In the post-Civil War political environment, President Andrew Johnson, a Democrat who had served as Abraham Lincoln's second vice president, endorsed the quick re-admission of the Southern secessionist states. The two-thirds Republican majorities of both houses of Congress, however, passed laws over Johnson's vetoes, establishing a series of five military districts overseeing newly created state governments. This "Congressional Reconstruction" was designed to create local civil rights laws to protect newly freed slaves; to protect and patrol the area; to ensure the secessionist states would show some good faith before being readmitted; to ensure Republican control of the states; and, arguably, to inflict some punishment on the secessionists. States would be readmitted gradually.