Had the assassin's plot gone as planned, Johnson would have been killed along with Lincoln instead, he became President. Tragically, President Abraham Lincoln was assassinated days after the Civil War ended in 1865. McClellan and his running mate, George Pendleton. Together, the two won a sweeping victory against Democratic candidate General George B. Concerned about his chances for reelection, Lincoln felt that he needed a man like Johnson as his vice president to help balance the ticket in 1864 and represent the fusion of War Democrats with Republicans into a “Union” party. By the summer of 1863, however, he began to favor emancipation as a war measure-a means to punish the Confederates and rob them of resources. After Lincoln made him the military governor of Tennessee, Johnson convinced the President to exempt Tennessee from the Emancipation Proclamation. In the North, however, Johnson's stand made him an overnight hero.Īlthough Johnson was deeply committed to saving the Union, he did not believe in the emancipation of slaves when the war started. In the South, Johnson was deemed a traitor his property was confiscated and his wife and two daughters were driven from the state. When Tennessee left the Union after the election of Abraham Lincoln, Johnson broke with his home state, becoming the only Southern senator to retain his seat in the U.S. However closely he identified with his fellow Southerners' views on slavery, Johnson disagreed strongly with their calls to break up the Union over the issue. senator aligned with the states' rights and proslavery wing of the Democratic Party. When the Civil War broke out, Johnson was a first-term U.S. House of Representatives, and as governor of Tennessee. He quickly moved up to serve in his state's legislature, the U.S. Johnson considered himself a Jacksonian Democrat, and he gained the support of local mechanics, artisans, and rural folk with his common-man, tell-it-like-it-is style. Political Leaningsīy 1834, the young tailor had served as town alderman and mayor of Greeneville and was fast making a name for himself as an aspiring politician. Nevertheless, she operated behind the scenes with energy and tact and was fondly remembered by the White House staff. She only made two public appearances during her entire stay in the executive mansion. When Johnson reached the White House, First Lady Eliza Johnson was a semi-invalid suffering from tuberculosis during her husband's term in office. Eliza educated Andrew and helped him make wise investments in town real estate and farmlands. Andrew later returned to his mother, and the entire family moved west to Greeneville, Tennessee, where young Andrew set up shop as a tailor and met his wife, Eliza McCardle. After serving a number of years in this trade, the boys ran away for several years, dodging rewards for their capture placed by their former employer. His mother and her new husband apprenticed fourteen-year-old Andrew and his older brother William to a local tailor. Whereas Lincoln is esteemed as America's greatest President, Johnson, his successor, is ranked as one of the worst.Īndrew's father died when Andrew was a young boy, and his mother remarried. The only other man to attain the office of President with so little formal education was Abraham Lincoln. Born in a log cabin in North Carolina to nearly illiterate parents, Andrew Johnson did not master the basics of reading, grammar, or math until he met his wife at the age of seventeen. Andrew Johnson gives truth to the saying that in America, anyone can grow up to become President.
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