On February 24, 1868, President Andrew Johnson became the first of three U.S. presidents to be impeached. His tenure was marked by intense conflict with Congress over Reconstruction policies following the Civil War.
Andrew Johnson, a Southern Democrat who opposed secession, was chosen as Abraham Lincoln’s running mate in 1864 to promote national unity. However, after Lincoln’s assassination in April 1865, Johnson assumed the presidency, inheriting the immense challenge of rebuilding the nation.
Johnson’s vision for Reconstruction was lenient toward the defeated Southern states. He pardoned many former Confederates and allowed Southern governments to reinstate restrictive laws against freed African Americans. This infuriated the Radical Republicans in Congress, who sought stronger protections for newly freed slaves and harsher consequences for the South.
The conflict between Johnson and Congress escalated when the House Judiciary Committee launched investigations into the president’s actions, looking for grounds for impeachment. However, they lacked solid evidence—until 1868.
In 1867, Congress passed the Tenure in Office Act, restricting the president’s ability to remove cabinet members without Senate approval. Johnson vetoed the law, but Congress overrode his veto. When Johnson fired Secretary of War Edwin Stanton in 1868—an ally of the Radical Republicans—he directly violated the law, setting the stage for impeachment.
On February 24, 1868, the House of Representatives voted to impeach Johnson. His trial began in the Senate on March 5 and lasted for nearly three months. The final vote was incredibly close—Johnson was acquitted by just one vote, avoiding removal from office.
Despite surviving impeachment, Johnson’s presidency never fully recovered. He failed to secure the Democratic nomination in 1868 and returned to his hometown of Greeneville, Tennessee. In 1873 a cholera epidemic swept through the South, including Greeneville, and the former president fell ill, but recovered.
In a surprising turn of events, he was elected to the U.S. Senate in January, 1875—the only former president to do so. However, his triumph was short lived, as he passed away later that year.
