Seated in Stevens’s parlor: James M. Scovel, “Thad Stevens,” undated article, in Stevens Papers, Box 8.
Owen had less luck: Robert Dale Owen, “Political Results from the Varioloid,” Atlantic Monthly 35:662–64 (June 1875).
During the first half of April: Kendrick, pp. 82, 89, 97.
When the revised version: Owen, pp. 665–66; New York Independent, May 31, 1866 (quoting Sen. Jacob Howard of Michigan); Welles Diary, vol. 2, pp. 495–98.
Focusing on practical matters: New York Herald, May 2, 1866.
That provision would survive: By 1875, Robert Dale Owen was critical of the failure to enforce this provision: “[W]hile various States have abridged suffrage by imposing qualifications [such as literacy tests and poll taxes], no attempt has been made, or is likely to be made, to ascertain how many adult males are thereby excluded, or to deduct, proportionately, from the basis of representation in these States.” Owen, p. 667.
When he closed: Cong. Globe, 39th Cong., 1st sess., pp. 3042–3149 (May 5 through June 13, 1866); Owen, p. 665; “A Woman in Washington,” The Independent, June 14, 1866.
Do you inquire why: Cong. Globe, 39th Cong., 1st sess., p. 3148 (June 13, 1866).
Meeting with one Cabinet member: Senate Ex. Doc. No. 57, 39th Cong., 1st sess. (June 22, 1866); “Message re Amending the Constitution,” June 22, 1866, in Johnson Papers 10:615; Browning Diary, vol. 2, p. 80; Temple, p. 343 (Tennessee); testimony of T. C. Wetherly, April 2, 1868, in Archives, Impeachment: Various House Papers (South Carolina); Trefousse, Andrew Johnson, p. 275 (Alabama); James, p. 497 (Johnson’s opposition to the Fourteenth Amendment was “decisive” in persuading Southern states to reject it). Most Southern state officials opposed the Fourteenth Amendment, and no Southern states ratified it until their governments were reconstituted after the Reconstruction Acts of 1867 took effect. Perman, Reunion Without Compromise, pp. 249–53.
Thereafter, the two congressmen: Cullom, p. 153.
6. POLITICAL WAR
We have got to fight: Mark M. Krug, Lyman Trumbull, Conservative Radical, New York: A. S. Barnes (1965), p. 244.
The president, according to his own treasury secretary: McCulloch, pp. 404–5.
In mid-June: Carter, p. 237; Welles Diary, vol. 2, pp. 528–31.
In the year since the assassination: Moore Diary/AJ (May 2, 1866).
One contemporary called: Brooks, Men in Lincoln’s Time, pp. 35–36; Blaine, vol. 2, pp. 65, 108; Goodwin, pp. 11–13, 506–7; Field, p. 262; Donn Piatt, Memories of the Men Who Saved the Union, New York: Belford, Clarke & Co. (1887), p. 135; Van Deusen, pp. 428–30; John M. Taylor, William Henry Seward: Lincoln’s Right Hand, New York: HarperCollins (1991), pp. 245–46, 250; Frederic Bancroft, The Life of William H. Seward, Gloucester, MA: Peter Smith (1967), vol. 2, pp. 462–63; Washington Daily National Intelligencer, June 22, 1865. Navy Secretary Gideon Welles held a grudging admiration for Seward’s political skills, claiming that the secretary of state “made constant mistakes, but recovered with a facility that was wonderful and almost always without injury to himself.” Welles Diary, vol. 1, p. 139.
One Republican thought: Blaine, vol. 2, p. 67.
Some attributed: Staudenraus, ed., p. 326 (June 7, 1864); Blaine, vol. 2, pp. 64–69; Hamlin, p. 506; Van Deusen, p. 433. Dickinson also was a “War Democrat.” Had the New York delegation supported Dickinson aggressively, he might well have won the nomination, but some New York strength was siphoned off to Johnson. Hamlin, pp. 464–76; Glonek, p. 291.
He strongly approved: Seward to Johnson, February 23, 1866, in Johnson Papers 10: 164; Milwaukee Daily Sentinel, March 31, 1866 (reprinting column from Cincinnati Gazette).
In a public letter: Goodwin, pp. 300–304, 467–68; Washington National Daily Intelligencer, March 8, 1866 and July 16, 1866; Milwaukee Daily Sentinel, February 24, 1866; Yankton (SD) Union and Dakotan, September 15, 1866 (reprinting Seward speech).
According to his new secretary of the interior: Welles Diary, vol. 2, pp. 551–52 (July 11, 1866); Trefousse, Andrew Johnson, p. 257; William Dennison to Johnson, July 11, 1866, in Johnson Papers 10: 668–69; James Harlan to Johnson, July 27, 1866, in Johnson Papers 10:741; Browning Diary, vol. 2, p. 79.
In the seven months: Sauerevein of Baltimore to McPherson (August 1, 1865), in McPherson Papers, Box 49R (“The contest for Federal appointments here is over,…Mr. Johnson has not forgotten his democracy.”); Krug, Trumbull, p. 244 (In April, Johnson’s purge of federal officials in Illinois harmed Trumbull’s political organization); Cong. Globe, 39th Cong., 1st sess., p. 2308 (Sen. Henderson) (May 1, 1866) (“I have nothing to ask from the present Executive in the way of patronage; and I can safely express the opinion here that if I had the President would not grant it”); McKitrick, pp. 387–89. Michael Les Benedict, The Impeachment and Trial of Andrew Johnson, New York: W. W. Norton & Co. (1973), p. 48.
Those highly coveted jobs: Blaine, vol. 2, p. 125; Harry J. Carman and Reinhard H. Luthin, Lincoln and the Patronage, Gloucester, MA: Peter Smith (1964), p. 60.
Johnson’s use of patronage: Benedict, Impeachment, p. 47; Foner, p. 266.
In Ohio, Senator John Sherman: Quoted in Herbert S. Schell, “Hugh McCulloch and the Treasury Department, 1865–1869,” Mississippi Valley Historical Review 17:417 (December 1930); John Sherman to William Sherman, October 26, 1866, in Rachel Sherman Thorndike, ed., The Sherman Letters: Correspondence Between General and Senator Sherman from 1837 to 1891, New York: Charles Scribner’s Books (1894), p. 278.
For six months: Welles Diary, vol. 2, p. 498; Browning Diary, vol. 2, p. 63 (February 23, 1866) (discussion with the President of need to replace Stanton); Benjamin P. Thomas and Harold M. Hyman, Stanton: The Life and Times of Lincoln’s Secretary of War, Westport, CT: Greenwood Press (1962), pp. 491–92.
The war secretary seemed: Ulysses S. Grant, The Personal Reminiscences of Ulysses S. Grant, New York: Konecky & Konecky (originally 1885), p. 656; McClure, p. 156.
When stress laid him low: Goodwin, pp. 176–78, 449; Welles Diary, vol. 1, p. 70 (July 13, 1862); Thomas & Hyman, p. 501. Goodwin’s portrayal of Stanton is sensitive and compelling.
Referring to Abraham Lincoln: Walter Gaston Shotwell, Driftwood, London: Longmans, Green & Co. (1927), p. 69; Ward Lamon, Recollections of Abraham Lincoln, Chicago: A. C. McClurg & Co. (1895), p. 231.
“Folks come up here”: Welles Diary, vol. 1, p. 355 (July 2, 1863); Stephen B. Oates, Abraham Lincoln: The Man Behind the Myths, New York: Harper & Row (1984), p. 173; Riddle, Recollections of War Times, p. 318.
According to one contemporary: Piatt, p. 63.
Tensions arose quickly: Stanton to Johnson, March 3, 1865, in Johnson Papers 7:498–99; George Baber, “Johnson, Grant, Seward, Sumner,” North American Review 145:72 (1887); Trefousse, Andrew Johnson, pp. 216–17.
In truth, Johnson referred: Welles Diary, vol. 2, p. 424 (February 2, 1866); Moore Diary/AJ, p. 32 (March 1867).
According to Grant’s aide: Badeau, p. 84; Harold M. Hyman, “Stanton and Grant: A Reconsideration of the Army’s Role in the Events Leading to Impeachment,” American Historical Review 66:91–92 (October 1960).
By summertime: Thomas and Hyman, p. 483; Welles Diary, vol. 3, pp. 133–34 (July 15, 1866).
Stanton attended Cabinet meetings: Moore Diary/AJ, p. 2 (July 14, 1866); Welles Diary, vol. 3, p. 25 (January 19, 1867); Richard Taylor, Destruction and Reconstruction, New York: Arno Press (1973) (originally 1879), pp. 252–53; McCulloch, p. 391.
The Secretary’s personal integrity: Boutwell, vol. 2, pp. 91–93.
Pledging to remain at his post: Dawes, p. 305.
The president blamed: Foner, p. 264; Martin E. Mantell, Johnson, Grant, and the Politics of Reconstruction, New York: Columbia University Press (1973), p. 20.
He accused a minority: McPherson, p. 127.
One supporter: Harriett Weed, ed., Autobiography of Thurlow Weed, Boston: Houghton, Mifflin & Co. (1884), pp. 630–31; Trefousse, Andrew Johnson, p. 263; “Speech in New York,” August 29, 1
866, in Johnson Papers 11:164. Most of Johnson’s speeches included a description of his rise through public offices. “Remarks to Citizens of Montana,” February 7, 1866, in Johnson Papers 10:51.
If I have played the Judas: McPherson, pp. 134–40.
For many, Johnson’s speeches: Rutherford B. Hayes to Guy M. Bryan, October 1, 1866, in Hayes Diary, vol. 3, p. 33; Cullom, p. 153 (during the Swing Around the Circle, when the president’s speeches were “intemperate and extreme,” “many people thought [Johnson] was intoxicated most of the time”). The humorist David Locke, writing as Petroleum V. Nasby, lampooned Johnson in an exaggerated country dialect that Lincoln (a Nasby enthusiast) had loved to read aloud to visitors:
[Johnson] was sacrificing hisself for them—who hed made greater sacrifices? He hed bin Alderman uv his native town, and Vice-President; he wuz too modest to make a speech; but ef he was Joodas Iskariot, who wuz the Saviour? He hed swung around the circle, and hadn’t found none so far.
David Ross Locke, The Struggles of Petroleum V. Nasby, Boston: Beacon Press (1963), p. 219.
A Johnson ally: Grant to Julia Grant, September 9, 1866, in Grant Papers 16:308; Foner, p. 265.
Republicans sat: http://www.senate.gov/pagelayout/history/one_item_and_teasers/partydiv.htm; http://www.clerk.house.gov/art_history/house_history/index.html.
Wary of both Virginians: Senator John Sherman to General William T. Sherman, July 8, 1866, in Thorndike, ed., The Sherman Letters, p. 276; New York Times, July 16, 1866; Hyman, p. 93.
Another Republican senator: Margaret Shortreed, “The Antislavery Radicals: From Crusade to Revolution,” Past and Present (November 1959), p. 83; John Thayer, “A Night with Stanton in the War Office,” McClure’s 8:439 (March 1, 1897).
One report had him: Baltimore American, October 11, 1866. This report was promptly repudiated, but received wide distribution. Baltimore American, October 12, 1866.
Grant’s reported response: George S. Boutwell, “Johnson’s Plot and Motives,” North American Review 141:574 (December 1885); Ulysses S. Grant III, Ulysses S. Grant: Warrior and Statesman, New York: William Morrow (1969), pp. 279, 297; Grant Testimony, Judiciary Committee, in Grant Papers 17:226. Another version of this Johnson-Grant exchange appears in a recollection by a boyhood chum of Grant’s. Daniel Ammen, “Recollections and Letters of Grant,” North American Review 141:367 (October 1885). Though these recountings of the episode vary from each other, the basic exchange plainly occurred, and it alarmed General Grant and many others.
An Ohio congressman formed: Thomas and Hyman, p. 493; Grant to General Cyrus B. Comstock, September 24, 1866, in Grant Papers 16:314; A. G. Riddle, The Life of Benjamin Wade, Cleveland: William W. Williams (1887), p. 272n. Grant later reported to Johnson that his investigator found “no cause for apprehension…at least for the present.” Grant to Johnson, October 12, 1866, in Johnson Papers 11:344–45.
As a precaution: Grant to Sheridan, October 12, 1866, in Grant Papers 16:330–31; Smith, pp. 427–28.
A North Carolina newspaper: Chicago Tribune, October 23, 1866; Mary R. Dearing, Veterans in Politics: The Story of the G.A.R., Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University Press (1952), pp. 105–7; Browning Diary, vol. 2, p. 94; Chicago Tribune, September 20, 1866, quoting New Bern [NC] Progress.
“If insurrection does come”: Clemenceau, p. 121; Baltimore American and Commercial Advertiser, October 10, 1866; Moore Diary/AHR, p. 103; Browning Diary, vol. 2, pp. 102, 105; Welles Diary, vol. 2, pp. 620–21 (November 17, 1866); Grant to Johnson, October 24, 1866, in Grant Papers 16:350.
Then he walked out: Grant to Johnson, October 21, 1866, in Johnson Papers 11:375; Welles Diary, vol. 2, p. 621; Grant to Stanton, October 27, 1866, in Grant Papers 16:357; Boutwell, “Johnson’s Plot,” p. 575.
To his wife: William Sherman to John Sherman, October 31, 1866, in Thorndike, Sherman Letters, p. 280; Smith, p. 427; Sherman to Ellen Ewing Sherman, October 26, 1866, in Grant Papers 16:339–40n.
Another congressman countered: The Independent, March 29, 1866 (Wendell Phillips); Chicago Tribune, April 10, 1866; Cong. Globe, 39th Cong., 1st sess., p. 2849; Stevens to Robert C. Schenck, August 31, 1866, in Stevens Papers 2:191; Schenck to Stevens, September 23, 1866, ibid. 2:195.
“Did we fight down the rebellion”: Hamlin, pp. 510–11. Increasing interest in impeachment can be tracked in the correspondence of leading Radicals through 1866. W. Jones to Butler, May 18, 1866, Butler Papers, Box 40; H. Willis to Thaddeus Stevens, October 23, 1866, Stevens Papers, Box 4.
Before a Brooklyn crowd: Chicago Tribune, October 18, 1866 (reporting on Butler speech in Chicago), and November 28, 1866; Trefousse, Butler, p. 189; Littell’s Living Age (November 17, 1866). At the same time as Butler’s speech, Wendell Philips induced a “vast audience” in Philadelphia to begin “stomping” for Johnson’s impeachment. R. D. Mussey to Butler, November 25, 1866, Butler Papers, Box 41. Another urgent proponent of impeachment in the fall of 1866 was Rep. James Ashley of Ohio. Robert F. Horowitz, The Great Impeacher: A Political Biography of James M. Ashley, New York: Brooklyn College Press (1979), p. 127.
To another Radical: Washington Daily National Intelligencer, November 24, 1866; Trefousse, Thaddeus Stevens, p. 203.
His annual statement: McPherson, pp. 143–47.
7. FALSE START ON IMPEACHMENT
I do impeach: Cong. Globe, 39th Cong., 2d sess., p. 320.
“[T]he great war”: Clemenceau, pp. 74–75 (January 5, 1867).
Called “a calculating fanatic”: William Lawrence to Butler, December 3, 1866, Butler Papers, Box 41; Horowitz, pp. 128–29; Welles Diary, vol. 3, p. 12.
They poured in: New York Times, January 7, 1867; National Archives, File HR 39A-H14.7-“Records of the Committee on the Judiciary” (containing petitions); E. B. Ward to Butler, January 27, 1867, in Butler Papers, Box 42 (reporting circulation of 30,000 petitions demanding Johnson’s impeachment and removal from office).
Nebraska but not Colorado: Cong. Globe, 39th Cong., 2d sess., p. 344 (January 8, 1867); Trefousse, Andrew Johnson, pp. 273–74.
“I approve your taking”: Boutwell, Reminiscences, vol. 2, pp. 107–8; Moore Diary/AHR, p. 106 (March 4, 1867).
For some time: Cong. Globe, 39th Cong., 2d sess., p. 5 (December 3, 1866); Chicago Tribune, December 6, 1866.
Stevens and his allies: Cong. Globe, 39th Cong., 2d sess., pp. 547–48 (January 18, 1867), 943 (February 1, 1867).
Even though the law: Welles Diary, vol. 3, pp. 50, 54.
Impeachment dates back: Raoul Berger, “Impeachment for ‘High Crimes and Misdemeanors,’” in Impeachment: Selected Materials, House Comm. on the Judiciary, 93d Cong., 1st sess. (October 1973), p. 621.
Otherwise, as Ben Franklin: Max Farrand, ed., The Records of the Federal Convention of 1787, New Haven: Yale University Press (1911), vol. 2, p. 65 (July 20, 1787).
The Constitution devotes: Article 1, Section 2, states, “The House of Representatives…shall have the sole power of impeachment.” Article 1, Section 3 provides: “The Senate shall have the sole power to try all impeachments. When sitting for that purpose, they shall be on oath or affirmation. When the President of the United States is tried, the Chief Justice shall preside: And no person shall be convicted without the concurrence of two thirds of the members present.” It also states that “Judgment in cases of impeachment shall not extend further than to removal from office, and disqualification to hold and enjoy any office of honor, trust or profit under the United States: but the party convicted shall nevertheless be liable and subject to indictment, trial, judgment and punishment, according to law.”
Under Article 2, Section 2, “the President…shall have power to grant reprieves and pardons for offenses against the United States, except in cases of impeachment.” Section 4 of Article 2 states that “the President, Vice President and all civil officers of the United States, shall be removed from office on impeachment for, and conviction of, treason, bribery, or other high crimes and misdemeanors.”
James Madison critici
zed: Farrand, vol. 2, p. 550 (September 8, 1787).
Others have argued: Clinton Rossiter, ed., The Federalist Papers, New York: Mentor (1999), No. 77, p. 432; ibid., No. 79, p. 442.
With little debate: Cong. Globe, 27th Cong., 3d sess., pp. 144–46 (January 10, 1843); Robert J. Morgan, A Whig Embattled, The Presidency Under John Tyler, Hamden, CT: Archon Books (1974), pp. 53–54.
After a five-week trial: David Kyvig, The Age of Impeachment: American Constitutional Culture Since 1960, Lawrence: University Press of Kansas (2008), p. 25.
“The President has usurped”: New York Times, January 19, 1867.
Some Republican newspapers: New York Times, January 11, 1867 (reprinting editorials from many newspapers).
“There is nothing judicial or fair”: Welles Diary, vol. 3, p. 20 (January 14, 1867); John Nugent to S. L. M. Barlow, January 10, 1867, in Barlow Papers, Box 64.
The House committee began: Nugent to S. L. M. Barlow, January 10, 1867, in Barlow Papers, Box 64; E. B. Ward to Ben Butler, January 27, 1867, in Butler Papers, Box 42; Horowitz, p. 130.
Supposedly, Mrs. Cobb: “Impeachment Investigation,” H. Rep. No. 7, 40th Cong., 1st sess., pp. 2–13 (testimony taken before the House Judiciary Committee, 1867).
It also inquired: Ibid., pp. 28–29, 45, 60–66.
The government did not know: Ibid., pp. 159–75, 183–86.
When the Thirty-Ninth Congress expired: Cong. Globe, 39th Cong., 2d sess., pp. 1754–55 (March 2, 1867).
Ashley darkly told the House: New York Times, March 7, 1867; Cong. Globe, 40th Cong., 1st sess., pp. 18–19.
“I have had a son killed”: Welles Diary, vol. 3, p. 90 (May 4, 1867); Moore Diary/AJ, p. 33 (March 1867).
The reaction in the South: Perman, Reunion Without Compromise, pp. 270–71, 286–87.
He reclaimed land: “Interview with Cincinnati Commercial Correspondent,” July 2, 1867, in Johnson Papers 12:368; Benedict, Impeachment, pp. 44, 90; McFeely, pp. 112–18, 128, 130, 294.
The Republican congressmen: Thomas and Hyman, pp. 542–44; Welles Diary, vol. 3, p. 105 (June 11, 1867); ibid., pp. 110–11 (June 20, 1867); Washington Daily National Intelligencer, May 28, 1867; U.S. Department of Justice, Opinions of the Attorneys General 12:141 (May 24, 1867); ibid., 12:182 (June 12, 1867); Michael Les Benedict, “From Our Archives: A New Look At the Impeachment of Andrew Johnson,” Political Science Quarterly, 113:493 (1998).
Impeached: The Trial of President Andrew Johnson and the Fight for Lincoln's Legacy Page 41