Impeached: The Trial of President Andrew Johnson and the Fight for Lincoln's Legacy by David O. Stewart

Author:David O. Stewart
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub
Tags: Government, Presidents & Heads of State, Executive Branch, General, United States, Political Science, Biography & Autobiography, 19th Century, History
ISBN: 9781439163320
Publisher: Simon & Schuster
Published: 2009-01-01T05:00:00+00:00

William Evarts, New York lawyer, who led the president’s defense inside and outside of the Senate.

Schofield kept a level head. He needed to be sure that his elevation would not rile the general-in-chief. He would fail as war secretary if he were caught in a cross fire between the president and Grant. After dinner that evening, the two generals went for a walk. Schofield described the proposition from Evarts. Grant, who viewed Schofield as a friend, had no objection to the appointment. With that assurance, Schofield returned to Evarts’s hotel room at 8 P.M.

Evarts explained that although there was no factual basis for impeachment, some Republicans would not vote for acquittal unless the War Department was restored to normal. Schofield had been selected, Evarts said, because Grant would accept him (which Schofield knew was true), which would satisfy Republicans. The appointment was not a personal matter for the president, the lawyer went on, because “he really had no friends.”

When Schofield returned to the Grants’ home at 11 P.M., Grant insisted he would never believe a pledge by Johnson of future good conduct, then added that the president should be removed from office. Yet Grant still thought it proper for Schofield to accept the appointment. Next morning, Schofield told Evarts that he could go forward if the president abandoned the “annoying irregularities” in War Department matters that had developed during months of struggle with Stanton. When Evarts objected that Johnson could make no such commitment, Schofield replied that he would assume that his condition was acceptable if the president went through with the nomination.

Evarts kept tight control over the announcement of Schofield’s nomination. The president sent Colonel Moore to deliver it to the Senate on Thursday, April 23, but Evarts waved the colonel away. The moment was not right. On the next day, the third day of closing arguments, Moore was back at the Senate with the nomination in hand. This time, Evarts nodded yes, and the paper was delivered. It created, Moore wrote in his diary, “considerable interest.” Judge Curtis gave Moore a cheering message to carry back to the president. “[D]uring the last twenty-four hours impeachment had gone rapidly astern.”

The press reported the Schofield nomination as an olive branch extended to doubtful Republican senators, and noted that Grant did not object to it. That last point was the most important one. Grant could have scuttled the maneuver by advising Schofield not to take the appointment. Partisans like Stanton and Stevens doubtless would have preferred for Grant to do so, denying the president any advantage in the trial. The general-in-chief did not, however, consult political advisers on the question. He decided on his own. Every day, he knew, the standoff over the War Department snarled the military. Even though the appointment might save Johnson, Grant would not obstruct resolution of that standoff. The Schofield nomination represented a surprising act of mutual forbearance between Johnson and Grant, whose dislike for each other had not abated. If Johnson would swallow his pride

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