At the very moment when the President should have stood as a generous mediator, calming the irritation of the South -- an irritation inevitably incident to defeat--and restraining somewhat, at least in the manner of preferring them, the demands and requirements which the Government in its hour of victory was justified in making, Johnson committed the grievous fault of espousing the Southern cause and quarreling with the party which had confided to him the power he was abusing.
Under the patronage and protection of the President, Southern men would have been more or less than human if they had not grown arrogant and defiant towards the men of the North.

The chivalric sympathy which always moves the magnanimous in their treatment of a fallen foe, was therefore drowned in the indignation to which Northern men were naturally moved by provocations as unexpected as they were extraordinary.

Stimulated by the protection of the President and encouraged by his contumacious quarrel with Congress, the South was driven from one unwise step to another, until the entire situation became hopelessly entangled, and every movement affected by anger and passion;--the North resolving more and more to insist on the fruits of victory, the South resolving more and more to act as though they had conquered in the contest.

It was not unnatural, under the anxieties and discouragements of the crisis, that the South should have clung to Mr.Johnson for protection; but in the calm review which the lapse of twenty years affords, the most ardent Southern partisan must see that the President's policy was at enmity with the interest and happiness of his section.
It is not to be forgotten, however, that Mr.Johnson's course was marked by the inherent qualities of his mind.

He had two signal defects, either of which would impair his fitness for Executive duty; united they rendered him incapable of efficient administration:--he was conceited and he was obstinate.