Worksheet

Letters, Petitions and a Ballot: Citizens and Lawmaking, 1864–1873

Grade 8 civics: a dated timeline traces the Yosemite and Yellowstone bills into law and Susan B. Anthony’s 1872 vote, petitions and jury trial.

Grade 8Social StudiesInteractive · Printable

Aligned toCIV.8.3

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1 C3 Framework standard
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11 questions
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Format: Interactive · Printable
Grade: Grade 8
Subject: Social Studies
Question types: Fill in the blank, Multiple choice, Circle the answer, Sorting, Short answer

About this worksheet

What students practice

Students trace the steps that turned the Yosemite and Yellowstone bills into laws.
Students identify voting, petitioning, contacting officials and jury service in historical events.

How to use

Have students read the timeline first and mark each step of a bill, then read the passage and answer on their own.

Curriculum

C3 Framework standard covered

CIV.8.3

Explain how a bill becomes a law and how citizens take part in government by voting, serving on juries, petitioning and contacting officials.

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Letters, Petitions and a Ballot: Citizens and Lawmaking, 1864–1873

Use a timeline to follow two park bills and one citizen’s vote.

The timeline

Study the timeline and read the passage. Then answer the questions.

Timeline: Citizens and Lawmaking, 1864–1920
Date	Event
February 1864	Raymond writes Sen. Conness on Yosemite
March 1864	Conness introduces Yosemite bill
June 30, 1864	Lincoln signs the Yosemite Grant
1866	Women petition Congress for the vote
Summer 1871	Hayden survey explores Yellowstone
December 18, 1871	Yellowstone bill introduced in Congress
January 30, 1872	The Senate passes the Yellowstone bill
February 27, 1872	The House passes the Yellowstone bill
March 1, 1872	Grant signs; first national park created
November 5, 1872	Susan B. Anthony votes in Rochester, NY
June 1873	Anthony is tried in federal court
1920	19th Amendment protects women’s vote

How Citizens Moved the Government

1A bill can start in either house of Congress, though bills to raise taxes must start in the House. A committee studies it first. Both houses must pass the same wording. The President then has ten days, not counting Sundays, to act. He may sign the bill, or veto it and send it back. If he does neither while Congress is in session, the bill becomes law without his signature.

2Citizens shape the laws too. They vote for members of Congress and for President. They contact officials with letters and visits. The First Amendment protects their right to petition the government. In court, ordinary citizens serve on juries, which decide the facts of a case.

3Yosemite Valley in California had long been home to the Ahwahneechee people, and in 1851 a California militia unit forced many of them from the valley. By the 1860s tourists and settlers were arriving. In February 1864 Israel Raymond, a California businessman, wrote to Senator John Conness, urging that the valley be protected. Conness introduced a bill the next month. In the middle of the Civil War, both houses passed it, and President Abraham Lincoln signed it, granting the valley to California to protect “for public use, resort and recreation.”

4In 1871 Ferdinand Hayden led a government survey into the Yellowstone region, in the territories of Montana and Wyoming. Photographer William Henry Jackson took pictures of geysers and hot springs, and artist Thomas Moran made sketches. Back in Washington, Hayden showed Jackson’s photographs and rock samples to members of Congress and wrote to them about the land. Congress passed a bill to protect it, and President Ulysses S. Grant signed it. The Shoshone, Bannock, Crow and other nations had hunted and gathered in the region for thousands of years. Lawmakers did not ask these nations, and later park rules kept them out.

5In these years, no state let women vote in national elections. Women’s rights leaders, including Susan B. Anthony and Elizabeth Cady Stanton, petitioned Congress for the vote. On Election Day in 1872, Anthony and a group of other women voted in Rochester, New York. Weeks later she was arrested for voting illegally. At her trial, Justice Ward Hunt ruled that she had broken the law. He ordered the jury to find her guilty without letting the jurors talk it over. He fined her $100, which she refused to pay.

Use paragraph 1. Suppose Congress is meeting and the President neither signs nor vetoes a bill for ten days, not counting Sundays. What happens to the bill?

A. It becomes law without the President’s signature.
B. It dies and has to be introduced again next year.
C. It goes to the Supreme Court for a decision.
D. It goes back to committee to be studied again.

Use the timeline. Which step came right before President Grant signed the Yellowstone bill?

A. The Senate passed the bill.
B. The House passed the bill.
C. The bill was introduced in Congress.
D. Hayden’s survey explored the region.

Use the timeline. Write the number of years.

Yellowstone became a national park years after Lincoln signed the Yosemite Grant.

Sort each action by the way citizens took part.

Raymond’s letter to Senator ConnessAnthony’s ballot in RochesterThe 1866 requests signed and sent to CongressHayden showing photographs to members of CongressThe jurors at Anthony’s trial in 1873Citizens choosing members of Congress on Election Day

Voting	Petitioning	Contacting an official	Serving on a jury

Why would Hayden show Jackson’s photographs to members of Congress?

A. Photographs were required before any bill could be introduced.
B. Jackson wanted to sell his photographs to the government.
C. The President had asked Congress to vote against the park.
D. Most lawmakers had never seen the land they would vote on.

Compare and judge

Use the timeline and the passage.

Which statement is true of both the Yosemite law and the Yellowstone law?

A. Someone outside Congress urged lawmakers to protect the land.
B. Both were vetoed and then passed over the veto.
C. Both gave the land to a state government to manage.
D. Both were signed by President Ulysses S. Grant.

About how long did it take the Yosemite bill to go from introduction to the President’s signature?

A. About one year
B. About eight years
C. About three months
D. About two weeks

Circle the sentence in paragraph 5 that shows a jury’s usual role being taken away.

Weeks later she was arrested for voting illegally.At her trial, Justice Ward Hunt ruled that she had broken the law.He ordered the jury to find her guilty without letting the jurors talk it over.He fined her $100, which she refused to pay.

Why did women’s rights leaders petition Congress in 1866 instead of voting against lawmakers who opposed them?

A. Petitions were the way that bills were introduced in Congress.
B. Lawmakers in 1866 were not chosen by voters.
C. Women could not vote, so a petition was a way to be heard.
D. Congress had asked women to send their ideas in writing.

10.

How might the Shoshone, Bannock and Crow have judged the Yellowstone law differently from Hayden?

A. They had asked Congress for it in a petition of their own.
B. They had no voice in it, and it later kept them off lands they used.
C. They would have praised it for protecting their hunting rights.
D. They would have seen it as a state law with no national effect.

11.

Which way of taking part on this page did the most to change what the government did: voting, petitioning, contacting officials or serving on a jury? Make a claim, use at least two events from the timeline or the passage as evidence, and explain your reasoning.