# Andrew Johnson's impeachment **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [January 6, 2006, 6:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/andrew-johnsons-impeachment/338774 "2006-01-06T18:52:57Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 19\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![batsto](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/b2d939/32.png) [@batsto](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/batsto)\ **Post date:** [January 6, 2006, 6:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/andrew-johnsons-impeachment/338774/1 "2006-01-06T18:52:57Z")
According to this site: > **[Andrew Johnson: Saved by a Scoundrel](https://slate.com/news-and-politics/1999/01/andrew-johnson-saved-by-a-scoundrel.html)** > > Every impeachment junkie has by now heard the tale of the valiant Edmund Ross, the Republican senator who in 1868 broke party ranks to acquit the... When Ross cast his vote of ‘not guilty’ at the trial of president Johnson, “At least four other senators were prepared to oppose conviction had their votes been needed–a fact that has been forgotten, maybe, because it doesn’t square with the High Noon portrait of Ross as the man of principle facing down the mob.” I’d never heard this before, and I’m curious if anyone else has. If the vote was so close, and Ross cast that deciding vote, then weren’t there votes needed? Hadn’t they already cast their guilty votes when Ross cast his? I’m not sure what that sentence is supposed to mean. Anyone able to shed a little light on this? ---
**Author:** ![Freddy\_the\_Pig](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/a587f6/32.png) [@Freddy\_the\_Pig](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Freddy_the_Pig)\ **Post date:** [January 6, 2006, 7:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/andrew-johnsons-impeachment/338774/2 "2006-01-06T19:25:32Z")
I know of no reliable, contemporary source for a statement that any other Senator (much less four) was prepared to vote for acquittal. As a practical matter, you’re correct–then, as now, the Senate voted in alphabetical order, and Ross is toward the end of the alphabet. I’ve never read that Ross disclosed his vote to other Senators beforehand. Even if he had, there was some residual uncertainty over the vote of Van Winkle, so any Senator voting “guilty” in the belief that it wouldn’t matter was taking a heck of a chance on such an important issue. ---
**Author:** ![batsto](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/b2d939/32.png) [@batsto](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/batsto)\ **Post date:** [January 6, 2006, 9:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/andrew-johnsons-impeachment/338774/3 "2006-01-06T21:19:46Z")
I thought as much–he doesn’t really give a source for that, he just states it as though it’s something all smart people like him know to be true. The bio at the bottom of the article says this guy writes a column called ‘history lesson’ or something like that on a regular basis. But either he’s full of it, or I’m an idiot because I can’t see how that sentence makes any sense the way it’s written. ---
**Author:** ![Exapno\_Mapcase](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/exapno_mapcase/32/1051_2.png) [@Exapno\_Mapcase](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Exapno_Mapcase)\ **Post date:** [January 6, 2006, 9:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/andrew-johnsons-impeachment/338774/4 "2006-01-06T21:59:51Z")
Eric Foner’s _Reconstruction: America’s Unfinished Revolution 1863-1877_, probably the definitive text on the period, agrees with the Slate article. p.336 > [@](#): > > Whatever the merits of the case, it soon became apparent that an influential group of Senate Republicans preferred, as Johnson’s attorney William M. Evarts remarked, “the present situation to the change proposed.” … Moreover, the crisis atmosphere of February receded… > > By April, Washington bookmakers’ odds had shifted in favor of acquittal, and when the decision finally came in mid-May, only thirty-five Senators voted for conviction, one short of the required two-thirds. The votes of seven Republicans supplied Johnson’s narrow margin of victory, although a number of others stood ready to support the President if necessary. Foner’s book is from 1988, so this is not recent revisionism. It’s a nice myth, promulgated by Theodore Sorensen, I mean John Kennedy, in _Profiles in Courage_, but it doesn’t appear to have much historical substance. ---
**Author:** ![Freddy\_the\_Pig](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/a587f6/32.png) [@Freddy\_the\_Pig](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Freddy_the_Pig)\ **Post date:** [January 7, 2006, 1:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/andrew-johnsons-impeachment/338774/5 "2006-01-07T01:01:01Z")
From my POV Johnson should not only have been removed from office but strung up by the heels like Mussolini, so responsibility for his acquittal is a matter of assigning blame, not credit. And I’m not sure about letting Ross off the hook. The New York Times on the day after the vote wrote: > [@](#): > > The indignation centres terribly and almost wholly upon poor Ross, and he has a hard position to occupy. Five times, once in writing, as his colleague Pomeroy says, he can swear he has promised to vote for conviction. So late as last night at dinner at the latter’s house he promised. . . . He was not outspoken except to his friends, to whom he frankly stated ten days ago his opinion that the President was guilty. Leading one to wonder, unless they voted after Ross in the roll call, how could other Senators have been sure their vote _wouldn’t_ be needed? The most recent book-length study of Johnson’s impeachment, _The Impeachment and Trial of Andrew Johnson_ by Michael Les Benedict, was written in 1973. Benedict makes no mention of “standby” votes for acquittal and tells the same story as the Times. Foner’s comment appears to be sourced to either the Plummer or Roske article, both of which are mentioned on Greenberg’s web site. If anybody has access to the Midwest Quarterly (Autumn 1985) or American Historical Review (January 1959), I’d be interested in knowing what Plummer or Roske had to say. Specifically, I’d like to know (a) if the “standby Senators” are named; (b) what the evidence is that they were “voting standby”; and © how they knew their vote wouldn’t be needed. ---
**Author:** ![Exapno\_Mapcase](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/exapno_mapcase/32/1051_2.png) [@Exapno\_Mapcase](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Exapno_Mapcase)\ **Post date:** [January 7, 2006, 2:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/andrew-johnsons-impeachment/338774/6 "2006-01-07T02:43:02Z")
Johnson is nobody’s favorite president, but the charges against him were totally phony, a massive violation of the separation of powers between Congress and the President. By the time the vote took place, it’s clear that everybody in Washington realized it and the vote was allowed to go through closely enough to humiliate Johnson but keeping him from being removed from office. Foner’s additional comments that those Republicans who voted against conviction were not punished by their party is further proof of this. Don’t forget that the fateful vote was on the 11th article (or charge) of the impeachment, a catch-all of charges drafted by Thaddeus Stevens that really charges him only of the “crime” of dissing Congress. It can be read in full [here](http://www.worldwideschool.org/library/books/hst/northamerican/HistoryoftheImpeachmentofAndrewJohnsonPresidentoftheUnitedStates/chap7.html) along with the others. It was voted on before the others because the leadership determined that it was the one most likely to go through for political reasons. They voted ten days later on the first two articles but those of course failed as well. I rummaged through my books on the reconstruction era to see what others had to say earlier than Foner. Here’s a stopper. William a Dunning, _Reconstruction, Political and Economic 1867-1877_. A 1962 reprint of a book first published in 1907. > [@](#): > > p. 107. But, in fact, other moderates stood ready to vote “not guilty” if their votes should be necessary to secure acquittal. > > Footnote: Conversation with ex-Senator J. B. Henderson in 1901. Henderson was one of the seven Republicans who voted for Johnson. So, the notion that the vote was fixed ahead of time goes back a full century in the literature. It would be interesting to know exactly who the others were and how the agreement would have worked in practice if Ross lost his nerve, true. But it seems highly likely that the radicals overplayed their hand and that the moderates (or liberals, as they became known) were not going to let the farce go unchallenged. ---
**Author:** ![DSYoungEsq](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/c6cbf5/32.png) [@DSYoungEsq](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DSYoungEsq)\ **Post date:** [January 7, 2006, 3:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/andrew-johnsons-impeachment/338774/7 "2006-01-07T03:37:23Z")
> [@Freddy the Pig](#): > > I know of no reliable, contemporary source for a statement that any other Senator (much less four) was prepared to vote for acquittal. As a practical matter, you’re correct–then, as now, the Senate voted in alphabetical order, and Ross is toward the end of the alphabet. I’ve never read that Ross disclosed his vote to other Senators beforehand. Even if he had, there was some residual uncertainty over the vote of Van Winkle, so any Senator voting “guilty” in the belief that it wouldn’t matter was taking a heck of a chance on such an important issue. There is no reason to assume that the vote went strictly alphabetically. Then, as now, senators can request to defer their vote to the end, allowing them to strategically position themselves to make deciding votes. This is usually arranged in advance with the party whips, etc. ---
**Author:** ![Freddy\_the\_Pig](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/a587f6/32.png) [@Freddy\_the\_Pig](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Freddy_the_Pig)\ **Post date:** [January 7, 2006, 5:59am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/andrew-johnsons-impeachment/338774/8 "2006-01-07T05:59:54Z")
That’s fascinating that Dunning attributes the fact of standby Senators to Senator Henderson. Benedict writes the following of Henderson, which he attributes to correspondence of [William S. King](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_S._King), then Postmaster of the House of Representatives: > [@](#): > > Henderson indicated that he would resign rather than cast the deciding vote for acquittal and held out the possibility that he would convict on the eleventh article. On May 12, the Missouri congressional delegation assured him that they did not want his resignation and suggested that he abstain on the articles on which he could not vote guilty. The Senator seemed to agree but added that he would speak to Sprague, Van Winkle, Anthony, and Willey. If they intended to convict on the eleventh article, the President would be removed regardless of Henderson’s vote. One gets the impression of a Senator who was uncertain of his own mind, and wanted to believe that his vote didn’t matter. Given that Dunning was a racist who believed that allowing black people to vote was a grievous error, I’m a little surprised that Henderson deflected “credit” from his own vote for acquittal by saying that others would have done so if he didn’t. Dunning was writing and Henderson was reminiscing during the first decade of the Twentieth Century, near the height of the backlash against so-called “radical Reconstruction”. I will endeavor to track down the Plummer and Roske articles. > [@DSYoungEsq](#): > > There is no reason to assume that the vote went strictly alphabetically. Then, as now, senators can request to defer their vote to the end, allowing them to strategically position themselves to make deciding votes. This is usually arranged in advance with the party whips, etc. The Senate roll is invariably called in alphabetical order. Senators can pass (or be absent) on the first call if they wish to defer their vote, but the _Times_ article makes it clear that every Senator was present and voting on the first pass, as one would expect on a critical vote while the Senate was sitting as a court of impeachment. ---
**Author:** ![Exapno\_Mapcase](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/exapno_mapcase/32/1051_2.png) [@Exapno\_Mapcase](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Exapno_Mapcase)\ **Post date:** [January 7, 2006, 1:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/andrew-johnsons-impeachment/338774/9 "2006-01-07T13:58:03Z")
The literature on the Civil War until after WWII, which is when the revisionist historians really took hold, is notoriously biased toward - and written by - southerners. No argument there. Dunning would have reason to support Johnson against the radical Republicans as well, though again, the impeachment itself was an unsupportable farce. However, he does castigate Ross for trying to gain favors for his friends afterward while contrasting him to Fessenden who refused to do so on the grounds that it would expose him to “offensive imputations.” The one advantage Dunning and the others of his time had was that they could talk to living participants. The Slate article cites the 1959 Roske article, possibly written as a correction to the Kennedy book, and Plummer’s 1985 article as well as Berwanger’s 1978 article which appears to have been expanded into a book. None of these appear to be available online, but in searching them out I did find [SENATE TRIALS AND FACTIONAL DISPUTES: IMPEACHMENT AS A MADISONIAN DEVICE, by JONATHAN TURLEY (Cited: 49 Duke L. J. 1)](http://www.law.duke.edu/journals/dlj/articles/dlj49p1.htm), which may give a clue as to why four additional members are listed as possible voters against conviction if needed: > [@](#): > > Likewise, in a critical vote on the argument over preliminary issues, eleven Republicans supported President Johnson’s Senate allies, who failed by only four votes in their motion demanding more time.416 This vote was a telling partisan test since Radical Republicans [\*pg 89] believed that they had to move quickly to secure a conviction.417 These members realized that a Senate trial had the ability to transform votes and sought to limit deliberation and debate. Republicans, however, did not sacrifice the fairness of the proceedings. Instead, they supported the President’s defenders on a series of critical evidentiary demands viewed as necessary guarantees of a fair trial, despite the direct result of undermining the case of the majority.418 Eleven Republicans defected to mandate a full trial.419 Eleven Republicans also defected to support a close vote on additional witnesses in favor of President Johnson’s defense.420 Some of these senators, who would ultimately vote for conviction, still maintained the need for an open and deliberative process. As a result, while a trial of ten days was sought by the House managers, five weeks were exhausted in preliminary matters before actual testimony was even heard by the Senate. More than two months passed before any final vote occurred on the eleven articles of impeachment. The understanding that Johnson would not be convicted seems to be well established in the literature. Perhaps if we knew the names of the other four Senators the question of whether Ross’s vote was necessary or just early would be better answered. ---
**Author:** ![DSYoungEsq](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/c6cbf5/32.png) [@DSYoungEsq](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DSYoungEsq)\ **Post date:** [January 7, 2006, 1:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/andrew-johnsons-impeachment/338774/10 "2006-01-07T13:59:46Z")
> [@Freddy the Pig](#): > > The Senate roll is invariably called in alphabetical order. Senators can pass (or be absent) on the first call if they wish to defer their vote, but the _Times_ article makes it clear that every Senator was present and voting on the first pass, as one would expect on a critical vote while the Senate was sitting as a court of impeachment. I’m not surprised that there was detail of the voting given; the news was much more complete then. If I may trouble you, what exactly does the _Times_ say about the manner of the vote? ---
**Author:** ![BobT](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/8e8cbc/32.png) [@BobT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BobT)\ **Post date:** [January 7, 2006, 6:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/andrew-johnsons-impeachment/338774/11 "2006-01-07T18:31:37Z")
The May 17, 1868 New York Times reported: > [@](#): > > "Thirty-six was the best vote the friends of conviction could upon after Tuesday, and since then the fight has been to get the one necessary vote for acquittal on the one side and to keep the one neccesary vote for conviction on the other. The debate of Monday developed the fact that that the President had five Republican votes sure. Senator Fowler’s course developed the fact on Tuesday that he had six. It has been the work of the week to get the seventh man, and Edmund G. Ross, of Kansas, was secured. When Gen. Thos. Ewing, Jr., said yesterday that Ross would vote for acquittal if necessary to secure it, he knew whereof he spoke… > > The friends of conviction were heavy-hearted, for they knew the last condition of Ross. The friends of acquittal were light hearted for they knew his last condition. > > … > Then a thousand pairs of eyes shot into the very heart of the modest, quite little man who rises at the call of the name of Ross. Nervously and quickly he responds, “not guilty.” The story goes through each Senator voting and it was done in alphabetical order from Anthony to Willey. ---
**Author:** ![Freddy\_the\_Pig](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/a587f6/32.png) [@Freddy\_the\_Pig](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Freddy_the_Pig)\ **Post date:** [January 7, 2006, 6:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/andrew-johnsons-impeachment/338774/12 "2006-01-07T18:41:03Z")
> [@Exapno Mapcase](#): > > The understanding that Johnson would not be convicted seems to be well established in the literature. Not sure I’d go that far. It’s true that, for a variety of reasons, Republicans were _much_ less confident in May than they had been in February. In February they had thought that removal would be a slam dunk. It’s also true that the “pro-removal” position was consistently winning less than a two-thirds majority on preliminary votes. But some Senators were willing to vote for removal but still wanted to bend over backward to give Johnson as full and fair a trial as possible. And from a “standby” POV, “less confident of conviction” doesn’t equal “completely confident of acquittal”. Given that the _only_ statements attributed to Ross before the vote were that he would vote for conviction, I don’t see how _any_ Senator could have voted “guilty”, knowing that it wouldn’t matter, until after Ross opened his mouth on the roll call. If he revealed his true vote to any other Senator beforehand, that person apparently carried the secret to his grave. Which leaves Senators whose names came after Ross. Sherman, Sprague, and Willey would be outside possibilities. > [@DSYoungEsq](#): > > If I may trouble you, what exactly does the Times say about the manner of the vote? It’s extremely detailed: > [@](#): > > The eleventh article is now read. The Clerk calls “Mr. Anthony”. Mr. Anthony rises in his seat, and the Chief Justice says, “Mr. Senator Anthony, how say you: is Andrew Johnson, President of the United States, guilty or not guilty of a high misdemeanor as charged in this article?” Mr. Anthony, with the poise of self-possession and the demeanor of an elegant gentleman, answers in clear, decided tones, “guilty”. And so on through the 54 Senators, in alphabetical order. ---
**Author:** ![DSYoungEsq](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/c6cbf5/32.png) [@DSYoungEsq](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DSYoungEsq)\ **Post date:** [January 7, 2006, 7:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/andrew-johnsons-impeachment/338774/13 "2006-01-07T19:53:37Z")
Hmm, interesting. Wish they reported like that today. Thank-you. 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![Freddy\_the\_Pig](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/a587f6/32.png) [@Freddy\_the\_Pig](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Freddy_the_Pig)\ **Post date:** [January 7, 2006, 9:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/andrew-johnsons-impeachment/338774/14 "2006-01-07T21:31:34Z")
Damn, the UIC library is still closed this weekend for Christmas break. Won’t be able to look for the journals for another week. ---
**Author:** ![Exapno\_Mapcase](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/exapno_mapcase/32/1051_2.png) [@Exapno\_Mapcase](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Exapno_Mapcase)\ **Post date:** [January 7, 2006, 10:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/andrew-johnsons-impeachment/338774/15 "2006-01-07T22:25:33Z")
> [@Freddy the Pig](#): > > Given that the _only_ statements attributed to Ross before the vote were that he would vote for conviction, I don’t see how _any_ Senator could have voted “guilty”, knowing that it wouldn’t matter, until after Ross opened his mouth on the roll call. If he revealed his true vote to any other Senator beforehand, that person apparently carried the secret to his grave. You keep saying that, but the New York Times article quoted by **BobT** completely contradicts this. It says in so many words that Ross’ vote was known ahead of time. What more evidence are you demanding? ---
**Author:** ![BobT](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/8e8cbc/32.png) [@BobT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BobT)\ **Post date:** [January 7, 2006, 10:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/andrew-johnsons-impeachment/338774/16 "2006-01-07T22:41:56Z")
While I reprinted portions of the NY Times story from 1868, I don’t think you can rely on that account as being 100% accurate. The reporter was no doubt looking for a dramatic angle. ---
**Author:** ![Exapno\_Mapcase](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/exapno_mapcase/32/1051_2.png) [@Exapno\_Mapcase](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Exapno_Mapcase)\ **Post date:** [January 7, 2006, 10:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/andrew-johnsons-impeachment/338774/17 "2006-01-07T22:56:05Z")
Why shouldn’t we believe that Gen. Thos. Ewing, Jr. said what the article reported him to say on the day before the vote? That would presumably be public info and easily refuted if not true. ---
**Author:** ![Freddy\_the\_Pig](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/a587f6/32.png) [@Freddy\_the\_Pig](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Freddy_the_Pig)\ **Post date:** [January 14, 2006, 10:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/andrew-johnsons-impeachment/338774/18 "2006-01-14T22:10:37Z")
Sorry, I didn’t notice **BobT** ’s post the last time I posted. The Plummer article cites _The Impeachment of a President_ by Hans Trefousse, and Trefousse names names (at last!) and cites primary sources. Here is his discussion, with my paraphrase of his sources in the footnotes: > [@](#): > > The closeness of the balloting in itself may be deceiving. Considerable evidence exists that other senators stood ready to vote for acquittal if their votes had been needed. As early as May 18 the Chicago Tribune asserted that the President’s friends laid claim to four more votes in case of necessity, and the substance of the story was confirmed shortly after the trial by Samuel Randall, the Democratic Congressman from Pennsylvania (1). On August 3, Johnson himself wrote to Benjamin Truman that Morgan had been one of the Republicans in question (2). In 1913 Senator Henderson also asserted that Morgan had been the reported swing voter. Because of the intense pressure, he voted to convict, but would not have done so had his vote made any difference (3). Some years earlier the Missouri Senator told William A. Dunning that Willey had also been ready to switch, a point he later reiterated to Trumbull’s biographer, Horace White (4). He also mentioned Sprague as one of the Senators willing to change, and John Bigelow learned that Nye had been another (5). In short, Johnson’s victory was assured long before the vote was taken. A sufficient number of moderate Republicans stood ready to acquit him, come what might. (1) according to William S. Hawley in a letter to Samuel Tilden, 5/22/1868. Tilden was the Chairman of the NY Democratic Party; I don’t know who Hawley was. (2) Truman was one of Johnson’s secretaries. He published the letter in Century Magazine in 1913. (3) Henderson was also quoted in Century Magazine in 1913. (4) as noted above by **Exapno** , and in Trumbull’s biography. (5) John Bigelow was a former ambassador to France who supported Johnson. The comment is from his unpublished diary. Trefousse doesn’t say how he “learned” this. So what about it? Is the matter settled? Certainly, other Senators _could_ have safely and insincerely voted for conviction if Ross’s vote was widely known on the morning of May 16. But did they? The common thread in the above sources is that all were opponents of removal. One gets a sense of a football team which won a close game saying, “It wasn’t really that close; we could have scored a couple more touchdowns but we were running out the clock in the fourth quarter.” No Senator ever said that _he_ would have changed his vote if it had mattered; only that _others_ would have done so. Perhaps this is to be expected. Senators don’t like to advertise that they cast an insincere CYA vote on an important matter. But then, both sides at the time behaved as if Ross’s vote was decisive–plying him with patronage on the one hand, and becoming livid over his “betrayal” on the other. I think Trefousse should have stuck with the wording of his first two sentences. The last two are an over-statement. ---
**Author:** ![aahala](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/a88e4f/32.png) [@aahala](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/aahala)\ **Post date:** [January 15, 2006, 5:13am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/andrew-johnsons-impeachment/338774/19 "2006-01-15T05:13:52Z")
I have no idea if the story on the link below is correct, but if it is, then the four Senators in reserve could have been true: [http://www.worldwideschool.org/library/books/hst/northamerican/HistoryoftheImpeachmentofAndrewJohnsonPresidentoftheUnitedStates/chap12.html](http://www.worldwideschool.org/library/books/hst/northamerican/HistoryoftheImpeachmentofAndrewJohnsonPresidentoftheUnitedStates/chap12.html) The page alleges a private meeting between the end of testimony and the first vote, with a headcount showing many Republicans not wishing to state their upcoming vote and enough stating they would vote no on specific articles, most would fail.