Students in grade eight study the ideas, issues and events from the framing of the Constitution up to World War I, with an emphasis on America’s role in the war. After reviewing the development of America’s democratic institutions founded in the Judeo-Christian heritage and English parliamentary traditions, particularly the shaping of the Constitution, students trace the development of American politics, society, culture and economy and relate them to the emergence of major regional differences. They learn about the challenges facing the new nation, with an emphasis on the causes, course and consequences of the Civil War. They make connections between the rise of industrialization and contemporary social and economic conditions.

 (Parantheses indicate the school year quarter in which the information is most thoroughly covered.)

8.1 (Quarter 1) Students understand the major events preceding the founding of the nation and relate their significance to the development of American constitutional democracy, in terms of:

1. the relationship between the moral and political ideas of the Great Awakening and the development of revolutionary fervor
2. the philosophy of government expressed in the Declaration of Independence with an emphasis on government as a means of securing individual rights (e.g., key phrases such as "...all Men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights")
3. the significance of the American Revolution as it affected other nations especially France
4. its blend of civic republicanism, classical liberal principles, and English parliamentary traditions

8.2 (Quarter 2) Students analyze the political principles underlying the U.S. Constitution and compare the enumerated and implied powers of the federal government, in terms of:

1. the significance of the Magna Carta, the English Bill of Rights, and the Mayflower Compact
2. the Articles of Confederation and the Constitution, and the success of each in implementing the ideals of the Declaration of Independence
3. the major debates that occurred during the development of the Constitution and their ultimate resolutions on areas such as shared power among institutions, divided state-federal power, slavery, the rights of individuals and states (later addressed by the addition of the Bill of Rights), and the status of American Indian nations under the commerce clause
4. the political philosophy underpinning the U.S. Constitution as specified in The Federalist (authored by James Madison, Alexander Hamilton, and John Jay) and the role of such leaders as James Madison, George Washington, Roger Sherman, Gouverneur Morris, and James Wilson in the writing and ratification of the Constitution
5. the significance of Jefferson’s Statute for Religious Freedom as a forerunner of the First Amendment, and the origins, purpose and differing views of the founding fathers on the issue of the separation of church and state
6. the powers of government enumerated in the Constitution and the fundamental liberties ensured by the Bill of Rights
7. the principles of federalism, dual sovereignty, separation of powers, checks and balances, the nature and purpose of majority rule, and how the American idea of constitutionalism preserves individual rights

8.3 (Quarter 2) Students understand the foundation of the American political system and the ways in which citizens participate in it, in terms of:

1. the principles and concepts codified in the state constitutions between 1777 and 1781 that create the context out of which American political institutions and ideas developed
2. how the ordinances of 1785 and 1787 privatized national resources and transferred federally owned lands into private holdings, townships and states
3. the advantages of a "common market" among the states as foreseen and protected by the Constitution’s clauses on interstate commerce, common coinage, and full-faith and credit
4. the conflicts between Thomas Jefferson and Alexander Hamilton that resulted in the emergence of two political parties (e.g., view of foreign policy, Alien and Sedition acts, economic policy, National Bank, funding and assumption of the revolutionary debt)
5. the significance of domestic resistance movements and ways in which the central government responded to such movements (e.g., Shays’ Rebellion, the Whiskey Rebellion)
6. the basic law-making process and how the design of the U.S. Constitution provides numerous opportunities for citizens to participate in the political process and to monitor and influence government (e.g., function of elections, political parties, interest groups)
7. the function and responsibilities of a free press

8.4 (Quarters 2-3) Students analyze the aspirations and ideals of the people of the new nation, in terms of:

1. its physical landscapes and political divisions and the territorial expansion of the U.S. during the terms of the first four presidents
2. the policy significance of famous speeches (e.g., George Washington’s Farewell Address, Jefferson’s Inaugural, John Q. Adams Fourth of July 1821 Address)
3. the rise of capitalism and the economic problems and conflicts that arose (e.g., Jackson’s opposition to the National Bank; early decisions of the U.S. Supreme Court that reinforced the sanctity of contracts and a capitalist economic system of law)
4. the daily lives of people, including the traditions in art, music, and literature of early national America (e.g., writings by Washington Irving, James Fenimore Cooper)

8.5 (Quarters 2-3) Students analyze U.S. foreign policy in the early Republic, in terms of:

1. the political and economic causes and consequences of the War of 1812 and the major battles, leaders, and events leading to a final peace
2. the changing boundaries and the principal relationships between the United States, its neighbors (current Mexico and Canada) and Europe, including the influence of the Monroe Doctrine, and how those relationships influenced westward expansion and the Mexican American War
3. the major treaties with Indian nations during the administrations of the first four presidents and their varying outcomes

8.6 (Quarters 3-4) Students analyze the divergent paths of the American people from 1800 to the mid-1800's and the challenges they faced, with emphasis on the Northeast, in terms of:

1. the influence of industrialization and technological developments on the region, including human modification of the landscape and how physical geography shaped human actions (e.g., growth of cities, deforestation, farming, mineral extraction)
2. the physical obstacles to, and the economic and political factors in (e.g., Henry Clay’s American System), building a network of roads, canals and railroads
3. the reasons for the wave of immigration from Northern Europe to the U.S. and growth in the number, size, and spatial arrangements of cities (e.g., Irish immigrants and the Great Irish Famine)
4. the lives of black Americans who gained freedom in the North and founded schools and churches to advance black rights and communities
5. the development of the American education system from its earliest roots, including the role of religious and private schools, Horace Mann's campaign for free public education, and its assimilating role in American culture
6. the women's suffrage movement (e.g., biographies, writings, and speeches of Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Margaret Fuller, Lucretia Mott, Susan B. Anthony)
7. common themes in American art as well as Transcendentalism and individualism (e.g., writings about and by Emerson, Thoreau, Melville, Alcott, Hawthorne, Longfellow)

8.7 (Quarter 3) Students analyze the divergent paths of the American people from 1800 to the mid-1800s and the challenges they faced, with emphasis on the South, in terms of:

1. the development of the agrarian economy in the South, the location of the cotton producing states and the role of cotton and the cotton gin
2. the origins and development of the institution of slavery; its effects on black Americans and on the region's political, social, religious, economic, and cultural development; and the various attempted strategies to both overturn and preserve it (e.g., biographies of Nat Turner, Denmark Vesey)
3. the different characteristics of white Southern society and how the physical environment influenced events and conditions prior to the Civil War
4. the lives and opportunities of free-blacks in the North as compared with free-blacks in the South

8.8 (Quarter 3) Students analyze the divergent paths of the American people from 1800 to the mid-1800's and the challenges they faced, with emphasis on the West, in terms of:

1. the election of Andrew Jackson in 1828, the importance of Jacksonian democracy and his actions as president (e.g., spoils system, veto of National bank, policy of Indian removal, opposition to Supreme court)
2. the purpose, challenges and economic incentives associated with westward expansion including the concept of Manifest Destiny (e.g., Lewis and Clark expedition, accounts of the removal of Indians and the Cherokees’ "Trail of Tears," settlement of the Great Plains) and the territorial acquisitions that spanned numerous decades
3. the role of pioneer women and the new status that western women achieved (e.g., biographies, journals, diaries and other original documents on Laura Ingalls Wilder, Annie Bidwell, slave women gaining freedom in the West, Wyoming granting suffrage to women in 1869)
4. the role of the great rivers and the struggle over water rights
5. Mexican settlements (i.e., their locations, cultural traditions, attitudes toward slavery, land-grant system, the economies they established)
6. the Texas War for Independence and the Mexican-American War (i.e., territorial settlements, the aftermath of the wars and the effect on the lives of Americans, including Mexican-Americans today)

8.9 (Quarter 3) Students analyze the early and steady attempts to abolish slavery and realize the ideals of the Declaration of Independence, in terms of:

1. the leaders of the movement (e.g., biographies and other literature on John Quincy Adams and his proposed constitutional amendment, John Brown and the armed resistance, Harriet Tubman and the underground railroad, Benjamin Franklin, Theodore Weld, William Lloyd Garrison, Frederick Douglass)
2. how early state constitutions abolished slavery
3. the role of the Northwest Ordinance in education and in banning slavery in new states north of the Ohio River
4. the slavery issue as raised by the annexation of Texas and the effect of California coming into the union as a free state as part of the Compromise of 1850
5. the significance of the States' Rights Doctrine, Missouri Compromise (1820), Wilmot Proviso (1846), the Compromise of 1850, Henry Clay’s role in the Missouri Compromise and the Compromise of 1850, the Kansas-Nebraska Act (1854), Dred Scott v. Sandford (1857), and the Lincoln-Douglas debates (1858)
6. the lives of free blacks and the laws that curbed their freedom and economic opportunity

8.10 (Quarter 3-4) Students analyze the multiple causes, key events and complex consequences of the Civil War, in terms of:

1. the conflicting interpretations of state and federal authority as emphasized in the speeches and writings of statesman such as Daniel Webster and John C. Calhoun
2. the boundaries constituting "the North" and "the South", the geographical differences between the two regions, and the differences between agrarians and industrialists
3. the constitutional issues posed by the doctrine of nullification and secession and the earliest origins of that doctrine
4. Abraham Lincoln's presidency and his significant writings and speeches and their relationship to the Declaration of Independence such as his "House Divided" speech (1858), the Gettysburg Address (1863), the Emancipation Proclamation (1863), his inaugural addresses (1861 and 1865)
5. the views and lives of leaders and soldiers on both sides of the war, including black soldiers and regiments (e.g., biographies of Ulysses S. Grant, Jefferson Davis, Robert E. Lee)
6. critical developments in the war, including the major battles, geographical advantages and obstacles, technological advances, and Lee's surrender at Appomattox
7. how the war affected combatants, with the largest death toll of any war in American history, and the physical devastation, the effect on civilians, and the effect on future warfare

8.11 (Quarter 4) Students analyze the character and lasting consequences of Reconstruction, in terms of:

1. the original aims of Reconstruction and the effects on the political and social structure of different regions
2. the push-pull factors in the movement of former slaves to the cities in the North and to the West, and their differing experiences in those regions (e.g. the experiences of Buffalo Soldiers)
3. the effects of the Freedman’s Bureau and the restrictions on the rights and opportunities of freedman, including racial segregation and "Jim Crow" laws
4. the rise and effects of the Ku Klux Klan
5. the thirteenth, fourteenth, and fifteenth amendments to the Constitution, and their connection to Reconstruction

8.12 (Quarters 1-4) Students analyze the transformation of the American economy and the changing social and political conditions in the United States in response to the Industrial Revolution, in terms of:

1. patterns of agricultural and industrial development as they relate to climate, natural resource use, markets, and trade, including their location on a map
2. the reasons for the development of federal Indian policy and the Plains wars with American Indians and their relationship to agricultural development and industrialization
3. how states and the federal government encouraged business expansion through tariffs, banking, land grants, and subsidies
4. entrepreneurs, industrialists, and bankers in politics, commerce, and industry (e.g., Andrew Carnegie, John D. Rockefeller, Leland Stanford)
5. the location and effects of urbanization, renewed immigration, and industrialization (e.g., effects on social fabric of cities, wealth and economic opportunity, and the conservation movement)
6. child labor, working conditions, laissez-faire policies toward big business and the leaders of (e.g., Samuel Gompers) and the rise of the labor movement, including collective bargaining, strikes, and protests over labor conditions
7. the new sources of large-scale immigration and the contribution of immigrants to the building of cities and the economy; the ways in which new social and economic patterns encouraged assimilation of newcomers into the mainstream amidst growing cultural diversity; and the new wave of nativism
8. the characteristics and impact of Grangerism and Populism
9. the significant inventors and their inventions (e.g., biographies of Thomas Edison, Alexander Graham Bell, Orville and Wilbur Wright) and the incentives that prompted the quality of life (e.g., inventions in transportation, communication, agriculture, industry, education, medicine)