Chapter 9:
Continued conflict between Grant and Johnson.
during the summer of 1867 the conflict of opinion and effort between Johnson and Grant became positive, though it was still in a great degree concealed from the country. The President's opposition to the Congressional policy continued. He held that the Reconstruction acts were unconstitutional, and that consequently he was not bound to obey them. Grant held that only the Supreme Court could pronounce on the question of constitutionality, and that until it should pronounce, all officers, from the President down, were bound to obey the law. In May and June the Attorney-General delivered the opinions which Grant had foreseen, and did his best to neutralize the force and defeat the purpose of the legislative action. The President directed Grant to forward these opinions to the District Commanders. Grant obeyed, but at the same time informed the commanders that they were their own interpreters of their own duties and powers; and as the President gave no positive order on the subject none of them conformed their action to the Attorney-General's opinions. The President, of course, observed the tacit disobedience, but he was powerless to control or punish his subordinates. He had disregarded the will of Congress, and in return the officers of the army disregarded his. The situation was approaching mutiny on one side, or else treason on the other.Congress had adjourned at the end of March and left the [72] contest with the President entirely in the hands of Grant, uncertain even then how far he concurred with them in purpose or sentiment. Some, indeed, knew that he was in harmony with the Legislature, but many still doubted his sympathy. In July, however, Congress met again, and by this time the majority had become convinced that Grant was in accord with themselves rather than with the President; or at any rate those who yet distrusted him thought Reconstruction safer in his hands than in those of Johnson. A supplementary law was at once passed, increasing and defining the powers of the District Commanders, confirming all their previous acts, giving them the right in terms to suspend or remove from office any civil functionary holding place under State authority, and defining the conditions of registration so that it was impossible any longer to misstate or evade the intention of the law. But more than all, the supplementary statute made the acts of the District Commanders subject to the approval of the General of the Army, while the same original power of removal and suspension was conferred on him which they enjoyed, and it was made his duty as well as theirs to exercise this power whenever necessary to carry out the purpose of the law. This actually charged Grant with the supreme duty of supervising the Reconstruction of the Union.
The authority now intrusted to the General-in-Chief made him in many respects independent of the President. He accepted the prerogative, I am sure, unwillingly, but believed it necessary for the preservation of those results which the war had been fought to secure. At an earlier stage in the crisis, he had urged that this peculiar jurisdiction should not be committed to him, and he consented to receive it only when he became convinced that Johnson was determined not to carry out the law. For Grant had been continually consulted during the preparation of the supplementary act, and did much to limit his own authority and to restrain the [73] most ardent of the President's opponents. It was at one time proposed by some too-zealous Congressmen to make him almost a Dictator over the Southern States and entirely independent of the President, but against this he advised in the strongest possible manner, as subversive of the principles of the Government, and his counsels prevailed. He not only had no ambition for additional power, he even yet shrank from assuming an attitude of avowed or public antagonism to the President. He disliked both the appearance of this before the people, and the reality, however disguised; but he submitted to what seemed under the circumstances unavoidable. If I had any power of reading his feelings, the position into which he was thrust was not only unacceptable to him, but positively painful; yet he would not shirk it. He wrote to Sherman at this time:
In this particular there is little difference between parties. No matter how close I keep my tongue each tries to interpret from the little I let drop that I am with them. I wish our political troubles were ended on any basis. I want to turn over the command of the Army to you for a year or so, and go abroad myself. But to leave now would look like throwing up a command in the face of the enemy.
What he did with the Republicans at this time was not for them as a political party, but because he believed that the acts of the President had made their course the only one practicable. Nevertheless, he was dragged by circumstances into political relations which those about him began to perceive must soon become defined. He was too shrewd and clear-headed not to understand this himself, but I certainly believe that he disliked the prospect. He still disclaimed any partisan bias, and was unwilling to be called either Republican or Democrat. I saw nothing in him, I heard no word from him, in all this crisis that betrayed any political aspiration or indicated the faintest ambition to [74] succeed Johnson in the Presidency. I never saw him more angry than when unauthorized persons spoke to him as if he was likely to become a Presidential candidate, and if the three or four individuals whose intimacy he recognized ever mentioned the subject, he put it away and was evidently annoyed. Up to this time he never admitted to me that the event was probable, far less desirable. Rawlins told me that Grant refused to discuss the subject with him, and Mrs. Grant assured me that the idea was most distasteful to the General. Those who knew the influence she maintained with her great husband will believe that he could have had no such desire of which she was ignorant.
Grant's constitutional reticence must be constantly kept in mind by those who wish to appreciate his character. Because he did not speak was no reason to suppose he did not think or feel. It seemed to him immodest to uncloak himself to the world, or even entirely to his most intimate friend. He could not, if he would, expose his opinions and sentiments to every one he met. He was indignant at those who sought to penetrate further than he chose to allow, and kept back something from them who got closest. He had secrets of business from one friend, of politics from another, of feeling from many; and no one knew all. I found out traits in his character in the last months of his life that I had not suspected before, and I doubt not that he had emotions and beliefs which he died without revealing to his wife or children. Yet no man ever loved wife or children more profoundly than he.
After the Supplementary Act was passed he entered upon a phase of his career that required all the forbearance, sagacity, and skill of which he was master. He was a subordinate of the President, yet had been made in some degree independent of him. The President was naturally indignant at the situation, which was indeed anomalous, and even unjustifiable, except on the ground that it was indispensable [75] in order to save the State. But Congress believed the President not only hostile to the true interests of the country, but recusant to the expressed will of the people. The era was indeed revolutionary and the circumstances unprecedented. The time was out of joint, and Grant felt that it was his unwelcome task to set it right. It was made his duty both by law and by patriotism to carry out a policy which the Head of the State sought by every means to defeat and destroy; and Grant determined to perform the duty. Nevertheless, he succeeded even yet in maintaining the appearance of amicable relations with the President. He showed him all the deference due his office, and was able to postpone for a while longer the fiercest phases of that hostility which was destined to break out at last between the Executive and Congress.
His equanimity of temper was as important at this juncture as either his steadfastness or unselfishness of purpose. He had no anxiety except to do his duty and save his whole country, North and South, from further peril. He felt that it was as important not to inflame passion as to carry out a policy. He was as careful not to exasperate North or South as to perform any other service to the State. A word from him would have excited Congress beyond its own control; an appeal to the North might have precipitated another war. But he kept to himself, or to the very few in whom he confided, his knowledge of many exasperating words and deeds; he cautioned his subordinates; he strove to hold in check the hot-heads in Congress, so that even yet there were Republicans who doubted him and only used him because he was a necessity. He felt especially–I often heard him declare it—extreme reluctance to the use of arbitrary power at the South. He was republican in principle and democratic in sentiment, if ever a man was either, and he took no arbitrary step, except unwillingly. But he felt that the emancipated millions must be protected, that the recently [76] hostile population must be held in check, if necessary with the curb; and though he was anxious to appease passion, to harmonize, if yet possible, the legislative and executive branches of the Government, to preserve the democratic principle, to retain his own magnanimous feeling toward the conquered, he was firm, and if needful stern, in holding all that had been acquired. He treated those who had been rebels with justice as well as mercy; he was determined to protect the white and black Unionists; he would carry out the law, even in spite of its highest officer, his own superior.
He thus went heartily into the spirit of the reconstruction measures. He advised the removal of all Southern functionaries who were not really anxious to renew their allegiance, but at the same time urged the remission of the penalties of treason in the case of those who proved themselves repentant, or at least loyal. He counseled his subordinate commanders constantly and watched them closely. But he took care not to transcend his powers. His letters to these officers are full of anxiety not to overstep his own limitations. But up to this time the District Commanders without exception took his advice as orders.
Under this wise and really pacific management the evil spirit at the South was almost laid; murder became less common, justice more frequent. The population itself declared its satisfaction with military rule, its preference for this to any now practicable government. It liked, indeed, to call itself conquered, and hugged its hardships. For with Grant enforcing the law, the South knew there was no alternative. In many States the registration of the new voters began. It seemed as if Reconstruction would be accomplished, and peace was to come at last to the distracted land. Perceiving that the President was powerless and the North determined, the South prepared to submit to what was inevitable, as it had submitted before at Vicksburg and at Appomattox.
