Many congressional leaders were willing to have Congress itself carry through the very policies which Lincoln had advocated, and a majority of the Northern people would have endorsed them without much caring who was to execute them.
The murder of Lincoln, the failure of the radicals to shape Johnson's policy as they had hoped, and the continuing reaction against the excessive expansion of the executive power added strength to the opposition.

But it was a long fight before the radical leaders won.
Their victory was due to adroit tactics on their own part and to mistakes, bad judgment, and bad manners on the part of the President.
When all hope of controlling Johnson had been given up, Thaddeus Stevens and other leaders of similar views began to contrive means to circumvent him.

On December 1, 1865, before Congress met, a caucus of radicals held in Washington agreed that a joint committee of the two Houses should be selected to which should be referred matters relating to reconstruction.
This plan would thwart the more conservative Senate and gain a desirable delay in which the radicals might develop their campaign.

The next day at a caucus of the Union party the plan went through without arousing the suspicion of the supporters of the Administration.

Next, through the influence of Stevens, Edward McPherson, the clerk of the House, omitted from the roll call of the House the names of the members from the South.