Wearied of Stanton's disloyalty, Johnson asked him to resign and, upon a refusal, suspended him in August 1867, and placed General Grant in temporary charge of the War Department.General Grant, Chief Justice Chase, and Secretary McCulloch, though they all disliked Stanton, advised the President against suspending him.But Johnson was determined.About the same time he exercised his power in removing Sheridan and Sickles from their commands in the South and replaced them with Hancock and Canby.The radicals were furious, but Johnson had secured at least the support of a loyal Cabinet.
The suspension of Stanton was reported to the Senate in December 1867, and on January 13, 1868, the Senate voted not to concur in the President's action.
Upon receiving notice of the vote in the Senate, Grant at once left the War Department and Stanton again took possession.Johnson now charged Grant with failing to keep a promise either to hold on himself or to make it possible to appoint some one else who would hold on until the matter might be brought into the courts.The President by this accusation angered Grant and threw him with his great influence into the arms of the radicals.Against the advice of his leading counselors, Johnson persisted in his intention to keep Stanton out of the Cabinet.Accordingly on the 21st of February he dismissed Stanton from office and appointed Lorenzo Thomas, the Adjutant General, as acting Secretary of War.Stanton, advised by the radicals in Congress to "stick," refused to yield possession to Thomas and had him arrested for violation of the Tenure of Office Act.The matter now was in the courts where Johnson wanted it, but the radical leaders, fearing that the courts would decide against Stanton and the reconstruction acts, had the charges against Thomas withdrawn.Thus failed the last attempt to get the reconstruction laws before the courts.On the 22nd of February, the President sent to the Senate the name of Thomas Ewing, General Sherman's father-in-law, as Secretary of War, but no attention was paid to the nomination.
On February 24, 1868, the House voted, 128 to 47, to impeach the President "of high crimes and misdemeanors in office." The Senate was formally notified the next day, and on the 4th of March the seven managers selected by the House appeared before the Senate with the eleven articles of impeachment.At first it seemed to the public that the impeachment proceedings were merely the culmination of a struggle for the control of the army.There were rumors that Johnson had plans to use the army against Congress and against reconstruction.
General Grant, directed by Johnson to accept orders from Stanton only if he were satisfied that they came from the President, refused to follow these instructions.Stanton, professing to fear violence, barricaded himself in the War Department and was furnished with a guard of soldiers by General Grant, who from this time used his influence in favor of impeachment.Excited by the most sensational rumors, some people even believed a new rebellion to be imminent.
The impeachment was rushed to trial by the House managers and was not ended until the decision was taken by the votes of the 16th and 26th of May.The eleven articles of impeachment consisted of summaries of all that had been charged against Johnson, except the charge that he had been an accomplice in the murder of Lincoln.The only one which had any real basis was the first, which asserted that he had violated the Tenure of Office Act in trying to remove Stanton.The other articles were merely expansions of the first or were based upon Johnson's opposition to reconstruction or upon his speeches in criticism of Congress.Nothing could be said about his control of the patronage, though this was one of the unwritten charges.J.W.Schuckers, in his life of Chase, says that the radical leaders "felt the vast importance of the presidential patronage; many of them felt, too, that, according to the maxim that to the victors belong the spoils, the Republican party was rightfully entitled to the Federal patronage, and they determined to get possession of it.There was but one method and that was by impeachment and removal of the President."The leading House managers were Stevens, Butler, Bingham, and Boutwell, all better known as politicians than as lawyers.The President was represented by an abler legal array: Curtis, Evarts, Stanbery, Nelson, and Groesbeck.
Jeremiah Black was at first one of the counsel for the President but withdrew under conditions not entirely creditable to himself.
The trial was a one-sided affair.The President's counsel were refused more than six days for the preparation of the case.Chief Justice Chase, who presided over the trial, insisted upon regarding the Senate as a judicial and not a political body, and he accordingly ruled that only legal evidence should be admitted; but the Senate majority preferred to assume that they were settling a political question.Much evidence favorable to the President was excluded, but everything else was admitted.As the trial went on, the country began to understand that the impeachment was a mistake.Few people wanted to see Senator Wade made President.The partisan attitude of the Senate majority and the weakness of the case against Johnson had much to do in moderating public opinion, and the timely nomination of General Schofield as Secretary of War after Stanton's resignation reassured those who feared that the army might be placed under some extreme Democrat.
