(3 of 3)
But Johnson, never a humble man, was anything but subdued beneath the words or the steps. He was in fact vibrating at the top of his confidence, utterly conscious of himself and the November victory, and raring for action —at least until he landed in the hospital at week's end. One measure of how much effort it will take to translate the generalities of the inaugural address into realities came in the speech itself, when Johnson set himself a difficult task: "The hour and the day and the time are here to achieve progress without strife, to achieve change without hatred—not without difference of opinion, but without the deep and abiding divisions which scar the Union for generations."