The impeachment of Andrew Johnson for "high crimes and misdemeanors" was initiated by the United States House of Representatives on February 24, 1868. The alleged high crimes and misdemeanors were afterwards specified in eleven articles of impeachment adopted by the House on March 2 and 3, 1868. The primary charge against Johnson was that he had violated the Tenure of Office Act by replacing Edwin Stanton, Secretary of War, with Lorenzo Thomas ad interim. The Act had been passed by Congress in March 1867, Johnson's veto overruled, with the primary intent of protecting Stanton from being fired without the Senate's consent. Stanton often sided with the Radical Republican faction and had a good relationship with Johnson.
Johnson was the first United States president to be impeached. After the House formally adopted the articles of impeachment, they forwarded them to the United States Senate for adjudication. The trial in the Senate began on March 5, with Chief Justice Salmon P. Chase presiding. On May 16, the Senate voted against convicting Johnson on one of the articles, with its 35–19 vote in favor of conviction falling one vote short of the necessary two-thirds majority. A 10-day recess of the Senate trial was called to before reconvening to convict him on additional articles. On May 26, the Senate voted against convicting the president on two more articles by margins identical to the first vote. After this, the trial was adjourned sine die without votes being held on the remaining eight articles of impeachment.
The impeachment and trial of Andrew Johnson had important political implications for the balance of federal legislative-executive power. It maintained the principle that Congress should not remove the president from office simply because its members disagreed with him over policy, style, and administration of the office. It also resulted in diminished presidential influence on public policy and overall governing power, fostering a system of governance which future-president Woodrow Wilson referred to in the 1880s as "Congressional Government".
Background Presidential Reconstruction
Tensions between the executive and legislative branches had been high prior to Johnson's ascension to the presidency. Following Union Army victories at Gettysburg and Vicksburg in July 1863, President Lincoln began contemplating the issue of how to bring the South back into the Union. He wished to offer an olive branch to the rebel states by pursuing a lenient plan for their reintegration. The forgiving tone of the president's plan, plus the fact that he implemented it by presidential directive without consulting Congress, incensed Radical Republicans, who countered with a more stringent plan. Their proposal for Southern reconstruction, the Wade–Davis Bill, passed both houses of Congress in July 1864, but was pocket vetoed by the president and never took effect.
The assassination of Abraham Lincoln on April 14, 1865, just days after the Army of Northern Virginia's surrender at Appomattox, briefly lessened the tension over who would set the terms of peace. The Radicals, while suspicious of new president Andrew Johnson and his policies, believed based on his record that he would defer or at least acquiesce to their hardline proposals. Though a Tennessee Democrat, Johnson had fiercely criticized Southern secession. After Tennessee joined the states leaving the Union, he chose to stay in Washington, rather than resign his U.S. Senate seat. Later, when Union troops occupied Tennessee, Johnson was appointed military governor. He exercised his powers in that office vigorously, frequently stating that "treason must be made odious and traitors punished".
After Johnson became president, however, he embraced Lincoln's more lenient policies, thus rejecting the Radicals and setting the stage for a showdown with Congress. During the first months of his presidency, Johnson issued proclamations of general amnesty for most former Confederates, both government and military officers, and oversaw creation of new governments in the hitherto rebellious states—governments dominated by ex-Confederate officials. In February 1866, Johnson vetoed legislation extending the Freedmen's Bureau and expanding its powers; Congress was unable to override the veto. Afterward, Johnson denounced Radical Republicans Representative Thaddeus Stevens and Senator Charles Sumner, along with abolitionist Wendell Phillips, as traitors. Later, Johnson vetoed a Civil Rights Act and a second Freedmen's Bureau bill. The Senate and the House each mustered the two-thirds majority necessary to override both vetoes.
At an impasse with Congress, Johnson offered himself directly to the American public as a "tribune of the people". In the late summer of 1866, the president embarked on a national "Swing Around the Circle" speaking tour, where he asked his audiences for their support in his battle against the Congress and urged voters to elect representatives to Congress in the upcoming midterm election who supported his policies. The tour backfired on Johnson, however, when reports of his undisciplined, vitriolic speeches and ill-advised confrontations with hecklers swept the nation. Contrary to his hopes, the 1866 elections led to veto-proof Republican majorities in both houses of Congress. As a result, Radicals were able to take control of Reconstruction, passing a series of Reconstruction Acts—each one over the president's veto—addressing requirements for Southern states to be fully restored to the Union. The first of these acts divided those states, excluding Johnson's home state of Tennessee, into five military districts, and each state's government was put under the control of the U.S. military. Additionally, these states were required to enact new constitutions, ratify the Fourteenth Amendment, and guarantee voting rights for black males.
Previous efforts to impeach Johnson
First inquiry
On January 7, 1867, the House of Representatives voted to launch an impeachment inquiry against Johnson, to be run by the House Committee on the Judiciary. Since the resolution only created an inquiry and did not actually directly impeach the president as many Radical Republicans wanted to do, it was seen as offering Republicans a chance to register their displeasure with Johnson without actually formally impeaching him. Many Republicans felt safe in the belief that any impeachment resolution would die a quiet death in the Judiciary Committee. The House Committee on the Judiciary initially sided 4–5 on June 3, 1867, against recommending forwarding articles of impeachment to the full House. However, on November 25, 1867, the House Committee on the Judiciary, which had not previously forwarded the result of its inquiry to the full House, reversed their previous decision due to a change of mind by one of its member and voted 5–4 to recommend impeachment. In a December 7, 1867, vote, the full House rejected impeachment by a 108–57 vote in which more Republicans voted against impeachment than for it.
Launch of a second inquiry
On January 27, 1868, Rufus P. Spalding moved that the rules be suspended so that he could present a resolution resolving that the House Select Committee on Reconstruction be authorized to conduct a new impeachment inquiry into Johnson for, "what combinations have been made or attempted to be made to obstruct the due execution of the laws," and that the committee have leave to report at any time. The motion to consider the resolution was agreed to by a vote of 103–37, and the House voted to approve the resolution by a vote of 99–31. No Democrats voted for the resolution, while the only Republicans who cast votes against it were Elihu B. Washburne and William Windom. On February 10, 1868, the House voted to transfer any further responsibility over impeachment away from the Committee on the Judiciary and to the Select Committee on Reconstruction.
Despite Thadeus Stevens being the chair of the committee, the membership of the House Committee on Reconstruction was not initially favorable to impeachment. It had four (Republican) members that had voted for impeachment in December 1867, and five members (three Republicans and two Democrats) that had voted against it. At a February 13, 1868, committee meeting, a vote on a motion to table consideration of a resolution proposed by Stevens to impeach Johnson had effectively signaled that five of the committee's members still stood opposed to impeachment, unchanged in their position since the December 1867 vote. After the February 13 vote, it momentarily appeared that the prospect of impeachment was dead.
Tenure of Office Act
Congress' control of the military Reconstruction policy was mitigated by Johnson's command of the military as president. However, Johnson had inherited Lincoln's appointee Edwin M. Stanton as secretary of war. Stanton was a staunch Radical Republican who would comply with congressional Reconstruction policies as long as he remained in office. To ensure that Stanton would not be replaced, Congress passed the Tenure of Office Act in 1867 over Johnson's veto. The act required the president to seek the Senate's advice and consent before relieving or dismissing any member of his cabinet (an indirect reference to Stanton) or, indeed, any federal official whose initial appointment had previously required its advice and consent.
Johnson's dismissal of Secretary of War Stanton
The Tenure of Office Act was put in place to prevent the president from dismissing an officer that had been previously appointed with the advice and consent of the Senate without the Senate's approval to remove them. Per the law, if the president dismissed such an officer when the Senate was in recess, and the Senate voted upon reconvening against ratifying the removal, the president would be required to reinstate the individual. Because the Tenure of Office Act did permit the president to suspend such officials when Congress was out of session, after Johnson failed to obtain Stanton's resignation, he instead suspended Stanton on August 5, 1867, which gave him the opportunity to appoint General Ulysses S. Grant, then serving as commanding general of the Army, to serve as the interim secretary of war. When the Senate adopted a resolution of non-concurrence with Stanton's dismissal in December 1867, Grant told Johnson he was going to resign, fearing punitive legal action. Contrary to Johnson's belief that Grant had agreed to remain in office, when the Senate voted and reinstated Stanton in January 1868, Grant immediately resigned, before the president had an opportunity to appoint a replacement. Johnson was furious at Grant, accusing him of lying during a stormy cabinet meeting. The March 1868 publication of several angry messages between Johnson and Grant led to a complete break between the two. As a result of these letters, Grant solidified his standing as the front-runner for the 1868 Republican presidential nomination.