They had only to reconcile differences of detail and to adjust the jealousies of local interest; but in 1866 Congress was called upon to exclude the President practically from all share in the law-making power, and to charge him on his oath of duty to faithfully execute laws, against which he had constantly entered his solemn protest, not only as inexpedient but as unconstitutional.

Perhaps a man of more desperate resolution than Mr.
Johnson might have used his Executive power more effectively against Congress, but he must have done so at the expense of his fidelity to sworn obligations.

The practical deduction as to the working of our Governmental machinery, from the whole experience of that troublous era, is that two-thirds of each House, united and stimulated to one end, can practically neutralize the Executive power of the Government and lay down its policy in defiance of the efforts and the opposition of the President.
The defection of Senator Lane of Kansas from the ranks of the most radical Republicans caused great surprise to the country.

He had been so closely identified with all the tragic events in the prolonged struggle to keep slavery out of Kansas, that he was considered to be an irreconcilable foe to the party that tolerated or in any way apologized for its existence.

The position he had taken in voting against the Civil Rights Bill worried and fretted him.