HISTORY IN BRIEF
USA HISTORY IN BRIEF
USA
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George Washington addressing the
Constitutional Convention in Philadelphia, 1787.
INTRODUCTION
T
T
he history of the United
States has been an
experiment in democracy
for more than 200 years. Issues
that were addresd in the
early years continue to be
addresd and resolved today:
big government versus small 属龙几月出生好
government, individual rights
versus group rights, unfettered
capitalism versus regulated
commerce and labor, engagement
with the world versus isolationism.
The expectations for American
democracy have always been
high, and the reality has
sometimes been disappointing.
Yet the nation has grown and
prospered, through a continual
process of adaptation and
compromi.
Early America
A
A
t the height of the most recent Ice Age, about 35,000
years ago, much of the world’s water was locked up
in vast continental ice sheets. A land bridge as much
as 1,500 kilometers wide connected Asia and North America. By
12,000 years ago, humans were living throughout much of the
Western Hemisphere.
The first Americans crosd the land bridge from Asia
and were believed to have stayed in what is now Alaska for
thousands of years. They then moved south into the land that
xxx3was to become the United States. They ttled along the Pacifi c
Ocean in the Northwest, in the mountains and derts of the
Southwest, and along the Mississippi River in the Middle West.
The early groups are known as Hohokam, Adenans,
Hopewellians, and Anasazi. They built villages and grew crops.
Some built mounds of earth in the shapes of pyramids, birds, or
rpents. Their life was cloly tied to the land, and their society
was clan-oriented and communal. Elements of the natural
world played an esntial part in their spiritual beliefs. Their
Left, Mesa Verde ttlement in Colorado, 13th century. Above, aerial view of the Great
Serpent Mound in Adams County, Ohio. Carbon tests of the effigy revealed that the
creators of this 1,330-foot monument were members of the Native American Fort
Ancient Culture (A.D. 1000-1550).
3
culture was primarily oral, although some developed a type of
hieroglyphics to prerve certain texts. Evidence shows that
there was a good deal of trade among the groups but also that
some of their relations were hostile.
For reasons not yet completely understood, the early
groups disappeared over time and were replaced by other groups
of Native Americans, including Hopi and Zuni, who fl ourished. By
the time Europeans reached what is now the United States, about
two million native people, maybe more, lived here.
The first Europeans to arrive in North America — at least
the first for whom there is solid evidence — were Nor.
They traveled west from Greenland, where Erik the Red had
fou
nded a ttlement around the year 985. In 1001, his son Leif
is thought to have explored the northeast coast of what is now
Canada. Ruins of Nor hous dating from that time have been
discovered at L’An-aux-Meadows in northern Newfoundland.
It would be almost 500 more years before other Europeans
reached North America and another 100 years after that before
permanent ttlements were established. The fi rst explorers
were arching for a a passage to Asia. Others — chiefl y
British, Dutch, French, and Spanish — came later to claim the
lands and riches of what they called the “New World.”
The first and most famous of the explorers was Christopher
Columbus of Genoa. His trips were financed by Queen Isabella of
Spain. Columbus landed on islands in the Caribbean Sea in 1492,
but he never saw the mainland of the future United States. John
蝰鱼Cabot of Venice came five years later on a mission for the king of
England. His journey was quickly forgotten, but it provided the
basis for British claims to North America.
The 1500s were the age of Spanish exploration in the
Americas. Juan Ponce de León landed in what is now Florida in
1513. Hernando De Soto reached Florida in 1539 and continued
as far as the Mississippi River. In 1540, Francisco Vázquez
de Coronado t out north from Mexico, which Spain had
Two monuments to the
central role Spain played
in the exploration of
what is now the United
States. Left, the Castillo
de San Marcos, built
1672-1695 to guard
St. Augustine, Florida,
the fi rst permanent
European ttlement in
the continental United
States. Left bottom,
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fountain and mission
remains of the San Juan
Capistrano Mission,
California, one of nine
missions founded by
Spanish Franciscan
missionaries led by Fray
Junípero Serra in the
1770s. Serra led the
Spanish colonization of
what is today the state
of California.
conquered in 1522, in arch of the mythical Seven Cities of
Cibola. He never found them, but his travels took him as far as
the Grand Canyon in Arizona, as well as into the Great Plains.
While the Spanish were pushing up from the south, the 情侣姓名配对测试
northern portion of the prent-day United States was slowly
being revealed through the journeys of other Europeans. The
included Giovanni da Verrazano, Jacques Cartier, and Amerigo
Vespucci, for whom the continent — America — would be named.
The first permanent European ttlement in what was to
become the United States was established by the Spanish in
the middle 1500s at St. Augustine in Florida. However, it would
not play a part in the formation of the new nation. That story
took place in ttlements farther north along the Atlantic coast
— in Virginia, Massachutts, New York, and the 10 other areas
colonized by a growing tide of immigrants from Europe.
Colonial Period
M
M
ost ttlers who came to the British colonies i
n
the 1600s were English. Others came from The
Netherlands, Sweden, Germany, France, and later from
Scotland and Northern Ireland. Some left their homelands to escape
war, political oppression, religious percution, or a prison ntence.
Some left as rvants who expected to work their way to freedom.
Black Africans were sold into slavery and arrived in shackles.
By 1690, the population was 250,000. Less than 100 years
later, it had climbed to 2.5 million.
The ttlers had many different reasons for coming to
America, and eventually 13 distinct colonies developed here.
Differences among the three regional groupings of colonies
were even more marked.
The first ttlements were built along the Atlantic coast
and on the rivers that flowed to the ocean. In the Northeast,
ttlers found hills covered with trees and soil filled with stones
left behind when the Ice Age glaciers melted. Water power was
easy to harness, so “New England” — including Massachutts,
Connecticut, and Rhode Island — developed an economy
bad on wood products, fishing, shipbuilding, and trade.
The middle colonies — including New York and Pennsylvania
— had a milder climate and more varied terrain. Both industry
and agriculture developed there, and society was more varied
and cosmopolitan. In New York, for example, one could fi nd
Bohemians, Danes, Dutch, English, French, Germans, Irish,
Italians, Norwegians, Poles, Portugue, Scots, and Swedes.
The Southern colonies — Virginia, Georgia, and the Carolinas
— had a long growing ason and fertile soil, and the economy
was primarily agricultural. There were both small farmers and
wealthy aristocratic landowners who owned large plantations
worked by African slaves.
Detail from a painting by American artist
Benjamin West (1738-1820), which depicts
William Penn s treaty with the Native Americans
living where he founded the colony of
Pennsylvania as a haven for Quakers and others
eking religious freedom. Penn s fair treatment
of the Delaware Indians led to long-term, friendly
relations, unlike the conflicts between European
ttlers and Indian tribes in other colonies.
Thomas Jefferson, author of the
Declaration of Independence and third
president of the United States.
8
Pilgrims signing the Mayfl ower Compact
aboard ship, 1620.
Benjamin Franklin: scientist, inventor,
writer, newspaper publisher, city
father of Philadelphia, diplomat, and
signer of both the Declaration of
Independence and the Constitution.
U.S. postage stamp
commemorating the
bicentennial of the Lewis
and Clark expedition
under President Thomas
Jeff erson. Their expedition
mapped western land all
the way to Oregon for the
young United States.
9
Relations between ttlers and Native Americans, who were
called Indians, were an uneasy mix of cooperation and confl ict.
Certain areas saw trade an
d some social interaction, but in
general, as the new ttlements expanded, the Indians were
forced to move, often after being defeated in battle.
Settlement of the colonies was directly sponsored not by
the British government, but by private groups. All except Georgia
emerged as companies of shareholders or as proprietorships
chartered by the king. Some were governed rigidly by company
leaders, but in time, all developed a system of participatory
government bad on British legal precedent and tradition.
Years of political turmoil in Britain culminated with the
Glorious Revolution of 1688-89 that depod King James
II and led to limits on the monarchy and greater freedoms
for the people. The American colonies benefited from the
changes. Colonial asmblies claimed the right to act as local
parliaments. They pasd measures that limited the power of
royal governors and expanded their own power.
Over the decades that followed, recurring disputes between
the governors and asmblies awakened colonists to the
increasing divergence between American and British interests.
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The principles and precedents that emerged from the
disputes became the unwritten constitution of the colonies.
At first, the focus was on lf-government within a British
commonwealth. Only later came the call for independence.
Road to Independence
T
T
he principles of liberalism and democracy — the political
foundation of the United States — sprang naturally from
the process of building a new society on virgin land.
Just as naturally, the new nation would e itlf as diff erent and
exceptional. Europe would view it with apprehension, or hope.
Britain’s 13 North American colonies matured during the
1700s. They grew in population, economic strength, and cultural
attainment. They were experienced in lf-government. Yet it
was not until 170 years after the founding of the fi rst permanent
ttlement at Jamestown, Virginia, that the new United States of
America emerged as a nation.
War between Britain and France in the 1750s was fought
partly in North America. Britain was victorious and soon
initiated policies designed to control and fund its vast empire.
The measures impod greater restraints on the American
colonists’ way of life.
The Royal Proclamation of 1763 restricted the opening of
new lands for ttlement. The Sugar Act of 1764 placed taxes on
luxury goods, including coffee, silk, and wine, and made it illegal
to import rum. The Currency Act of 1764 prohibited the printing
of paper money in the colonies. The Quartering Act of 1765
forced colonists to provide food and housing for royal troops.
And the Stamp Act of 1765 required the purcha of royal
stamps for all legal documents, newspapers, licens, and leas.
Colonists objected to all the measures, but the Stamp Act
sparked the greatest organized resistance. The main issue, in
the eyes of a growing number of colonists, was that they were
being taxed by a distant legislature in which they could not
participate. In October 1765, 27 delegates from nine colonies
met in New York to coordinate efforts to get the Stamp Act
repealed. They pasd resolutions asrting the individual
colonies’ right to impo their own taxes.
Self-government produced local political leaders, and
the were the men who worked together to defeat what they
considered to be oppressive acts of Parliament. After they
succeeded, their coordinated campaign against Britain ended.
During the next veral years, however, a small number of 欧迪芬加盟
radicals tried to keep the controversy alive. Their goal was not
accommodation, but independence.
Samuel Adams of Massachutts was the most eff ective.
He wrote newspaper articles and made speeches appealing
to the colonists’ democratic instincts. He helped organize
committees throughout the colonies that became the basis of a
revolutionary movement. By 1773, the movement had attracted
风寒感冒症状有哪些colonial traders who were angry with British attempts to
regulate the tea trade. In December, a group of men sneaked on
to three British ships in Boston harbor and dumped their cargo
of tea overboard.
To punish Massachutts for the vandalism, the British
Parliament clod the port of Boston and restricted local
authority. The new measures, dubbed the Intolerable Acts,
backfired. Rather than isolate one colony, they rallied the
others. All the colonies except Georgia nt reprentatives
to Philadelphia in September 1774 to discuss their “prent
unhappy state.” It was the first Continental Congress.
Colonists felt a growing n of frustration and anger
over British encroachment on their rights. Yet by no means was
there unanimity of thought on what should be done. Loyalists
wanted to remain subjects of the king. Moderates favored
compromi to produce a more acceptable relationship with
the British government. And revolutionaries wanted complete
independence. They began stockpiling weapons and mobilizing
forces — waiting for the day when they would have to fight for it.
Revolution
T
T
he American Revolution — its war for independence
from Britain — began as a small skirmish between
British troops and armed colonists on April 19, 1775.
The British had t out from Boston, Massachutts, to
ize weapons and ammunition that revolutionary colonists
had collected in nearby villages. At Lexington, they met a group
of Minutemen, who got that name becau they were said to
The protest against British taxes known as the “Boston Tea Party, 1773.
14
Artist s depiction of the first shots of the American Revolution, fired at Lexington,
Massachutts, on April 19, 1775. Local militia confronted British troops marching to ize
colonial armaments in the nearby town of Concord.
16
Drawing of revoluti
onary firebrand Patrick Henry
(standing to the left) uttering perhaps the most
famous words of the American Revolution —
Give me liberty or give me death!” — in a debate
before the Virginia Asmbly in 1775.
James Madison, fourth president of the
United States, is often regarded as the “Father
of the Constitution. His essays in the debate
over ratification of the Constitution were
collected with tho of Alexander Hamilton
and John Jay as The Federalist Papers.
18
be ready to fight in a minute. The Minutemen intended only a
silent protest, and their leader told them not to shoot unless
fired on first. The British ordered the Minutemen to disper,
and they complied. As they were withdrawing, someone fi red
a shot. The British troops attacked the Minutemen with guns
and bayonets.
Fighting broke out at other places along the road as the
British soldiers in their bright red uniforms made their way back
to Boston. More than 250 “redcoats” were killed or wounded.
The Americans lost 93 men.
Deadly clashes continued around Boston as colonial
reprentatives hurried to Philadelphia to discuss the situation.
A majority voted to go to war against Britain. They agreed to
Alexander Hamilton, cretary of the treasury
in the administration of President George
Washington. Hamilton advocated a strong
federal government and the encouragement
of industry.
John Marshall, chief justice of the U.S.
Supreme Court from 1801 to 1835, in a
portrait by Alonzo Chappel.
combine colonial militias into a continental army, and they
appointed George Washington of Virginia as commanderin-
chief. At the same time, however, this Second Continental
Congress adopted a peace resolution urging King George III to
prevent further hostilities. The king rejected it and on August 23
declared that the American colonies were in rebellion.
Calls for independence intensified in the coming months.
Radical political theorist Thomas Paine helped crystallize the
argument for paration. In a pamphlet called Common Sen,
which sold 100,000 copies, he attacked the idea of a hereditary
monarchy. Paine prented two alternatives for America:
continued submission under a tyrannical king and outworn
system of government, or liberty and happiness as a lfsuffi
cient, independent republic.
The Second Continental Congress appointed a committee,
headed by Thomas Jefferson of Virginia, to prepare a document
outlining the colonies’ grievances against the king and
explaining their decision to break away. This Declaration of
Independence was adopted on July 4, 1776. The 4th of July has
since been celebrated as America’s Independence Day.
The Declaration of Independence not only announced the
birth of a new nation. It also t forth a philosophy of human
freedom that would become a dynamic force throughout the
world. It drew upon French and British po
