Who Was Andrew Jackson?

   The essential question for our newest topic is, Is Andrew Jackson's long- standing reputations as "the people's president" deserved? To answer this question, my class broke up into three groups to cover topics that Andrew Jackson dealt with. The three topics were the Spoil System, the Indian Removal Act and the Bank War. Each group created a Google slide show and presented their findings to the class. By researching what each topic was, what Jackson did, and how it affected the people we could find out if Jackson really was "the people's president" or not. To answer the essential question, you would have to refer to each of the presentations. For the topic of Spoils Andrew Jackson was certainly not "the people’s president". When he was elected president he instated the spoils system in which he removed people from their current government jobs and instead gave them to people who have helped him get elected. This was disastrous because it took 919 people out of their jobs and replaced them with unqualified people. This did not only affect the 919 people that lost their jobs but the rest of society who had to suffer as well. Jackson's main goal was to protect the people during the Bank War but in the end it only created problems. Jackson wanted to protect the average business man by not letting rich people get too ahead in their businesses, but that only created a divided between the rich and poor. For the Indian Removal Act, Andrew Jackson was "the people's president" for Americans, but was not considerate for other people, such as the Indians. Jackson wanted to move the Indians west so that there was more land for the white people and ensured the Indians that moving west was a good idea for them because other Indian tribes have died out living near white people. The Indians however did not want to leave their native land but Jackson eventually forced them out and law and many died on the march to their new land. All of the presentations my class did helped me answer the essential question. My groups presentation was the spoil system which can be seen below.

The Rise of Democracy

Most recently in History class we have been learning about democracy in the 1800s and how it came to be in the United States. Our goal for this lesson was to figure out the meaning of Democracy, and how active the system was in the U. S. during the 1800s. More specifically, our essential questions were how should we define and how democratic was the United States in the 1800s? To answer these questions, our groups were given seven pieces of information to analyze and attach to the posters that we would make to help answer these questions. After analyzing the information, my group came up with the definition that democracy is that democracy is a system of government where the power in vested in the people and through freely elected representatives. Also, we came to the conclusion that in the early 1800s, the US was not very democratic, but as the years progressed, it became a more and more democratic country. Below is that final product of my groups poster. 

Equality Over Everything

     The essential question for our unit on the Latin American Revolutions is as follows, "Why is it essential to acknowledge human value regardless of race? How are the events in the Latin American Revolutions evidence of this social imperative?". In class we studied the impact of race of the Latin American revolutions for independence. We looked at a pie chart of the percentages of certain races of that time and also the social rankings according to race. The basic idea, the more white you are the more power you have. Full whites, the Peninsulares, were on top of the social ranking but only a very small percentage of the populations. On the bottom of the social ranking, before slaves, were the Indians, who made up approximately half of the population. We then studied the effects of the Brazilian, Mexican, and Gran Colombian revolution. The class then broke into three groups. Each group was assigned one of the following counties: Brazil, Mexico, and Gran Columbia. I was in the group that was assigned Mexico. We read about our country and made a timeline of important events that took place in the country. My timeline for Mexico can be seen to the below.

     Upon sharing timelines we found some commonalities and differences. All three revolutions' primary goal was to have independence and each was successful. The differences are that the revolution of Gran Colombia resulted in several independent countries while Mexico and Brazil resulted in one. Also, the Brazilian revolution was not very violent while the other two revolutions were. Even though all three revolutions took different routes to independence each one had the issue of race inequality. In Brazil, once Pedro became King he only aloud Peninsular to become members of his cabinet. People became very unhappy and Pedro became unpopular amongst the population and later stepped down from the thrown. In Mexico the priest that launched the revolution stated three reasons to launch it, and one of those reasons was to have racial equality. Simon Bolivar united anyone who wasn't enslaved in Gran Colombia into one army to fight against the common enemy, the Spanish. Race played in all three revolutions, and in the end the banding together of other races to fight as one ended up with success. But people made judgments about different races and didn't treat them like they were important but when they all came together they victoriously fought to their common goal. 

In our world today race is still an issue, you would think that because it has caused so many problems in the past, people would realize that it should not be an issue. Recently there has been many reports of unarmed African American men who have been shot down due to a policemen suspecting they are doing something wrong; when in reality they aren’t and because of their race they have been discriminated against. This issue of race that has costed many people their lives, most definitely still needs to be considered today. People have lost their lives fighting for racial equality and if we still have not achieved that goal then what have those people died for?