The Expansion of Presidential Power During Reconstruction: The Fetus of Monarchy Continues to Grow
This is the second installment of a series on fears some Founding Fathers had about the Constitution containing a “fetus of monarchy” that could result in a president who “may easily become king.” Be sure to check out the first installment, which follows the growth of presidential power from the ratification of the Constitution through the Civil War.
When we last checked in on the fetus of monarchy, it had become a young child testing limits as Honest Abe pushed the boundaries of executive power by calling up troops, suspending habeas corpus, and freeing slaves in the south with the Emancipation Proclamation. After the war and Abe’s ill-fated trip to see the play “Our American Cousin”, the growth of executive power mostly continued; however, there were a few notable efforts by Congress and the courts to rein in the president’s power during this period.
The Childhood of Monarchy: Andrew Johnson Gets Put in Time-Out by Congress
After Lincoln’s assassination, Andrew Johnson ascended to the presidency. Commonly voted by historians as one of the worst American presidents, Johnson was a Southern Democrat who joined Abe, a Republican, under the banner of the National Union Party ticket. Lincoln was trying to project an image of national unity by reaching across the aisle to work with a pro-Union southerner, but once Johnson became president he positioned himself as an obstacle to Reconstruction and the advancement of civil rights among the newly freed African Americans in the south.
Johnson began making heavy use of the veto, rejecting key pieces of legislation such as the Civil Rights Act of 1866, the Freedmen’s Bureau Bill, and the Reconstruction Acts of 1867. He ended up issuing a record-breaking 29 vetoes. But congressional Republicans were ready to assert their authority: Congress overrode Johnson on those three bills as well as 12 more, making him the recipient of the most veto overrides in history.
Congress wasn’t done with punishing him for trying to assert too much presidential authority, however: Johnson’s attempted firing of pro-Reconstruction Secretary of War Edwin Stanton led to his impeachment under the newly passed Tenure of Office Act, which sought to limit the power of presidents to fire certain appointees. Johnson remained president after avoiding conviction by one vote in his Senate trial, but he was severely weakened politically and was unsuccessful at securing his party’s nomination for re-election.
Ulysses S. Grant Says Hold My Sippy Cup: The President Reasserts Power Over Domestic Affairs
Congress found some success in curbing the ever-expanding powers of the presidency during the Johnson administration, but war hero Ulysses S. Grant set the new high-water mark for veto usage by issuing 93 vetoes, more than 3 times as many as Johnson, with only four overrides. In other major areas, though, he worked with Congress to expand the powers of the federal government as a whole, particularly when it came to enforcing Reconstruction.
In the early 1870s, Congress passed a series of laws known as the Enforcement Acts that attempted to address widespread voter suppression and violence in the south by groups like the Ku Klux Klan. Southern state governments were either unwilling or unable to stop the violence, so Congress authorized the federal government to intervene. Grant wasted no time using his newly authorized powers to their full extent, deploying federal troops and suspending habeas corpus in areas with aggressive Klan activity.
While Lincoln suspended habeas corpus under his own authority, Grant had the explicit authorization of the Congress to do so: the legislative and executive branches worked together in this instance to enable greater federal government control over what would’ve previously been considered state affairs. Grant’s aggressive use of military force solidified the role of the president as the primary enforcer of federal law.
Coming Soon in The Fetus of Monarchy series: Executive Power During the Gilded Age
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