form of reorganization. What had been accomplished during the war was valuable more as precedent than for the actual results, and the most threatening element in the situation was the division, which was imminent, between the president and Congress. Lincoln seemed to think of the initiation of reconstruction as an executive function, while Congress certainly considered it a matter of legislation. There was not only a difference in the source of reorganization but in the kind of reorganization. The president aimed at creating governments and electorates whose loyalty should be determined by promissory oaths of future allegiance, while Congress was resolved upon recognizing electorates and governments whose test should be loyalty to the Union in the past. The one policy would enable all honorable Confederates to unite in rebuilding their States; the other would turn public affairs over to people many of whom had been turncoats or skulkers during the war. But just as slavery had been in some sense the cause of the destruction of the Union, although each side denied it, so reëstablishment of the Union was to be complicated by questions growing out of the destruction of slavery, and even thus early we find Lincoln feeling his way toward a trial of negro suffrage. He wished it to be confined to the best of the race, but in other hands than his it might prove a veritable Pandora's box. Congress, on the other hand, until checked by the elections, had determined upon a more thorough method of reconstruction, requiring voters to take a much more stringent oath than that required by Lincoln, but still admitting only white men to the franchise.

An impression prevailed in some quarters that Lincoln contemplated for the States surrendering with Lee and Johnston a different plan from that developed during the war in the Border States and Louisiana, so long held by the Federal troops. It was suggested that he was thinking of using the old State governments as the nucleus, or at least as machinery, to develop a loyal sentiment and to create loyal citizens. If so, however, here, as before, there was

no scheme clear in his mind, and his action would vary with circumstances. Certainly such a plan was not favored by Stanton and others at Washington.

At all events, the fatal bullet of Booth in Ford's Theatre put an end to the planning of him who, in one way or another, would have been the restorer of his country. His successor had to start out hampered by his own prejudices and by not precisely knowing Lincoln's views; and it may be there would be greater difficulties yet for him. The North was rendered frantic by the assassination, and inclined to go to greater extremes than the very man whose death she deplored. Unless Andrew Johnson should have at least as much tact as Lincoln, he might find the difficulties under the new circumstances greater than those his predecessor had encountered. Everything and everybody was at sea. No one could tell what would result.

CHAPTER III

THE RESTORATION UNDER JOHNSON

It was the irony of fate for a Southern man to be called to the helm at this crisis, and yet the Southerners at least would seem to have no cause to rejoice. Andrew Johnson was a man of the middle class, a tailor by trade, in a small town in East Tennessee. He had learned to read after his marriage, and became prominent in politics because of his extreme views. He had been a member of the legislature, governor, and congressman in succession, was senator at the outbreak of the war, and declined to resign when the State seceded. He had a hatred of what he called the "slave aristocracy" and all the bitterness usually engendered by the factional struggles of his native State, but his ability and the reputation he had made for firmness carried him into the vice-president's chair. Congress refused to count the presidential vote of Tennessee because there was "no lawful election," probably on the theory, Lincoln to the contrary notwithstanding, that the State was outside the Union. The seating of one of its citizens as vice-president presented an anomaly; and it was doubled now that that citizen had become President of the United States. Johnson took the oath of office at his hotel on the morning of Lincoln's death, and delivered a short inaugural in the Senate chamber. It may be doubted if Sumner was right in declaring Johnson intoxicated on the occasion of his inauguration as vice-president, but he had certainly entered upon his

duties full of himself as well as full of patriotism. Now, as president, the only assurance he could give of the future was a reference to his laborious past, which, he said, was founded upon the great principle of right. He modestly declared, "Duties have been mine; consequences are God's." The same bitterness which had distinguished the private citizen and the military governor showed itself in the president. He immediately accused the Southern leaders of complicity in Lincoln's assassination and threatened all traitors with punishment. "Why," he said, "should a man

be executed for killing one other man and those who murdered a nation go free?" He undertook to arrest General Lee, but General Grant interfered and enforced the sanctity of his parole. Johnson's expressions as to making treason odious were so forcible that Senator Wade suggested that he slaughter not more than a round dozen of the prominent Confederates, and delegations from churches asked him to be merciful.

Such was the man who was to attempt a restoration of the Union. He was totally different in character from Charles II., who presided over the English Restoration, for he was patriotic and able, if violent in speech, and reversed the Earl of Rochester's famous epigram on Charles. His word could be relied on, and if he said foolish things, at least he did many wise ones.

A leading man in Lincoln's Cabinet-and as some thought, the leading man in the whole administration, Lincoln not excepted-was William H. Seward, Secretary of State. He had been governor of New York and a strong competitor of Lincoln for the presidential nomination, and had proved himself a statesman of high rank. He had done much to aid Lincoln, and his persuasive methods were now influential in calming Johnson. This was much to the credit of Seward, as he had himself been stricken down in the massacre of the Cabinet which had been attempted by Booth and the other conspirators, but even severe wounds could keep the secretary only six weeks from the council table.