Leniency or No

Like Lincoln, Johnson favored leniency. He planed to bring the South back into the union peacefully. The Republican Party were opposed to this lenient approach. They wanted to military governments in the South that would punish the rebel states and keep their own party in power. Johnson and the radical-led Congress were soon openly at odds. March 1867, to protect its power against "executive tyranny," Congress passed the Tenure of Office Act. (This is the act forbade the President to remove federal officials who were previously confirmed by Congress without congressional consent.) To test this act, which he considered unconstitutional and had already tried to voted , Johnson dismissed his radical secretary of war, Edwin M. Stanton. The radicals charged that the President had broken the law, and the House voted to impeach.