Andrew Johnson - United States Senator

United States Senator

The Whigs thought Andrew Johnson a dangerous prospect as a United States Senator, and made it a priority to prevent his election by the state legislature. Johnson, aware of the uphill battle, interjected himself into the campaigns for the legislature in the election of 1857. Though his party won the governor's race and control of the legislature, Johnson still had to overcome considerable opposition from the conservatives in both parties. His final biennial speech as Governor was pivotal, and he used it to recapitulate his populist philosophy of government. Two days later the legislature elected the outgoing governor to the U.S. Senate. The opposition was appalled, with the Richmond Whig for example, referring to him as "the vilest radical and most unscrupulous demagogue in the Union."

He immediately set about introducing the Homestead Act in the Senate, just as he had ushered it to passage in the House years before. It became apparent that, as the slavery issue took center stage, the slaveholding states were more reluctant to agree with the bill, with the primary antagonists being the senators in Virginia, Texas, North Carolina and Alabama. In May 1860 a significantly amended version of the Act was passed in both houses but was vetoed by President Buchanan. As chairman of the Committee to Audit and Control the Contingent Expense, Johnson continued his relentless opposition to spending, especially when the capital city was the beneficiary; he argued it was egregious to expect citizens in other states to fund the infrastructure of another locality, regardless of the fact it was the seat of government.

Time was also taken up in a controversy involving his Senate colleague from Tennessee, John Bell, a leading Whig. The state legislature had passed resolutions instructing their representatives in Washington to support pro-slavery and popular sovereignty measures such as the LeCompton Constitution and the Kansas–Nebraska Act. Bell took great exception to these attempts to supersede his voting discretion, and requests issued from Nashville for his resignation. Johnson took advantage of this opportunity to express his strong views in favor of the measures in question, as well as popular instruction. As the slavery debate escalated, Johnson continued to take an independent course. He opposed the antislavery Republican Party while making it clear that his devotion to the Union was consistent with his devotion to his perceived Constitutional right to own slaves.

In 1860, the Tennessee delegation nominated Johnson for president at the Democratic National Convention, and Johnson tentatively offered himself as a Vice-President on the Douglas ticket as a back up plan. But when the convention and the party showed signs of a split, he withdrew from the race entirely. In the general election, Johnson reluctantly supported John C. Breckinridge of Kentucky, the candidate of most Southern Democrats. Johnson took to the Senate floor after the election demonstrated the schism in the country, giving a sensational speech headlined by the New York Times: "...I will not give up this government...No; I intend to stand by it...and I invite every man who is a patriot to... rally around the altar of our common country...and swear by our God...that the Constitution shall be saved, and the Union preserved." As southern Senators began to express their intent to resign their seats, Johnson reminded Sen.Jefferson Davis, the Confederacy's future leader, that if his coalition would only hold to their seats, the Democrats would control the Congress, and thus better defend the South's interests. During this session, Johnson also supported the pro-slavery Crittenden Compromise.

Johnson continued to ingratiate himself with the North, the President-elect and his party, with his Unionist speeches in the Senate in early 1861: "I have an abiding confidence in the intelligence, the patriotism, and the integrity of the people, and I feel in my own heart that, if this subject could be got before them, they would settle the question and the Union of these States would be preserved." In fact, Lincoln ultimately looked to Johnson for considerable help with Tennessee's federal patronage decisions.

Johnson returned home when his state legislature took up the issue of secession. His area of East Tennessee was a Unionist stronghold, but the secessionists dominated the Middle and Western areas. The legislature decided to put the matter to a popular vote. Before the Tennessee electorate voted on secession, Johnson, at his peril, toured the state, speaking in opposition to the measure, contending it was unconstitutional. He was an aggressive stump speaker and responded forthrightly to hecklers and even endured instances of assault, though unharmed. When Tennessee seceded, though the vote did not win a majority in East Tennessee, Johnson was forced to flee from the state with armed security; he was in fact the only Senator from the seceded states to continue participation in Congress. His explanation for this decision was, "Damn the Negroes, I am fighting those traitorous aristocrats, their masters." For their protection as well, his family were forced to leave Greeneville; they would not return home for eight years. Between Congressional sessions he toured Kentucky and Ohio, trying in vain to convince any Union commander who would listen to conduct an operation into East Tennessee. Johnson was named to the Joint Committee on Conduct of the War whose purpose was to goad-on laggard Union generals; Johnson, to no avail, used this platform to voice the urgency of military intervention in East Tennessee.