C
John Cabot
Explored the northeast coast of North America in 1497 and 1498, claiming Nova Scotia, Newfoundland, and the Grand Banks for England.

John C. Calhoun
Political figure throughout the Era of Good Feelings and the Age of Jackson. Calhoun served as James Monroe’s secretary of war, as John Quincy Adams’s vice president, and then as Andrew Jackson’s vice president for one term. A firm believer in states’ rights, Calhoun clashed with Jackson over many issues, most notably nullification.

Camp David Accords
Negotiaged by President Carter, the Camp David Accords were signed by Israel’s leader, Menachem Begin, and Egypt’s leader, Anwar el-Sadat, on March 26, 1979. The treaty, however, fell apart when Sadat was assassinated by Islamic fundamentalists in 1981.

Camp meetings
Religious revivals on the frontier during the Second Great Awakening. Hundreds or even thousands of people—members of various denominations—met to hear speeches on repentance and sing hymns.

Stokely Carmichael
Once a prominent member of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee, Carmichael abandoned his nonviolent leanings and became a leader of the Black Nationalist movement in 1966. He coined the phrase “Black Power.”

Andrew Carnegie
A Scottish immigrant who in 1901 founded Carnegie Steel, then the world’s largest corporation. In addition to being an entrepreneur and industrialist, Carnegie was a philanthropist who donated more than $300 million to charity during his lifetime.

Carpetbaggers
Nickname given to northerners who moved South during Reconstruction in search of political and economic opportunity. The term was coined by Southern Democrats, who said that these northern opportunists had left home so quickly that they were able to carry all their belongings in rough suitcases made from carpeting materials.

Jimmy Carter
Democratic president of the United States from 1977 to 1981. Carter is best known for his commitment to human rights. During his term in office, he faced an oil crisis, a weak economy, and severe tension in the Middle East.

Jacques Cartier
A French sailor who explored the St. Lawrence River region between 1534 and 1542. Cartier searched for a Northwest Passage, a waterway through which ships could cross the Americas and access Asia. He found no such passage but opened the region up to future exploration and colonization by the French.

Cash-and-carry
In September 1939, FDR persuaded Congress to pass a new, amended Neutrality Act, which allowed warring nations to purchase arms from the U.S. as long as they paid in cash and carried the arms away on their own ships. This cash-and-carry program allowed the U.S. to aid the Allies but stay officially out of the war.

Fidel Castro
A communist revolutionary. Castro ousted an authoritarian regime in Cuba in 1959 and established the communist regime that remains in power to this day.

Central Intelligence Agency (CIA)
Primarily concerned with international espionage and information gathering. In the 1950s, the CIA became heavily involved in many civil struggles in the Third World, supporting groups likely to cooperate with the U.S. rather than the USSR.

Central Powers
Germany and Austria-Hungary during World War I. The Central powers fought against the Allies (Great Britain, France, and Italy). In 1917, the U.S. joined the war effort against the Central Powers.

A Century of Dishonor
Written by Helen Hunt Jackson and published in 1881, A Century of Dishonor attempted to raise public awareness of the harsh and dishonorable treatment of Native Americans at the hands of the United States.

Samuel de Champlain
A Frenchman who explored the Great Lakes and established the first French colony in North America at Quebec in 1608.

Checks and balances
The principles established by the Constitution to prevent any one branch of government (legislative, executive, and judicial) from gaining too much power. Checks and balances represent the solution to the problem of how to empower the central government while also protecting against corruption and despotism.

Chesapeake-Leopard affair
In June 1807, the British naval frigate HMS Leopard opened fire on the American naval frigate USS Chesapeake, killing three men and wounding twenty. British naval officers then boarded the American ship, seized four men who had deserted the Royal Navy, hanged them from a yardarm, and sailed away. Outraged, Thomas Jefferson responded with the Embargo Act in an attempt to force Britain to respect American neutrality rights.

Chinese Exclusion Act
Passed by Congress in 1882 amid a wave of anti-immigrant sentiment among American workers. The act banned Chinese immigration for ten years.

Winston Churchill
Prime minister of England from 1940 to 1945. Churchill was known for his inspirational speeches and zealous pursuit of war victory. Together he, FDR, and Stalin mapped out the post-war world order as the “Big Three.” In 1946, Churchill coined the term “iron curtain” to describe the USSR’s division of eastern Europe from the West.

Civil Rights Act
Passed in 1964, the act outlawed discrimination in education, employment, and all public accommodations.

Civil Works Administration (CWA)
Created by FDR to cope with the added economic difficulties brought on by the cold winter months of 1933. The CWA spent approximately $1 billion on short-term projects for the unemployed but was abolished in the spring of that year.

Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC)
Created in 1933 as part of FDR’s New Deal, the CCC pumped money into the economy by employing the destitute in conservation and other projects.
Henry Clay
An important political figure during the Era of Good Feelings and the Age of Jackson. Clay engineered and championed the American System, a program aimed at economic self-sufficiency for the nation. As speaker of the house during Monroe’s term in office, he was instrumental in crafting much of the legislation that passed through Congress. A gifted negotiator, Clay helped resolve the Missouri Compromise of 1820 and designed the Compromise of 1833 and Compromise of 1850. He led the Whig Party until his death in 1852.

Clayton Antitrust Act
Spearheaded by Woodrow Wilson in 1914. The act improved upon the vague Sherman Antitrust Act by enumerating a series of illegal business practices.

Bill Clinton 
Democrat, Clinton served as president from 1993 to 2001, during a period of intense partisanship in the U.S. government. Clinton’s few major domestic and international successes were overshadowed by the sex scandal that led to his impeachment and eventual acquittal.

Christopher Columbus
Sailed to the New World under the Spanish flag in 1492. Although not the first European to reach the Americas, he is credited with the journey across the Atlantic that opened the New World to exploration. In 1493, he established Santo Domingo on the island of Hispaniola as a base for further exploration.

Committee to Defend America First
Advocated isolationism and opposed FDR’s reelection in 1940. Committee members urged neutrality, claiming that the U.S. could stand alone regardless of Hitler’s advances on Europe.

Committees of Correspondence
Organized by New England patriot leader Samuel Adams. The Committees of Correspondence comprised a system of communication between patriot leaders in the towns of New England and provided the political organization necessary to unite the colonies in opposition to Parliament. These committees were responsible for sending delegates to the First Continental Congress.

Common Sense
Written by Thomas Paine in 1776. Paine argued that the colonists should free themselves from British rule and establish an independent government based on Enlightenment ideals. Common Sense became so popular and influential that many historians credit it with dissolving the final barriers to the fight for independence.

Compromise of 1833
In response to the escalating Nullification Crisis, Andrew Jackson signed two laws aimed at easing the crisis. Together, these laws were known as the Compromise of 1833. The first measure provided for a gradual lowering of import duties over the next decade, and the second measure, known as the Force Bill, authorized the president to use arms to collect customs duties in South Carolina.

Compromise of 1850
Designed by Henry Clay and pushed through Congress by Stephen A. Douglas. The Compromise of 1850 aimed to resolve sectional conflict over the distribution of slave-holding versus free states. It stipulated the admission of California as a free state; the division of the remainder of the Mexican cession into two separate territories, New Mexico and Utah, without federal restrictions on slavery; the continuance of slavery but abolition of the slave trade in the District of Columbia; and a more effective Fugitive Slave Law. The compromise, however, proved incapable of stemming controversy over slavery’s expansion.

Confederate States of America
States that seceded during the Civil War.

Congregationalism
Church system set up by the Puritans of the Massachusetts Bay Colony, in which each local church served as the center of its own community. This structure stood in contrast to the Church of England, in which the single state church held sway over all local churches. Congregationalism assured colonists a role in directing the individual congregations, which became the center of religious, and often political, life in New England communities.

Congress of Industrial Organizations (CIO)
Emerged from within the American Federation of Labor in 1938. The CIO became an influential labor group, operating during an era of government and business cooperation. In 1955, it merged with the AFL to become the AFL-CIO.

Congressional caucus
Met during the early years of the United States to choose presidential candidates. The caucus is significant in that it denied the public any voice in the nomination process, instead leaving the choice up to a centralized group of politicians based in Washington, DC. By the election of 1824, the congressional caucus had become a symbol of undemocratic elitist rule. Resented by much of the American public, the caucus lost its political influence in the early 1820s.

Connecticut Compromise
Reconciled the Virginia Plan and the New Jersey Plan for determining legislative representation in Congress. The Connecticut Compromise established equal representation for all states in the Senate and proportional representation by population in the House of Representatives.

Conquistador
A general term for any one of a group of Spanish explorers in the New World who sought to conquer the native people, establish dominance over their lands, and prosper from natural resources. The Conquistadors established a large Hispanic empire stretching from Mexico to Chile and wreaked havoc among native populations.

Constitution
The Constitution is the document that outlines the operation and central principles of American government. As opposed to the Articles of Confederation, which it replaced, the Constitution created a strong central government with broad judicial, legislative, and executive powers, though it purposely restricted the extent of these powers through a system of checks and balances. Written at the Constitutional Convention, the Constitution was ratified by the states in 1789.

Constitutional Convention
A meeting to amend the Articles of Confederation. Delegates came to the convention from every state except Rhode Island in May 1787, and decided to draft an entirely new framework of government that would give greater powers to the central government. This document became the Constitution.

Containment
A policy established during Truman’s presidency, at the start of the Cold War, that called for the prevention of further Soviet expansion by any means. Containment soon evolved into a justification for U.S. global involvement against communism.
Calvin Coolidge
President from 1923 to 1929, nicknamed “Silent Cal.” The reticent Coolidge believed that government should interfere with the economy as little as possible and spent his time in office fighting congressional efforts to regulate business.
James Fenimore Cooper
An influential American writer in the early nineteenth century. His novels, The Pioneers (1823), The Last of the Mohicans (1826), and others, employed distinctly American themes.
Corrupt bargain
Although Andrew Jackson won the most popular and electoral votes in the 1824 election, he failed to win the requisite majority and the election was thrown to the House of Representatives. Speaker of the House Henry Clay backed John Quincy Adams for president, ensuring Adams’s victory, and Adams rewarded Clay by making him secretary of state. Jackson and his supporters, enraged that the presidency had been “stolen” from them, denounced Adams and Clay’s deal as a “corrupt bargain.”
Cotton gin
Invented in 1793 by Eli Whitney. The cotton gin separated the fibers of short-staple cotton from the seeds. The mechanization of this task made cotton plantations much more efficient and profitable, giving rise to a cotton-dominated economy in the South.
Court Packing scheme
A court reform bill proposed by FDR in 1937. It was designed to allow the president to appoint an additional Supreme Court justice for each current justice over the age of seventy, up to a maximum of six appointments. Though he claimed the measure was offered in concern for the workload of the older justices, the proposal was an obvious attempt to dilute the power of the older, conservative justices. The Senate voted against the proposal later that year. Many historians argue that the proposed bill resulted in a loss of credibility for FDR, helping slow the New Deal to a standstill.
Jim Crow laws
State laws that institutionalized segregation in the South from the 1880s through the 1960s. Along with segregating schools, buses, and other public accommodations, these laws made it difficult or impossible for Southern blacks to vote.
Cuban Missile Crisis
In 1962, a year after the failed Bay of Pigs Invasion, the U.S. government learned that Soviet missile bases were being constructed in Cuba. President John F. Kennedy demanded that the USSR stop shipping military equipment to Cuba and remove the bases. U.S forces set up a naval blockade, preventing Soviet ships from reaching Cuba without inspection. After a stressful waiting period during which nuclear war seemed imminent, Soviet Premier Khrushchev backed down and began dismantling the bases in return for a U.S. promise not to invade Cuba.
George Armstrong Custer
A Civil War hero. Custer was dispatched to the hills of South Dakota in 1874 to fight off Native American threats. When gold was discovered in the region, the federal government announced that Custer’s forces would hunt down all Sioux not in reservations beginning January 31, 1876. Many Sioux refused to comply, and Custer mobilized his troops. At the Battle of Little Bighorn, the Sioux wiped out an overconfident Custer and his men.