David O. Stewart’s Impeached
Next week is The Big Week – my book on the 1868 impeachment trial of President Andrew Johnson will launch officially on Tuesday, May 12. Already, there have been some very gratifying early reviews, including:
“Impeached is a fascinating account of the attempt to remove Andrew Johnson from the Presidency. Vigorously written, it is by all means the best account of this troubled episode in our history. It demolishes the myth that Johnson’s impeachment was unjustified and that those who defended him were heroes. Stewart proves that impeachment may be an unwieldy tool for recapturing control of the national government but at critical times it can be an essential one. This is a book I highly recommend.”
–David Herbert Donald, author of Lincoln, Charles Warren Professor of History, Harvard
From Kirkus Review, March 4, 2009 (STARRED)
“A riveting look at one of American history’s most dismal episodes. The [Johnson] impeachment spectacle qualifies as the last battle of the Civil War and the first act of the tawdry Gilded Age. A practicing attorney who has defended a federal judge against impeachment, Stewart demonstrates his legal acumen, explaining the constitutional bases for impeachment and teasing out “the tenacious opacity of the phrase ‘high crimes and misdemeanors’ . . . Also an adept historian, Stewart stresses the political nature of impeachment, where developments and outcome depend as much on events and the character and convictions of the protagonists. The author also profiles Benjamin Butler, the prosecution’s headstrong manager, the surprisingly slippery president-in-waiting, Ulysses S. Grant, and Edmund G. Ross, whose deciding vote against impeachment was likely purchased. Ross falls shockingly short of the profile in courage John F. Kennedy sketched, but the senator was only a small part of the gambling, bargaining, payoffs and bribes surrounding the trial. Stewart vibrantly renders these atmospherics, the poisonous politics, the personal animosities and the unbridled corruption that will leave readers rooting for both sides to lose. Likely to become the standard version of this historic clash between a president and Congress.”
From BookPage, May 2009
“In his magnificent Impeached: The Trial of President Andrew Johnson and the Fight for Lincoln’s Legacy, David O. Stewart, author of the highly acclaimed Summer of 1787, provides an extraordinary narrative that brings the many key players vividly to life while at the same time exhibiting an admirable clarity in discussing issues and events. . . . Stewart’s book splendidly illuminates an important chapter in American history”
From Publishers Weekly, March 9, 2009
“Fresh from his masterful The Summer of 1787, Stewart takes on one of the seamiest events in American history: the vengeful impeachment of Lincoln’s successor as president; the Senate failed to convict Andrew Johnson by a single vote. . . . Stewart takes readers through a tangled web of motives and maneuverings in lively, unadorned prose. He’s skilled at characterizing his large cast of characters and, as a lawyer, has a practiced nose for skullduggery, of which there was much. . . . As he sums it up, in 1868 “none of the country’s leaders was great, a few were good, all were angry, and far too many were despicable.” Stewart . . . tells the story as well as it’s ever been told.”
From Booklist, April 15, 2009:
“[T]he climax of a life-and-death struggle between Johnson and the “Radical Republicans” in Congress. At stake were competing visions of the path of Reconstruction. . . .Stewart, an attorney, eloquently frames the issues and provides a stirring narrative of this dramatic conflict. . . .The process of impeachment was characterized by hypocrisy and outright bribery.”
“David Stewart’s Impeached is as riveting and rollicking as the best Washington novel. There is all kinds of intrigue — from allegations of bribery by a ‘whiskey ring,’ to a cabinet secretary barricading himself in his office, to an incoming Vice President giving a drunken tirade on Inauguration Day — all played out at a deadly serious time, with the Union hanging in the balance. Only it’s not a novel; it’s Stewart’s meticulously researched re-rendering of a time in our history that, he argues persuasively, has been distorted to turn a racist and incompetent Andrew Johnson and his anti-impeachment supporters into courageous defenders of Abe Lincoln’s legacy.” -
Steven Brill, author of The Teamsters and After; founder of The American Lawyer and Court TV
“Anyone who thinks American politics has lately been at a high level of viciousness should read this gripping story of Andrew Johnson’s impeachment trial. There are fewer angels than we have thought, and more political hatred and knife work–all with fundamental underlying issues of justice and race.”
Anthony Lewis, former New York Times columnist and author of Gideon’s Trumpet
I will start down the book promotion trail on Monday evening (May 11), with an appearance at the National Constitution Center in Philadelphia. C-SPAN is scheduled to record the event; I’ll let you know when they plan to air it on Book TV, just as soon as I know. Then next Saturday, May 16, I’ll be at Politics & Prose in DC, with later stops in Baltimore, Chicago, Kansas City, Springfield IL (at the Lincoln Presidential Library!), and Boston. The full schedule is at my website, at http://davidostewart.com/stewart-events.htm. It would be great to see you at one of those events.
And, most of all, I hope you enjoy the book.
Best regards,
David
