1607–1754
Period 2 of AP United States History, worth 6–8% of the exam. 12 questions below, each with the working. Every answer was checked by a second pass before it was published.
European colonisation of North America, regional differences among the colonies, transatlantic trade and slavery, colonial society and the Great Awakening.
How this unit is tested
What you have to know
12 practice questions
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Which economic theory held that colonies existed primarily to enrich the mother country by supplying raw materials and consuming its manufactured goods?
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Answer. Mercantilism
Mercantilism tied colonial existence directly to the economic benefit of the mother country, which is why England enforced the Navigation Acts to keep colonial trade flowing through English hands. -
What was the primary purpose of the headright system in colonial Virginia?
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Answer. To encourage immigration and the importation of laborers by granting land for each person brought to the colony
Because tobacco cultivation demanded large tracts of land and abundant labor, Virginia offered land grants per settler or servant transported, directly fueling the growth of large plantations. -
Explain why the labor system in the Chesapeake colonies shifted from indentured servitude to chattel slavery in the late seventeenth century.
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Answer. Falling supply of English servants, rising tobacco profits, and fear of freed servants (crystallized by Bacon's Rebellion in 1676) pushed planters toward a cheaper, permanent, and more controllable labor source in enslaved Africans
Bacon's Rebellion showed planters the danger of a growing class of poor, landless former servants; shifting to lifelong, hereditary enslaved labor removed that political threat while also locking in a permanent workforce as servant immigration declined. -
What was the Middle Passage, and why was it significant to the Atlantic economy?
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Answer. The transatlantic voyage transporting enslaved Africans to the Americas under brutal conditions; it supplied the forced labor that powered plantation economies across the Americas
As the middle leg of the triangular trade, the Middle Passage linked African labor to American cash-crop production, making chattel slavery the economic foundation beneath the entire Atlantic trading system. -
Which colonial region was most characterized by a diversified economy, family farms, and significant religious and ethnic pluralism?
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Answer. The Middle Colonies
Colonies like Pennsylvania and New York attracted diverse European immigrants and combined grain farming ('breadbasket' economy) with trade, producing far more religious and ethnic variety than New England or the Chesapeake. -
Describe how the Puritan concept of a religious covenant shaped New England town life.
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Answer. Puritans believed their community had a binding agreement with God to live righteously, which they enforced through tight-knit congregational churches, town meetings, and communal oversight of behavior
This covenant idea produced small, self-governing towns organized around the church, where local town meetings handled civic decisions and religious conformity was closely monitored, distinguishing New England's social structure from the more dispersed Chesapeake settlement pattern. -
What was the main social and religious effect of the Great Awakening on colonial society?
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Answer. It challenged the authority of established clergy and encouraged a more personal, emotional, and individualized approach to faith
Revivalist preachers like George Whitefield drew large crowds outside official church structures, elevating personal conversion experience over formal doctrine and modeling a broader questioning of traditional authority. -
Define salutary neglect and explain its long-term political effect on the colonies.
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Answer. Salutary neglect was Britain's loose enforcement of trade and taxation laws before 1763, which allowed colonial assemblies to develop real self-governing power and a tradition of political autonomy
Because Britain rarely enforced regulations strictly during this period, institutions like Virginia's House of Burgesses and other colonial assemblies grew accustomed to managing local affairs, a habit of self-rule that later fueled resistance to stricter British control after 1763. -
Which group during the Great Awakening favored emotional, revivalist preaching and personal conversion experiences over traditional, formal worship?
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Answer. New Lights
New Lights embraced the passionate preaching style of figures like Whitefield and Edwards, while Old Lights defended established, more formal religious practice and clergy authority. -
Explain one key reason the French maintained more cooperative relationships with Native American groups than the English did during this period.
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Answer. The French prioritized the fur trade over large-scale settlement, sent relatively few colonists, and often formed trading and marital alliances with Native communities rather than displacing them for farmland
Because French colonial goals depended on Native trading partners rather than land for agriculture, French colonists had strong incentives to maintain alliances, unlike English settlers whose expanding farms and population steadily displaced Native land. -
What triggered the Pueblo Revolt of 1680, and what was its outcome?
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Answer. Spanish suppression of Native religion and forced labor under the encomienda system triggered the revolt; the Pueblo peoples successfully drove the Spanish out of present-day New Mexico for over a decade
The revolt shows Native resistance was not passive: coordinated Pueblo communities expelled Spanish colonizers entirely until Spain reconquered the region roughly twelve years later, illustrating the limits of Spanish colonial control. -
How did the social hierarchy of the Chesapeake colonies differ from that of New England by the mid-1700s?
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Answer. The Chesapeake developed a sharper divide between a small planter elite dependent on enslaved labor and a large enslaved population, while New England had a more gradated hierarchy of yeoman farmers, merchants, and clergy with far fewer enslaved people
Plantation agriculture concentrated land and enslaved labor in the hands of a wealthy few in the Chesapeake, producing stark inequality, whereas New England's subsistence and trade economy supported a broader middling class of independent farmers and artisans.
What people get wrong
- Treating indentured servitude and chattel slavery as interchangeable. Instead, note that indentured servitude was temporary and not racially hereditary, while chattel slavery was lifelong and passed to children — the shift between them after events like Bacon's Rebellion (1676) is itself a testable cause-and-effect.
- Assuming every English colony was founded for religious freedom. Instead, sort founding motives by colony: Massachusetts and Pennsylvania were religious projects, but Virginia, Carolina, and Georgia were founded chiefly for profit or strategic buffer purposes.
- Confusing mercantilism with free-market capitalism. Instead, remember mercantilism is a regulated, government-directed system designed to benefit the mother country, which is exactly why the Navigation Acts existed.
- Writing generic answers about 'the colonies' as a single unit on comparison questions. Instead, always name a specific region (New England, Middle, Chesapeake/Southern) and a specific piece of evidence, since graders reward concrete regional distinctions.
- Describing the Great Awakening as purely a religious event with no broader consequence. Instead, connect it to social change: it increased religious pluralism, elevated ordinary preachers over the established clergy, and modeled the questioning of traditional authority that would later matter politically.
Drill this unit until it sticks
These questions come back on a schedule built from what you get wrong, alongside the rest of AP United States History. Free, and no account needed to start.