Status
Available
Genres
Collection
Publication
Random House (2019), Edition: 1st Edition, 576 pages
Description
"When Lincoln was assassinated and Andrew Johnson became President, a fraught time in America became perilous. Congress was divided over how Reconstruction should be accomplished and the question of black suffrage. The South roiled with violence, lawlessness, and efforts to preserve the pre-Civil War society. Andrew Johnson--chosen as Vice President for electability, because he was a Southern Democrat--had no interest in following Lincoln's agenda. With the unchecked power of executive orders, Johnson pardoned the rebel states and their leaders, opposed black suffrage, and called Reconstruction unnecessary. Congress decided to take action against a President who acted like a king. With extensive research and profound insights, Brenda Wineapple makes this overlooked historical period come alive with important new insights. The impeachment--the first in American history--was the last-ditch, patriotic effort make the goals of the Civil War a reality, and to make the Union one again"--… (more)
User reviews
LibraryThing member drneutron
I came across this one on Overdrive, and given current events here in DC, it couldn’t be more timely. Wineapple tells the story of the first impeachment of a US President - Andrew Johnson - during Reconstruction. And as the title says, it’s also about the people involved in the impeachment,
What most fascinated me about the story is how similar it is to today. Johnson was a boorish egotist with an over-inflated sense of Presidential power, and a populist who played to the white South for support. He was opposed by Radical Republicans, the progressives of the day, who couldn’t quite pull together enough support to make impeachment happen. Since there was no Vice President, the Senator next in line to take over was eerily like Bernie Sanders in his politics. The fights in trial could be word-for-word from the current proceedings - whether to allow witness testimony, was there enough evidence to convict, did an actual crime have to take place for this to be impeachable?
Wineapple’s book is well worth a read, and a worthy antidote for anyone who thinks we live in special circumstances. My only criticism is that the editor should have tightened up the story - it did get a bit repetitive towards the end.
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with very interesting looks at the personalities involved. What most fascinated me about the story is how similar it is to today. Johnson was a boorish egotist with an over-inflated sense of Presidential power, and a populist who played to the white South for support. He was opposed by Radical Republicans, the progressives of the day, who couldn’t quite pull together enough support to make impeachment happen. Since there was no Vice President, the Senator next in line to take over was eerily like Bernie Sanders in his politics. The fights in trial could be word-for-word from the current proceedings - whether to allow witness testimony, was there enough evidence to convict, did an actual crime have to take place for this to be impeachable?
Wineapple’s book is well worth a read, and a worthy antidote for anyone who thinks we live in special circumstances. My only criticism is that the editor should have tightened up the story - it did get a bit repetitive towards the end.
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LibraryThing member 1Randal
Interesting book on the presidency and impeachment of Andrew Johnson. Very well researched and documented. Timely book, considering what is going on in Washington at this very moment. Will history repeat itself?
LibraryThing member MacDad
Wineapple tries too hard to make the saga of Johnson's impeachment into a parable for the Trump age.
LibraryThing member grandpahobo
The book is very comprehensive and provides tremendous detail about the events and people involved. It also provides an important perspective about how the impeachment affected the politics of the country from decades and still resonates today. Its not dry and the author presents the story in a
Finally, you will be amazed by the similarities between Andrew Johnson and Trump, as well as the stark difference between the leaders of congress then and now.
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very compelling way.Finally, you will be amazed by the similarities between Andrew Johnson and Trump, as well as the stark difference between the leaders of congress then and now.
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LibraryThing member ecw0647
The 13th amendment had some unintended consequences. One was the abolition of the 3/5ths rule that counted slaves as only 3/5ths of a person for representation. That meant that when and if the southern states were readmitted to the union they instantly gained 20 more representatives and the
The “cheerful” South of President Johnson was not the South described in German immigrant leader Carl Schurz’s report. The former Major General would report on a post-war region whose people alternated between depressed prostration at the hands of a conqueror and a desire for vengeance against blacks and Southern Unionists. Schurz wrote that even the shooting of uniformed United States soldiers was not “unfrequently” reported.
Worse was the situation of freedmen and the Northerners working with them. Officials from the Freedman’s Bureau were often mobbed and their contractors assaulted and murdered. Blacks were expected to behave as slaves by 95% of the white Southerners Schurz talked to. One former slaveholder even suggested they should submit willingly to whippings by whites. Those that did not “act like slaves” were sometimes tortured or killed. Blacks who left the plantations where they had been enslaved were “shot or otherwise severely punished”, Schurz wrote. A diligent investigator, Schurz met with former slaves and examined the “bullet and buckshot wounds in their bodies”.
Brenda Wineapple has done a masterful job of describing the background of Johnson, his trial and the personalities of the Senators involved. There's no question that Johnson had no interest in helping former slaves gain an appropriate footing after decades of subjugation. He certainly did not want them to have the vote and considered them subhuman. His only goal was getting the union back together and if that meant letting former slave owners back into positions of authority in the south, removing federal troops that were the only guarantee of protection for former slaves, and dismantling the Freedman's Bureau, well then, so be it. His argument was that the Constitution had supported slavery so what was the big deal. In fact, he supported amendments to the Constitution that would have guaranteed the perpetual right to have slaves and another that would have made those amendments unamendable. (Where he found that piece of idiocy in the Constitution I have no idea.)
Johnson famously said he believed in “government for white men”. Hundreds of African Americans died in riots in New Orleans and Memphis that showed the new freedoms would not be easily kept. Johnson’s supporters dismissed the scores of murders as “isolated incidents”. Johnson dismissed military leaders in the southern states and appointed governors who would support him.
Even though the book was written before the current impeachment crisis, similarities abound. Johnson took a train around the country holding rallies to whip up support and making remarks such as “I don’t care about my dignity.” Senator John Sherman of Illinois complained that Johnson had “sunk the presidential office to the level of a grog-house”. No one it seems liked him. Wineapple highlights “the president’s morbid sensitivity, his need for absolute loyalty, and his wariness”. Johnson revered Andrew Jackson, another populist. He hated elitists (i.e. lawyers) and plutocrats.
Clearly, Johnson was guilty of violating the Tenure of Office Act. Johnson always claimed it was unconstitutional, and it probably was. It certainly was according to the Supreme Court in 1926 that ruled a similar law unconstitutional. The original had been repealed in 1887. But the article on which Johnson was most nearly convicted was the catch-all 11th article, which accused him of offenses including violations of the separation of powers but also of autocratic actions and other behavior inconsistent with the office.
The final tally in the Senate failed to convict by one vote and it's clear according to David Stewart that Ross's vote -- contrary to the hagiography in Profiles in Courage -- was purchased.
Excellent read.
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opportunity to win back everything they had lost during the war. Already, former slave owners and whites were attacking, beating, and killing any black who might venture onto the street, especially anyone they suspected of having been in the union army. The Memphis, TN riots of 1866 were just a taste of what might be coming and Tennessean Andrew Johnson was no help at all. Conditions in the south had become intolerable as Johnson emissary, Carl Shurz, discovered to Johnson’s dismay.The “cheerful” South of President Johnson was not the South described in German immigrant leader Carl Schurz’s report. The former Major General would report on a post-war region whose people alternated between depressed prostration at the hands of a conqueror and a desire for vengeance against blacks and Southern Unionists. Schurz wrote that even the shooting of uniformed United States soldiers was not “unfrequently” reported.
Worse was the situation of freedmen and the Northerners working with them. Officials from the Freedman’s Bureau were often mobbed and their contractors assaulted and murdered. Blacks were expected to behave as slaves by 95% of the white Southerners Schurz talked to. One former slaveholder even suggested they should submit willingly to whippings by whites. Those that did not “act like slaves” were sometimes tortured or killed. Blacks who left the plantations where they had been enslaved were “shot or otherwise severely punished”, Schurz wrote. A diligent investigator, Schurz met with former slaves and examined the “bullet and buckshot wounds in their bodies”.
Brenda Wineapple has done a masterful job of describing the background of Johnson, his trial and the personalities of the Senators involved. There's no question that Johnson had no interest in helping former slaves gain an appropriate footing after decades of subjugation. He certainly did not want them to have the vote and considered them subhuman. His only goal was getting the union back together and if that meant letting former slave owners back into positions of authority in the south, removing federal troops that were the only guarantee of protection for former slaves, and dismantling the Freedman's Bureau, well then, so be it. His argument was that the Constitution had supported slavery so what was the big deal. In fact, he supported amendments to the Constitution that would have guaranteed the perpetual right to have slaves and another that would have made those amendments unamendable. (Where he found that piece of idiocy in the Constitution I have no idea.)
Johnson famously said he believed in “government for white men”. Hundreds of African Americans died in riots in New Orleans and Memphis that showed the new freedoms would not be easily kept. Johnson’s supporters dismissed the scores of murders as “isolated incidents”. Johnson dismissed military leaders in the southern states and appointed governors who would support him.
Even though the book was written before the current impeachment crisis, similarities abound. Johnson took a train around the country holding rallies to whip up support and making remarks such as “I don’t care about my dignity.” Senator John Sherman of Illinois complained that Johnson had “sunk the presidential office to the level of a grog-house”. No one it seems liked him. Wineapple highlights “the president’s morbid sensitivity, his need for absolute loyalty, and his wariness”. Johnson revered Andrew Jackson, another populist. He hated elitists (i.e. lawyers) and plutocrats.
Clearly, Johnson was guilty of violating the Tenure of Office Act. Johnson always claimed it was unconstitutional, and it probably was. It certainly was according to the Supreme Court in 1926 that ruled a similar law unconstitutional. The original had been repealed in 1887. But the article on which Johnson was most nearly convicted was the catch-all 11th article, which accused him of offenses including violations of the separation of powers but also of autocratic actions and other behavior inconsistent with the office.
The final tally in the Senate failed to convict by one vote and it's clear according to David Stewart that Ross's vote -- contrary to the hagiography in Profiles in Courage -- was purchased.
Excellent read.
Show Less
LibraryThing member JBD1
A readable and well-crafted account of the presidency of Andrew Johnson, focusing on the efforts of the Radicals to remove him from the office (which they probably would have succeeded in doing had there been a vice president in place and Ben Wade not in line for the presidency). I don't think
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Wineapple is entirely fair to Seward, and she's a little too sympathetic to Johnson, but it's a good read, anyway. Show Less
LibraryThing member Dairyqueen84
I had to return this to the library so did not get to finish. Will I put it on hold again? Maybe. It seemed all over the place in time. It does humanize historical figures of the period which I found interesting.
Awards
Publishers Weekly's Best Books of the Year (Nonfiction — 2019)
NPR: Books We Love (2019)
The New York Times Notable Books of the Year (Nonfiction — 2019)
Notable Books List (Nonfiction — 2020)
Language
Original language
English
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