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AP
®
United States History
PRACTICE EXAM QUESTIONS
Covering periods 6 through 9
Updated Fall 2015
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Contents
iv Introduction
1 Section I: Multiple-Choice Questions
13 Multiple-Choice Answer Key
14 Section II: Short-Answer Questions
16 Section III: Document-Based Question
22 Section IV: Long-Essay Question
23 Scoring Guidelines and Notes for Short-Answer, Document-Based,
and Long-Essay Questions
Introduction
The practice questions in this publication are provided by the College Board to help
teachers prepare students for the AP United States History Exam. This publication
includes multiple-choice, short-answer, and long-essay questions, in addition to
a Document-Based Question, all addressing content from Periods 6 through 9. An
additional publication with similar material for Periods 1 through 5 is also available.
In order to make sure that these questions remain useful for instruction, teachers
are permitted to download the materials and make copies to use with their students
in a classroom setting only. To maintain the security of these questions, teachers
should collect all materials after their administration and keep them in a secure
location. These questions should not be posted on school or personal websites, nor
electronically redistributed for any reason. Further distribution of these materials
will disadvantage teachers who rely on uncirculated questions for classroom
testing.
Sample Questions AP U.S. History Exam
Section I: Multiple-Choice Questions
Questions 1 - 3 refer to the excerpt below.
“American women are learning how to put planes and tanks together, how to read
blueprints, how to weld and rivet and make the machinery of war production hum under
skillful eyes and hands. But they’re also learning how to look smart in overalls and how to
be glamorous aer work. ey are learning to fulll both the useful and the beautiful ideal.”
— Woman’s Home Companion, 1943
1. e excerpt was most likely intended to do which of the following?
(A) Address the need to contain the Soviet Union through military action
(B) Dispel concerns about wartime cooperation between industry and the government
(C) Raise questions about the role of the United States in the world
(D) Reduce anxieties about wartime mobilization on the home front
2. By the 1950s which of the following most contributed to the continuation of the “beautiful
ideal” for women?
(A) e anxieties caused by the Cold War
(B) e rise of suburban housing developments
(C) e increased educational opportunities for both sexes
(D) e shi from a manufacturing to a service economy
3. e excerpt best serves as evidence of which of the following trends during the 1940s?
(A) Women’s widespread support for an equal rights amendment
(B) Growing challenges to civil liberties
(C) New technological and scientic advances
(D) Enhanced opportunities for women
© 2016 The College Board
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Sample Questions AP U.S. History Exam
Questions 4 - 6 refer to the 1919 image below.
The Granger Collection, New York
4. e concerns expressed in the image contributed most directly to
(A) restrictions on Chinese labor
(B) government repression of radicals
(C) international conferences to promote arms reduction
(D) military intervention in the Caribbean and Latin America
Sample Questions AP U.S. History Exam
5. e sentiments expressed in the image helped prompt Congress to take which of the following
actions in the 1920s?
(A) Instituting new military service requirements
(B) Establishing restrictive immigration quotas
(C) Recognizing labor unions and collective bargaining rights
(D) Creating tough mandatory sentencing guidelines in criminal cases
6. Which of the following United States actions taken aer the Second World War most directly
reects a continuation of the concerns expressed in the image?
(A) Criticizing decolonization in Africa and Asia
(B) Expanding individual freedoms through Supreme Court decisions
(C) Suppressing dissent through measures such as loyalty oaths
(D) Developing atomic weapons
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Sample Questions AP U.S. History Exam
Questions 7 - 10 refer to the excerpt below.
“What began as a protest movement is being challenged to translate itself into a political
movement. It is now concerned not merely with removing the barriers to full opportunity
but with achieving the fact of equality. From sit-ins and freedom rides we have gone into
rent strikes, boycotts, community organization, and political action. As a consequence of
this natural evolution, the Negro today nds himself stymied by obstacles of far greater
magnitude than the legal barriers he was attacking before: automation, urban decay,
de facto school segregation.”
— Bayard Rustin, “From Protest to Politics,” 1965
7. e excerpt was written most directly in response to which of the following?
(A) e racial desegregation of the United States military
(B) e emergence of a distinctive African American arts and literature during the Harlem
Renaissance
(C) e development of a counterculture that rejected many of the values of the previous
generation
(D) e success of the Civil Rights movement in achieving legal and legislative victories
8. Statistics on which of the following could best be used to support the argument made in the
excerpt?
(A) e percentage of African Americans registered to vote by year
(B) e incomes of African Americans as compared to those of White people by year
(C) e number of African Americans holding political oce by year
(D) e incidences of lynching by year
9. e Civil Rights movement’s shi in focus described in the excerpt most directly contributed to
(A) more concentration on problems in the South
(B) greater use of nonviolent demonstrations as a protest tactic
(C) increased divisions among activists over strategies and goals
(D) growing cooperation with feminist groups
10. e activism described in the excerpt most directly helped inspire renewed social and political
activism by
(A) American Indians
(B) labor unions
(C) environmentalists
(D) military veterans
Sample Questions AP U.S. History Exam
Questions 11 - 14 refer to the excerpt below.
“e central task of the New Deal . . . might be either social reform in a restored economy,
or political stabilization in a disintegrating society, or, most likely and most urgently,
economic recovery itself. . . . In fact, these three purposes—social reform, political
realignment, and economic recovery—owed and counterowed throughout the entire
history of the New Deal. . . . Perhaps precisely because the economic crisis of the Great
Depression was so severe and so durable, Roosevelt would have an unmatched opportunity
to eect major social reforms and to change the very landscape of American politics.”
— David M. Kennedy, historian, Freedom from Fear: e American
People in Depression and War, 1929–1945, published in 1999
11. Which of the following historical evidence could best be used to support Kennedy’s argument
in the excerpt?
(A) e passage of legislation providing unemployment insurance
(B) Attempts by the United States to remain isolated from international conicts
(C) e strong inuence of White southerners on New Deal legislation
(D) Eorts by the government to discourage women from holding paid jobs
12. e “political realignment” described in the excerpt contributed most directly to the
(A) increase in the power of local and state governments
(B) new inuence of money from independent political action committees on electoral
campaigns
(C) emergence of a Republican voting bloc among evangelical Christians in the South
(D) greater identication of working-class communities with the Democratic Party
13. Which of the following most strongly sought to limit the scope of New Deal actions described
in the excerpt?
(A) Organizations of older Americans
(B) Radicals such as members of the Communist Party
(C) Conservatives in Congress and on the Supreme Court
(D) African American groups such as the National Association for the Advancement of
Colored People (NAACP)
14. e New Deal drew most directly on which of the following earlier sets of ideas?
(A) Abolitionism
(B) Populism
(C) Progressivism
(D) Social Darwinism
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Sample Questions AP U.S. History Exam
Questions 15 - 18 refer to the table below.
FEDERAL GOVERNMENT SPENDING, 1960–1968 (in billions of dollars)
Fiscal Year National Defense Social Services Other Total Spending
1960 48.1 26.2 17.9 92.2
1961 49.6 29.8 18.3 97.7
1962 52.3 31.6 22.9 106.8
1963 53.4 33.5 24.4 111.3
1964 54.8 35.3 28.4 118.5
1965 50.6 36.6 31.0 118.2
1966 58.1 43.3 33.1 134.5
1967 71.4 51.3 34.8 157.5
1968 81.9 59.4 36.8 178.1
15. e overall pattern of spending in the table most directly reects which of the following federal
policy positions at the time?
(A) Alleviating poverty requires federal government regulation of lifestyles and morality.
(B) Federal power should be used to address social issues and ght communism abroad.
(C) Federal power should be checked by state and local government initiatives.
(D) National defense must be achieved above all other considerations.
16. e pattern in spending for national defense shown in the table most directly reects which of
the following?
(A) A decisive loss for the United States in the Korean War
(B) Democratic Party dominance in national politics aer 1968
(C) Increased public condence in the United States government
(D) Eorts to contain communism in Southeast Asia
Sample Questions AP U.S. History Exam
17. Which of the following developments aer the Second World War most directly enabled the
total spending shown in the table?
(A) Signicant increases in immigration that transformed scal policy
(B) Rising general prosperity and an expanding middle class
(C) e conspicuous consumption of the baby-boom generation
(D) e economic impact of declining northern industrial cities
18. e pattern of social services spending in the table is most similar to which of the following
spending patterns in other historical periods?
(A) Appropriations to create a national banking system in the 1840s and 1850s
(B) Assistance to American Indians at the end of the 1800s
(C) Attempts to deal with the eects of the Great Depression in the 1930s
(D) Funding for conservation eorts during the early 1900s
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Sample Questions AP U.S. History Exam
Questions 19 - 21 refer to the 1909 image below.
Courtesy of the Library of Congress.
19. Problems associated with the conditions depicted in the image most directly led to
(A) demands for increased federal regulation of industry
(B) economic instability and recession
(C) calls for a return to an agrarian economy and society
(D) decreases in union activism and membership
Sample Questions AP U.S. History Exam
20. Which of the following were most likely to have led organized opposition to the practices
shown in the image?
(A) Factory owners
(B) Tenant farmers
(C) Radical Republicans
(D) Middle-class women
21. Which of the following provided the strongest justication for the practices shown in the
image?
(A) Manifest Destiny
(B) eories of change known as Social Darwinism
(C) Socialism and utopianism
(D) Romantic belief in human perfectibility
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Sample Questions AP U.S. History Exam
Questions 22 - 25 refer to the excerpt below.
“It was in suburbs such as Garden Grove, Orange County [California] . . . that small groups
of middle-class men and women met in their new tract homes, seeking to turn the tide
of liberal dominance. Recruiting the like-minded, they organized study groups, opened
‘Freedom Forum’ bookstores, lled the rolls of the John Birch Society, entered school
board races, and worked within the Republican Party, all in an urgent struggle to safeguard
their particular vision of freedom and the American heritage. In doing so, they became
the ground forces of a conservative revival—one that transformed conservatism from a
marginal force preoccupied with communism in the early 1960s into a viable electoral
contender by the decade’s end.”
— Lisa McGirr, historian, Suburban Warriors: e
Origins of the New American Right, 2001
22. Which of the following historical developments could best be used as evidence to support
McGirr’s argument in the excerpt?
(A) Challenges to perceived moral and cultural decline
(B) e passage of the Civil Rights Act of 1964
(C) e emergence of a counterculture
(D) e rise of the Black Power movement
23. e groups described in the excerpt most likely opposed
(A) the Vietnam War
(B) racial segregation
(C) Great Society programs
(D) organized public prayer
24. Which of the following historical developments most directly resulted from the trend described
in the excerpt?
(A) e passage of new immigration laws in 1965
(B) e Supreme Court decisions expanding individual freedoms in the 1960s and 1970s
(C) e emergence of environmental activism in the 1970s
(D) e election of Ronald Reagan as president in 1980
Sample Questions AP U.S. History Exam
25. By the 1980s and 1990s, the strength of the movement described in the excerpt was best
illustrated by the
(A) expanded role of the United States in international peacekeeping operations
(B) growth in the size and scope of the federal government
(C) increase in union membership among public employees
(D) prominence of evangelical Christian organizations in politics
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Sample Questions AP U.S. History Exam
Questions 26 - 27 refer to the excerpt below.
“e [Cheyenne River] agent reports the Indians as remarkably peaceable and quiet, and
their sanitary condition good. e number of acres of land under cultivation in 1882 was
400. . . . In 1882–83, the Indians cut 900 tons of hay. . . . ere were about seventy-ve log
houses at the agency, built by Indian labor. e agency farm consists of 150 acres. e
Protestant Episcopal and Congregational denominations have missions at the agency. . . .
A regular school is maintained at the agency, and the Episcopal Church supports another
about three miles north. Both are reported in a ourishing condition, and the pupils, about
sixty in number, as making commendable progress.”
— Report on Indian Agencies, South Dakota, 1884
26. Which of the following groups would have been most likely to see the developments described
in the report as desirable?
(A) Nativists who supported the idea of an Anglo America
(B) Mine operators who sought to excavate land in the Dakotas
(C) Reformers who advocated for assimilation
(D) e leadership of American Indian nations
27. Prior to 1884, the United States government most typically responded to American Indian
resistance by
(A) using the military to enforce federal policy toward American Indians
(B) discouraging White settlers from moving onto American Indian land
(C) providing monetary incentives for American Indian farming
(D) upholding the sovereignty of American Indian nations
Sample Questions AP U.S. History Exam
Multiple-Choice Answer Key
1 - D
2 - B
3 - D
4 - B
5 - B
6 - C
7 - D
8 - B
9 - C
10 - A
11 - A
12 - D
13 - C
14 - C
15 - B
16 - D
17 - B
18 - C
19 - A
20 - D
21 - B
22 - A
23 - C
24 - D
25 - D
26 - C
27 - A
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Sample Questions AP U.S. History Exam
Section II: Short-Answer Questions
e following questions are meant to illustrate the types of questions that might appear in this
section of the exam. Note that the short-answer questions do not require students to develop
and support a thesis statement.
Use complete sentences; an outline or bulleted list alone is not acceptable.
Question 1
“During [the 1920s], the city contested the supremacy of rural, small-town America. e
city represented a challenge for economic power: the determination of nance capitalism
to regain the political preeminence that had been pared away in the Progressive era. e
city threatened to disrupt class stability through the drive by unskilled labor to form
industrial unions. . . . e city imperiled the hierarchy of social status through the clamor
of new immigrant[s]. Most of all, the older America was alarmed by the mores of the
metropolis.”
— William E. Leuchtenburg, historian, 1958
“e geographic reorganization of urban and rural areas [in the 1920s] drew these regions
into a closer and more interdependent relationship with each other. is relationship was
most evident in cities and towns which lay in the outlying districts around urban centers.
ese towns attracted people from both central cities and the surrounding countryside.
. . . In addition, farm families that converted to truck farming were tied more closely
into the urban market and urban culture. . . . [A] shi from the direct production of
goods to the purchase of them in metropolitan markets [also] changed people’s habits of
consumption. . . . Consumption habits [drew] women out of the household and into the
marketplace. . . . A 1930 study of bread consumption, for example, found that most families
[in urban and rural areas] had shied to store-bought goods.”
— Joseph Interrante, historian, 1980
1. Using the excerpts above, answer (a), (b), and (c).
a) Briey explain ONE major dierence between Leuchtenburg’s and Interrante’s
interpretations of cities and rural areas during the 1920s.
b) Briey explain how ONE specic historical event or development in the period 1919–1930
that is not explicitly mentioned in the excerpts could be used to support Leuchtenburg’s
interpretation.
c) Briey explain how ONE specic historical event or development in the period 1919–1930
that is not explicitly mentioned in the excerpts could be used to support Interrante’s
interpretation.
Sample Questions AP U.S. History Exam
Question 2
2. Answer (a), (b), and (c).
a) Briey explain why ONE of the following was the most signicant factor in the decline of
public condence in the United States government during the 1970s.
Foreign policy
Economy
Politics
b) Provide ONE example of a specic historical event or development that supports your
explanation in (a).
c) Provide specic historical evidence for why ONE of the other options is less convincing
than your choice in (a) as the most signicant factor in the decline of public condence in
the United States government during the 1970s.
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Sample Questions AP U.S. History Exam
Section III: Document-Based Question
Directions: e following question is based on the accompanying documents. e documents
have been edited for the purpose of this exercise.
In your response you should do the following.
•
esis: Present a thesis that makes a historically defensible claim and responds to all parts of
the question. e thesis must consist of one or more sentences located in one place, either in
the introduction or the conclusion.
•
Argument Development: Develop and support a cohesive argument that recognizes and
accounts for historical complexity by explicitly illustrating relationships among historical
evidence such as contradiction, corroboration, and/or qualication.
•
Use of the Documents: Utilize the content of at least six of the documents to support the
stated thesis or a relevant argument.
•
Sourcing the Documents: Explain the signicance of the author’s point of view, author’s
purpose, historical context, and/or audience for at least four documents.
•
Contextualization: Situate the argument by explaining the broader historical events,
developments, or processes immediately relevant to the question.
•
Outside Evidence: Provide an example or additional piece of specic evidence beyond those
found in the documents to support or qualify the argument.
•
Synthesis: Extend the argument by explaining the connections between the argument and
one of the following.
A development in a dierent historical period, situation, era, or geographical area.
A course theme and/or approach to history that is not the focus of the essay (such as
political, economic, social, cultural, or intellectual history).
Question 1
1. Evaluate the extent of change and continuity in the lives of African Americans in the South
during the period 1865 to 1905.
Sample Questions AP U.S. History Exam
Document 2
Source: Laws of St. Landry Parish, Louisiana, 1865.
No Negro shall be allowed to pass within the limits of said parish without a special permit
in writing from his employer. Whoever shall violate this provision shall pay a ne . . . or
in default thereof shall be forced to work four days on the public road, or suer corporeal
punishments as provided hereinaer. . . .
No Negro shall be permitted to rent or keep a house within said parish. Any Negro
violating this provision shall be immediately ejected and compelled to nd an employer. . . .
Every Negro is required to be in the regular service of some white person, or former owner,
who shall be held responsible for the conduct of said Negro. . . . Any Negro violating the
provisions of this section shall be ned . . . or in default of the payment thereof shall be
forced to work ve days on the public road, or suer corporeal punishment as hereinaer
provided.
No Negro shall be permitted to preach, exhort, or otherwise declaim to congregations
of colored people, without a special permission in writing from the president of the
police jury. Any Negro violating the provisions of this section shall pay a ne . . . or in
default thereof shall be compelled to work ten days on the public road, or suer corporeal
punishment as hereinaer provided.
No Negro who is not in the military service shall be allowed to carry rearms, or any kind
of weapons, within the parish, without the special written permission of his employers,
approved and endorsed by the nearest or most convenient chief of patrol. . . . It shall be
the duty of every citizen to act as a police ocer for the detection of oenses and the
apprehension of oenders, who shall be immediately handed over to the proper captain or
chief of patrol.
Source: addeus Stevens, speech before the United States House of Representatives,
December 18, 1865.
We have turned, or are about to turn, loose four million slaves without a hut to shelter
them, or a cent in their pockets. e infernal laws of slavery have prevented them from
acquiring an education, understanding the commonest laws of contract, or of managing
the ordinary business of life. is Congress is bound to provide for them until they can
take care of themselves. If we do not furnish them with homesteads, and hedge them
around with protective laws; if we leave them to the legislation of their late masters, we
had better have le them in bondage. eir condition would be worse than that of our
prisoners at Andersonville. If we fail in this great duty now, when we have the power, we
shall deserve and receive the [denunciation] of history and of all future ages.
Document 1
© 2016 The College Board
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Sample Questions AP U.S. History Exam
Document 3
Graph based on information drawn from the Biographical Directory of the United States Congress, compiled online at
http://history.house.gov/Exhibitions-and-Publications/BAIC/Historical-Data/Black-American-Representatives-and-Senators-by-
Congress/.
Sample Questions AP U.S. History Exam
Document 4
Source: Lucy McMillan, an African American woman, testimony before the United States
Congress Joint Select Committee to Inquire into the Condition of Aairs in the Late
Insurrectionary States, Spartanburg, South Carolina, 1871.
Question: Did the Ku Klux come where you live at any time?
Answer: . . . Monday night they came in and burned my house down; I dodged out
alongside of the road not far o and saw them. I was sitting right not far o, and as
they came along the river I knew some of them. I knew John McMillan, and Kennedy
McMillan, and Billy Bush, and John Hunter. ey were all together. I was not far o, and I
saw them. ey went right on to my house. When they passed I ran further up on the hill
to get out of the way of them. ey went there and knocked down and beat my house a
right smart while. And then they all got still, and directly I saw the re rise. . . .
Question: What was the reason given for burning your house?
Answer: ere was speaking down there last year and I came to it. . . .
Question: Where was this speaking?
Answer: Here in this town. I went on and told them, and then they all said I was making
laws; or going to have the land, and the Ku Klux were going to beat me for bragging that I
would have land. . . .
Question: Was this the only reason you know for your house being burned?
Answer: at is all the reason. All the Ku Klux said all that they had against me was that I
was bragging and boasting that I wanted the land.
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Sample Questions AP U.S. History Exam
Document 5
Source: Interview with Henry Blake, African American farmer in Little Rock, Arkansas, as
part of the Federal Writers’ Project, a government program during the Great Depression.
I was born March 16, 1863, they tell me. I was born in Arkansas. . . . My father was a
slavery man. I was too. . . . Aer slavery we had to get in before night too. If you didn’t, Ku
Klux would drive you in. ey would come and visit you anyway. . . . Right aer the war,
my father farmed a while and aer that he pulled a ski. . . . Aer freedom, we worked on
shares a while. en we rented. When we worked on shares, we couldn’t make nothing,
just overalls and something to eat. Half went to the other man and you would destroy your
half if you weren’t careful. A man that didn’t know how to count would always lose. He
might lose anyhow. ey didn’t give no itemized statement. No, you just had to take their
word. ey never give you no details. ey just say you owe so much. No matter how good
account you kept, you had to go by their account and now . . . if you didn’t make no money,
that’s all right; they would advance you more. But you better not leave him, you better
not try to leave and get caught. ey’d keep you in debt. ey were sharp. . . . Anything
that kept you a slave because he was always right and you were always wrong if there was
dierence. If there was an argument, he would get mad and there would be a shooting take
place.
Document 6
Source: Ida B. Wells, pamphlet and lecture, 1893.
We were liberated not only empty-handed but le in the power of a people who resented
our emancipation as an act of unjust punishment to them. ey were therefore armed with
a motive for doing everything in their power to render our freedom a curse rather than a
blessing. In the halls of National legislation the Negro was made a free man and citizen.
e southern states, which had seceded from the Union before the war, regained their
autonomy by accepting these amendments and promising to support the constitution.
Since “reconstruction” these amendments have been largely nullied in the south, and the
Negro vote reduced from a majority to a cipher. is has been accomplished by political
massacres, by midnight outrages of Ku Klux Klans, and by state legislative enactment.
e South is enjoying to-day the results of this course pursued for the rst een years of
our freedom. e Solid South means that the South is a unit for white supremacy, and that
the Negro is practically disfranchised through intimidation. e large Negro population
of that section gives the South thirty-nine more votes in the National Electoral College. . . .
ese votes are cast by white men who represent the Democratic Party.
Sample Questions AP U.S. History Exam
Document 7
Source: William A. Sinclair, historian and former slave, e Aermath of Slavery, 1905.
It was divinely wise that the colored race in beginning its new life of liberty was taught
to look also on the higher and greater things of life; that the mind was taken beyond
its accustomed sphere. . . . Schools were planted: the lower grades; the preparatory
schools; the normal schools; the colleges; the professional schools. ey began work
almost simultaneously,—in some cases while the shock of war was still on; in other cases
the instant that peace was declared. e work was carried on with such rapidity and
thoroughness, and there was such hearty and overwhelming response from the colored
people—who crowded and overowed school-houses with their children, and, for lack
of room in-doors, sessions were held out-of-doors under the oak and elm trees—that the
white people of the South stood sullenly surprised, and the people of North gladly amazed.
It meant a revolution in the Southland irresistible, sweeping, all-embracing. It meant a
New South!
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Sample Questions AP U.S. History Exam
Section IV: Long-Essay Question
Directions: In your response you should do the following.
•
esis: Present a thesis that makes a historically defensible claim and responds to all parts of
the question. e thesis must consist of one or more sentences located in one place, either in the
introduction or the conclusion.
•
Application of Historical inking Skills: Develop and support an argument that applies
historical thinking skills as directed by the question.
•
Supporting the Argument with Evidence: Utilize specic examples of evidence to fully and
eectively substantiate the stated thesis or a relevant argument.
•
Synthesis: Extend the argument by explaining the connections between the argument and one of
the following.
A development in a dierent historical period, situation, era, or geographical area.
A course theme and/or approach to history that is not the focus of the essay (such as political,
economic, social, cultural, or intellectual history).
Question 1
1. Evaluate the extent to which the Progressive Era (1890–1920) marked a turning point in the history of
women in the United States.
In the development of your argument, analyze what changed and what stayed the same from the period
immediately before the Progressive Era to the period during and immediately aer it. (Historical
thinking skill: Periodization)
Sample Questions AP U.S. History Exam
Scoring Guidelines and Notes
Short-Answer Question 1
Targeted Skill: Interpretation
Scoring Guide
0–3 points
Score 3
Response accomplishes all three tasks set by the question.
Score 2
Response accomplishes two of the tasks set by the question.
Score 1
Response accomplishes one of the tasks set by the question.
Score 0
Response accomplishes none of the tasks set by the question.
Scoring Notes
a) Response briey explains ONE major dierence between Leuchtenburg’s and Interrante’s
interpretations of cities and rural areas during the 1920s.
Examples of responses to part (a) that would earn credit:
•
Leuchtenburg argues that the 1920s experienced increasing conict between cities and
rural areas of the United States and conict over the growth of the metropolis.
•
Interrante argues that in the 1920s cities and rural areas became more interdependent.
b) Response briey explains how ONE specic historical event or development in the period
1919–1930 that is not explicitly mentioned in the excerpts could be used to support
Leuchtenburg’s interpretation.
Examples of responses to part (b) that would earn credit:
•
Conict over modernism and traditionalism
•
Rural concerns about secular values in the metropolis
•
Rural concerns about the modern mores and values of the new consumer culture that
promoted expressions of freedom and individualism through consumption
•
Rural concerns about the visibility of feminism, demands for women’s rights, cultural
expressions adopted by young women (New Woman)
•
Rural concerns about new technologies and secular values, especially the teaching of
evolution (Scopes trial)
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Sample Questions AP U.S. History Exam
•
Rural concerns about the rise of new visibility of African Americans, New Negro
movement, Black nationalism, Harlem Renaissance
•
Rural concerns about immigration and migration to the cities that led to the rise of nativist
and Ku Klux Klan movements
•
Rural concerns about urban crime, gangs, drugs, and alcohol; strong support for
Prohibition among rural Protestants
•
Protestantism versus Catholicism
c) Response briey explains how ONE specic historical event or development in the period
1919–1930 that is not explicitly mentioned in the excerpts could be used to support Interrante’s
interpretation.
Examples of responses to part (c) that would earn credit:
•
Greater interdependence between cities and rural areas because of the automobile
•
Consumer society’s creation of new interdependence between cities and rural areas
•
Increasing dependence of rural Americans upon work in the city and the migration of
young people to cities and outlying towns for work
•
Building of suburban developments that increasingly connected rural areas and towns
•
Transportation that increasingly connected all Americans (trains, auto, streetcars, etc.)
•
Dependence of farmers upon city populations that consumed food and produced
commodities
•
An increasingly national culture fostered by media and advertising
Sample Questions AP U.S. History Exam
Short-Answer Question 2
Targeted Skill: Causation
Scoring Guide
0–3 points
Score 3
Response accomplishes all three tasks set by the question.
Score 2
Response accomplishes two of the tasks set by the question.
Score 1
Response accomplishes one of the tasks set by the question.
Score 0
Response accomplishes none of the tasks set by the question.
Scoring Notes
a) Response briey explains why ONE of the following was the most signicant factor in the
decline of public condence in the United States government during the 1970s: foreign policy,
economy, or politics.
b) Response provides ONE example of a specic historical event or development that supports the
explanation in (A).
Foreign policy
•
e United States experienced a series of embarrassments on the world stage. Examples
could include but are not limited to the following: the Iranian Revolution of 1979, the
Iranian hostage crisis, the aborted mission to rescue the hostages in Iran.
•
e United States economy seemed to be victimized by world events. Examples could
include but are not limited to the following: the OPEC oil embargo of 1973 (which began
partly as retaliation for United States support of Israel) that led to long lines at gas stations.
•
e apparent ongoing expansion of Soviet power seemed to indicate that the United
States policy of containment was failing. Examples could include but are not limited to the
following: the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan in 1979.
•
e United States seemed to be retreating from a position of world authority. Examples
could include but are not limited to the following: return of the Panama Canal.
•
United States defeat in Vietnam seemed to indicate the failure of United States policy of
containment. Examples could include but are not limited to the following: the withdrawal
of United States combat forces from Vietnam, the fall of Saigon.
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Sample Questions AP U.S. History Exam
Economy
•
e OPEC oil embargos of 1973 and 1979 undercut the United States economy. Examples
could include but are not limited to the following: lines at gas stations, the United States
federal government’s consideration of gas rationing (and voluntary gas rationing by many
states), and the lowering of speed limits on interstate highways to 55 mph nationwide.
•
Stagation and ination undercut the United States economy. Examples could include
but are not limited to the following: the cost of a barrel of oil increasing to four times the
prewar price, the devaluation of the United States dollar.
•
e decline of industry and deindustrialization led to the loss of jobs and livelihoods for
many people. Examples could include but are not limited to the following: the collapse of
steel industry in Northeast, the economic decline in many cities.
•
Overall increase in diculty for ordinary people to make ends meet. Examples could
include but are not limited to the following: declining real wages, more dual-income
families, and increasing cost of living.
Politics
•
e Watergate incident undermined condence in political leadership. Examples could
include but are not limited to the following: Richard Nixon’s resignation of the presidency.
•
Jimmy Carter’s presidency was widely perceived as a failure. Examples could include but
are not limited to the following: rising unemployment, rising ination, and Carter’s “crisis
of condence” speech.
•
Many people saw government as dishonest, corrupt, or operating outside of the law.
Examples could include but are not limited to the following: FBI inltration of the Civil
Rights movement, the student movement, and antiwar protest organizations; revelations at
Congressional hearings.
c) Response provides specic historical evidence for why ONE of the other options is less
convincing than the choice in (A) as the most signicant factor in the decline of public
condence in the United States government during the 1970s.
•
Many of the problems that seemed like foreign policy successes or failures at the time had
more complicated impacts in the long term. For example, the defeat in Vietnam helped
shape United States military policy for the subsequent decades. Similarly, the Soviet
invasion of Afghanistan helped set the stage for the collapse of the Soviet Union and the
end of the Cold War.
•
e economic decline of the 1970s set the stage for economic resurgence in the 1980s and
1990s.
•
e political challenges of the 1970s set the stage for needed improvements such as
campaign nance reform.
Sample Questions AP U.S. History Exam
Document-Based Question
Evaluate the extent of change and continuity in African Americans’ lives in the South during
the period 1865 to 1905.
Scoring Guidelines
Please note:
•
Each point of the rubric is earned independently, e.g., a student could earn the point for
argument development without earning the point for thesis.
•
Unique evidence from the student response is required to earn each point, e.g., evidence in
the student response that qualies for the contextualization point could not be used to earn
the point for sourcing the documents or the point for synthesis.
A. esis and Argument Development (2 points)
Targeted Skill: Argumentation (E1, E4, and C1)
1 point Presents a thesis that makes a historically defensible claim and responds to all
parts of the question. e thesis must consist of one or more sentences located
in one place, either in the introduction or the conclusion.
Scoring Note: Neither the introduction nor the conclusion is necessarily limited to a single
paragraph.
1 point Develops and supports a cohesive argument that recognizes and accounts for
historical complexity by explicitly illustrating relationships among historical
evidence such as contradiction, corroboration, and/or qualication.
0 points Neither presents a thesis that makes a historically defensible claim and responds
to all parts of the question nor develops and supports a cohesive argument that
recognizes and accounts for historical complexity.
B. Document Analysis (2 points)
Targeted Skills: Analyzing Evidence: Content and Sourcing (A1 and A2) and
Argumentation (E2)
1 point Utilizes the content of at least six of the documents to support the stated thesis
or a relevant argument.
1 point Explains the signicance of the author’s point of view, author’s purpose,
historical context, and/or audience for at least four documents.
0 points Neither utilizes the content of at least six of the documents to support the stated
thesis or a relevant argument nor explains the signicance of the author’s point
of view, author’s purpose, historical context, and/or audience for at least four
documents.
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Sample Questions AP U.S. History Exam
C. Using Evidence Beyond the Documents (2 points)
Targeted Skills: Contextualization (C3) and Argumentation (E3)
Contextualization
1 point Situates the argument by explaining the broader historical events,
developments, or processes immediately relevant to the question.
Scoring Note: Contextualization requires using knowledge not found in the documents to
situate the argument within broader historical events, developments, or processes immediately
relevant to the question. e contextualization point is not awarded for merely a phrase or
reference, but instead requires an explanation, typically consisting of multiple sentences or a
full paragraph.
Evidence Beyond the Documents
1 point Provides an example or additional piece of specic evidence beyond those
found in the documents to support or qualify the argument.
Scoring Notes:
is example must be dierent from the evidence used to earn other points on this rubric.
is point is not awarded for merely a phrase or reference. Responses need to reference an
additional piece of specic evidence and explain how that evidence supports or qualies the
argument.
0 points Neither situates the argument by explaining the broader historical events,
developments, or processes immediately relevant to the question, nor provides
an example or additional piece of evidence beyond those found in the
documents to support or qualify the argument.
D. Synthesis (1 point)
Targeted Skill: Synthesis (C4 or C5)
1 point Extends the argument by explaining the connections between the argument and
one of the following.
a) A development in a dierent historical period, situation, era, or geographical
area
b) A course theme and/or approach to history that is not the focus of the essay
(such as political, economic, social, cultural, or intellectual history)
0 points Does not extend the argument by explaining the connections between the
argument and the other areas listed.
Scoring Note: e synthesis point requires an explanation of the connections to a dierent
historical period, situation, era, or geographical area, and is not awarded for merely a phrase
or reference.
Sample Questions AP U.S. History Exam
On Accuracy: e components of this rubric each require that students demonstrate
historically defensible content knowledge. Given the timed nature of the exam, the essay
may contain errors that do not detract from the overall quality, as long as the historical
content used to advance the argument is accurate.
On Clarity: ese essays should be considered rst dras and thus may contain
grammatical errors. ose errors will not be counted against a student unless they obscure
the successful demonstration of the content knowledge and skills described above.
Scoring Notes
A. esis and Argument Development (2 points)
a) esis
Responses earn one point by presenting a thesis that makes a historically defensible claim
that responds to all parts of the question (1 point).
An acceptable thesis would make a historically defensible claim that would evaluate
the extent of change and continuity in African Americans’ lives in the South during the
period 1865 to 1905. e thesis must address both change and continuity, but it does not
need to treat each equally.
Examples of acceptable thesis:
•
Although slavery was eliminated, sharecropping replaced it and still resembled slavery
in form and practice. Sometimes African Americans were sharecroppers on the same
plantation or land that they had worked as slaves.
•
Although constitutional amendments provided civil rights for African Americans,
these civil rights were severely limited in practice and later through Jim Crow laws, or
segregation laws, in the South.
•
Radical Republicans and the federal government initially made concerted eorts to
achieve greater economic, political, and social equality for African Americans, but
over time these eorts declined.
•
Although African Americans gained new rights, over time White people used racially
targeted terrorism and violence to subordinate African Americans in the South.
•
Although the Fieenth Amendment gave African Americans the right to vote,
the ability to do so was curtailed over time by mechanisms such as literacy tests,
grandfather clauses, poll taxes, and the fear of violence.
•
In the period 1865 to 1905, the lives of African Americans in the South remained
much as they were in the period prior to the Civil War. Although no longer enslaved,
African Americans in the South aer 1865 continued to experience violence and
exclusion from economic, social, and political equality.
•
Although they continued to suer violence, discrimination, and hardship, African
Americans in the South experienced a great deal of positive change in the period aer
1865, including economic independence and political representation.
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Sample Questions AP U.S. History Exam
An unacceptable thesis would:
•
Fail to make a historically defensible claim about the extent of change and continuity
in African Americans’ lives in the South from 1865 to 1905.
•
Fail to address both change and continuity, but instead focus only on change or only
on continuity.
•
Restate the question.
b) Argument Development
To earn this point, responses must move beyond a single sentence or a listing of facts
in support of the thesis or argument; they must explain the relationship of historical
evidence to a complex and cohesive thesis or argument and do so throughout the essay (1
point). Evidence can be related to the argument in ways such as contradiction (e.g., using
evidence to address a possible counterargument to the main argument in the essay),
corroboration (e.g., combining multiple pieces of evidence to support a single argument),
or qualication (e.g., use of evidence to present an argument that is subsequently made
more complex by noting exceptions).
Unacceptable examples of argument development could include the following:
•
Responses that do not develop a cohesive essay
•
Responses that simply parrot the documents or list the documents in order
•
Responses that fail to organize documents in any meaningful way
•
Responses that do not reconnect the evidence of the essay back to a thesis or argument
NOTE: is cannot be accomplished in a single sentence or by listing facts in support of the
thesis or argument. e point will be received for explaining the relationship of historical
evidence to the thesis or argument throughout the entire essay.
B. Document Analysis (2 points)
a) Document Content
Responses earn one point by utilizing the content of at least six of the documents to
support the stated thesis or a relevant argument (1 point). Responses cannot earn a point
by merely quoting or paraphrasing the documents with no connection to a thesis or
argument.
b) Signicance of Point of View, Purpose, Context, and/or Audience
Responses also earn one point by explaining the signicance of the author’s point of view,
author’s purpose, historical context, and/or audience for at least four documents
(1 point).
C. Using Evidence Beyond the Documents (2 points)
a) Contextualization
Responses earn a point for contextualization by explaining the broader historical events,
developments, or processes immediately relevant to the question (1 point).
Sample Questions AP U.S. History Exam
Examples of acceptable contextualization:
•
Slavery was eliminated (irteenth Amendment).
•
Ongoing impediments for African Americans included the fear of violence, literacy
tests, grandfather clause, and poll tax.
•
Northern interest in Reconstruction waned aer 1870 and White Democrats (also
known as Redeemers) regained control of governments. is process is sometimes
called Redemption.
•
Congress was unwilling to reapportion southern land, and land remained in the hands
of White Southerners.
•
African American women were not permitted to vote during Reconstruction.
•
Most African Americans were excluded from the new manufacturing jobs (for
example, jobs in textile mills).
•
Many African Americans still worked for White families as servants.
•
Some African Americans were able to buy and work their own land and build their
own businesses.
•
African American men gained the right to vote (Fieenth Amendment).
•
African Americans gained equal protection under the law and legal citizenship
(Fourteenth Amendment).
•
African Americans’ marriages and families were recognized by law.
•
e Freedmen’s Bureau attempted to provide African Americans with some economic
assistance, but eorts were short-lived and had very limited success.
•
e New South began emerging by 1900; some manufacturing emerged in cities and
job opportunities developed outside of agriculture.
•
African Americans gained access, albeit limited, to public schools.
•
African Americans gained more autonomy over working conditions, even under
sharecropping.
•
African American institutions such as churches developed; Black churches continued
to grow and provide aid to African Americans in the South.
•
Black colleges were founded to provide educational opportunities for a few African
Americans.
•
Racially targeted violence against African Americans escalated.
b) Evidence Beyond the Documents
Responses earn a separate point for providing an example or additional piece of specic
evidence beyond those found in the documents to support or qualify the argument
(1 point).
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Sample Questions AP U.S. History Exam
Examples of additional pieces of specic evidence beyond those found in the
documents to support or qualify the argument:
•
Black Codes
•
Civil Rights Act of 1866
•
Civil Rights Act of 1875
•
Civil Rights Cases, 1883
•
Compromise of 1877
•
W. E. B. Du Bois
•
Enforcement Act of 1870 (also known as the Civil Rights Act of 1870 or the First Ku
Klux Klan Act or Force Act)
•
Fieenth Amendment
•
“Forty Acres and a Mule”
•
Fourteenth Amendment
•
Freedmen’s Bureau (United States Bureau of Refugees, Freedmen, and Abandoned
Lands)
•
President Ulysses S. Grant
•
President Rutherford B. Hayes
•
Jim Crow laws
•
President Andrew Johnson
•
Lynching
•
National Association of Colored Women
•
New South
•
Niagara Movement (1905)
•
Panic of 1873
•
Plessy v. Ferguson (1896)
•
Radical Reconstruction
•
Radical Republicans
•
Railroads
•
Reconstruction Act of 1867
•
Redemption/Redeemers
•
Sharecropping
•
Charles Sumner
•
Tenant farming
•
Tenure of Oce Act
Sample Questions AP U.S. History Exam
•
United States v. Cruikshank (1876)
•
irteenth Amendment
•
Booker T. Washington
D. Synthesis (1 point)
Responses earn a point for synthesis by extending their argument in one of two possible
ways (1 point).
a) Responses can extend their argument by explaining the connections between their
argument and a development in a dierent historical period, situation, era, or
geographical area (Synthesis prociency C4). ese connections must consist of more
than just a phrase or reference.
Examples of acceptable synthesis by appropriately connecting the argument to a
development in a dierent historical period, situation, era, or geographic area:
•
Introducing substantive comparisons to African Americans’ experiences under slavery
•
Examining the extension of eorts to gain rights for African Americans in the rst
half of the twentieth century (for example, by drawing substantive and historically
valid comparisons with the NAACP, the National Urban League, or Marcus Garvey’s
Universal Negro Improvement Association)
•
Discussing how constitutional amendments passed during Reconstruction provided
the basis for the expansion of rights during the modern Civil Rights movement
•
Discussing how the time span between the era of Reconstruction and the modern
Civil Rights movement demonstrates how little changed for African American lives; or
comparison of the success and failures of 1865–1905 to those of 1955–1995 for African
Americans’ lives
b) Responses can extend their argument by explaining the connections between their
argument and a course theme and/or approach to history that is not the focus of the
essay, such as political, economic, social, cultural, or intellectual history (Synthesis
prociency C5).
Examples of acceptable synthesis by connecting the argument to dierent course
themes and/or approaches to history that are not the main focus of the question:
•
Examining the changing narrative of the history of the Reconstruction and early Jim
Crow era through reference to lms like Birth of a Nation (1915)
•
Arguing a thesis focused on political and economic changes and continuities, then
introducing the element of social or cultural changes in the conclusion.
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Sample Questions AP U.S. History Exam
Document Summaries
Document 1: addeus Stevens, speech, 1865
Summary of key points explaining content of source or argument made by the author:
•
Stevens was asking for new legislation to provide homesteads and protective legislation
to former slaves.
•
Stevens feared a continuity in the lives of African Americans if Congress does not act.
Examples of author’s point of view:
•
Stevens was a member of the Radical wing of the Republican Party and a strong
advocate for African American rights
Example of author’s purpose:
•
To call for economic and social support for African Americans who had previously
been enslaved
Examples of historical context:
•
Less than one year aer the end of the Civil War, still in the phase of Reconstruction
dominated by President Andrew Johnson
Examples of audience:
•
United States House of Representatives, but also the public more generally
Document 2: Laws of St. Landry Parish, Louisiana, 1865
Summary of key points explaining content of source or argument made by the author:
•
African Americans were free so states were changing their laws to regulate the lives of
formerly enslaved people.
•
e regulations listed in the document were a continuation of the harsh conditions
African Americans lived in before and during the Civil War.
Examples of author’s point of view:
•
Written by White legislators who intended that the laws be implicitly discriminatory
toward African Americans and who intended to maintain the social, economic, and
legal system as it operated prior to the end of slavery
Example of author’s purpose:
•
To establish a series of laws restricting the labor, mobility, activities, and rights of
African Americans
•
To preserve a social and legal system that resembled slavery in all but name
Examples of historical context:
•
Less than one year aer the end of the Civil War, still in the phase of Reconstruction
dominated by President Andrew Johnson
•
One example of Black Codes passed by many states and localities
Sample Questions AP U.S. History Exam
Examples of audience:
•
e public in St. Landry Parish, Louisiana, both Black and White
Document 3: African Americans in Congress, 1865–1889
Summary of key points explaining content of source or argument made by the author:
•
Political participation for African Americans changed dramatically aer the Civil War,
allowing some African Americans to be elected to Congress.
•
By 1887, those changes had diminished and African American representation in
Congress was the same as in 1865.
Examples of author’s point of view: n/a
Example of author’s purpose:
•
To document the number of African Americans serving in Congress during the years
of Radical Reconstruction and the decades aer
Examples of historical context:
•
Covers a period from the end of the Civil War until nearly the end of the century;
shows an increase in African American political representation in 1860s and 1870s
and decline from 1877 onward, aer the end of Reconstruction
•
Decline to no representation during the period in which Jim Crow segregation was in
force
Examples of audience: n/a
Document 4: Lucy McMillan, testimony, 1871
Summary of key points explaining content of source or argument made by the author:
•
e Ku Klux Klan was a newly formed organization. Also, Congress was newly willing
to investigate mistreatment of African Americans.
•
McMillan testied about an attack from the Ku Klux Klan designed to terrorize
African Americans and leave them in conditions similar to conditions they
experienced under slavery.
Examples of author’s point of view:
•
McMillan was an aggrieved African American woman who had been attacked by the
Ku Klux Klan.
•
e investigator was possibly a member of Congress or a congressional sta member.
Example of author’s purpose:
•
McMillan sought to explain her experience with the Ku Klux Klan and possibly to gain
redress.
•
She sought to highlight the Ku Klux Klan’s treatment of an African American woman.
•
e investigator sought to gather information and/or evidence on the Ku Klux Klan
conspiracy.
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Sample Questions AP U.S. History Exam
Examples of historical context:
•
Six years aer the end of the Civil War and several years aer the height of
Reconstruction reforms, during a period when White backlash against Reconstruction
was pervasive and when Congress was still willing to investigate it.
•
Testimony may have been in response to the passage of the Enforcement Act of 1870
(also known as the Civil Rights Act of 1870 or the First Ku Klux Klan Act or Force
Act).
Examples of audience:
•
Congressional committee unsympathetic to former Confederate states
•
Relatively narrow audience although it may be able to redress the grievances of
McMillan
Document 5: Interview with Henry Blake about the late 1860s
Summary of key points explaining content of source or argument made by the author:
•
Sharecropping was the new economic arrangement property owners made with
former slaves.
•
Blake highlights how similar African American lives were aer the Civil War to their
lives before and during the Civil War.
Examples of author’s point of view:
•
e author was an African American man, a former sharecropper who was keenly
aware of the unequal treatment of sharecroppers by White landlords.
Example of author’s purpose:
•
To explain experiences growing up under sharecropping
Examples of historical context:
•
Late nineteenth century, aer sharecropping had become a major mode of cotton
production for African Americans in the South
Examples of audience:
•
Interviewer conducting oral history interview for the Federal Writers’ Project during
the New Deal
Document 6: Ida B. Wells, pamphlet and lecture, 1893
Summary of key points explaining content of source or argument made by the author:
•
e actions of state legislators and the Ku Klux Klan nullied any change the Civil War
may have brought about in the lives of African Americans.
Examples of author’s point of view:
•
African American woman, journalist, antilynching activist, founder of the National
Association of Colored Women and the NAACP.
•
She was a political and women’s rights activist and suragist, outraged by current
conditions.
Sample Questions AP U.S. History Exam
Example of author’s purpose:
•
To argue that African Americans remained oppressed in a number of ways
•
To critique White supremacy in the South and the return of the Redeemer
governments (Democratic) in the southern states
•
To bring public attention to lynching and violence committed against African
Americans in the South
Examples of historical context:
•
Almost three decades aer the Civil War, and more than een years aer the end of
Reconstruction
•
Written during a time of increasingly pervasive Jim Crow laws, discrimination against
African Americans, and lynching
Examples of audience:
•
People who were interested in or sympathetic to racial issues
Document 7: William A. Sinclair, 1905
Summary of key points explaining content of source or argument made by the author:
•
New schools were created to provide African Americans with an education. is
aorded many African Americans with new opportunities.
Examples of author’s point of view:
•
Written by an African American male, a historian, a former slave whose experiences
with Reconstruction were extremely positive.
•
Sinclair celebrated educational reform in the South and the responses of former slaves
to these educational opportunities.
•
He supported the view that African Americans were the leaders of Reconstruction,
rather than Radical Republicans.
Example of author’s purpose:
•
To describe the immediate aermath of slavery
•
To highlight the positive changes for African Americans as a result of emancipation,
especially in education, and the ways that these changes aected White people in the
South
•
To highlight the barbarism of White people in the South
Examples of historical context:
•
Forty years aer the end of the Civil War, the subject had become history.
•
Sinclair was writing at a time when racial discrimination is pervasive and activists
such as Booker T. Washington and W. E. B. Du Bois were seeking new opportunities
for African Americans.
Examples of audience:
•
Readers interested in the history of Reconstruction
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Sample Questions AP U.S. History Exam
Long-Essay Question
Evaluate the extent to which the Progressive Era (1890–1920) marked a turning point in
the history of women in the United States.
In the development of your argument, analyze what changed and what stayed the same from
the period immediately before the Progressive Era to the period during and immediately aer
it. (Historical thinking skill: Periodization)
Scoring Guidelines
Please note:
•
Each point of the rubric is earned independently, e.g., a student could earn the point for
synthesis without earning the point for thesis.
•
Unique evidence from the student response is required to earn each point, e.g., evidence in
the student response that qualies for either of the targeted skill points could not be used
to earn the point for thesis.
A. esis (1 point)
Targeted Skill: Argumentation (E1)
1 point Presents a thesis that makes a historically defensible claim and responds to all
parts of the question. e thesis must consist of one or more sentences located
in one place, either in the introduction or the conclusion.
0 points Does not present a thesis that makes a historically defensible claim and
responds to all parts of the question.
B. Argument Development: Using the Targeted Historical inking Skill (2 points)
Targeted Skills: Argumentation (E2 and E3) and Periodization (D5 and D6)
1 point Describes the ways in which the historical development specied in the prompt
was dierent from and similar to developments that preceded AND followed.
1 point Explains the extent to which the historical development specied in the prompt
was dierent from and similar to developments that preceded AND followed.
0 points Does not describe the ways in which the historical development specied in
the prompt was dierent from and similar to developments that preceded AND
followed.
Scoring Note: If the prompt requires evaluation of a turning point, then responses must discuss
developments that preceded AND followed in order to earn either point.
Sample Questions AP U.S. History Exam
C. Argument Development: Using Evidence (2 points)
Targeted Skill: Argumentation (E2 and E3)
1 point Addresses the topic of the question with specic examples of relevant evidence.
1 point Utilizes specic examples of evidence to fully and eectively substantiate the
stated thesis or a relevant argument.
0 points Does not address the topic of the question with specic examples of relevant
evidence.
Scoring Note: To fully and eectively substantiate the stated thesis or a relevant argument,
responses must include a broad range of evidence that, through analysis and explanation,
justies the stated thesis or a relevant argument.
D. Synthesis (1 point)
Targeted Skill: Synthesis (C4 or C5)
1 point Extends the argument by explaining the connections between the argument and
one of the following.
a) A development in a dierent historical period, situation, era, or geographical
area.
b) A course theme and/or approach to history that is not the focus of the essay
(such as political, economic, social, cultural, or intellectual history).
0 points Does not extend the argument by explaining the connections between the
argument and the other areas listed.
Scoring Note: e synthesis point requires an explanation of the connections to a dierent
historical period, situation, era, or geographical area, and is not awarded for merely a phrase
or reference.
On Accuracy: e components of this rubric each require that students demonstrate
historically defensible content knowledge. Given the timed nature of the exam, the essay
may contain errors that do not detract from the overall quality, as long as the historical
content used to advance the argument is accurate.
On Clarity: ese essays should be considered rst dras and thus may contain
grammatical errors. ose errors will not be counted against a student unless they obscure
the successful demonstration of the content knowledge and skills described above.
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Sample Questions AP U.S. History Exam
Scoring Notes
A. esis (1 point)
Responses earn one point by presenting a thesis that makes a historically defensible claim
that responds to all parts of the question (1 point).
An acceptable thesis would evaluate the extent to which the Progressive Era marked a
turning point in the history of women in the United States. (1 point).
Possible thesis statements arguing the extent to which the Progressive Era marked a turning
point in the history of women could include the following.
•
Women challenged their prescribed place and articulated new visions of social, political,
and economic equality.
•
Women’s increased participation in activist groups such as the Woman’s Christian
Temperance Union (WCTU), the Anti-Saloon League, the National Consumers League,
the Anti-Imperialist League, the North American Woman Surage Association, and the
National Woman’s Party gave them more engagement in public life.
•
African American and Latina women began greater participation in activist groups
(such as the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People [NAACP]),
antilynching work (such as that of Ida B. Wells), and mutual aid societies.
•
Women’s participation in settlement house work and increasingly professionalized
social work encouraged greater civic engagement and drew on ideas oen labeled as
maternalism and municipal housekeeping.
•
Women gained the right to vote through the Nineteenth Amendment.
•
Increasing numbers of young women obtained paid employment in factories and in
white-collar occupations.
Possible thesis statements arguing the Progressive Era did NOT mark a turning point in the
history of women could include the following.
•
Women had fought for surage and participated in activist groups such as the WCTU
since at least the 1840s.
•
e number of women involved in Progressive Era reform, as a percentage of the
population, was small.
•
Women did not gain access to signicant political inuence or social or economic
equality.
•
Prominent Progressive Era women were exceptions rather than the norm.
•
e failure of the Equal Rights Amendment highlighted the limits of political equality.
•
Gender divisions in employment and lower wages for women persisted; women
remained largely absent from professional elds and management.
•
Most women remained primarily responsible for homes and children.
•
e persistence of racial segregation and discrimination aected African American and
other minority women.
Sample Questions AP U.S. History Exam
An unacceptable thesis would:
•
Fail to evaluate the extent to which the Progressive Era marked a turning point in the
history of women in the United States.
•
Fail to address all parts of the question.
•
Restate the question.
B. Argument Development: Using the Targeted Historical inking Skill (2 points)
Note: In evaluation of a turning point, responses must discuss developments that preceded
AND followed in order to earn either point.
a) Argument Development – Describes
Responses earn one point by describing the way in which the Progressive Era was dierent
from AND similar to developments that preceded AND followed it for the history of
women in the United States.
Examples of acceptable descriptions of dierences and similarities:
•
Describing work opportunities before and during/aer the Progressive Era
•
Describing the political engagement of women before and during/aer the
Progressive Era
•
Describing the social roles and cultural perceptions of women before and during/aer
the Progressive Era
•
Describing the participation in social reform movements before and during/aer the
Progressive Era
Examples of unacceptable descriptions of dierences and similarities:
•
Responses that do not address the situation before and aer the Progressive Era
•
Responses that focus only on dierences without addressing similarities or vice versa
•
Responses with confused chronology
•
Responses that are vague or do not connect women to the Progressive Era
b) Argument Development – Explains
Responses earn one separate point by explaining the extent to which the Progressive Era
was dierent from AND similar to developments that preceded AND followed it for the
history of women in the United States.
Examples of acceptable explanation of the extent of similarities and dierences:
•
Explaining the extent to which work opportunities changed for women before and
during/aer the Progressive Era
•
Explaining the extent to which political engagement of women changed before and
during/aer the Progressive Era
•
Explaining the extent to which social roles and cultural perceptions of women changed
before and during/aer the Progressive Era
•
Explaining the extent to which participation in social reform movements changed
before and during/aer the Progressive Era
© 2016 The College Board
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Sample Questions AP U.S. History Exam
Examples of unacceptable explanation of reasons for dierences and similarities:
•
Explanations that do not clearly connect developments to the time before and aer the
Progressive Era
•
Explanations that do not explain the extent of change or continuity, but simply note
that there was or was not a change
C. Argument Development: Using Evidence (2 points)
a) Using Evidence – Examples
Responses earn one point by addressing the topic of the question with specic examples of
relevant evidence (1 point).
Examples of specic evidence that could be used to address the topic of the question:
•
Jane Addams
•
Susan B. Anthony
•
Anti-Saloon League
•
Gertrude Bonnin
•
Carrie Chapman Catt
•
Hull House social settlement
•
International Ladies’ Garment Workers’ Union (ILGWU)
•
Helen Keller
•
Florence Kelley
•
Julia Lathrop
•
Muller v. Oregon (1908)
•
Carrie Nation
•
National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP)
•
National Consumers League
•
National Woman’s Party
•
Ne w Woman
•
North American Woman Surage Association
•
Alice Paul
•
Jeannette Rankin
•
Margaret Sanger
•
Rose Schneiderman
•
Anna Howard Shaw
•
Elizabeth Cady Stanton
•
Ida B. Wells
•
Woman’s Christian Temperance Union
Sample Questions AP U.S. History Exam
Examples of unsuccessfully using evidence to address the topic of the question:
•
Evidence that is factually incorrect
•
Evidence that demonstrates confused chronology
•
Evidence that is not directly connected to the question
b) Using Evidence – Eective Substantiation
Responses earn a separate point by utilizing specic examples of evidence to fully
and eectively substantiate a thesis or relevant argument about the degree to which the
Progressive Era marked a turning point in the history of women in the United States
(1 point). Fully and eectively substantiating the thesis goes beyond merely providing
many examples. is point is earned by clearly and consistently linking signicant
evidence to the argument and showing how the evidence demonstrates the degree to
which the Progressive Era was a turning point for the history of women.
D. Synthesis (1 point)
Responses earn a point for synthesis by extending their argument in one of two possible
ways (1 point).
a) Responses can extend their argument by explaining the connections between their
argument and a development in a dierent historical period, situation, era, or
geographical area (Synthesis prociency C4). ese connections must consist of more
than just a phrase or reference.
Examples of synthesis by connecting the argument to a development in a dierent
historical period, situation, era, or geographical area:
•
Explicitly calling out the international aspects of a history focused mostly on the
United States
•
Explicitly comparing women’s experiences during the Progressive Era to earlier times
such as the period of the American Revolution (for example, by calling out republican
motherhood) or during the decades prior to the Civil War (for example, by calling out
women’s social engagement during the Second Great Awakening or the Seneca Falls
convention)
•
Explicitly comparing women’s experiences during the Progressive Era to later
moments such as during the women’s rights movement of the 1960s and 1970s (oen
termed Second Wave Feminism)
b) Responses can extend their argument by explaining the connections between their
argument and a course theme and/or approach to history that is not the focus of the
essay such as political, economic, social, cultural, or intellectual history (Synthesis
prociency C5).
Examples of synthesis by connecting the argument to a dierent course theme or
approach to history:
•
Arguing a thesis focused on political and economic turning points, then introducing
the element of social or cultural changes in the conclusion
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Sample Questions AP U.S. History Exam
