Download Research Paper Questions What was really going on between

Research Paper Questions
1. What was really going on between Pocahontas and John Smith?
2. Was Nathaniel Bacon a hero or a criminal?
3. When Benedict Arnold’s plot to seize West Point for the British was revealed his reputation was destroyed. But has
history unfairly forgotten his earlier contributions? Was he somewhat justified in the resentments he harbored?
4. Should George Washington be considered a great general of the Revolutionary War or is his reputation over-rated?
5. What were the key elements to Nathaniel Greene’s great success as a general in the Revolutionary War?
6. Do the inscriptions inside the Jefferson Memorial accurately instruct visitors about the real Thomas Jefferson?
7. Has Aaron Burr been unfairly vilified by history?
8. Should Andrew Jackson be vilified for his policy toward the Native Americans? Or did he choose the best policy in the
light of the times?
9. How justified were Lincoln’s wartime abridgements of civil liberties?
10. Should the Carlisle Indian School be judged harshly for how it treated the Native Americans?
11. Was the impeachment of Andrew Johnson justified?
12. Was Reconstruction (1865-1877) a complete failure?
13. Was Cornelius Vanderbilt a “Robber Baron” or “Captain of Industry”?
14. Was John D. Rockefeller a “Robber Baron” or “Captain of Industry”?
15. Was Andrew Carnegie a “Robber Baron” or “Captain of Industry”?
16. Was J.P. Morgan a “Robber Baron” or “Captain of Industry”?
17. Was Andrew Mellon a “Robber Baron” or “Captain of Industry”?
18. How did the wealthy class influence art during the Gilded Age?
19. Was the policy to shut-down the Ghost Dance justfified?
20. Was the decision to take possession of the Philippines good policy?
21. Who should take most of the blame for the failure of the Senate to ratify the Treaty of Versailles?
22. Were the seeds of the Cold War planted when Woodrow Wilson intervened in Russia in 1918? What were Wilson’s
intentions?
23. Why did Prohibition fail?
24. Franklin Roosevelt once said that Huey Long was one of the most dangerous men in America. Why might Roosevelt
have believed this about Long?
25. Was the majority opinion in Korematsu v. United States well-reasoned?
26. Given what was known at the time, was it reasonable policy to have interned the west coast Japanese?
27. From the Japanese point of view, was the Pacific war inevitable?
28. Given what was known at the time (1933-1945,) was the American government response toward Jewish refugees,
and toward the Holocaust generally, an adequate response?
29. Did the United States’ policy toward China in the 1940s contribute to the success of the Chinese communist
revolution?
30. Did President Truman’s Cold War policies heat up or temper the Cold War?
31. Did President Eisenhower’s Cold War policies heat up or temper the Cold War?
32. Did President Kennedy’s Cold War policies heat up or temper the Cold War?
33. Should the United States have supported the creation of Israel in 1948?
34. Did the United States deal effectively and fairly with Egypt in the 1950s?
35. Why have labor unions declined in membership since the 1950s?
36. Was President Truman right to fire Douglas MacArthur when and how he did it?
37. Was the Korean War a vital fight against communism or was it not in U.S. interests?
38. Was the decision to end the Korean War by leaving Korea divided into two parts a good decision?
39. Were there any legitimate concerns behind the “red-hunting” anticommunism of the late 1940s and early 1950s?
40. Were the Rosenbergs communist spies or victims of communist hysteria?
41. Why did the Russians pull ahead in the space race in the 1950s?
42. Was Brown v. Board of Education an activist decision?
43. The FBI’s response to the civil rights movement was a national disgrace. To what extent is this an accurate
statement?
44. Why was the Bay of Pigs a failure?
45. How was Lyndon Johnson able to pass the major Civil Rights bill of 1964?
46. What actually happened in the Gulf of Tonkin on August 2, 1964? Was President Lyndon Johnson’s outrage justified?
47. Why did the United States lose the Vietnam War?
48. Was President Johnson knowingly dishonest with the American people concerning Vietnam?
49. Has history focused too much on the hippies, flower children, and war protesters of the 1960s? To what degree was
the 1960s a conservative decade?
50. Although the Energy Crisis in the 1970s illuminated the problems of over-dependence on foreign oil, Americans have
not developed significant alternatives. Why?
51. Could any of President Richard Nixon’s achievements in office compensate for his Watergate crimes? What should
history say about the Nixon presidency?
52. To what degree has the War on Drugs launched by the United States government in the 1980s been effective?
53. Silent Spring by Rachel Carson became one of the most controversial books of the 1960s. Were the responses
ultimately taken by the United States government justified?
54. Should the immigration policies established by the Immigration Reform Act of 1965 be reconsidered?
55. To what extent was the movie Easy Rider the ultimate 1960s movie?
56. To what extent was the movie The Graduate the ultimate 1960s movie?
57. Why did things go so terribly wrong at the 1968 Democratic Convention?
58. Was the cost to land a man on the moon money well spent?
59. Was the majority decision in Griswold well-reasoned?
60. Should the Equal Rights Amendment have been added to the Constitution?
61. Was the Watergate Affair an overblown political scandal?
62. Why did President Gerald Ford pardon Richard Nixon? Was it the best choice?
63. A frightening accident on Three Mile Island produced a popular movement to halt the further development of nuclear
power. Was this an overreaction? Should more nuclear power plants be built?
64. Did Ronald Reagan select the best option when he sent troops into Grenada?
65. What conclusions can be drawn from the Iran-Contra scandal?
66. Was Oliver North a criminal or a scapegoat?
67. Was the impeachment of President Clinton justified?
68. Was the Black Hawk Down incident a result of President Clinton’s failure of leadership?
69. Should President Clinton have intervened in Rwanda? How was the non-intervention justified?
70. Are racial affirmative action programs justified?
71. War the War to force Iraq out of Kuwait justified?
72. Was it a good decision to repeal “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell”?
73. Should Title IX be repealed?
74. In 2000 the Supreme Court ruled in George Bush’s favor in Bush v. Gore. Should the Court have taken this case? Did
they make the right decision?
75. Why did al Qaeda attack the United States on September 11, 2001?
76. Was the Patriot Act a legitimate defense against terrorism or an unnecessary restriction of liberties?
77. Has the United States’ strategy in Afghanistan been successful?
78. Was the 2003 invasion of Iraq justified?
79. Select a president: Examine his campaign platform and determine whether or not or to what degree he altered his
positions once he became president.
80. Become an expert on a significant Supreme Court Case. Take a position on whether it was well or poorly reasoned.
81. What factors contributed to the decline of the American automobile industry in the last decades of the 20th century?
82. Should the U.S. Ratify the International Treaty on Climate Change?