Here are the answers to your questions:
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Why was Miguel Hidalgo seen as such an important figure in Mexico’s War of Independence?
- He was a poor Catholic priest who was executed after leading a peasant revolt against the Spanish army.
- Miguel Hidalgo is recognized for initiating Mexico's War of Independence by issuing the famous "Grito de Dolores," calling for the end of Spanish rule. His leadership and subsequent execution made him a symbol of the struggle for independence.
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What motivated the revolutionaries on Saint-Domingue (now Haiti)? What was their main goal?
- freedom from the oppression and cruelty of slavery.
- The revolutionaries, led by figures such as Toussaint Louverture, were driven primarily by the desire to end the brutal conditions of slavery and achieve freedom and equality.
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Simon Bolivar was a freedom fighter who united many of the juntas in the Spanish colonies to resist control by the restored Spanish crown. Whose ideas did Bolivar hope to bring to the countries of Latin America?
- Voltaire, Hobbes, and Jefferson.
- Bolivar was influenced by Enlightenment thinkers, particularly the ideas of liberty and governance propounded by figures like Thomas Jefferson and Voltaire.
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Most of the territories in South America sought independence from Spain once Napoleon was defeated in Europe and another king was put on the Spanish throne. What internal threat did these new nations share with the new French republic?
- a wide diversity of opinions about how the new governments should function and relate to each other.
- Like the new French republic, the newly independent South American nations faced challenges in forming cohesive and stable governments due to differing ideologies and struggles for power among various factions.