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RE: Johnson at odds with Holt & Stanton in June of 1865
As president,Andrew Johnson did not need Joseph Holt's approval to commute a capital sentence. No execution warrant could be carried out without his signature. The Victorian public morality which condemned Mary Surratt's execution expressed after the fact lay dormant before her death. The public believed in her guilt but I believe did not seriously contemplate that the US government would for the first time execute a woman.
That Andrew Johnson did not share the prevailing ethos of society is obvious. What is striking is both the casual brutality of his sentiments "the trouble with this war is there aren't enough women being hanged'' and his failure to explain in detail to the public before the execution why he deemed it necessary in this particular case to defy the existing popular sentiment.
Tom
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Johnson at odds with Holt & Stanton in June of 1865
