James Johnson

Who was James Johnson?

James Johnson was a U.S. Representative from Georgia and served as the 43rd Governor of Georgia between June and October 1865.

He was born in 1811 in Robeson County, North Carolina. He graduated from the University of Georgia in 1832 and moved to Columbus, Georgia where he started his law practice after passing the bar in 1835. In 1851, he was elected to the United States House of Representatives as a Unionist and opposed secession. He was appointed as Governor of Georgia on June 17, 1865 after the Civil War by U.S. President Andrew Johnson, and tasked primarily with reorganizing the state government, which had collapsed with the Confederacy. He served until a constitutional convention was held in Milledgeville in October 1865; at that convention, the Secession Ordinance was repealed, a new constitution was adopted, and the State's war debt was repudiated. He unsuccessfully ran for the U.S. Senate in 1866. He died in 1891 in Chattahoochee County, Ohio.