The Critical Year: A Study of Andrew Johnson and Reconstruction

by Howard K. Beale

Offers a scholarly point-by-point vindication of Johnson's major Reconstruction policies, blaming the era's turbulence on radical congressional leaders

Hardcover

Published January 1, 1958

About the author

A specialist in the Reconstruction era and American foreign policy in the early 20th century, Howard Kennedy Beale earned his PhB in English from the University of Chicago and an M.A. and Ph.D, from Harvard University. Beale taught at the University of North Carolina from 1935 until 1948, and at the University of Wisconsin from 1948 until his death in 1959.

Reviews

[Don Heiman · Rating 4 out of 5]

"The Critical" year 1866 was a year that defined the American democracy we experience today. Howard Beale published this book in 1958 and his research was exceptionally well done. The documentation is thorough. His writing style is pedantic and occasionally hard to follow. I learned much about Andrew Johnson, Civil War Reconstruction, Radicals, and 13th and 14th civil justice Constitutional amendments. It is an important book for students of American presidents and social movements.