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IS THERE A PRESIDENT IN THE HOUSE? (PART IV)

© John S. Cooper

The period after the Civil War saw Presidents ranging from one of the most politically experienced to possibly the least politically experienced. The Reconstruction Era, as this period was known, was one of the most corrupt in our nation’s political history. The South, especially, felt the effects of corruption the hardest.

Andrew Johnson held almost every elected office in American politics. A runaway tailor’s apprentice (making him the only President to be a wanted fugitive with a price on his head), he settled in eastern Tennessee and opened a tailor shop. People gathered in his shop (as opposed to the stereotypical general store) to discuss politics and current events. They elected him to the city council, and then as their mayor. He then went to the state house of representatives and then the state senate, and finally to Congress.

He was elected to the U.S. House of Representatives as a member of the 28th Congress in 1842. He served in the House from 1843 to 1853. During this time, he served as the chairman of the House Committee on Public Expenditures. In 1852, his House career came to an end. Democrats from the western and central part of Tennessee had long wanted to rid themselves of Johnson, who came from the anti-slavery eastern portion of the slave state. They gerrymandered (redrew the district lines of his Congressional district in a way that made it extremely hard for him to win re-election) his district, knowing he could not win in the newly created district. They hoped that he would either run and lose, or just give up. They misjudged Andrew Johnson. He did indeed withdraw from the race for the House seat. But he did not retire. Instead, he announced his intention of running for governor of the state of Tennessee. He ran and won, which made the leading Democrats even more unhappy with him. After two terms a governor, he was elected to the U.S. Senate in 1856. He served in the U.S. Senate from October 8, 1857 until his resignation on March 4, 1862. He served as the chairman of the Committee to Audit and Control the Contingent Expense, an important committee.

Although well known, and even a long-shot name mentioned for the Democratic Presidential nomination in 1860, Johnson’s action in the Senate at the start of the Civil War made him famous in the North, and infamous in the South. As southern states seceded from the Union, their Representatives and Senators resigned and left the Congress. Of all the southern members of Congress, only Johnson refused to leave. He made an impassioned speech denouncing those who left, especially those who owed much to the nation. He had especially hard words for Jefferson Davis. In his speech, Johnson said of Davis who was educated at West Point, “…when I remember that he was nurtured by this government … I cannot understand how he can be willing to hail another banner … It seems to me that if I could not unsheathe my sword in vindication of the flag of my country … I would return the sword to its scabbard. I would never sheathe it in the bosom of my mother! Never! Never!” His stand by the Union made him a hero in the North, but the South saw him as a traitor. During a tour of Tennessee campaigning to try to convince Tennessee to stay in the Union, John was burned and hung in effigy. Once, he barely avoided being lynched by leaving through the back door of a train station while a mob rushed in the front door, rope in hand.