Timeline of the impeachment of Andrew Johnson

This article is part of a series about Andrew Johnson
Personal Early life Slavery Legacy Bibliography 15th Governor of Tennessee Governorship 16th Vice President of the United States Vice presidency Drunk V.P. inaugural address Assassination of Abraham Lincoln 17th President of the United States Presidency Inauguration Foreign policy Cabinet appointment Judicial appointment Conclusion of Civil War Reconstruction era Reconstruction Acts Civil Rights Act (1866) Swing Around the Circle Impeachment First inquiry Second inquiry Trial Managers investigation Efforts Timeline Articles of impeachment Vice presidential and Presidential campaigns 1864 National Union national convention election 1868 Democratic National Convention Post-presidency Return to Senate Death Cemetery Historic Site Family Eliza McCardle Johnson Martha Johnson Patterson Charles Johnson Mary Johnson Stover Robert Johnson Frank Johnson
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Andrew Johnson became the first president of the United States to be impeached by the United States House of Representatives on February 24, 1868 after he acted to dismiss Edwin Stanton as secretary of war in disregard for the Tenure of Office Act.

Before Johnson's February 21, 1868 effort to dismiss Stanton, there had already been an active push by Radical Republicans to impeach Johnson, but this was met with resistance from many in the moderate wing of the Republican Party. Radical Republicans were frustrated by Johnson's efforts to obstruct their plans for Reconstruction.^[1] The Republican Party held a large majority in both chambers of the United States Congress at the time.^[2] The early push to impeach Johnson saw the launch of two impeachment inquiries. After the conclusion of the first impeachment inquiry (which saw the House Committee on the Judiciary recommend impeaching Johnson), there was a December 7, 1867 vote in which the House broadly voted against impeaching Johnson. A second impeachment inquiry was launched in January 1868. However, only shortly before Johnson's attempted dismissal of Stanton in February, it had shortly appeared that the prospect of impeachment was a dead issue.

After the February 24, 1868 passage of the resolution impeaching Johnson, eleven articles of impeachment were adopted by the House in early March. An impeachment trial was held by the United States Senate in which Johnson was acquitted on three of the articles before the trial adjourned sine die without voting on the remaining articles of impeachment. All three articles voted on saw an identical acquittal, with the Senate coming only a single vote short of the two-thirds support needed to convict Johnson.