More on the History 333 Research paper standards.
The best research papers will do all of the seven standards well. Your most sophisticated thinking, though, is measured by standards 5 & 6. A lot of papers don't end up making much of an analytical argument but do all the other things well and present an interesting historical narrative. Such a paper may not get a straight A, but it would certainly allow you to pass the course.
If you write this kind of a paper, standard number 7, originality, would look like this: "it crafts the narrative details from many different sources, primary and secondary, to add color and historical voices and tell the story in a unique way."