The Republic for Which It Stands: The United States during Reconstruction and the Gilded Age, 1865-1896 (Oxford History of the United States)

by Richard White

Impeachment went forward because Republican moderates were convinced that a defiant Johnson was illegally subverting the will of Congress and attempting to block the Reconstruction of the South. Southern Unionists, whose political, and sometimes actual, lives rested on the outcome, hated Johnson. Republican anger and frustration initially overcame Republican differences.73 Johnson, as usual, counted on popular support and was, as usual, deluded;