The Impeachers: The Trial of Andrew Johnson and the Dream of a Just Nation

by Brenda Wineapple

Thaddeus Stevens spoke again, this time elegiacally. “In my youth, in my manhood, in my old age, I had fondly dreamed that when any fortunate chance should have broken up for a while the foundation of our institutions, and released us from our obligations the most tyrannical that ever man imposed in the name of freedom, that the intelligent, pure and just men of the Republic, true to their professions and their consciences, would have so remodeled all our institutions as to have freed them from every vestige of human oppression, of inequality or rights, of the recognized degradation of the poor, and the superior caste of the rich. “This bright dream has vanished,” he concluded. Our institutions are not yet devoid of human oppression or inequality, he went on to say. And yes, we might have done better if we had the cooperation of President Johnson. But we don’t. The President would have the former Confederacy remain a slave empire under a different name. We cannot allow that or forgive that. So we must not delay, we must not give up, we must take and do what we can: “Mutual concession,” Thaddeus Stevens added, “is our only resort, or mutual hostilities.”