troops into Afghanistan; the Soviet Union invaded it in December 1979. Carter cut off Iranian oil imports only after the seizure, in response to it. The Iran-Iraq war began in 1980, after the embassy was taken.
Category: Ford and Carter