How do British efforts to regulate the colonies during the Seven Years’ War and tax them after it lead to a war for liberty and independence? Topics to consider include tensions between colonists and the
British during the Seven Years` War, British attempts to tax the colonies and their response, expanding political participation and demands for rights, and the Declaration of Independence. (Weeks 9-10)
How was the institution of slavery an issue of debate at the Constitution convention?  How were these debates resolved and slavery made a part of the US Constitution? (Week 11)
How does the increased demand for cotton transform the lives of slaves in America?  Topics to consider include the rising demand for cotton, the internal slave trade, the labor of field slaves and house slaves, punishments slaves faced, the particular traumas that slave women faced and the forms of resistance in which slaves engaged. (Weeks 12-13)
Discuss the developing divisions between the North and the South that lead to the Civil War.  What role does the issue of slavery play in these divisions?  Issues that may be included are religion and abolitionism, David Walker, Nat Turner, the transformation of opposition to slavery from a religious moral reform movement to a political anti-slavery movement, the issue of slavery in the territories, the northern view of the South, and the southern view of the North (Week 14, 16)
What impact does industrialization have upon American society? (Week 15)
Who does the Emancipation Proclamation free?  What role do African Americans play in achieving their freedom? (Week 17)