Facts and Details in U.S. Political History from 1899 to the Present - SAT Subject Test in United States History

The McCarthy and HUAC hearings were the key elements of the second Red Scare, rooted largely in the 1950s, which focused on investigating Communist Party members in America. None of the other answer choices feature parties that were very active during the 1950s, providing another clue and an ability to eliminate certain answer choices.

The Watergate Scandal focused on the breaking and entering of Democratic National Committee offices in the Watergate Office Complex in Washington, DC, on June 17, 1972. In particular, investigations looked into President Nixon’s own involvement and the administration’s cover up of the break in. In 1975, Richard Nixon resigned the Presidency instead of being impeached by the United States Congress.

The 1960 Campaign featured the first Presidential Debate to be televised to a national audience, and led to speculation as to the effect of television on campaigns. Personal campaigning and primaries both were innovations of the 1890s, while Conventions predate the Civil War by decades. Negative campaigning is as old as democracy itself, and goes back to antiquity.

Sixteenth Amendment. For much of its early history the United States government collected finances mostly through custom duties and excise taxes. Income tax was generally viewed as an unconstituional incursion on the right of individuals to acquire wealth. However, during the cash-strapped years of the Civil War the Republican goverment levied a three-percent income tax. It proved to be extremely lucrative and after it was repealed in 1872, many Populist and Socialist movements began to demand a graduated income tax. The movement picked up momentum when the Democratic Party adopted it to its platform in 1908, and the Sixteenth Amendment was adopted into the Consitution in 1909 allowing the United States government to collect an income tax without regard to how the money was earned or a need to parcel the money out to the States. It represents a major extension of Federal power in the Twentieth Century.

Ronald Reagan’s 1980 election caused a major restructuring of the American political landscape, bringing many groups into the Republican column that had previously been strongly Democratic. This restructuring also firmed up many Democratic voters. Particularly key to Reagan’s victory were conservative Christian voters, while all the other groups listed became firmly Democratic.

The Teapot Dome Scandal was the name given to Albert B. Fall's criminal involvement with the leasing of the petroleum reserves in Wyoming and California.

On January 20th, 1961, John F. Kennedy delivered this famous inaugural address in Washington.

William McKinley was assassinated by an anarchist in Buffalo, New York, in 1901. His killer was convicted and sentenced to death, even though his political motives are still unclear.

In the 1936 election the incumbent Democratic candidate, Franklin Roosevelt, defeated the Republican challenger, Herbert Hoover, in a landslide. Roosevelt received a great deal of popular support from, amongst others, the urban poor, farmers, the unemployed, African Americans (who had previously traditionally voted Republican), Catholics, and Progressives. Roosevelt’s policies had generally endeared him to the working and middle classes, but his policies generally angered the wealthy, who found their income heavily taxed—as much as seventy-five percent—under Roosevelt’s new graduated income tax.

Jeanette Rankin was the first woman elected to Congress, from the state of Montana in 1916. Rankin was a prominent member of the female suffrage movement in the early Twentieth Century and helped achieve full voting rights for women in both Montana and Washington. Like many influential women of her time, Rankin believed that the corruption and backwardness of American politics was a result of the lack of feminine participation in government. Aside from her position as a champion of female rights, Rankin is also well known for being a dedicated pacifist—she was the only member of Congress to vote against declaring war on Japan after the attack on Pearl Harbor. Rankin actually achieved her position in Congress before women had full suffrage rights in the United States (1920). At the moment of her election, in 1916, women were voting in several different forms in the majority of American states.

Much of the respective campaigns of each party in the 1992 election centered on the state of the economy at the time and its minimal growth during the Bush administration. The Democrats were able to refer to Bush’s promises not to raise taxes, which his administration had gone back on, and a floundering economy as evidence of the Republican Party’s ineffectual leadership.

When facing a question like this, particularly regarding modern elections, if you do not know the answer it is always most prudent to guess that it was the economy that was the biggest issue. Generally speaking, people care about that which affects themselves, and the economy most obviously affects every voter. The other issues were all part of the campaign platforms of both parties, but the economic arguments made the difference.

The Eighteenth Amendment, which ushered in the Prohibition Era with its illegal bars known as speak-easys, prohibited the manufacture, sale or transportation of alcohol. The Amendment was repealed on December 5th, 1933 with the Twenty-First Amendment.

Richard Nixon, the 37th President of the United States, has been the only president to resign. He did so as a consequence of his involvement in the Watergate Scandal.

The Teapot Dome Scandal occurred during the Presidency of Warren G. Harding. Harding’s Secretary of the Interior, Albert Fall, leased nationalized oil reserves to private companies in exchange for bribes. In 1922 the practice was investigated by Senator Thomas Walsh and once the full details emerged the Harding administration suffered a massive drop in public support.

The Progressive Party of Theodore Roosevelt campaigned in the election of 1912. The Progressive Party was formed when Roosevelt and his supporters split from the Republican Party of President Taft. In the subsequent election, however, Roosevelt only succeeded in splitting the votes that would usually go to the Republican Party. His party gained twenty-seven percent of the popular vote, more than twenty-three percent achieved by Taft. But, less than the forty-two percent of votes that went to Democratic candidate Woodrow Wilson.

The Espionage Act of 1917 was passed during World War One. Its stated intention was to prohibit any interference with the working of the United States Army and to eliminate any assistance that might have been provided to the enemies; however, it was quickly amended to outlaw any form of dissent or protest against the war effort. It famously resulted in the arrest of Socialist Party leader Eugene Debs (as well as, much later, the execution of Julius and Ethel Rosenberg). The Act has consistently held up in the Supreme Court despite its apparent violation of the Freedom of Speech.

After serving seven years as President, having ascended from the Vice Presidency on the death of William McKinley, Theodore Roosevelt refused to seek reelection in 1908, and handpicked William Howard Taft as his successor. During Taft's four years in office, a huge rift develop between Taft and Roosevelt. In 1912, Roosevelt attempted to get the Republican nomination for president as a liberal influence in contrast to Taft. After he was unsuccessful, he helped start the Progressive Party, colloquially known as the Bull Moose Party, and ran as its candidate for President. Woodrow Wilson, a moderate who was Governor of New Jersey, won the Democratic Party's nomination in 1912 then defeated both Roosevelt and Taft for the Presidency. Roosevelt's 27% of the vote remains the highest any third party candidate has received in an election since the Civil War.

Andrew Johnson, in 1868, and Bill Clinton, in 1998, are the only two United States Presidents to have been impeached by the House. Both were acquitted in the Senate. Richard Nixon would have likely been the only President to undergo the full impeachment process, if he had not chosen to resign before the trial began. Andrew Johnson’s impeachment was an effort by the Radical Republicans (who controlled Congress at the time) to remove Johnson from office. They desired control over the reconstruction process in the South and charged Johnson with a violation of the Tenure of Office Act and improper conduct against the will of the public. The vote passed the house, but did not gain the necessary two-thirds majority vote in the Senate—they were just one vote short. The impeachment of Bill Clinton was made on grounds of perjury and obstruction of justice. The opposition Republican Party controlled Congress at the time, but not sufficiently to carry out the impeachment in the Senate. The vote was evenly split in the Senate, falling seventeen votes short.

The dropping of the atomic bombs was authorized by President Harry Truman. In the weeks leading up to the destruction of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, the United States issued warnings to the Japanese government that if they did not surrender—immediately and unconditionally—then Japan faced absolute annihilation; however, the Japanese government policy and cultural mindset at this time forbade surrender. The United States began by firebombing many Japanese cities and plans were laid for a ground invasion of Japan. Truman considered his options: he could either authorize a ground invasion of Japan, risking hundreds of thousands of American lives and many more Japanese lives, or he could attempt to end the war in one dramatic and abhorrent atomic attack. He picked the latter. Hiroshima was bombed on August 6th, 1945—Nagasaki three days later. The devastation caused by these bombings was unprecedented in human history—they remain the only nuclear attacks the world has ever witnessed. The Japanese government realized nothing could be done in the face of this new overwhelming technology and surrendered unconditionally a few days later. Historians still debate the decision Truman made: many condemn him, while many others praise him.