17th United States President, 16th United States Vice President, U.S. Senator, Tennessee Governor, U.S. Congressman. Born near Raleigh, North Carolina, to Mary "Polly" McDonough, a laundress and seamstress, and Jacob Johnson, a hotel porter. His father died when he was about three years old. As a boy, he was apprenticed to a tailor. In 1826, he moved to Greenville, Tennessee, and went into business as a tailor. In 1829, he was elected alderman for Greeneville. He was elected mayor of Greeneville in 1834 and the following year he was elected to the Tennessee State Legislature. In 1843, he was elected to the U.S. House of Representatives where he advocated for what would become the Homestead Act. In 1853, he left the House of Representatives to become the 15th Governor of Tennessee. He left the governorship in 1857 to take a seat in the U.S. Senate where he advocated the preservation of the Union. In June 1861, Tennessee voters approved secession from the Union. Johnson had been traveling across his state speaking out against secession, and was the only senator from the South to remain loyal to the Union after his state seceded. He gave up his seat in the Senate in 1862 when President Lincoln appointed him Tennessee's military governor. In 1864, the President chose him as his running mate over the incumbent Vice President since Johnson was a Southerner and a Democrat. They were sworn into office on March 4, 1865. When the President was assassinated five weeks later, Johnson was sworn in as President. Despite an initial appearance of vindictiveness, he soon dropped punitive actions against Confederates in his Reconstruction policy, and leaned far more toward conciliation. In May 1865, he recognized a Reconstruction government in Virginia and issued a Proclamation of Amnesty which restored full citizenship to many former Confederates if they would swear allegiance to the Union. Congress, however, found the President far too conciliatory and moved to refuse a seat to any Senator or Representative from the pre-war South. In April 1866, a Civil Rights Act, which was designed to nullify the Black Codes imposed in the former Confederacy by guaranteeing equal civil rights to Blacks, was passed over Johnson's veto. In February 1868, President Johnson notified Congress that he had removed Edwin Stanton as Secretary of War, the fallout for which was impeachment proceedings against the President. During May 1868, there were three votes in the Senate. On all three occasions, thirty-five Senators voted guilty, and nineteen voted not guilty. As the Constitution requires a two-thirds majority for conviction in impeachment trials, Johnson was acquitted. He issued a general clemency for all former Confederates that same year. By the end of his term in office, the Republicans had nominated U. S. Grant as their Presidential candidate and the Democrats nominated Horatio Seymour, thus Johnson was out of the running. He ran an unsuccessful bid for election to the Senate, and was again unsuccessful in an 1872 run for the House of Representatives. In 1874, however, he was elected to the Senate and served from March 4, 1875, until his death in July that same year. He is the only President to have served in the Senate following his presidency.