osed to be a popular
demand, so far as the Republican party represented the people, for the
President's conviction--a demand found to be based, when analyzed, upon
other acts of the President than those for which he was arraigned in
the Articles of Impeachment. The people in this respect followed
precisely in the line of their Representatives. It was certainly not
a praiseworthy procedure that this supposed popular wish should have
been mentioned at all as an argument for conviction. The most
dignified of the many comments which this feature of the trial elicited
was by Senator Fessenden, in the official _opinion_ which accompanied
his vote:--"To the suggestion that popular opinion demands the
conviction of the President on these charges, I reply that he is not
now on trial before the people, but before the Senate. In the words of
Lord Eldon, upon the trial of the Queen, 'I take no notice of what is
passing out of doors, because I am supposed constitutionally not to be
acquainted with it. . . . It is the duty of those upon whom a judicial
task is imposed to meet reproach, and not to court popularity.' . . .
_The people_ have not taken an oath to do impartial justice according
to the Constitution and the law. _I have_ taken that oath."

The trial of President Johnson is the most memorable attempt made by
any English-speaking people to depose a sovereign ruler in strict
accordance with all forms of law. The order, dignity and solemnity
which marked the proceedings may therefore be realized with pride by
every American citizen. From the beginning to the end there was no
popular menace, or even suggestion of disturbance or violence, let the
trial end as it might. If the President had been convicted he would
have quietly retired from the Executive Mansion and Benjamin F. Wade,
President of the Senate, sworn by the Chief Justice in the presence
of the two Houses of Congress, would have assumed the power and
performed the duties of Chief Magistrate of the Nation. During the
original agitation of Impeachment in the House of Representatives some
imprudent expressions had been made by hot-headed partisans, in regard
to the right of the President to disperse Congress and appeal directly
to the people to vindicate his title to his office. But these
declarations were of no weight and their authors would have promptly
retracted them in the hour of danger.

The time within which the trial of the President was comprised, fro