Andrew Johnson Timeline

Lincoln's Emancipation Proclamation declared freedom for slaves in rebelling states, shifting the war's purpose and creating tensions with border-state Unionists like Johnson.

Image source: Emancipation Proclamation

To broaden support during wartime, Lincoln chose Democrat Andrew Johnson of Tennessee as his running mate on the National Union Party ticket.

Image source: 1864 United States presidential election

Lincoln and Johnson decisively defeated Democrat George McClellan, winning reelection amid the Civil War.

Appearing intoxicated at his inauguration, reportedly due to illness and medication, Johnson gave rambling remarks that embarrassed him and raised doubts about his fitness for office.

Image source: Second inauguration of Abraham Lincoln

John Wilkes Booth shot President Lincoln at Ford's Theatre; Lincoln died the next morning, making Johnson president during the critical early Reconstruction period.

Image source: Assassination of Abraham Lincoln

Johnson became the seventeenth president hours after Lincoln's death, inheriting the immense challenge of reconstructing the South after the Civil War.

Johnson offered amnesty to most former Confederates who took a loyalty oath, requiring only wealthy planters to seek individual pardons, setting the stage for conflict with Congress.

Image source: Reconstruction era

The Thirteenth Amendment abolished slavery nationwide, though Johnson's tolerance of discriminatory Black Codes in the South angered Radical Republicans.

Congress overrode Johnson's veto to pass the Civil Rights Act, granting citizenship and equal rights to African Americans — the first major law enacted over a presidential veto.

Image source: Civil Rights Act of 1866

A rump convention in Philadelphia nominated Johnson for the presidency, but he declined the nomination, hoping instead to build a conservative coalition.

Secretary of State William Seward negotiated the purchase of Alaska from Russia for $7.2 million, a deal mocked as 'Seward's Folly' but later recognized as a strategic triumph.

Image source: Alaska Purchase

The House impeached Johnson for violating the Tenure of Office Act after he removed Secretary of War Edwin Stanton, making him the first U.S. president to be impeached.

Image source: Impeachment of Andrew Johnson

Johnson's Senate trial lasted weeks before Chief Justice Salmon Chase; the vote fell one short of the two-thirds needed for conviction, acquitting Johnson by a single vote.

The Fourteenth Amendment granted citizenship to all persons born in the United States and guaranteed equal protection under the law, over Johnson's opposition.

Image source: Fourteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution

Grant's victory over Horatio Seymour signaled public endorsement of Republican Reconstruction policies that Johnson had resisted.

Image source: 1868 United States presidential election

Johnson declined to attend Grant's inauguration and returned to Tennessee, one of only a handful of presidents to skip their successor's swearing-in.

The final Reconstruction Amendment prohibited denying the vote based on race or previous servitude, cementing the constitutional legacy Johnson had opposed.

After failing to win a Senate seat, Johnson was elected to the House from Tennessee's at-large district, returning to Congress after his presidency.

Johnson became the only former president to serve in the Senate, taking his seat just months before his death and delivering a final defiant speech about his impeachment.

Johnson suffered a stroke while visiting family in Tennessee and died at age sixty-six. He was buried in Greeneville with a copy of the Constitution placed beneath his head.