4. Finally, '''view multiple choice questions like a puzzle'''. Learn to enjoy solving them. Don't let any test or question intimidate you. Multiple choice questions become much easier when you find a way to enjoy figuring out their puzzles.
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==Review==
==The "Founding Fathers"==
"Founding Father" is a term in the dictionary, first coined by historians in 1886, which refers to the men who were most important in the founding of the United States, such as signing the Declaration of Independence or U.S. Constitution, or leading in other ways. The term "Framers" is more common today used to refer specifically to those who participated in the Constitutional Convention of 1787 in Philadelphia, which drafted the U.S. Constitution.
[[File:Declaration of Independence.jpg|right|300px|thumb|Agreeing on the Declaration of Independence, as painted later by the artist John Trumbull]]
The Founding Fathers, ranked roughly by their importance, includethe following (their colony is in parenthesis):
#George Washington(Virginia)#Benjamin Franklin(Pennsylvania)#Thomas Jefferson(Virginia)#Alexander Hamilton(New York)#James Madison(Virginia)#Samuel Adams(Massachusetts)#Thomas Paine(Pennsylvania)#Gouverneur Morris(New York, also Pennsylvania)#John Adams(Massachusetts)#Patrick Henry(Virginia)#John Jay(New York)#George Mason(Virginia)#Benjamin Rush(Pennsylvania)#John Witherspoon(New Jersey)#Roger Sherman(Connecticut)#John Hancock(Massachusetts)#James Monroe(Virginia)#James Wilson(Pennsylvania)#Robert Morris(Pennsylvania)#William Paterson(New Jersey)
Any exam on American History which includes the founding of our country will have multiple questions relating to people on the above list. Knowing what they did is essential to understanding the half-century from 1760-1810 during which the United States was formed. Perhaps 10% of a typical American History final exam relates in some way to what the above 20 did, particularly those near the top of the ranking, although the term "Founding Father" is unlikely to be used by an exam question today because it is not gender neutral.
Only six men signed both the Declaration of Independence and the U.S. Constitution (four of whom are in the above list of the most important Founders): George Clymer, Benjamin Franklin, Robert Morris, George Read, Roger Sherman, and James Wilson. Robert Morris and Roger Sherman also signed the Articles of Confederation.
In terms of religious belief, most of the Founding Fathers were Presbyterian. "Deism" -- a belief that God created the world but never intervenes and instead only His natural laws govern it -- was the view of [[Thomas Paine]] and some other colonists in the late 1700s. ==The Articles of Confederation==
The U.S. Constitution did not create the "United States." The "Articles of Confederation," which came first, did. It was a desire to improve on the Articles of Confederation (AOC) which resulted in the U.S. Constitution. A common exam question asks about flaws in the AOC.<ref>"AOC" on exams refers to the Articles of Confederation. In 2019 there is another "AOC" in the news: Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, who is one of the youngest members of Congress (age 30) and an outspoken "progressive" Democrat on the left side of the political spectrum.</ref>
The Articles of Confederation is a long and detailed document, available for free access on the internet, which expressly includes many powers and rights that were left unstated by the subsequent Constitution. The Articles expressly authorized the people to recall their representatives, for example.
The Articles provided for a unicameral (only one legislative body, not both a House and Senate like today) Congress to govern the states. There was no president (imagine that!), but rather a committee formed of one representative from each state who wielded executive authority. There were no federal (national) courts (imagine that also!). The Articles authorized Congress to conduct foreign policy, but did not authorize Congress to regulate commerce.
'''Debate: Does the United States really need an office of president?'''
And there was one additional compromise required for slavery: the new Congress could not ban the importation of slavery for 20 years, until 1808.
The Constitution was written through the use of the following several committees, which illustrates how to organize a large group of people in order to accomplish a good result. These committees included:<ref>http://www.usconstitution.net/constcmte.html</ref> the Rules Committee (to set rules for the conventionConvention), the First Committee of Eleven (delegates) (to resolve the issue of equal representation in the Senate), the Committee of Detail (to draft the Constitution on terms agreed to by the Convention), Second Committee of Eleven (to consider issues of uniform duties and fees), Third Committee of Eleven (to address "tabled" and unresolved issues), and the Committee of Style and Arrangement (to revise the style and arrangement of the Constitution).
After all the compromises and hard work of the committees, most (but not all) of the delegates at the Convention agreed to the final version of the Constitution; 39 (out of the original 55) signed it on Sept. 17, 1787 (now honored annually as "Constitution Day"). The Constitution begins with its Preamble which shows that the People are in charge: "We the People of the United States, in Order to form a more perfect Union ... do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America."
Benjamin Franklin, upon leaving the Convention (which had been conducted in secrecy), was asked by a member of the public what kind of government he created. Franklin famously replied, "A Republic, if you can keep it." Franklin was right that it requires constant hard work by many citizens to preserve our wonderful system of government, which is by and for the People. The United States is not a democracy, but a constitutional republic. Next it was sent to the states for ratification, and then the "fun" began. There was bitter opposition by the Anti-Federalists who did not like the idea of a powerful new central government. Powerful Founders were among the anti-Federalists: Samuel Adams, George Mason, Patrick Henry, and John Hancock. At the time, nearly every country in the world was a monarchymost other countries were run by monarchies. The new American government was the first of its kind.
The Constitution divides government into three separate branches that check and balance each other. If one branch grabs too much power, then the other two can work to stop it.
The Articles of In addition to its Preamble quoted above, the new Constitution, as developed at the Constitutional Convention, are contains Articles as follows:
:Congress (the legislative branch) is established in Article I of the Constitution. The Executive Branch (led by the President) carries out the laws as provided in Article II. The Judicial Branch (including the Supreme Court), established in Article III, interprets the laws.
The Constitution itself (before passage of the Bill of Rights adding the first ten amendments) contains several important protections of individual rights, including a right to a jury trial and a prohibition on any bill of attainder, which was a practice in England whereby the legislature would punish an individual by expressly and specifically naming him in legislation. Under the Constitution, only courts can punish individual citizens. Also, the Constitution banned nobility as exists in England, and spoke in terms of "citizens" in contrast to Britain, where the people were merely "subjects" of the King or Queen until 1948.
The Constitution was then sent to the states to consider ratifying it. Every state except Rhode Island held a ratifying convention to consider adopting it. Many small states ratified the Constitution quickly (the first state to ratify it was Delaware), because they liked the idea of having equal representation in the Senate. But bigger states, such as [[Massachusetts]], [[Virginia]] and [[New York]], were more reluctant to give up their power to a national government.
The debate over ratification in the large states pitted the Federalists (for example, Alexander Hamilton) against the Anti-Federalists (for example, Patrick Henry, Samuel Adams, George Mason, and John Hancock). Federalists supported the ratification of the Constitution. The Anti-Federalists opposed it, primarily because it lacked the Bill of Rightsbut also because they disliked creating a powerful new central government.
Massachusetts became the sixth state to ratify the Constitution, but only by a narrow majority after the Anti-Federalists Samuel Adams and John Hancock negotiated a compromise (the "Massachusetts Compromise") guaranteeing that the new Congress would immediately consider amendments to establish a Bill of Rights. Subsequently the remaining states also ratified it, many with the understanding that the Bill of Rights would be added to it.
==George Washington's Presidency==
[[George Washington]] was so popular and respected that he probably could have become king. Even if Washington did not become king, he could have ruled as president for the rest of his life. But his greatness was, like Jesus, to decline included declining this worldly power that was available to him he could have had, in order to advance a greater goodallow the young nation to develop for the benefit of the People. Washington was inaugurated as president in 1789 and voluntarily gave up power in 1797 at the age of 65 - seven years younger than the 2008 presidential candidate John McCain and nine years younger than President Donald Trump when he runs for reelection in 2020. Washington set an unwritten tradition of a maximum of two terms for presidents, which was followed by every president until the Democrat Franklin Roosevelt. After Roosevelt broke the rule by being elected four times to president in the early 1940s, the two-term tradition was enshrined in the Constitution as the 22nd Amendment in 1951.<ref>http://www.usconstitution.net/const.html</ref>
An example of Washington's greatness was his handling of "Citizen" Edmond Genet (pronounced "zhe–nay"), who was sent by France to the United States just after the French Revolution. France felt that the United States owed it assistance after how France provided so much help to Americans to win the Revolutionary War. But Washington wanted to stay out of foreign conflicts. Ignoring Washington's wishes, Genet went around America stirring up pro-French sentiment with his impassioned speeches. Genet even sent out private American citizens to attack British shipping (called "privateers," but acting like pirates). Washington told Genet to stop this, but he refused. Washington told France to recall him. But the French Revolution had become uncontrollable, with senseless violence and executions. "Citizen Genet," as he was known, reasonably feared the guillotine if he returned to France. He then begged Washington to grant him asylum in this country, which means allowing him to stay here safely. Despite Washington's enormous and justified irritation, he granted Genet's wishes. Genet later married the daughter of the governor of New York, and became an ordinary farmer!
The new U.S. Supreme Court did not have its own building or the immense power it has today. In 1793 it issued a decision named ''Chisholm v. Georgia'' which allowed, for the first time, a lawsuit to be filed against a state in the new federal courts by a citizen of ''a different'' state. This outraged the states and was considered an "activist" decision by the Supreme Court, because it subjected a state to the judicial power of the new national government. Proving how little respect there was for the new Supreme Court, within two years Congress passed and more than 3/4th of the states ratified the [[Eleventh Amendment]] to the Constitution specifically to overturn this decision. This illustrated a type of "check and balance" on Supreme Court power: the power of the People to amend the Constitution to overturn a bad Supreme Court decision. Including the Bill of Rights, there have been a total of 27 amendments to the Constitution, a few of which were motivated by a desire to overturn a bad Supreme Court decision. Notice that Congress cannot overrule the Supreme Court if the Court bases its decision in the Constitution itself; an amendment to the Constitution is then the only way to overrule a Supreme Court decision that is based in the Constitution.
==The Two-Party System==
The "two-party" system developed as part of the political struggle between rivals to take power after George Washington. On one side were farmers, people in debt (debtors), and rural America, who were led by future Presidents Thomas Jefferson and James Madison. On the other side were the bankers, manufacturers and cities (urban interests), which were led by Alexander Hamilton and John Adams. Jefferson sided with farmers, while Hamilton sided with manufacturers, and they opposed each other often during the Washington Administration.
The split between those loyal to England and those loyal to France also fed into the new two-party system. Jefferson favored France, while Adams favored England. They had previously been diplomats to those countries.
George Washington disfavored political parties, and in a sense was "above" them. But today many consider political parties to be essential to give voters a real choice in elections rather than having candidates adopting the same positions as each other, which would deprive voters a real choice on Election Day.
==The Presidency of John Adams==