On growing accustomed to power...................

     In dealing with these changes, Grant inevitably bore a sizable load on his shoulders.  He knew the postwar economic boom was uneven, the South having surrendered half its wealth, while four million freed slaves struggled to find their niche in American society.  He had to deal with the paradox that while demands on the American presidency had grown exponentially, the Congress-dominated system of the Johnson years had drastically weakened the executive branch.  In the nineteenth century, Congress was infinitely more powerful that in the twentieth and senators ruled as headstrong barons whose power often rivaled that of presidents.  Grant had a special conundrum to figure out.  The Radical Republicans who formed his power base were the very people who had asserted congressional power during Andrew Johnson's  impeachment.  The deep-seated habit of promoting congressional prerogatives against the president would be fiendishly difficult to subdue, many senators having grown accustomed to exercising unchecked power.

-Ron Chernow,   Grant