Entering into the 21st Century (1980–present): every key term you need (+ practice quiz)
102 flashcard terms for AP U.S. History Unit 9, written to match the course framework. Study them here, then drill them as interactive flashcards, or test yourself with the 27-question quiz — free, no account needed.
By 1980, backlash against 1960s liberalism, economic malaise, and a mobilized religious right converged in a movement that put Reagan in the White House.
New Right Coalition
Free-market economics, anticommunism, and social traditionalism — business conservatives, Cold Warriors, and evangelicals united against liberalism.
Moral Majority (1979)
Jerry Falwell's organization mobilized evangelical voters around abortion, school prayer, and 'family values' — religion as electoral force.
Sun Belt Power
Population and money shifting South and West gave conservatism its demographic base — and shifted electoral votes for decades.
Ronald Reagan
The 'Great Communicator' (1981–89): optimistic, ideological, and transformative — 'government is not the solution to our problem; government is the problem.'
Reaganomics
Supply-side economics: deep tax cuts (top rate 70%→28%), deregulation, and domestic spending restraint to unleash growth — with soaring deficits as the bill.
Supply-Side Theory
Cutting taxes would spur investment and growth enough to (in theory) pay for itself — critics called it 'trickle-down' and 'voodoo economics.'
PATCO Strike (1981)
Reagan fired 11,000 striking air-traffic controllers — a signal moment in organized labor's long decline.
Volcker Disinflation
The Fed's brutal interest rates broke 1970s inflation at the cost of the deep 1981–82 recession — then recovery fueled 'Morning in America' (1984).
Deficits & National Debt
Tax cuts plus a defense buildup tripled the national debt in the 1980s — deficit politics became a permanent fixture.
Deregulation
Airlines, trucking, finance, and broadcasting loosened — innovation and lower prices for some; the S&L collapse and later financial crises for others.
AIDS Crisis
The epidemic devastated gay communities amid government slowness; ACT UP's activism transformed public health politics.
War on Drugs & Mass Incarceration
Crack-era crackdowns, mandatory minimums, and 'tough on crime' politics quintupled the prison population, falling hardest on Black communities.
Reagan Doctrine
Support anticommunist insurgencies worldwide — Afghan mujahideen, Nicaraguan Contras — rolling back rather than merely containing.
Defense Buildup & SDI
Massive military spending and the 'Star Wars' missile-defense proposal pressured the strained Soviet economy.
'Evil Empire' to Geneva
Reagan's rhetoric hardened the Cold War — then he pivoted to negotiate with Gorbachev once reform began.
Iran-Contra Affair (1986–87)
Officials secretly sold arms to Iran and diverted profits to the Contras, defying Congress — the era's gravest scandal.
Gorbachev, Glasnost & Perestroika
Soviet reform unraveled the system; Reagan and Gorbachev's summits produced the INF Treaty (1987) — 'Tear down this wall!'
Fall of the Berlin Wall (1989)
Eastern Europe's peaceful revolutions toppled communism; the wall's opening symbolized the Cold War's end.
Soviet Collapse (1991)
The USSR dissolved into fifteen states — leaving the U.S. the sole superpower and the Cold War's framework gone.
Why the Cold War Ended
Debated: Reagan's pressure, Gorbachev's choices, Soviet economic rot, and Eastern European peoples' courage — strong essays weigh all four.
Persian Gulf War (1991)
After Iraq swallowed Kuwait, a U.S.-led coalition won a 100-hour ground war — the post-Cold War 'new world order's' first test.
Bill Clinton & the 'Third Way'
Clinton (1993–2001) moved Democrats to the center: NAFTA, welfare reform, balanced budgets, and 'the era of big government is over.'
NAFTA (1993)
Free trade with Canada and Mexico — emblem of globalization's promise (growth, cheap goods) and pain (manufacturing job losses).
1994 Republican Revolution
Gingrich's 'Contract with America' won Congress for the GOP for the first time in forty years — polarization's acceleration.
Welfare Reform (1996)
Ended AFDC's entitlement, adding work requirements and time limits — Clinton's centrist triangulation in action.
Clinton Impeachment (1998–99)
Impeached over lies about the Lewinsky affair; acquitted by the Senate — partisan warfare in full.
Tech Boom & the Internet
The 1990s' digital revolution — PCs, the web, dot-coms — drove the era's prosperity and remade communication, commerce, and culture.
Globalization Debate
Trade, outsourcing, and capital flows integrated the world economy — raising growth and inequality alike; Seattle's 1999 WTO protests marked the backlash.
Immigration Since 1965
Post-1965 flows from Latin America and Asia made America more diverse than ever — and immigration politics a permanent battleground.
Election of 2000
Bush v. Gore: a 537-vote Florida margin and a 5–4 Supreme Court decision ended the recount — Bush won the presidency while losing the popular vote.
September 11, 2001
Al-Qaeda's hijacked-plane attacks killed nearly 3,000 at the World Trade Center, Pentagon, and Flight 93 — transforming American policy and psyche.
War on Terror
The global campaign against terrorism: Afghanistan invaded (2001), the Department of Homeland Security, and a new security state.
USA PATRIOT Act (2001)
Expanded surveillance and detention powers — reviving the liberty-versus-security debate from the Alien and Sedition Acts onward.
Afghanistan War (2001–2021)
Toppling the Taliban gave way to twenty years of nation-building; America's longest war ended in withdrawal and Taliban return.
Iraq War (2003–2011)
Launched on claims of weapons of mass destruction never found; Saddam fell fast, but insurgency and sectarian war consumed the occupation.
Hurricane Katrina (2005)
The flooding of New Orleans and the botched response exposed poverty, race, and governmental failure — breaking Bush's second term.
Financial Crisis of 2008
A housing bubble built on subprime mortgages and exotic securities collapsed — Lehman fell, credit froze, and the Great Recession began.
TARP & Bailouts
The $700B rescue of banks (and autos) stabilized finance while igniting populist anger left (Occupy) and right (Tea Party).
Barack Obama
The first Black president (2009–17): stimulus, the ACA, Dodd-Frank, marriage equality's triumph — governing amid crisis and obstruction.
Affordable Care Act (2010)
Near-universal coverage via exchanges, subsidies, and Medicaid expansion — the largest social legislation since the Great Society, and as contested.
Tea Party & Polarization
Anti-tax, anti-Obama populism swept the 2010 midterms — the parties pulling apart in geography, media, and identity.
Culture Wars
Abortion, guns, religion, marriage, and schools — recurring value conflicts organizing politics since the 1970s.
Obergefell v. Hodges (2015)
The Court recognized same-sex marriage nationwide — capping a stunningly rapid civil-rights transformation.
Black Lives Matter
Movement against police violence and systemic racism, from Ferguson (2014) to the George Floyd protests (2020) — the largest in U.S. history.
Donald Trump
The 2016 populist upset: 'America First' nationalism, tax cuts, tariffs, three justices — and two impeachments — in a presidency of permanent controversy.
COVID-19 Pandemic (2020)
Over a million American deaths, lockdowns and remote life, vaccine triumph and division — a stress test of state and society.
January 6, 2021
A mob stormed the Capitol to overturn the 2020 election — democracy's institutions held, at a cost still being reckoned.
Digital Age & Social Media
Smartphones and platforms transformed information, community, and politics — connection and polarization from the same source.
Climate Change Politics
From Kyoto to Paris to the IRA (2022), warming became a central — and polarized — policy battleground.
Demographic Transformation
An aging, diversifying America — no racial majority among children by the 2020s — reshaping culture and both parties' coalitions.
Deindustrialization & Inequality
Manufacturing's long decline and the knowledge economy's rise widened regional and class divides — the political economy beneath populism.
America's Role Debated
Post-Cold War primacy, post-9/11 intervention, and rising China frame the era's question: what is America's place in the world?
Sandra Day O'Connor (1981)
Reagan's appointee — the first woman on the Supreme Court, long its pivotal swing vote.
Air Traffic & Deregulated Skies
Airline deregulation (1978) cut fares and birthed hub-and-spoke giants — the template for deregulating trucking, rail, and finance.
Savings & Loan Crisis
Deregulated thrifts gambled and collapsed in the late 1980s — a $130 billion taxpayer rescue foreshadowing 2008.
Black Monday (1987)
The Dow's 22% one-day crash — contained by Fed liquidity, remembered as finance's new fragility.
Crack Epidemic & 1986 Drug Act
Crack devastated urban neighborhoods; the 100:1 crack/powder sentencing disparity filled prisons with young Black men.
Willie Horton & 1988
Bush's furlough ad campaign against Dukakis — crime and race fused in modern attack politics.
Americans with Disabilities Act (1990)
Bush's landmark ban on disability discrimination — civil rights architecture extended, curb cuts and all.
Clarence Thomas–Anita Hill Hearings (1991)
Hill's harassment testimony against the Court nominee riveted the nation — gender, race, and power on live TV; the 'Year of the Woman' followed.
Rodney King & the LA Riots (1992)
Videotaped police beating, acquittals, and six days of riots (63 dead) — policing and race erupting a generation before Ferguson.
Ross Perot (1992)
The billionaire independent won 19% on deficits and anti-NAFTA populism — the era's largest third-party vote.
'Don't Ask, Don't Tell' (1993)
Clinton's compromise on gays in the military — repealed in 2010 as opinion transformed.