Customer Reviews

Andrew Johnson and Reconstruction

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I read this book some time ago for a college course and it is one of those rare books that sticks with you. It came to mind again recently since Andrew Johnson is the only other President other than the current occupant to undergo impeachment. Toward the end of the book there is an excellent summary of the impeachment proceedings brought against Johnson in the winter/spring of 1868. It is enlightening to compare that process with what has gone on today. But the book is much more than about the impeachment. It covers a variety of topics centering around the way in which Andrew Johnson squandered many opportunities to make Presidential Reconstruction work and to cooperate at least somewhat with the Republicans in Congress. My history professor always said that McKitrick reached a little far with some of his comparisons and analogies. In this book, for instance, you will find comparisons of the defeated South and how the North related to it in terms of the U.S. and Japan after WWII. There is social psychology in the book regarding symbolic requirements that a victor in war expects in order to consider his victory complete. There is imaginary scenario making with John Andrew and Wade Hampton. Far reaching some of these techniques may have been, but they also always serve to make the authors' points and the book is quite focused despite its scope. I will also say that it is a very entertaining book. Some of its accounts will make you smile, if not laugh. For example, you won't find many better descriptions of Lorenzo Thomas's attempts to become Secretary of War as Stanton refused to leave his office. Where else can you find a description of Congressman Ashley, rabidly pro-impeachment, as an "occult mixture of superstition and lunacy" or a description of Ashley, Boutwell, and Ben Butler as a "baleful trio of buzzards..." Andrew Johnson's disastrous "Swing Around the Circle" in the Congressional elections also, though tragic in ways, has some very funny descriptions.

I do not want to end with people thinking this is a light-hearted work, though. It is a serious analysis of the way personality can affect great national issues. The chapter on the tortured path taken to get to the 14th Amendment is alone worth the price of the book. This book was originally written in 1960 and though some of its findings may have been modified by later research by other authors, it is still very valuable. I noticed that Professor Eric Foner used parts of it not long ago in a course at Columbia, so it obviously still has value in teaching and respect within the historical profession.

You will spend quality time in reading about an important aspect of our history if you purchase this book. I highly recommend it.

The Civil War was not politically a 'bipartisan' war in anything like the sense what would be true of the two world wars. It was required to be waged as a party war. The Republicans became Union to throw people off. Theoretically, it was a Republican victory. It is legend that the ruthless quality of Southern reconstruction was the outgrowth of hatreds carried over from wartime and prolonged. The Northerners did not know how to manage their 'great victory' over the South; thus, it was a disastrophe -- to say the least. There was a conspiracy to take over and turn the white Southerners into slaves! Slaves of conscience, slaves to sin, not to Christ.

Andrew Johnson was not exactly a Tennessean but we claim his as one of our own. The Andrew Johnson Hotel on the River here was the tallest building and certainly glamorous (still is inside); that is the place where Hank Williams, Sr., died when his chauffeur stopped there to let him 'dry out.' Johnson had an impossible duty to the country to fulfill and he performed badly. Like the other Johnson president some hundred years later, who ascended to the presidency the same way he did ([...] of the real president, Lincoln, Kennedy) also from the South, they chose the wrong programs to push through the public: civil rights. Both ended disastrously.

This 17th president, now two and a half centuries since his time, has his reputation rehabilitated a bit. He changed parties and, thus, the Democratic nation was founded. Read STORY OF THE COPPERHEADS, THE HIDDEN CIVIL WAR by Gray Wood.

Johnson was almost impeached, but that's nothing special; if you're from the South, the Northerners automatically try to bring the important person down to their size. Why is it that so many of them moved South? We are inundated with those harsh-speaking 'know-it-all's who want to change us. If we are so bad in the South, I can't understand why they came here in the first place. Another Southern president, Clinton, was almost impeached. Richard Nixon, from California, was almost impeached. Blount was, too, when he was Tennessee's Governor. But impeachment never happens. I can't see why they go to all of that bother to desecrate the reputation as, if they are worthy to be elected president, they will overcome the bad name and rebound, like Jefferson Davis did for the Confederacy.

Just saw white-haired Ms. Pelot in a replay of the Beer Board on city Council still wearing that yellow, sexy, low-cut top with her white beads. She is trying to be a Southern belle but won't make it. They even bought a special chair for her. She was elected four years ago, and now it is her time to go as she has clearly taken over the reigns of Mayorship. I ran into Bill Lyons and asked, "Are you still running this town?" He admitted that he certainly is. Tell that to the young mayor and 'friend' who has decided to become interested in local politics.