Andrew Johnson was born in Raleigh, North Carolina on December 28th, 1808. His father passed away when he was very young. After the passing of his father, Jacob Johnson, his family became very poor and he never went to school to get an education. Andrew became an apprentice to a tailor when he was just fourteen years old and worked as one until he was about seventeen. After working as an apprentice, Andrew moved to Greenville, Tennessee and opened his own tailor shop. During this time, he still did not know how to read and had no education. While he worked as a tailor, he hired someone to read books to him. He learned a lot about history within that time. He knew more about history than the average educated person. Although he didn’t have a formal education, he was a very intelligent man and knew enough to qualify for his future political career. In 1830-1833, he served as the Alderman of Greeneville. After serving as Alderman, he was elected as Mayor of Greeneville, TN in 1834. After many political accomplishments …show more content…
During his time of being the President, Johnson accomplished a few important things in American History. Johnson was very focused on restoring the Union. He tried to follow through with Lincoln’s plan for the slaves and granted them second class citizenship. Johnson said that Reconstruction was over and the goals for the Union had been accomplished, as well for the ex-slaves. While he was president the 13th amendment and 14th amendment was passed and ratified to the Constitution. Many believe Johnson was one of the worst presidents we have ever had and that he was a racist. People think this because he vetoed 29 times, which broke the veto record (and some were in blacks’ favor). Alaska was purchased from Russia during his presidency by William Seward and became a part of the United States. The Reconstruction Act was also passed and it reversed a lot of things he had