He warned that Congress was dangerously expanding the federal government to give privileges to black men that white men did not have. This, he said, would destroy America, because a big government would require tax levies, which would fall on white men who had worked hard for their property. That money would be spent on government officials providing services for African Americans, like those working for the Freedmen’s Bureau. Republicans believed their policies leveled the playing field between former slaves and white Americans. Johnson argued that they were a redistribution of wealth that
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