Andrew Johnson (1808-1875) was the 17th president of the United States of America, as well as the third vice president to become President after the death of their predecessor. He is also known for being the first president to be impeached, though it didn’t come to anything.
He was born in North Carolina, and was extremely poor. He would often bring up the fact that he had been born in a two-room shack to remind voters that he had started out as a poor man, which helped to make a lot of people relate and trust him, or at least compassionate with him. He was apprenticed to a tailor in his hometown, but ran away and worked as a tailor across North Carolina until he decided to move west to Tennessee. There, he opened a successful clothing store, and married his wife, who happened to be a cobbler. They had five children, all of whom survived until adulthood. He had incredible success in Tennessean politics, mostly because of his extreme skill and fascination with oration and speeches in general. He eventually became U.S. representative in congress, and though what party he belonged to was always somewhat unclear, he usually ran as a democrat. Since his wife stayed in Tennessee when he moved to DC (because she had tuberculosis and couldn’t stand the trip), he rarely attended social functions. Normally this would hurt his chances to gain popularity, but it actually helped him advertise himself as a defender for the poor against the arrogant rich. An extremely important bill that he tried to get passed was the Homestead Act, which, though it didn’t pass the senate, popularized him with farmers and poor people wishing to move west.
He eventually became the Governor of Tennessee, and while he didn’t have much power, he was able to publicize himself even further. He also set up several public schools and public libraries, as well as common state fairs to benefit the working class. Thanks mostly to his popularity as governor, Johnson managed to become a senator in 1857. He once again tried to get the homestead act passed, but once again failed. The democrats ended up tearing each other apart while trying to choose someone to run for president, allowing Abraham Lincoln to step in and become President. Despite being a southerner, and owning slaves himself, he did not support the southern states seceding from the U.S, saying that he had a duty to his country. Despite his feelings, Tennessee seceded, and Andrew fled northward after several assaults. After Tennessee was retaken by the Union, Lincoln appointed Johnson as the military governor of Tennessee, and Tennessee managed to stay pretty peaceful, since enough of the people likeed Andrew.
He then became Lincoln’s vice president for his second term, winning many votes from both northern and southern states thanks to Andrew’s extreme love for his southern home. Lincoln’s assassination was actually supposed to be a triple homicide, the other targets being Johnson and William Seward. William survived his wounds, and Johnson’s assassin had gotten too drunk to pull off the assassination, though some believe he was in on it, and his assassin purposefully didn’t kill him, though he did execute his would-be-assassin, so there isn’t too much logic in that. Throughout his presidency, Reconstruction, the reuniting of the states, was the most important subject in the country during his presidency, and while he tried to allow state power to the southern states and gently reassimilate them into the U.S. Congress, however, didn’t like that, and constantly called for more and more hard and tough laws to be put in place to force the southerners into the north’s lifestyle. This caused many clashes, resulting in many bills that were passed despite the presidents veto, the first time this had ever happened, and eventually an impeachment. The impeachment required 2/3 of the votes to fire the president, and exactly 1 less person than the 2/3 required, so Johnson remained president.
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