3 joined sheets, together 851 x 203 mm, comprising a printed broadside and two lined sheets attached below, bearing 122 signatures, mild toning, old folds.

THE AMERICAN PUBLIC TURNS AGAINST ANDREW JOHNSON—AN EARLY MASS PETITION DEMANDING HIS IMPEACHMENT, CIRCULATED MORE THAN A YEAR BEFORE THE HOUSE FORMALLY IMPEACHED HIM

"To the Honorable the House of Representatives of the United States, the Grand Inquest of the Nation..."

Calls for Johnson's impeachment emerged amid the increasingly bitter struggle between the President and the Republican-controlled Congress over Reconstruction. By 1866, Johnson's opposition to congressional Reconstruction, his extensive use of the presidential pardon power on behalf of former Confederates, and his increasingly inflammatory public attacks on Congress had transformed political opposition into demands for his removal from office. During the autumn congressional campaign, Benjamin F. Butler of Massachusetts became one of the most prominent advocates of impeachment, publicly arguing that the House, as the "grand inquest of the nation," should bring charges against the President.

The present petition belongs to the early organized movement to impeach Johnson and can be dated to 1867. Among its charges is Johnson's reception at the White House of former New Orleans mayor John T. Monroe, whose administration had been implicated in the violence surrounding the New Orleans massacre of July 1866. General Philip H. Sheridan removed Monroe from office on 27 March 1867, and contemporary newspapers reported that the former mayor subsequently visited Johnson in Washington seeking Sheridan's removal. The episode, seized upon by Johnson's opponents as further evidence of his hostility toward Congressional Reconstruction, provides a terminus post quem for the present broadside.

Its lengthy indictment charges Johnson with abusing his pardon and appointment powers, frustrating congressional Reconstruction, denouncing Congress in inflammatory public speeches, and failing to protect loyal citizens in the former Confederacy. Particular attention is given to the violence at New Orleans in July 1866 and to Johnson's association with former New Orleans mayor John T. Monroe. The petition concludes by asking the House to investigate Johnson's alleged "malfeasances in office" and present a bill of impeachment so that he might be removed and permanently disqualified from federal office.
Congress did not impeach Johnson at this stage. The House Judiciary Committee opened a formal impeachment investigation in 1867, but the effort initially failed. The crisis finally came to a head after Johnson attempted to remove Secretary of War Edwin M. Stanton in February 1868 in violation of the Tenure of Office Act. On 24 February, the House voted to impeach him, making Johnson the first American president to be impeached. At his Senate trial he escaped conviction by a single vote, the Senate dividing 35 to 19—one vote short of the constitutionally required two-thirds majority.

SIGNED BY 122 AMERICANS, THIS REMARKABLE SURVIVAL DOCUMENTS THE POPULAR CAMPAIGN FOR JOHNSON'S REMOVAL IN 1866—MORE THAN A YEAR BEFORE HIS HISTORIC IMPEACHMENT

EXCEEDINGLY RARE: We have been unable to trace another example of the present 1867 petition. An earlier petition bearing the same heading, dated 1866, is preserved in the Pennsylvania Abolition Society Papers at the Historical Society of Pennsylvania; assuming that example lacks the later charge concerning Johnson's reception of former New Orleans mayor John T. Monroe, the present petition represents a later and apparently unrecorded version.