The Trial Of President Johnson
While the radical program was being executed in the South, Congress was engaged not only in supervising reconstruction but in subduing the Supreme Court and in "conquering" President Johnson. One must admire the efficiency of the radical machine. When the Southerners showed that they preferred military rule as permitted by the Act of the 2nd of March, Congress passed the Act of the 23d of March which forced the reconstruction. When the President ventured to assert his power in behalf of a considerate administration of the reconstruction acts, Congress took the power out of his hands by the law of the 19th of July. The Southern plan to defeat the new state constitutions by abstention was no sooner made clear in the case of Alabama than Congress came to the rescue with the Act of March 11, 1868.

Had it seemed necessary, Congress would have handled the Supreme Court as it did the Southerners. The opponents of radical reconstruction were anxious to get the reconstruction laws of March 1867, before the Court. Chief Justice Chase was known to be opposed to military reconstruction, and four other justices were, it was believed, doubtful of the constitutionality of the laws. A series of conservative decisions gave hope to those who looked to the Court for relief. The first decision, in the case of ex parte Milligan, declared unconstitutional the trials of civilians by military commissions when civil courts were open. A few months later, in the cases of Cummings vs. Missouri and ex parte Garland, the Court declared invalid, because ex post facto, the state laws designed to punish former Confederates.