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Question 1 of 50
In the 1970s, a coalition of free-market economists, anticommunist hawks, evangelical Christians, and suburban taxpayers angry at inflation, crime, and the cultural changes of the 1960s came together behind a program of lower taxes, smaller government, traditional values, and a stronger military. This movement was the
Question 2 of 50
In 1979, Baptist minister Jerry Falwell founded an organization that mobilized evangelical Christians, who had largely stayed out of politics, to register voters and campaign against abortion, pornography, gay rights, and the ban on school prayer, delivering millions of votes to Reagan in 1980. This organization was the
Question 3 of 50
Reagan’s economic program held that large cuts in income tax rates, especially for the wealthy and for business, would spur investment and growth that would eventually raise revenue and benefit everyone, an approach critics labeled “trickle-down” and George H. W. Bush had called “voodoo economics.” This program was called
Question 4 of 50
Reagan and his successors reduced federal rules governing airlines, trucking, banking, telecommunications, and energy, arguing that competition would lower prices and spur innovation, a policy that began under Carter and accelerated in the 1980s. This policy is called
Question 5 of 50
In 1981, Reagan fulfilled a campaign promise by appointing an Arizona judge as the first woman to serve on the Supreme Court, where she became a decisive swing vote for a quarter century, and his later appointments moved the Court steadily to the right. This justice was
Question 6 of 50
In 1983, Reagan proposed a space-based missile defense system using lasers and satellites to shoot down Soviet missiles, which scientists called unworkable and critics nicknamed Star Wars, but which forced the Soviets into a costly competition they could not afford. This program was the
Question 7 of 50
In 1986, it emerged that administration officials had secretly sold weapons to Iran in hopes of freeing American hostages in Lebanon and had used the profits to fund anticommunist rebels in Nicaragua in defiance of a congressional ban, the worst scandal of Reagan’s presidency. This episode was the
Question 8 of 50
Reagan’s foreign policy went beyond containment to support anticommunist insurgents fighting Soviet-backed governments in Afghanistan, Nicaragua, Angola, and elsewhere, aiming to roll back Soviet influence in the developing world rather than merely halt it. This policy was the
Question 9 of 50
In 1981, Reagan signed the largest tax cut in American history, reducing the top income tax rate from 70 to 50 percent and cutting all rates by 25 percent over three years, the centerpiece of his supply-side program. This law was the
Question 10 of 50
In 1982, a proposed constitutional amendment guaranteeing equal rights regardless of sex died three states short of ratification after a campaign led by Phyllis Schlafly, who argued it would subject women to the draft, end alimony, and undermine the family. This amendment was the
Question 11 of 50
Beginning in 1981, a mysterious disease that destroyed the immune system spread rapidly, first among gay men and intravenous drug users, killing tens of thousands while the Reagan administration said little for years and activists demanded research funding and an end to stigma. This epidemic was the
Question 12 of 50
Beginning in the early 1980s, federal and state governments responded to the spread of crack cocaine with mandatory minimum sentences, expanded policing, and harsh penalties that fell most heavily on Black neighborhoods and helped quadruple the prison population over the next three decades. This campaign was the
Question 13 of 50
From the 1970s on, steel mills, auto plants, and factories across the Northeast and Midwest closed or moved overseas as foreign competition and automation cut manufacturing jobs, leaving cities such as Detroit, Cleveland, and Pittsburgh with shrinking populations and tax bases. This region came to be called the
Question 14 of 50
In 1985, a reformer took power in the Soviet Union and launched policies of openness and economic restructuring, negotiated arms reductions with Reagan, and refused to use force to hold Eastern Europe, setting in motion the collapse of the Soviet bloc. This leader was
Question 15 of 50
In November 1989, after Hungary opened its border and mass protests swept East Germany, the communist government suddenly allowed free passage through the barrier that had divided a city since 1961, and crowds tore it down with hammers as the world watched on television. This event was the
Question 16 of 50
In December 1991, after a failed coup by hardliners and declarations of independence by its republics, the communist superpower that had been America’s rival for 45 years dissolved into fifteen separate nations, leaving the United States as the world’s only superpower. This event was the
Question 17 of 50
In 1991, after Iraq invaded and annexed Kuwait, a coalition of 34 nations led by the United States and authorized by the United Nations drove Iraqi forces out in a six-week air campaign and a ground war lasting 100 hours, with few American casualties. This conflict was the
Question 18 of 50
In 1993, Congress approved an agreement eliminating most tariffs and trade barriers among the United States, Canada, and Mexico, which Clinton championed over the objections of labor unions who warned it would send manufacturing jobs south of the border. This agreement was
Question 19 of 50
In 1994, Georgia congressman Newt Gingrich led Republicans to their first House majority in forty years by campaigning on a ten-point platform promising a balanced budget amendment, welfare reform, term limits, and tax cuts, nationalizing a midterm election. This platform was the
Question 20 of 50
In 1998, the House impeached a president for perjury and obstruction of justice arising from his false statements under oath about an affair with a White House intern, and the Senate acquitted him the following year on a largely party-line vote. This episode was the
Question 21 of 50
In 1996, Clinton signed a Republican bill that ended the federal guarantee of cash assistance to poor families dating from the New Deal, replacing it with block grants to the states, work requirements, and a five-year lifetime limit on benefits. This law was
Question 22 of 50
In April 1995, a truck bomb destroyed a federal building and killed 168 people, the deadliest act of domestic terrorism in American history, carried out by an antigovernment extremist angry at federal agents’ actions at Waco and Ruby Ridge. This attack was the
Question 23 of 50
In December 2000, with the presidential election hinging on a few hundred votes in Florida, the Supreme Court halted a recount by a 5–4 vote, effectively awarding the presidency to the candidate who had lost the national popular vote. This case was
Question 24 of 50
In 1990, Congress passed a sweeping civil rights law barring discrimination against people with disabilities in employment and public accommodations and requiring accessible buildings, transportation, and communications, extending the model of the 1964 act to a new group. This law was the
Question 25 of 50
In the late 1990s, the spread of the internet set off a frenzy of investment in online companies, many with no profits, that pushed the NASDAQ index to record highs before it collapsed in 2000 and wiped out trillions of dollars in stock value. This boom and bust was the
Question 26 of 50
After the Cold War, trade, investment, and communication linked the world’s economies ever more tightly, as American companies moved production overseas, container ships and the internet cut the cost of distance, and institutions such as the World Trade Organization wrote the rules. This process is called
Question 27 of 50
By the 1990s, most Americans worked not in factories or on farms but in retail, health care, finance, education, and other jobs that provided services rather than goods, a shift that created many low-wage jobs without union protection alongside well-paid professional ones. This change is called the rise of the
Question 28 of 50
On the morning of September 11, 2001, nineteen hijackers flew two airliners into the World Trade Center towers in New York and one into the Pentagon, while passengers forced a fourth down in Pennsylvania, killing nearly 3,000 people in the deadliest attack ever on American soil. These were the
Question 29 of 50
Six weeks after the September 11 attacks, Congress passed with little debate a law expanding the government’s power to wiretap, search records, detain noncitizens, and share intelligence, which civil libertarians warned sacrificed privacy and due process for security. This law was the
Question 30 of 50
In 2002, Congress merged 22 federal agencies, including the Coast Guard, customs, immigration, and the new Transportation Security Administration, into a single cabinet department charged with preventing terrorist attacks, the largest reorganization of government since 1947. This department was the
Question 31 of 50
In October 2001, the United States invaded a country whose Taliban government had sheltered al-Qaeda, quickly toppling the regime but then fighting a twenty-year insurgency that ended with the Taliban back in power after American withdrawal in 2021. This conflict was the
Question 32 of 50
In March 2003, the Bush administration invaded a Middle Eastern country, claiming its dictator possessed weapons of mass destruction and had ties to al-Qaeda, claims that proved false, and the quick overthrow of the regime was followed by years of insurgency and sectarian civil war. This conflict was the
Question 33 of 50
In 2002, President Bush announced that the United States would not wait for threats to materialize but would strike first against hostile states and terrorist groups seeking weapons of mass destruction, and that it would act alone if necessary. This policy was the
Question 34 of 50
Beginning in 2002, the United States held hundreds of suspected terrorists captured in Afghanistan and elsewhere at a naval base in Cuba, outside the reach of American courts, where some were subjected to interrogation methods that critics and later the Senate called torture. This facility was
Question 35 of 50
In August 2005, a hurricane breached the levees protecting New Orleans and flooded 80 percent of the city, killing more than 1,800 people, and the slow federal response, which left mostly poor and Black residents stranded for days, badly damaged the Bush administration. This disaster was
Question 36 of 50
In 2010, responding to the financial crisis, Congress passed the most sweeping regulation of Wall Street since the New Deal, creating a consumer protection bureau, requiring banks to hold more capital, and giving regulators power to wind down failing firms deemed too big to fail. This law was the
Question 37 of 50
In 2008, an Illinois senator who had opposed the Iraq War won the presidency with a campaign built on grassroots organizing, online fundraising, and a message of hope and change, becoming the first African American to hold the office. This president was
Question 38 of 50
In May 2011, Navy SEALs raided a compound in Pakistan and killed the Saudi-born founder of al-Qaeda who had planned the September 11 attacks and eluded capture for nearly a decade. This figure was
Question 39 of 50
In 2008, the collapse of a housing bubble built on risky subprime mortgages and the securities based on them brought down Lehman Brothers, froze credit markets, and set off the worst economic downturn since the 1930s, with unemployment reaching 10 percent and millions losing their homes. This downturn was the
Question 40 of 50
In 2010, Congress passed a law requiring most Americans to carry health insurance, barring insurers from denying coverage for preexisting conditions, expanding Medicaid, and creating subsidized insurance marketplaces, the largest expansion of the social safety net since Medicare. This law was the
Question 41 of 50
Beginning in 2009, a grassroots conservative movement protesting the bank bailouts, the stimulus, and the health care law, and demanding lower taxes and smaller government, helped Republicans win the House in 2010 and pushed the party further to the right. This movement was the
Question 42 of 50
In 2015, the Supreme Court ruled 5–4 that the Fourteenth Amendment guarantees same-sex couples the right to marry, capping a rapid shift in public opinion and law that had begun with a Massachusetts court ruling in 2003 and the repeal of the military’s “don’t ask, don’t tell” policy in 2011. This case was
Question 43 of 50
From the personal computer of the 1980s to the World Wide Web of the 1990s and the smartphone and social media of the 2000s, new technologies transformed how Americans worked, shopped, communicated, and got their news, creating enormous new companies and new social behaviors. This transformation is called the
Question 44 of 50
Since 2001, Congress has repeatedly debated and failed to pass a bill that would give legal status to immigrants brought to the country as children, a group whose numbers grew with the large Latin American and Asian immigration that followed the 1965 law and the rise of undocumented migration. This proposal is the
Question 45 of 50
In 2015, nearly every nation agreed to limit greenhouse gas emissions to hold global warming below two degrees Celsius, a commitment the United States joined under Obama, left under Trump, and rejoined under Biden, reflecting deep partisan division over the issue. This agreement was the
Question 46 of 50
Since the 1970s, the share of national income going to the top 1 percent of earners has roughly doubled while wages for most workers have barely grown, a trend driven by deindustrialization, the decline of unions, technology, globalization, and tax policy, and one that became a major political issue after 2008. This trend is called rising
Question 47 of 50
In 2010, the Supreme Court ruled 5–4 that corporations and unions could spend unlimited money on independent political advertising as a form of free speech, striking down campaign finance limits and leading to the rise of super PACs. This case was
Question 48 of 50
Beginning in 2013, and growing after police killings in Ferguson, Missouri, and elsewhere, a movement organized largely through social media protested police violence against Black Americans and mass incarceration, reaching its peak in nationwide demonstrations in 2020. This movement was
Question 49 of 50
In 2016, a businessman and television personality with no political experience won the presidency on a populist platform attacking trade deals, immigration, and the political establishment, while losing the popular vote, in an election that revealed deep divisions by education, region, and race. This president was
Question 50 of 50
Beginning in early 2020, a global outbreak of a new virus killed more than a million Americans, shut down schools and businesses for months, triggered a brief but severe recession, and set off bitter disputes over masks, vaccines, and the proper role of government in a public health emergency. This crisis was the