Download or read book Andrew Johnson written by Annette Gordon-Reed and published by Macmillan. This book was released on 2011-01-18 with total page 188 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A Pulitzer Prize-winning historian recounts the tale of the unwanted president who ran afoul of Congress over Reconstruction and was nearly removed from office Andrew Johnson never expected to be president. But just six weeks after becoming Abraham Lincoln's vice president, the events at Ford's Theatre thrust him into the nation's highest office. Johnson faced a nearly impossible task—to succeed America's greatest chief executive, to bind the nation's wounds after the Civil War, and to work with a Congress controlled by the so-called Radical Republicans. Annette Gordon-Reed, one of America's leading historians of slavery, shows how ill-suited Johnson was for this daunting task. His vision of reconciliation abandoned the millions of former slaves (for whom he felt undisguised contempt) and antagonized congressional leaders, who tried to limit his powers and eventually impeached him. The climax of Johnson's presidency was his trial in the Senate and his acquittal by a single vote, which Gordon-Reed recounts with drama and palpable tension. Despite his victory, Johnson's term in office was a crucial missed opportunity; he failed the country at a pivotal moment, leaving America with problems that we are still trying to solve.

Download or read book The Impeachers written by Brenda Wineapple and published by Random House. This book was released on 2019-05-21 with total page 577 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: ONE OF THE BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR: Jennifer Szalai, The New York Times; The New York Times Book Review; NPR; Publishers Weekly “This absorbing and important book recounts the titanic struggle over the implications of the Civil War amid the impeachment of a defiant and temperamentally erratic American president.”—Jon Meacham, Pulitzer Prize–winning author of The Soul of America When Abraham Lincoln was assassinated and Vice-President Andrew Johnson became “the Accidental President,” it was a dangerous time in America. Congress was divided over how the Union should be reunited: when and how the secessionist South should regain full status, whether former Confederates should be punished, and when and whether black men should be given the vote. Devastated by war and resorting to violence, many white Southerners hoped to restore a pre–Civil War society, if without slavery, and the pugnacious Andrew Johnson seemed to share their goals. With the unchecked power of executive orders, Johnson ignored Congress, pardoned rebel leaders, promoted white supremacy, opposed civil rights, and called Reconstruction unnecessary. It fell to Congress to stop the American president who acted like a king. With profound insights and making use of extensive research, Brenda Wineapple dramatically evokes this pivotal period in American history, when the country was rocked by the first-ever impeachment of a sitting American president. And she brings to vivid life the extraordinary characters who brought that impeachment forward: the willful Johnson and his retinue of advocates—including complicated men like Secretary of State William Seward—as well as the equally complicated visionaries committed to justice and equality for all, like Thaddeus Stevens, Charles Sumner, Frederick Douglass, and Ulysses S. Grant. Theirs was a last-ditch, patriotic, and Constitutional effort to render the goals of the Civil War into reality and to make the Union free, fair, and whole. Praise for The Impeachers “In this superbly lyrical work, Brenda Wineapple has plugged a glaring hole in our historical memory through her vivid and sweeping portrayal of President Andrew Johnson’s 1868 impeachment. She serves up not simply food for thought but a veritable feast of observations on that most trying decision for a democracy: whether to oust a sitting president. Teeming with fiery passions and unforgettable characters, The Impeachers will be devoured by contemporary readers seeking enlightenment on this issue. . . . A landmark study.”—Ron Chernow, Pulitzer Prize–winning author of Grant

Download or read book Impeached written by David O. Stewart and published by Simon and Schuster. This book was released on 2010-06-15 with total page 464 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: An account of the attempt to remove Andrew Johnson from the presidency. It demolishes the myth that Johnson's impeachment was unjustified.

Download or read book The Impeachment and Trial of Andrew Johnson written by Michael Les Benedict and published by W. W. Norton & Company. This book was released on 1999 with total page 228 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Probes into the efforts to remove Johnson from the presidency and details the results of the impeachment trial.

Download or read book Andrew Johnson written by Hans Louis Trefousse and published by . This book was released on 1998 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A definitive life of the flawed man who succeeded to the American presidency after Lincoln's assassination and who presided, disastrously, over the tumultuous first years of Reconstruction. Historian Hans L. Trefousse gives us "a brilliant, compassionate portrait of a dynamic era of social change and national healing, and of the tragic failure of an American leader" (LIBRARY JOURNAL). Photos.

Download or read book Lyndon B Johnson written by Charles Peters and published by Macmillan. This book was released on 2010-06-08 with total page 236 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The towering figure who sought to transform America into a "Great Society" but whose ambitions and presidency collapsed in the tragedy of the Vietnam War Few figures in American history are as compelling and complex as Lyndon Baines Johnson, who established himself as the master of the U.S. Senate in the 1950s and succeeded John F. Kennedy in the White House after Kennedy's assassination on November 22, 1963. Charles Peters, a keen observer of Washington politics for more than five decades, tells the story of Johnson's presidency as the tale of an immensely talented politician driven by ambition and desire. As part of the Kennedy-Johnson administration from 1961 to 1968, Peters knew key players, including Johnson's aides, giving him inside knowledge of the legislative wizardry that led to historic triumphs like the Voting Rights Act and the personal insecurities that led to the tragedy of Vietnam. Peters's experiences have given him unique insight into the poisonous rivalry between Johnson and Robert F. Kennedy, showing how their misunderstanding of each other exacerbated Johnson's self-doubt and led him into the morass of Vietnam, which crippled his presidency and finally drove this larger-than-life man from the office that was his lifelong ambition.

Download or read book The Presidency of Andrew Johnson written by Albert E. Castel and published by University Press of Kansas. This book was released on 1979 with total page 280 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A critical study of his administration assessing his Reconstruction program, and economic, foreign relations, and Indian policies.

Download or read book The Passage of Power written by Robert A. Caro and published by Vintage. This book was released on 2012-05-01 with total page 785 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: WINNER OF THE NATIONAL BOOK CRITICS CIRCLE AWARD, THE LOS ANGELES TIMES BOOK PRIZE, THE MARK LYNTON HISTORY PRIZE, THE AMERICAN HISTORY BOOK PRIZE Book Four of Robert A. Caro’s monumental The Years of Lyndon Johnson displays all the narrative energy and illuminating insight that led the Times of London to acclaim it as “one of the truly great political biographies of the modern age. A masterpiece.” The Passage of Power follows Lyndon Johnson through both the most frustrating and the most triumphant periods of his career—1958 to1964. It is a time that would see him trade the extraordinary power he had created for himself as Senate Majority Leader for what became the wretched powerlessness of a Vice President in an administration that disdained and distrusted him. Yet it was, as well, the time in which the presidency, the goal he had always pursued, would be thrust upon him in the moment it took an assassin’s bullet to reach its mark. By 1958, as Johnson began to maneuver for the presidency, he was known as one of the most brilliant politicians of his time, the greatest Senate Leader in our history. But the 1960 nomination would go to the young senator from Massachusetts, John F. Kennedy. Caro gives us an unparalleled account of the machinations behind both the nomination and Kennedy’s decision to offer Johnson the vice presidency, revealing the extent of Robert Kennedy’s efforts to force Johnson off the ticket. With the consummate skill of a master storyteller, he exposes the savage animosity between Johnson and Kennedy’s younger brother, portraying one of America’s great political feuds. Yet Robert Kennedy’s overt contempt for Johnson was only part of the burden of humiliation and isolation he bore as Vice President. With a singular understanding of Johnson’s heart and mind, Caro describes what it was like for this mighty politician to find himself altogether powerless in a world in which power is the crucial commodity. For the first time, in Caro’s breathtakingly vivid narrative, we see the Kennedy assassination through Lyndon Johnson’s eyes. We watch Johnson step into the presidency, inheriting a staff fiercely loyal to his slain predecessor; a Congress determined to retain its power over the executive branch; and a nation in shock and mourning. We see how within weeks—grasping the reins of the presidency with supreme mastery—he propels through Congress essential legislation that at the time of Kennedy’s death seemed hopelessly logjammed and seizes on a dormant Kennedy program to create the revolutionary War on Poverty. Caro makes clear how the political genius with which Johnson had ruled the Senate now enabled him to make the presidency wholly his own. This was without doubt Johnson’s finest hour, before his aspirations and accomplishments were overshadowed and eroded by the trap of Vietnam. In its exploration of this pivotal period in Johnson’s life—and in the life of the nation—The Passage of Power is not only the story of how he surmounted unprecedented obstacles in order to fulfill the highest purpose of the presidency but is, as well, a revelation of both the pragmatic potential in the presidency and what can be accomplished when the chief executive has the vision and determination to move beyond the pragmatic and initiate programs designed to transform a nation. It is an epic story told with a depth of detail possible only through the peerless research that forms the foundation of Robert Caro’s work, confirming Nicholas von Hoffman’s verdict that “Caro has changed the art of political biography.”

Download or read book Master of the Senate written by Robert A. Caro and published by Knopf. This book was released on 2002-04-23 with total page 1233 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Master of the Senate, Book Three of The Years of Lyndon Johnson, carries Johnson’s story through one of its most remarkable periods: his twelve years, from 1949 to 1960, in the United States Senate. At the heart of the book is its unprecedented revelation of how legislative power works in America, how the Senate works, and how Johnson, in his ascent to the presidency, mastered the Senate as no political leader before him had ever done. It was during these years that all Johnson’s experience—from his Texas Hill Country boyhood to his passionate representation in Congress of his hardscrabble constituents to his tireless construction of a political machine—came to fruition. Caro introduces the story with a dramatic account of the Senate itself: how Daniel Webster, Henry Clay, and John C. Calhoun had made it the center of governmental energy, the forum in which the great issues of the country were thrashed out. And how, by the time Johnson arrived, it had dwindled into a body that merely responded to executive initiatives, all but impervious to the forces of change. Caro anatomizes the genius for political strategy and tactics by which, in an institution that had made the seniority system all-powerful for a century and more, Johnson became Majority Leader after only a single term-the youngest and greatest Senate Leader in our history; how he manipulated the Senate’s hallowed rules and customs and the weaknesses and strengths of his colleagues to change the “unchangeable” Senate from a loose confederation of sovereign senators to a whirring legislative machine under his own iron-fisted control. Caro demonstrates how Johnson’s political genius enabled him to reconcile the unreconcilable: to retain the support of the southerners who controlled the Senate while earning the trust—or at least the cooperation—of the liberals, led by Paul Douglas and Hubert Humphrey, without whom he could not achieve his goal of winning the presidency. He shows the dark side of Johnson’s ambition: how he proved his loyalty to the great oil barons who had financed his rise to power by ruthlessly destroying the career of the New Dealer who was in charge of regulating them, Federal Power Commission Chairman Leland Olds. And we watch him achieve the impossible: convincing southerners that although he was firmly in their camp as the anointed successor to their leader, Richard Russell, it was essential that they allow him to make some progress toward civil rights. In a breathtaking tour de force, Caro details Johnson’s amazing triumph in maneuvering to passage the first civil rights legislation since 1875. Master of the Senate, told with an abundance of rich detail that could only have come from Caro’s peerless research, is both a galvanizing portrait of the man himself—the titan of Capital Hill, volcanic, mesmerizing—and a definitive and revelatory study of the workings and personal and legislative power.

Download or read book Andrew Johnson and Reconstruction written by Eric L. McKitrick and published by Chicago U.P. This book was released on 1960 with total page 544 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Re-evaluation of Andrew Johnson's role as President, and history of the political scene, from 1865 to 1868.

Download or read book The Avenger Takes His Place written by Howard B. Means and published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt. This book was released on 2006 with total page 308 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Brings to life one of the most critical moments in American history through the eyes of one of its most misunderestimated presidents--Andrew Johnson. Until now, books on Johnson have focussed exclusively on the impeachment trial (these books sold well during Clinton's impeachment proceedings). By contrast, award-winning journalist and novelist Howard Means focuses upon the first 45 days of Johnson's presidency, beginning with the assassination of Lincoln on April 14 and ending at the close of May 1865, when Johnson declared his terms of peace and set the nation on a course that still reverberates in our own time. Means' book shows how the nation's future hung in the balance when a Southerner (a slave-holder at the start of the Civil War) and a Democrat was being called upon to replace the most famous Republican president in history. At a time that required the most delicate of political touches, Johnson had shown that he was perhaps the most obstinate man in America. He had been drunk at his own inauguration as vice-president only a month before. Not only did Mary Todd Lincoln detest him, she also thought he had been among the plotters that murdered her husband. How would Johnson lead the nation? Would he be a reconciler like Lincoln? Or would he, as the Radicals and much of the nation expected, side with them? (The Avenger takes his place comes from a poem by Herman Melville that appeared shortly after Lincoln's death.) For forty-five days the nation--including a deeply anxious South--waited. That crucial month and a half is the focus of this book.

Download or read book Lyndon Johnson and the American Dream written by Doris Kearns Goodwin and published by Open Road Media. This book was released on 2015-08-04 with total page 405 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: With a new foreword: The New York Times–bestselling biography of President Lyndon Johnson from the Pulitzer Prize–winning author of Team of Rivals. Featuring a 2018 foreword by the Pulitzer Prize–winning political historian that celebrates a reappraisal of Lyndon Johnson’s legacy five decades after his presidency, from the vantage point of our current, profoundly altered political culture and climate, Doris Kearns Goodwin’s extraordinary and insightful biography draws from meticulous research in addition to the author’s time spent working at the White House from 1967 to 1969. After Johnson’s term ended, Goodwin remained his confidante and assisted in the preparation of his memoir. In Lyndon Johnson and the American Dream, she traces the 36th president’s life from childhood to his early days in politics, and from his leadership of the Senate to his presidency, analyzing his dramatic years in the White House, including both his historic domestic triumphs and his failures in Vietnam. Drawing on personal anecdotes and candid conversation with Johnson, Goodwin paints a rich and complicated portrait of one of our nation’s most compelling politicians in “the most penetrating, fascinating political biography I have ever read” (The New York Times).

Download or read book The Impeachment of Andrew Johnson written by Chester G. Hearn and published by McFarland. This book was released on 2000-01-01 with total page 274 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: While it is commonly known that Andrew Johnson was the first president to be impeached, less well known are the circumstances that led to the unsuccessful campaign to remove him from office. This account of Johnson's political life in Washington (including brief coverage of his early career in Tennessee) focuses on his conflict with the Radical Republicans, a group of fanatical abolitionists who, after Lincoln's assassination, sought to dominate American government and punish the South as harshly as possible. Johnson's focus on healing the nation and his refusal to submit to the Radicals' demands led to his impeachment. Though Johnson was acquitted, his impeachment clearly illustrates the danger when one branch of government tries to dominate the others. This chronicle of the first U.S. presidential impeachment covers in detail the political forces that nearly removed him from office. Numerous illustrations, a bibliography and an index are included.

Download or read book Andrew Johnson s Civil War and Reconstruction written by Paul H. Bergeron and published by Univ. of Tennessee Press. This book was released on 2011-04-01 with total page 313 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Few figures in American political history are as reviled as Andrew Johnson, the seventeenth president of the United States. Taking office after the assassination of Abraham Lincoln, he clashed constantly with Congress during the tumultuous early years of Reconstruction. He opposed federally-mandated black suffrage and the Fourteenth Amendment and vetoed the Freedmen’s Bureau and Civil Rights bills. In this new book, Paul H. Bergeron, a respected Johnson scholar, brings a new perspective on this often vilified figure. Previous books have judged Johnson out of the context of his times or through a partisan lens. But this volume—based on Bergeron’s work as the editor of The Papers of Andrew Johnson—takes a more balanced approach to Johnson and his career. Admiring Johnson's unswerving devotion to the Union, Lincoln appointed him as military governor of Tennessee, a post, Bergeron argues, that enhanced Johnson's executive experience and his national stature. While governor, Johnson implemented the emancipation of slaves in the state and laid the foundation for a new civilian government. Bergeron also notes that Johnson developed a close connection with the president which eventually resulted in his vice-presidential candidacy. In many respects, therefore, Johnson's Civil War years served as preparation for his presidency. Bergeron moves beyond simplistic arguments based on Johnson’s racism to place his presidency within the politics of the day. Putting aside earlier analyses of the conflict between Johnson and the Republican Radicals as ideological disputes, Bergeron discusses these battles as a political power struggle. In doing so, he does not deny Johnson’s racism but provides a more nuanced and effective perspective on the issues as Johnson tried to pursue the “politics of the possible.” Bergeron interprets Johnson as a strong-willed, decisive, fearless, authoritarian leader in the tradition of Andrew Jackson. While never excusing Johnson’s inflexibility and extreme racism, Bergeron makes the case that, in proper context, Johnson can be seen at times as a surprisingly effective commander-in-chief—one whose approach to the problems of reestablishing the Union was defensible and consistent. With its fresh insight on the man and his times, Andrew Johnson’s Civil War and Reconstruction is indispensable reading for students and scholars of the U.S. presidency and the Civil War and Reconstruction periods.

Download or read book Lincoln s First Crisis written by William Bruce Johnson and published by Rowman & Littlefield. This book was released on 2020-07-21 with total page 443 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Lincoln’s First Crisis concerns five of the most consequential months in American history: December 1860 through April 1861. When Abraham Lincoln swore his oath as president, the United States was disintegrating. Seven states had seceded, and as many as eight seemed poised to join them, depending upon how the new president handled the secession crisis and its flashpoint: Fort Sumter in South Carolina, the heart of the rebellion. The fate of the republic hung in the balance. The Sumter crisis has been hotly debated and deeply researched for more than 150 years. In this thoughtful reassessment, William Bruce Johnson combines thorough research and the latest historiography with a litigator’s methodical analysis and a storyteller’s eye for meaningful detail. Shortly after taking office, Lincoln decided upon a plan to avoid war with the seceded states while keeping his inaugural promise to maintain a Union military presence in the South. Because he chose not to reveal his plan to anyone, rumors soon spread that he was simply afraid to act. One source of such rumors was Lincoln’s secretary of state, William Henry Seward. Resentful that Lincoln had deprived him of the Republican nomination and convinced that Lincoln lacked the political sophistication necessary to deal with the secession crisis, Seward decided to negotiate with the Confederacy on his own and in secret. General Winfield Scott, meanwhile, the Union’s most senior military officer, had for a decade depended upon Seward for political advice, and now considered himself under orders from Seward, not the president. Johnson traces how Seward and Scott sabotaged Lincoln’s plan. From this account, from his examination of various personalities (such as that of Fort Sumter’s commander, Major Robert Anderson), and from his granular research into aspects of the Order of Battle in Charleston, Johnson has here constructed a new narrative of this crucial period, culminating in a new theory of how and why the Civil War began as it did, and how and why, if the new president’s orders had been properly carried out by Seward and Scott, it might have been averted.

Download or read book History of the Impeachment of Andrew Johnson President of the United States by the House of Representatives and His Trial by the Senate for High Crimes and Misdemeanors in Office 1868 written by Edmund Gibson Ross and published by . This book was released on 1896 with total page 200 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:

Download or read book The Loyalist written by Jeffrey Smith and published by Createspace Independent Publishing Platform. This book was released on 2012-02-28 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: On Good Friday, April 14, 1865, just five days after the end of the Civil War, President Abraham Lincoln was assassinated by a bitter Confederate sympathizer named John Wilkes Booth. Lincoln became an instant martyr, immortalized as the "The Great Emancipator." After Lincoln's assassination, the commonest of men tried to fill the gigantic void. Andrew Johnson, a self-educated tailor from Tennessee, became the 17th President of the United States, and the first to enter office after the murder of his predecessor. Rising above an impoverished childhood, Johnson was truly a self-made man, learning a useful trade and developing his own successful business. At the same time, he rapidly ascended the poltical ladder--Alderman, Mayor, State Legislator, Congressman, Governor of Tennessee, United States Senator, Military Governor of Union-occupied Tennessee, Vice-President, and President of the United States. As the only lawmaker from the South to remain in Congress after the outbreak of the Civil War, Andrew Johnson was the ultimate "Loyalist." In recognition for his dedication to the Union, Johnson was nominated as Abraham Lincoln's running mate in the 1864 presidential election. Barely a month into his vice-presidency, Johnson was thrust on the center stage of America politics. After Lincoln was murdered, the tailor from Tennessee ascended into the unenviable position of succeeding a legend. Johnson's obstinancy and rigid interpretaion of the Constitution soon placed him at odds with the Republican congression leadership and the national press. The bitter chasm widened as the Johnson presidency lurched forward, and ultimately led to his being the first President in American history to be impeached by the House of Representatives. By a single vote, Johnson avoided conviction by the Senate, and forfeiture of of office. After narrowly surving this constitutional crisis, Johnson's historical legacy was irrevocably damaged, and his hopes for an elected term as President were dashed. Returning to Tennessee after his presidency, Johnson was determined to return to political office. In remarkable fashion, he was elected to the United States Senate, marking the first and only time that a former President has returned to serve in that legislative body. Ambitous, lacking humility, and largely humorless, Johnson was unable to tolerate criticism. He angrily attacked his foes, once likening himself to Christ on the Crucifix. His combative personality and intemperate remarks readily allowed his enemies to portray him as vindictive and unstable. "The Loyalist: The Life and Times of Andrew Johnson" is a concise biography of the 17th President of the United States, focusing upon the tumultuous years surrounding the American Civil War. Sustained by courage and ambition, Johnson was inevitably doomed by petulance, leading to a remarkable rise, dramatic fall, and partial vindication.