1867] Foreign Relations 567 ment of Johnson, 1868. 383. Impeachment of President Johnson, 1868. Until Impeach1867 it had generally been held that the President, who shared the power of appointment with the Senate, had absolute power of removal. In that year, however, Congress, by passing the Tenure of Office Act over Johnson's veto, sought to make removals also contingent on the approval of the Senate. In 1867 the President demanded the resignation of Stanton, Lincoln's War Secretary, who still held office, and was not in sympathy with his new chief; Stanton refused to resign. Finally, Johnson removed him, in spite of the Tenure of Office Act, which he regarded as unconstitutional. Stanton appealed to the House of Representatives, and that body impeached the President for disregarding the law. The trial lasted from March to May, 1868, when the Senate failed to convict Johnson by a vote of thirty-five to nineteen five Republican senators refusing to vote. Johnson, no doubt, was right in his interpretation of the Constitution; it is to be regretted, however, that while the impeachment proceedings were going on he continued his bitter attacks on his political opponents. In March, 1869, his stormy term of office came to a close, and General Grant succeeded him as President. 1865-69. 384. Foreign Relations, 1865-69. — While the Civil War The French was still in progress, and the United States was practically in Mexico, powerless to enforce the principles of the Monroe Doctrine, Great Britain, France, and Spain joined together to coerce Mexico into a payment of her national debt. Great Britain and Spain remained members of this curious league for a short time only. The French, left to themselves, overran Mexico, and instituted an empire in that country, with an Austrian archduke, Maximilian, as Emperor. This action of France aroused great indignation in the United States. Napoleon III, Emperor of the French, was friendly to Southern aspirations, and would, doubtless, have gladly waged war against the United States, but the matter never reached that point. The surrender of Lee entirely changed the situation. American troops were marched toward the Acquisition of Alaska, 1867. Election of 1868. Stanwood's Elections, ch. xxii. Mexican border, and the French minister at Washington was reminded by Seward (1866) that the United States desired the removal of the French soldiers from Mexico; they were at once removed, but Maximilian remained. He was executed by the Mexicans, who then re-established a republican form of government. In 1867 the United States acquired its latest addition of territory by the purchase of Alaska from Russia, for a little more than seven million dollars. This purchase added an immense tract of land to the national domain; its value is not yet fully ascertained, but indications point to its great mineral resources. 385. Election of 1868.-The Democratic candidate for the presidency in 1868 was Horatio Seymour. He had been governor of the state of New York, and had caused Lincoln much anxiety by his feeble support of the government's measures, and also by his open hostility displayed to some of them. In their platform the Democrats declared their approval of Johnson's plan of reconstruction. The Republicans nominated General Grant, and declared for the policy embodied in the reconstruction acts. Upon these platforms and with these candidates there could be little doubt which side the voters of the North would take, nor could there be much doubt as to the preferences of those entitled to vote in the South. Virginia, Georgia, Mississippi, and Texas were still unreconstructed. The negroes formed the majority of voters in the Southern states, and at this time their votes were counted. Out of two hundred and ninety-four electoral votes Grant received two hundred and fifteen. 386. End of Reconstruction.—The Fourteenth Amendment was declared in force in July, 1868, and the election of Grant in the following November plainly indicated that the majority of the voters desired the completion of the process of reconstruction, as embodied in the recent acts of Congress and in the Fourteenth Amendment. In February, 1869, Amendment, Congress added one more safeguard to the negroes' rights as citizens by proposing the Fifteenth Amendment. This Fifteenth 1869. 1871] End of Reconstruction 569 provided that neither the federal government nor any state government could abridge the rights of citizens of the United States to the franchise "on account of race, color, or previous condition of servitude." The ratification of this, as well as of the Fourteenth Amendment, was now made a condition of the readmission of Virginia, Mississippi, Texas, and Georgia to the Union. The Fifteenth Amendment was declared in force in March, 1870; but it was not until 1871 that the last of the states which had passed secession ordinances were restored to full rights. Meantime, since 1860, Kansas, West Virginia, Nevada, and Nebraska had been added to the Union. There were now (1871) thirty-seven states in all. The Southerners and the negroes. The Southern whites were determined to deprive the freedmen of the rights guaranteed to them by the amendments, and thus to defeat the object of the reconstruction acts. Banded together in secret societies, as the Ku-Klux, they whipped and cruelly ill-used the negroes to intimidate them into not using their right to vote. Congress, therefore, was obliged to exercise the great powers conferred on it by the recent amendments. It passed several laws, known in the South as the "Force Bills." These provided suitable The Force penalties for the infraction of the amendments, and gave Bills. the federal courts exclusive jurisdiction of all such cases. By 1872 the condition of affairs had so far improved that Congress repealed or modified some of the more severe of these measures. It also passed an Amnesty Act relieving many classes of Southerners from the disabilities laid upon them by the amendments and the reconstruction acts. The Southern whites used every means to regain control of the Southern state governments, and ultimately succeeded. There was much injustice done to the freedmen, and occasionally great disorder. Often two rival governments contended for mastery; the federal authorities were frequently obliged to interfere and to send soldiers to maintain order. This discouraging condition of affairs continued throughout Grant's two terms of office as President. The Treaty of 1871. 387. Relations with Great Britain. The Northern peoWashington, ple had never forgotten the action of the British government at the time of the "Trent affair," nor its inaction as to the Alabama and other Confederate vessels. There were also other causes of irritation, especially a dispute as to the boundary in the extreme northwest, and as to the rights of American fishermen in Canadian waters. In 1869 Reverdy Johnson, the American minister in London, negotiated a treaty on these matters, which was promptly rejected by the United States Senate. The next year, however, the British government suggested that a joint commission should meet at Washington to arrange some of the matters in controversy. The American government consented, on condition that the "Alabama dispute" should also be considered. The commissioners met at the federal capital, and concluded the Treaty of Washington (1871). According to this instrument, the matters in controversy were referred to courts of arbitration or to joint commissions, with the exception of the controversy as to the northwest boundary, which was referred to the German Emperor as arbiter. This last was in regard to the boundary from the mainland on the eastern side of Vancouver Sound to the Pacific Ocean at the western end of the Strait of Juan de Fuca. The point in dispute was especially over the ownership of St. Juan Island, which separated the two main channels. The matter was finally decided in favor of the United States (1872). The Alabama Arbitration, 1872. The "Alabama claims" comprehended all the disputes which had arisen out of the laxity of Great Britain in the enforcement of the obligations of neutrals during the Civil War. These were now referred to a court of arbitration, consisting of five members to be appointed, one each by the United States, Great Britain, Italy, Switzerland, and Brazil. The tribunal was authorized to proceed on the assumption that a neutral was obliged to use "due diligence" to prevent its territory being made the basis of hostile expeditions or armaments against one of the belligerents; but the British government was unwilling to admit that international prac 1872] Political Uncertainty 571 tice had imposed such obligations at the time of the Civil 388. Political Uncertainty, 1868–76. The Washington Election of 1872. Stanwood's Elections, ch. xxiii. |