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With the death of Abraham Lincoln came the swearing in of a new President and this was to be Vice-President Andrew Johnson, who only served as Vice-President for forty-one days. Johnson was sworn in less than three hours after Lincoln’s death.
Johnson had a very difficult job looking ahead: his main concern was bringing peace back to the United States after the Civil War, which split the country and made irreversible enemies. Johnson and Lincoln shared equal views on trying to reunite the country. They both intended to make a policy of trying to forgive and forget: the plan was for the confederate states to draft new constitutions abolishing slavery, and then each citizen would regain their citizenship by taking a simple oath to the federal government. But some took offense. There were radical republicans in Congress who wanted nothing of the sort: they wanted to severely punish the South for seceding. They thought that the Democratic Party would start all over again and regain power.
Andrew Johnson was trying to keep the peace; he had many in Congress that opposed his every effort in trying to reconcile with the South on a gentleman’s table. Congress continually passed laws that Johnson vetoed. They demanded the South to change their ways quickly and passed laws that made them do what Congress wanted. The South was slow to let go of grudges: they did not want the blacks, their former slaves and now freedmen, to have voting rights or own lands. But Congress saw to it that they would have these rights that were promised to every man, regardless of the color of their skin.
Unfortunately, Johnson had made a very big mistake. He had dismissed the Secretary of War Edwin M. Stanton, and Congress found its way to get rid of Johnson. They passed the vote to impeach Johnson for violating the Tenure of Office Act, which they passed with Johnson’s continuing veto. Johnson did not commit any real crime; he just opposed a few of the wrong congressmen. With the impeachment trials, Johnson had no way of winning re-election, so he decided to retire from public office to Greenville, Tennessee.
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