IMPEACHED: THE TRIAL OF PRESIDENT ANDREW JOHNSON AND THE FIGHT FOR LINCOLN'S LEGACY
Monday, May 11, 2009, 6:30 p.m.
Free. Reservations required. Please call 215.409.6700 or order online.
Annenberg Center for Education and Outreach
Kirby Auditorium
National Constitution Center
Independence Mall
525 Arch Street
Philadelphia, PA
With the assassination of Abraham Lincoln, an old-fashioned southern Jacksonian Democrat of pronounced states' rights views became the seventeenth president of the United States. In a surprising turn of events, Andrew Johnson was charged with the reconstruction of the defeated South, including the extension of civil rights and suffrage to African American Southerners. It quickly became clear that the president supported the enactment of “black codes” and would block efforts to force Southern states to guarantee full equality for African Americans, igniting a fierce battle with congressional Republicans. In 1866, Harper’s Weekly declared his presidency a “national misfortune.” Acclaimed author David O. Stewart returns to the Constitution Center to discuss the impeachment trial of President Johnson, which became the central battle of the struggle over how to reunite a nation after four years of war.
The titanic collision between the radical Republicans of the Congress and the president was diverted into a legalistic dispute over whether Johnson could fire his own Secretary of War. Inept lawyering by Johnson’s prosecutors, combined with political deals, saved Johnson by a single vote in the Senate. Stewart argues that there were compelling reasons to remove Johnson from the presidency, reveals the corrupt bargains that saved Johnson’s job, and credits Johnson’s prosecutors with seeking to remake the nation to accord with the ideals that Lincoln championed.
David O. Stewart has practiced law in Washington, D.C. for more than a quarter of a century. He has argued appeals all the way to the U.S. Supreme Court and was law clerk to Justice Lewis Powell of the Supreme Court. He is the author of the critically acclaimed book, The Summer of 1787.
Elizabeth R. Varon is Professor of History at Temple University and Associate Director of the Center for the Humanities at Temple. A specialist in the Civil War era and nineteenth-century South, she is the author of We Mean to be Counted: White Women and Politics in Antebellum Virginia, which won the Lerner-Scott Prize of the American Historical Association, and Southern Lady, Yankee Spy: The True Story of Elizabeth Van Lew, A Union Agent in the Heart of the Confederacy, which won the Lillian Smith Prize of the Southern Regional Council. Her newest book is Disunion!: The Coming of the American Civil War, 1789-1859, volume I of the "Littlefield History of the Civil War Era" series. She has just begun working on a study of the Underground Railroad in Philadelphia.
A book sale and signing will follow the program courtesy of Joseph Fox Bookshop. Parking availability is subject to change, so please call the ConstitutionCenter on the day of the program or check our web site for more information. Please also see our directions by public transportation.
For reservations please call 215.409.6700 or order online. Programs at the National Constitution Center begin promptly and latecomers may not be admitted to the program. Please note that this program is subject to change.
Links:
Impeached: The Trial of President Andrew Johnson and the Fight for Lincoln’s Legacy
President Andrew Johnson