| A | B |
|---|
| Culture | A nation’s way of life. It includes such things as language, religion, ethics, laws, and arts. |
| Judeo-Christian Heritage | The primary cultural influence is rooted in Judaism and Christianity rather than the pagan religions. |
| Puritan Work Ethic | The idea that work is a gift from God and a means of glorifying Him. |
| Free Enterprise | The economic system that the government leaves individuals free to own businesses and make a living dependent on their own initiative. |
| Limited Government | A government that exercises its powers under restrictions, usually by means of a constitution. |
| Pledge | A solemn promise |
| Allegiance | Our loyalty, our support, and our devotion to duty |
| Patriotism | A love for one’s country and a loyalty to that country. |
| Americanism | the virtues that made America great; defined by Theodore Roosevelt as, “the virtues of courage, honor, justice, truth, sincerity and hardihood–the virtues that made America”; a devotion or loyalty to the United States and its customs, traditions, characteristics, etc. |
| Heritage | Those characteristics and traditions that have been handed down to us by our ancestors. |
| Government | The authority and power to control, to direct, and to rule the actions and affairs of others. |
| Sovereign | Supreme power over all nations |
| Capital Punishment | The death penalty |
| Laws | Rules people follow in living together. |
| Code of Hammurabi | The Sumerian law code of a Babylonian king who was a contemporary of the Hebrew patriarchs. |
| Decalogue | The ten commandments; the true principles of morality, the basic rules of right and wrong and of good and evil. |
| Revealed Law | The law given by God explicitly in the Holy Scripture. |
| Natural Law | law based on man’s inborn moral sense |
| Theocracy | A system of government in which God Himself rules personally or through chosen representatives. |
| Autocracy | The rule by one whose will is supreme. |
| Democracy | The people rule, either directly by popular vote or indirectly through elected representatives. |
| Totalitarian Dictatorship | A system of government in which the ruler acquires his power by some means other than inheritance and rules with absolute authority, and control all aspects of society. |
| Socialism | A system of government control over the economy of a nation. |
| Fascism | It is also a state or national socialism in which all power is vested in a dictator and a single political party. |
| Communism | a totalitarian dictatorship by one or more persons that advocates the violent, revolutionary overthrow of the existing economic, political, and social order and sets up a tyrannical state that dominates the person, property, and thought of all the citizens by means of physical and psychological force and terror. |
| Materialism | The misconception that reality is matter in motion and that everything in the world, including thought, will, and feeling, can be explained only in terms of the material. |
| Separation of Church and State | The idea that the church and the government are to remain institutionally separate. |
| Common Law | a non-codified form of law based on long-accepted customs and traditions. |
| Trial by Jury | a man is judged guilty or innocent by a group of his peers. |
| Parliament | An official council, usually concerned with government affairs; the national legislative body of Great Britain |
| Magna Carta | The Great Charter that the lords of England forced King John to sign, putting the king under the law of the land. It contained seeds of freedom such as no taxation w/o representation, right of habeas corpus, trial by jury, and due process of law. |
| English Bill of Rights | Signed by Charles I, and reaffirmed certain English liberties, such as no man is above the law, there shall be no taxes without consent, the right to bear arms, etc. |
| Mayflower Compact | a charter written by the pilgrims and strangers on the Mayflower who sought to bring honor to their king and country, but also obey the laws of the colony. |
| Charters | a document issued by the crown which established the relationship between the king and his subjects. |
| Massachusetts Body of Liberties and the New Haven Colony Laws | attempts to conform the civil law to the Biblical law. |
| Town Meeting | the legislative system that the New England people used where the local citizens assembled periodically to become the chief lawmaking body for their town. |
| County | the Southern legislative system, since everyone lived farther away from each other than in the North. Elected representatives met to make decisions for the behalf of the citizens. |
| Great Awakening | the spiritual revival which swept the American colonies between 1730 and 1760. |
| Albany Plan | A proposed plan by Benjamin Franklin which called for an annual conference of delegates, one from each colony, to manage Indian affairs, pass laws, and levy taxes for the common defense of the colonies. It never was adopted. |
| Declaration of Rights and Grievances | A document issued by the Stamp Act Congress which protested the stamp tax and other British regulations which the colonists felt were illegal |
| Intolerable Acts | Parliament enacted acts meant to punish the colonists of Boston for resistance to parliamentary regulation. |
| Prohibitory Act | An act declared by Parliament and the king banning trade with the colonies and declaring that the colonies were no longer under the “King’s Protection.” |
| Declaration of Independence | The American formal dissolving of their ties and allegiance to England and the Crown, and declaring themselves a new nation. |
