d Ben Wade,
Sumner, Stevens, all the great leaders of that day could not,
through fear, influence him one particle.

In 1861, when he was being made the target of all sorts of threats
on account of his solitary stand against secession in the Senate,
he let fall this characteristic utterance:

"I want to say, not boastingly, with no anger in my bosom, that
these two eyes of mine have never looked upon anything in the shape
of mortal man that this heart has feared."

This utterance probably illustrates Johnson's character more clearly
than anything that I could say. He sought rather than avoided a
fight. Headstrong, domineering, having fought his way in a State
filled with aristocratic Southerners, from the class of so-called
"low whites" to the highest position in the United States, he did
not readily yield to the dictates of the dominating forces in
Congress.

Lincoln had a well-defined policy of reconstruction. Indeed, so
liberal was he disposed to be in his treatment of the Southern
States, that immediately after the surrender of Richmond he would
have recognized the old State Government of Virginia had it not
been for the peremptory veto of Stanton. Congress was not in
session when Johnson came to the Presidency in April, 1865. To do
him no more than simple justice, I firmly believe that he wanted
to follow out, in reconstruction, what he thought was the policy
of Mr. Lincoln, and in this he was guided largely by the advice of
Mr. Seward.

But there was this difference. Johnson was, probably in good faith,
pursuing the Lincoln policy of reconstruction; but when the
Legislatures and Executives of the Southern States began openly
passing laws and executing them so that the negro was substantially
placed back into slavery, practically nullifying the results of
the awful struggle, the untold loss of life and treasure, Mr.
Lincoln certainly would have receded and would have dealt with the
South with an iron hand, as Congress had determined to do, and as
General Grant was compelled to do when he assumed the Presidency.

From April to the reassembling of Congress in December, Johnson
had a free hand in dealing with the seceded States, and he was not
slow to take advantage of it. He seemed disposed to recognize the
old State Governments; to restrict the suffrage to the whites; to
exercise freely the pardoning power in the way of extending executive
clemency not only to almost all classes, but to every individ