laws as it saw fit to enact and until in its wisdom it decided to readmit any or all of them to the union.  Men of more conservative views held that, as the war had been waged by the North on the theory that no state could secede from the union, the Confederate states had merely attempted to withdraw and had failed.  The corollary of this latter line of argument was simple:  “The Southern states are still in the union and it is the duty of the President, as commander-in-chief, to remove the federal troops as soon as order is restored and the state governments ready to function once more as usual.”

=Lincoln’s Proposal.=—­Some such simple and conservative form of reconstruction had been suggested by Lincoln in a proclamation of December 8, 1863.  He proposed pardon and a restoration of property, except in slaves, to nearly all who had “directly or by implication participated in the existing rebellion,” on condition that they take an oath of loyalty to the union.  He then announced that when, in any of the states named, a body of voters, qualified under the law as it stood before secession and equal in number to one-tenth the votes cast in 1860, took the oath of allegiance, they should be permitted to reestablish a state government.  Such a government, he added, should be recognized as a lawful authority and entitled to protection under the federal Constitution.  With reference to the status of the former slaves Lincoln made it clear that, while their freedom must be recognized, he would not object to any legislation “which may yet be consistent as a temporary arrangement with their present condition as a laboring, landless, and homeless class.”

=Andrew Johnson’s Plan—­His Impeachment.=—­Lincoln’s successor, Andrew Johnson, the Vice President, soon after taking office, proposed to pursue a somewhat similar course.  In a number of states he appointed military governors, instructing them at the earliest possible moment to assemble conventions, chosen “by that portion of the people of the said states who are loyal to the United States,” and proceed to the organization of regular civil government.  Johnson, a Southern man and a Democrat, was immediately charged by the Republicans with being too ready to restore the Southern states.  As the months went by, the opposition to his measures and policies in Congress grew in size and bitterness.  The contest resulted in the impeachment of Johnson by the House of Representatives in March, 1868, and his acquittal by the Senate merely because his opponents lacked one vote of the two-thirds required for conviction.

=Congress Enacts “Reconstruction Laws."=—­In fact, Congress was in a strategic position.  It was the law-making body, and it could, moreover, determine the conditions under which Senators and Representatives from the South were to be readmitted.  It therefore proceeded to pass a series of reconstruction acts—­carrying all of them over Johnson’s veto.  These measures, the first of which became a law on March 2, 1867, betrayed an animus not found anywhere in Lincoln’s plans or Johnson’s proclamations.