Manifest Destiny describes  the idea that America had a right and need to extend from the Atlantic Ocean to the Pacific Ocean.  This concept was a large driver of pre-Civil War American foreign policy, including the annexation of Texas, the Mexican-American War, and the California gold rush.

A loose constructionist believes that the Judiciary must take into account changes over time when making decisions to amend the Constitution. A strict constructionist is someone who believes the opposite, that the Judiciary should always base its decision off of the original intentions of the founding fathers. The Warren Court is an important example of a loose constructionist Court. 

The 1824 Presidential Election occurred during the interim between the First and Second Party System, after the fall of the Federalist Party and before the rise of the Whig Party.  With four legitimate candidates, the Electoral College could not produce a majority vote for one candidate, and thus the House of Representatives chose John Quincy Adams as the next president despite Andrew Jackson winning more popular and electoral votes.

The Wilmot Proviso, proposed by David Wilmot, argued that any territory acquired from Mexico should be forever closed to slavery. The Bill passed the House, but failed in the Senate – where the South had a much greater proportion of representation. For much of the recent history prior the introduction of this bill, both political parties had sought to keep the issue of slavery out of the national debate. The Wilmot Proviso is considered important by historians because it began a period of national fracturing, that would temporarily be solved by the Compromise of 1850, but would flare up again in the years building up to the Civil War. 

The “Era of Good Feelings” is the name given to the eight-year term of President James Monroe, from 1816-1824. The period of time was marked by an extensive geographic expansion of national territory and mostly sustained economic prosperity. It was also a period with little political maneuvering as the Democratic-Republican Party assumed almost complete control of government. Monroe even ran unopposed for election in 1820. 

The North had many advantages over the South throughout the Civil War. Firstly, the North was a much more industrialized society, able to draw on a greater wealth of resources and factories to produce weaponry. Secondly, the North had a national history, unity, collective consciousness and all the institutions that go with these ideas already set up at the time of the outbreak of war—the South had to develop these on the fly. Thirdly, the South struggled to gain international recognition from any European nations because no European country wanted to be seen to support the institution of slavery. Finally, the North had a much more developed navy and this proved to be the difference in the Mississippi River campaign. One of the few advantages that the South had over the North was superior military commanders, like Robert E. Lee, and more than a few battles were won or lost based on this difference. Many historians believe that the South might have won the war on the strength of the Generals and military tactics alone were it not for the overwhelming economic advantages of the North and the dwindling supply of Southern soldiers. 

The Anaconda Plan was the name colloquially given to Winfield Scott’s strategy of choking the Confederacy during the Civil War. It called for the blockading of Southern ports to ruin the Confederacy’s ability to sustain itself economically, as well as an advance down the Mississippi river to divide the Confederacy in two. Historians generally agree that the fighting in the Mississippi theatre was crucial to the Union victory. 

The Monitor and the Merrimack were two ironclad Civil War ships. A naval battle between the two ships marked the first time in history that two ironclad ships had fought. The Monitor was a Union ship, the Merrimack a former Union ship operated by the Confederacy (for a time called the CSS Virginia). The battle began when the Merrimack obliterated the Union wooden ship forces, culminating the next day with the arrival of the Monitor.

Henry Clay was closely associated with the West. Clay was a Representative and Senator from Kentucky, who served as Speaker of the House on numerous occasions and Secretary of State to John Quincy Adams. The politics of mid-nineteenth-century America were heavily based upon regional identity—with the North and South most vigorously opposed on the majority of issues.

John Tyler served as Vice-President to President William Henry Harrison. Harrison was the first President to die in office. His death created significant controversy in American politics over who should succeed him. The United States Constitution stated that in the event of the death of the President the office and its powers shall “devolve on the Vice-President”. Many politicians, particularly Tyler’s opponents believed that this called for a sort of regency position whereby Tyler would act as President in name until a new election could be called. Tyler, convinced he was in the right, arrived in Washington and immediately took the oath of office and called together Harrison’s existing cabinet. When informed by Daniel Webster that Harrison usually made decisions based on the majority vote of his cabinet Tyler roundly informed Webster of his aforementioned stance – namely that he was President now and they ought to accept his decisions or find a new line of work. Eventually both houses of Congress accepted Tyler’s candidacy for Presidency and inaugurated him officially as the Tenth President of the United States. Later, the Tyler Precedent, would be codified into law under the Twenty-fifth Amendment.