Confederate surrender at appomattox and the assassination of president Abraham Lincoln in this period of uncertainty americans wondered how the new president Andrew Johnson would lead the divided nation many especially in africanamericans were hopeful that johnson would actively promote cause of black equality. Black leaders. However became disillusioned with johnson after a dramatic meeting with the president at the white house Frederick Douglass attack johnsons policies in a number of lectures across the country. Johnsons conflict with congress over reconstruction eventually led to his impeachment. Within the records of the National Archives is the resolution to impeach johnson written on a scrap of paper and introduced in the us house of representatives of february 21st, 1868. Three days later the house voted 128 to 47 to adopt the rest of resolution. In the failed promise Robert S Levine portrays the conflicts that brought Frederick Douglass and the wider black community to reject