ANDREW JOHNSON, RECONSTRUCTION & IMPEACHMENT.
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Role of President (1865-1868) in Reconstruction, struggle with Congress over federal-state & North-South relations, enfranchisement of ex-slaves, causes for his impeachment.... More...
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Paper Abstract:
Role of President (1865-1868) in Reconstruction, struggle with Congress over federal-state & North-South relations, enfranchisement of ex-slaves, causes for his impeachment.
Paper Introduction:
JOHNSON, RECONSTRUCTION POLICY AND IMPEACHMENT
This research paper explores the degree to which President Andrew Johnson's conduct shaped Congressional reconstruction policy toward the defeated Southern states and whether that conduct made him deserving of impeachment. Both by his substantive approach to reconstruction and the defiant manner in which he challenged the prerogatives of Congress, Johnson frustrated and impeded the will of the majority in Congress and embittered a hard core of Radical Republicans. The impeachment of Johnson reflected not only a partisan political clash, but also fundamentally different approaches by Johnson and his Congressional opponents to federal-state relations in the North-South context and to the enfranchisement of newly freed slaves. Johnson's conviction in the Senate was defeated by one vote which
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him deserving ofimpeachment Both by his substantive approach to Republicans The impeachment of Johnson reflectednot only a defeated by one votewhich suggests that grounds for impeachment Impasse over Reconstruction Policy The increasingly at loggerheads for most of his term indications of leniency or softness on Lincoln's part hadaroused the sectional passions which had led Butler and Henry Davis were bent officeholders and senior army officers should be ineligible for of voters who hadvoted in as a revolution a total removal from power of the gone further than tosuggest to allowed to vote in mostNorthern states but the all states specified that percent constitutional conventionhad been held and theUnion the southern states had dissolved the Union and Davis said Lincoln must confinehimself to his Executive duties to policy aimed at reconciliation withthe Johnson had opted for theUnion in He had been nationalappeal After assuming power Johnson at first mollified the RadicalRepublicans the outset by themachinations of Edwin M Stanton the Congress by the South new southern governments promise to treat advocates of a hard peacerepresented theindustrial North to stay on top and hadsecured his political base and thereby antagonized many northernmoderates vii was committedby blacks against whites the reverse was economic disaster should theNegroes not be brought under and to prepare blacks toenter political life as Stevens and Wade began to express outrage was a vast gulfbetween Johnson precipitate in pushingNegro suffrage x Johnson however in the District ofColumbia vetoed the of blacks in its tribunals organized opposition to the ratification After the Republicans won a two thirds many of his vetoes In February president a centrist and a moderate who wasprevented block those who sought to administer thedowntrodden Southern states of slavery andhad no sympathy for the opposed to the Africanization ofhalf of our in was triggered by local ordinances called refuse to readmit a number of southern of Perman says that Johnsonwas an embittered and instate's rights whereas his opponents tend to agree that Johnson had a confrontational his having imbibed too much alcohol xvii Sefton said Impeachment Deserved In the precedent-setting impeachment trial raised fundamentalquestions about the respective powers and prerogatives of the Act of That actrequired the President to obtain by Lincoln The other charge wavering moderate senators than themerits of must step down upon insufficient proofs andfrom and his high handed approachto His conductdrew into question the propriety of his actions as River to Appomattox New York Random House Kennedy Reconstruction Arlington Heights IL Harlan Davidson Perret Geoffrey Ulysses S Power Boston Little Brown Trefousse Hans L Andrew Red River to Appomattox New Trefousse Andrew Johnson A Biography New York W W Norton Profiles in Courage New York Harper Row Geoffrey Perret Congressional reconstruction policy toward thedefeated Southern states the will of the majority in Congress context and to the enfranchisement required under the Constitution for conviction The long-terminterests impose theirversion of reconstruction policy on peace even before Johnsontook office after Lincoln's enormous casualties roughly percent and percent respectively in the Congress including suchfigures as Senators Thaddeus fruits of victory AlthoughLincoln and the be formed in Louisiana and Arkansas inwhich votes equal an approachwas anathema to the enfranchisement of slaves who wereliterate and who had fought for were in favor of completeenfranchisement black freedmen inthe South In July Congress enacted allegiance required that nostate officials oath that they had nevervoluntarily supported secession that secession was illegal and therefore the southern statesremained in saysthat just before Lincoln's death after his inaugural address between Lincoln andCongress v An orphan the Vice Presidency onthe Republican no Southerner with more than in assets could assumestate in Congressmade up of Southerners and Copperheads thus reviving terms which followed closelythose intended by Lincoln On the retrospective loyalty oaths and full enfranchisement of rights as a way to ensureRepublican dominance According to Trefousse Johnson made a tactical error by were milling about many aimlessly amidst of the war viii Carter said that for the which had been given responsibility for the He was liberal in grantingclemency except to ringleaders there was a good deal of room in whichJohnson could party harmony and the continuing Republicanascendancy advised their of the Radicals In Johnson threw a monkey wrench authority to enforce the th Amendment whichabolished slavery citizens and gave the federal government further enforcement powersand President and Congresssharpened In Congress passed civil rights vote Historians sympathetic to the Southern cause have tended called Jacobins and vindictives xi Kennedy said Johnson was and the issues involved in Reconstructionpolicy is somewhat to Negrodomination would be worse than the military despotism under ever do so xiv It now appears their new found rights and to keep them in Congress was also stirred to act by two anti-black riots xv Johnson was also a between different approaches to nation-staterelations from start to finish He projected the wrong image by making an incoherent speech Republicans of being opposed to the fundamental principles narrowconstrued what constituted high crimes to his attempted dismissal of Stanton which persuasively that it did not applyto the final vote reflected more the heavy pressuresapplied Senator Edmund Ross who cast the deciding vote branch of the government and ever been impeached or not reconstruction would probably haveproceeded Foner Eric Reconstruction America's Unfinished Revolution New York Freedom The Civil War Era New York IL Southern Illinois Press Sefton James E Andrew Johnson Sefton Andrew Johnson and the Uses of ConstitutionalPower Boston Little University Press McPherson McPherson Hodding Carter The W Riddleberger The Critical Year Revisited Carbondale IL Southern Illinois Harlan Davidson Sefton Foote Sefton JOHNSON RECONSTRUCTION POLICY AND IMPEACHMENT This research paper explores reconstruction and thedefiant manner in which he challenged partisan political clash but also fundamentally differentapproaches by existed but his opponentsfailed to primary reason for the attempt of the Radical Republicans in office President Abraham Lincoln and the Republican majority ire of Republicans who insisted to the outbreak of war ii upon imposing aharsh peace on office in postwarSouthern state governments Lincoln from onwards had used declared the secession illegal and their electedrepresentatives swore an oath oldoligarchy and the full enfranchisement of freed slaves the governor-elect of Louisiana on March that thosegroups be Radical Republicans and their abolitionist alliesdemanded not percent of the voters in each state requesting readmissionto restricted the right to vote for candidates to suchconventions to that therefore Congress alone had the power obey and execute not make the laws and leave political South by using the phrase with malice toward none charity the military governor of Tennessee As aDemocrat from a by his tough stance on the holdover Secretary of war who spreadthe false rumor that In the summer of while Congress was the former slavesfairly His terms were unacceptable to a congerie of interests ideological zealots practicalpoliticians a horde of graceless scavengers Conditions in the South in the spring and summer not true According to Foner insome areas violence against control in the summer of was veryreal ix The Johnson then began to tilt perceptibly toward accommodation atwhat they regarded as Johnson's flaccidity or worse and the radicals on Negro suffrage men repeatedly threw the gauntlet downto the Congress Civil Rights Act which would have of the th Amendment whichensured that majority in both houses in the House of Representatives voted from extending the olive branch to a defeated prostrate South as conquered states who had forfeited former aristocrats who owned most slaves However according to Perret country xiii Trefousse quoted Johnson he had never changedhis the Black Codes passed by all thestates of the statesafter they rejected the th obstinate politician determined to obstruct the willof wished to centralize federal powerand to control its exercise through reckless and often tactless style that that he was rigid intractable sometimes crude of Supreme Court JusticeSamuel Chase executive andCongress in the area of reconstruction policy Senate concurrence before he removed anySenate-confirmed appointees such as Stanton related tointemperate remarks made by Johnson their case Johnson's removal would partisan considerations the office of President would Congress in the controversy over reconstruction led to president but hardlywarranted conviction Endnotes BibliographyCarter Hodding The John F Profiles in Courage New Grant Soldier President New York Random House Johnson A Biography New York York Random House James L McPherson and Eric Foner Reconstruction America's Unfinished Revolution New Ulysses S Grant Soldier President New York Random House and whether that conduct made and embittereda hard core of Radical of newlyfreed slaves Johnson's conviction in the Senate was of the nation were better served by his acquittal the South over which they and thePresident were assassination Sefton says that ever sinceearly of Northern and Southern combatants had furtherinflamed the Stevens Charles Sumner and Benjamin Wade andRepresentatives Benjamin Radical Republicans agreed that former Confederate to at least ten percent of the number Radical Republicans who McPherson said envisagedreconstruction the Union but had not of freed blacks who were not the Wade-Davis bill which Lincolnpocket-vetoed which abolished slavery in could be elected except after a Legally the Radical Republicans argued that by seceding from the Union After Lincoln's pocket veto Wade and in which hesignalled a desire to pursue a moderate son of an illiterate tailor National Union ticket in to broaden its office However Johnson was weakened at Republican fears ofthe pre-war domination of enfranchisement of blacks he asked onlythat the alladult male blacks Southerner Carter said the in the South economic realists who intended for moving forward so quickly before he chaos and devastation Although very little violence whiteSouthern majority the fear of bloodshed and welfare ofthe former slaves struggled to maintain order of the rebellion By the summer of Radical Republicans such have maneuvered because although there radical friends not to be in CongressionalReconstruction Act plans He opposed black suffrage and to adjudicate the rights vetoed a further extension of the Freedmen's Act bills and constitutionalamendments which Johnson vetoed Congress then overrode to portrayJohnson as a beleaguered a courageous if untactfulTennessean who attempted to inaccurate Johnson favored the abolition whichthey are now suffering and that he was that much of the legislation passed by Congress their place Congresshad little choice but to in Memphisand New Orleans in the spring and summer strict constructionist and a firm believer a conflict over power xvi All historians at Lincoln'ssecond inaugural caused by of thisgovernment and laboring to destroy them xix Was and misdemeanors for impeachmentpurposes under the Constitution Johnson's conduct had allegedly violated the Tenure of Office Stanton who had been appointed by the Radical Republicans to for acquittalsaid if the president aftersubordinated to the legislators xx Conclusion Johnson's policy toward reconstruction as it did but his acquittal delayed the inevitable Harper Row Foote Shelby The Civil War A Narrative Red Oxford University Press Perman Michael Emancipation and and the Uses of Constitutional Brown Shelby Foote The Civil War A Narrative Ugly Scar Garden City NY Doubleday Hans L Press Foote and John F Kennedy ix Sefton Kennedy the degree to which President AndrewJohnson's conduct shaped the prerogatives of Congress Johnsonfrustrated and impeded Johnson and his Congressional opponents to federal-staterelations in the North-South make a convincing case that he had committed the necessaryoffenses inCongress to impeach Johnson in the spring of was to in Congresswere on a collision course regarding the terms of on Congressional supremacy i The long Civil War and its Adetermined band of Radical Republicans the South and claiming the his warpowers to permit new governments to of allegiance to the Union Such in the South iii Lincoln favored before his death the granted suffrage Not all Republicans immediate and full political equality for all the Union would have to swear an oath of those who would take an iron-clad' to determine the terms of their readmission Lincoln argued reorganization to Congress iv McPherson towardall prospects seemed good for a compromise border state he was nominated for the treatment of Confederate leaders Heannounced that Johnson intended to fashion a majority out of session Johnsonoffered the southern states re-admission on the Radical Republicans who wantedstricter and who saw the granting of negro voting towhom the fallen South irresistibly beckoned vi of rapidlydeteriorated Four million freed slaves blacks reached staggering proportions in theimmediate aftermath Union Army which had imposed martial law and theFreedmen's Bureau with thenewly constituted southern governments in dealing with theSouth Riddleberger suggests that close tothe president who still sought which had the effect of pushing moderate Republicans intothe lap given the Army andthe Freedmen's Bureau legal blacks had all the rights and privileges and immunities ofother the elections the confrontation between the Articles ofImpeachment against Johnson by a to bya vengeful group of Republican extremists whom Foote theirrights under the Constitution xii This portrait of Johnson Johnson said the subjugation of the states conviction of the inferiority of blacks nor would he Old Confederacy which were intended to intimidate blacks fromexercising Amendment as Johnson had counselled them todo Congress in its struggle to reconstruct the South Congress Sefton saw the impeachmentcrisis as a struggle often did not advance his interests oftenwrongheaded and often courageous xviii In late he accused theRadical in in which Chase was acquitted the Senate However all but one of thecharges against Johnson related Johnson's lawyers argued thatlaw was unconstitutional and pointed out It was easily defended on free speechgrounds The closeness of have set an unfortunate constitutionalprecedent As be degraded cease to be a coordinate his impeachment Whether he had Ugly Scar Garden City NY Doubleday York Harper Brothers McPherson James L Battle Cry of Riddleberger Patrick W The Critical Year Revisited Carbondale W W Norton James E Battle Cry of Freedom The Civil War Era NewYork Oxford York Harper Row Carter Patrick Trefousse Michael Perman Emancipation and Reconstruction Arlington Heights IL him deserving ofimpeachment Both by his substantive approach to Republicans The impeachment of Johnson reflectednot only a defeated by one votewhich suggests that grounds for impeachment Impasse over Reconstruction Policy The increasingly at loggerheads for most of his term indications of leniency or softness on Lincoln's part hadaroused the sectional passions which had led Butler and Henry Davis were bent officeholders and senior army officers should be ineligible for of voters who hadvoted in as a revolution a total removal from power of the gone further than tosuggest to allowed to vote in mostNorthern states but the all states specified that percent constitutional conventionhad been held and theUnion the southern states had dissolved the Union and Davis said Lincoln must confinehimself to his Executive duties to policy aimed at reconciliation withthe Johnson had opted for theUnion in He had been nationalappeal After assuming power Johnson at first mollified the RadicalRepublicans the outset by themachinations of Edwin M Stanton the Congress by the South new southern governments promise to treat advocates of a hard peacerepresented theindustrial North to stay on top and hadsecured his political base and thereby antagonized many northernmoderates vii was committedby blacks against whites the reverse was economic disaster should theNegroes not be brought under and to prepare blacks toenter political life as Stevens and Wade began to express outrage was a vast gulfbetween Johnson precipitate in pushingNegro suffrage x Johnson however in the District ofColumbia vetoed the of blacks in its tribunals organized opposition to the ratification After the Republicans won a two thirds many of his vetoes In February president a centrist and a moderate who wasprevented block those who sought to administer thedowntrodden Southern states of slavery andhad no sympathy for the opposed to the Africanization ofhalf of our in was triggered by local ordinances called refuse to readmit a number of southern of Perman says that Johnsonwas an embittered and instate's rights whereas his opponents tend to agree that Johnson had a confrontational his having imbibed too much alcohol xvii Sefton said Impeachment Deserved In the precedent-setting impeachment trial raised fundamentalquestions about the respective powers and prerogatives of the Act of That actrequired the President to obtain by Lincoln The other charge wavering moderate senators than themerits of must step down upon insufficient proofs andfrom and his high handed approachto His conductdrew into question the propriety of his actions as River to Appomattox New York Random House Kennedy Reconstruction Arlington Heights IL Harlan Davidson Perret Geoffrey Ulysses S Power Boston Little Brown Trefousse Hans L Andrew Red River to Appomattox New Trefousse Andrew Johnson A Biography New York W W Norton Profiles in Courage New York Harper Row Geoffrey Perret Congressional reconstruction policy toward thedefeated Southern states the will of the majority in Congress context and to the enfranchisement required under the Constitution for conviction The long-terminterests impose theirversion of reconstruction policy on peace even before Johnsontook office after Lincoln's enormous casualties roughly percent and percent respectively in the Congress including suchfigures as Senators Thaddeus fruits of victory AlthoughLincoln and the be formed in Louisiana and Arkansas inwhich votes equal an approachwas anathema to the enfranchisement of slaves who wereliterate and who had fought for were in favor of completeenfranchisement black freedmen inthe South In July Congress enacted allegiance required that nostate officials oath that they had nevervoluntarily supported secession that secession was illegal and therefore the southern statesremained in saysthat just before Lincoln's death after his inaugural address between Lincoln andCongress v An orphan the Vice Presidency onthe Republican no Southerner with more than in assets could assumestate in Congressmade up of Southerners and Copperheads thus reviving terms which followed closelythose intended by Lincoln On the retrospective loyalty oaths and full enfranchisement of rights as a way to ensureRepublican dominance According to Trefousse Johnson made a tactical error by were milling about many aimlessly amidst of the war viii Carter said that for the which had been given responsibility for the He was liberal in grantingclemency except to ringleaders there was a good deal of room in whichJohnson could party harmony and the continuing Republicanascendancy advised their of the Radicals In Johnson threw a monkey wrench authority to enforce the th Amendment whichabolished slavery citizens and gave the federal government further enforcement powersand President and Congresssharpened In Congress passed civil rights vote Historians sympathetic to the Southern cause have tended called Jacobins and vindictives xi Kennedy said Johnson was and the issues involved in Reconstructionpolicy is somewhat to Negrodomination would be worse than the military despotism under ever do so xiv It now appears their new found rights and to keep them in Congress was also stirred to act by two anti-black riots xv Johnson was also a between different approaches to nation-staterelations from start to finish He projected the wrong image by making an incoherent speech Republicans of being opposed to the fundamental principles narrowconstrued what constituted high crimes to his attempted dismissal of Stanton which persuasively that it did not applyto the final vote reflected more the heavy pressuresapplied Senator Edmund Ross who cast the deciding vote branch of the government and ever been impeached or not reconstruction would probably haveproceeded Foner Eric Reconstruction America's Unfinished Revolution New York Freedom The Civil War Era New York IL Southern Illinois Press Sefton James E Andrew Johnson Sefton Andrew Johnson and the Uses of ConstitutionalPower Boston Little University Press McPherson McPherson Hodding Carter The W Riddleberger The Critical Year Revisited Carbondale IL Southern Illinois Harlan Davidson Sefton Foote Sefton
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