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, 1868Ross, Edmund G. (Edmund Gibson)
History
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
Ross, Edmund G. (Edmund Gibson)
Johnson, Andrew, 1808-1875 -- Impeachment
It emphasized not only the capacity of the American people for
intelligent and orderly self-government, but also the strength and
endurance of our popular forms. It was a profound surprise to those
habituated to different political conditions. They had witnessed with
astonishment the quiet disbandment of millions of men but as yesterday
engaged in mortal strife--the vast armies as peacefully returning to
former vocations as though from a great parade--and now, from a state of
civil convulsion that in many another nation would have produced
armed collision and public disorder, they saw an entire people quietly
accepting the verdict of the highest authoritive body of the land,
and practically dismissing the subject from thought. It was a splendid
world-wide tribute to the strength and endurance of our system of
popular government.
Yet the conclusion must not be deduced that the power of impeachment is
not a wise provision of our Constitution, nor in any sense inconsistent
with our popular forms. Conditions may, and are not unlikely to arise,
some day, when the exercise of the power to impeach and remove the
President may be quite as essential to the preservation of our political
system as it threatened to become in this instance destructive of that
system. Should that day ever come, it is to be hoped that the remedy
of impeachment, as established by the Constitution, may be as
patriotically, as fearlessly, and as unselfishly applied as it was on
this occasion rejected.
SUPPLEMENT.
Copy of letter addressed to each of the members of the Cabinet present
at the conversation between the President and General Grant on the 14th
of January, 1868, and the answers thereto:
Executive Mansion, Washington, D. C., February 5, 1868.
Sir:--The Chronicle of this morning contains a correspondence between
the President and General Grant, reported from the War Department, in
answer to a resolution of the House of Representatives. I beg to call
your attention to that correspondence, and especially to that part of
it which refers to the conversation between the President and General
Grant, at the Cabinet meeting on Tuesday, the 14th of January, and to
request you to state what was said in that conversation.
Very respectfully yours, Andrew Johnson.
Washington, D. C., February 5, 1868.
Sir:---Your note of this date was handed to me this evening. My
recollection of the conversation at the Cabinet meeting on Tuesday, the
14th of January, corresponds with your statement of it in the letter
of the 31st ultimo, in the published correspondence. The three points
specified in that letter, giving your recollection of the conversation,
are correctly stated.
Very respectfully, Gideon Welles.
To the President.
Treasury Department, February 6, 1868.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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