Andrew Johnson

17th President of the United States (1865-1869) · Vice President of the United States · Military Governor of Tennessee · U.S. Senator from Tennessee

Seventeenth U.S. president, a Tennessee Unionist who succeeded Lincoln, opposed civil rights for freed people during Reconstruction and was the first president impeached by the House.

Position
Solid, past the ring: second pole
Short, inside the ring: first pole
Balanced

★ Andrew Johnson on 12 axes

Share of each pole

Economy

Equality / Markets

OwnershipModerate: Private
30%70%
PublicPrivate
MarketsNo clear record
PlannedFree
WelfareModerate: Self-reliant
25%75%
SharedSelf-reliant

State and liberty

Liberty / Authority

AuthorityModerate: Strong leader
33%67%
DemocraticStrong leader
SecurityNo clear record
LibertyOrder
StructureModerate: Local
80%20%
LocalCentral

Society

Progress / Tradition

MoralityNo clear record
ProgressiveTraditional
ReligionNo clear record
SecularReligious
TechnologyNo clear record
EmbraceCaution
CultureStrong: National identity
13%87%
MulticulturalNational identity

World

Global / Nation

TradeNo clear record
GlobalProtected
Foreign policyMild: Strength
45%55%
CooperationStrength

How we placed it

Judgment calls

Positions summarize typical stances from primary sources and reference works. Where an axis is genuinely contested, the reasoning is below.

Ownership: A Jacksonian champion of small farmers who long backed giving public land to settlers; scored toward private ownership.
Markets: No documented position on economic regulation in the sources used here; left null.
Welfare: Vetoed the 1866 Freedmen's Bureau bill and opposed federal aid to the formerly enslaved.
Authority: Governed through mass pardons and vetoes against a Congress with large majorities, fired his war secretary in defiance of the Tenure of Office Act and was impeached, escaping removal by one vote.
Security: Opposed military trials and military government in the South, but in defense of white Southern rule rather than civil liberties in general; left null.
Structure: A strict constructionist who rejected secession but vetoed federal civil rights protections as violations of states' rights.
Morality: No documented position on family or social norms beyond the conventions of his era; left null.
Religion: No documented position in the sources used here; left null.
Technology: No documented view; 19th-century context.
Culture: Opposed Black suffrage and citizenship rights and appealed to anti-Black sentiment; scored strongly toward an exclusive national identity.
Trade: No documented position on the tariff in the sources used here; left null.
Foreign policy: His administration bought Alaska from Russia and pressed France to withdraw from Mexico.

6 axes are marked as no clear record: there is no reasonable basis to place Andrew Johnson there, so matching leaves them out.

Who was Andrew Johnson?

Andrew Johnson (1808-1875) grew up in poverty, worked as a tailor in Greeneville, Tennessee, and rose as a Democrat to the state governorship and the U.S. Senate. He was the only Southern senator to stay loyal to the Union in 1861, served as military governor of Tennessee and was elected vice president with Abraham Lincoln on a National Union ticket in 1864. Becoming president after Lincoln's assassination in April 1865, he offered quick readmission to the former Confederate states, clashed with Republicans in Congress over the rights of freed people and was impeached in 1868, escaping conviction by a single vote in the Senate.

Political views

Restored former Confederate states on lenient terms in 1865 and handed out thousands of pardons to members of the old planter class.
Source: millercenter.org
Refused to make Black suffrage a condition for the readmission of Southern states.
Source: millercenter.org
Vetoed the 1866 bill extending the Freedmen's Bureau and attacked it as unconstitutional.
Source: millercenter.org
Vetoed the Civil Rights Act of 1866, which defined nearly all people born in the United States as citizens, as a violation of states' rights.
Source: millercenter.org
Opposed the Fourteenth Amendment and the Reconstruction Acts that placed the South under military oversight.
Source: millercenter.org
Was impeached in 1868 after removing Secretary of War Edwin Stanton and was acquitted by one vote.
Source: en.wikipedia.org

Legacy

Historians rank Johnson among the least successful presidents, and most see his Reconstruction policy as a failure that left freed people exposed to violence and the Black Codes of Southern legislatures. Critics emphasize his openly racist statements, his vetoes of civil rights legislation and his use of pardons to restore the planter elite to power. A school of early 20th-century historians portrayed him as a defender of the Constitution against Radical Republicans, a view most later scholars rejected. Admirers point to his loyalty to the Union in 1861, his commitment to a strict reading of the Constitution and the purchase of Alaska by his secretary of state, William Seward. His impeachment remains a central precedent in debates over presidential removal.

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FAQ

Andrew Johnson: questions

What political party was Andrew Johnson?

Johnson was a Democrat who ran with Lincoln on the National Union ticket in 1864. As president he broke with the Republicans and later returned to the Democrats, winning a Senate seat in 1875.

Why was Andrew Johnson impeached?

The House impeached him in 1868 mainly for removing Secretary of War Edwin Stanton in violation of the Tenure of Office Act, amid a wider fight over Reconstruction. The Senate fell one vote short of convicting him.

What was Andrew Johnson's Reconstruction policy?

He readmitted Southern states quickly, pardoned most former Confederates and left the rights of freed people to the states. Congress overrode him and imposed its own Reconstruction plan in 1867.

Sources

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