After prep school he went to St. Mary's College, in Marion County, Kentucky, and graduated in June 1878.

On July 10, 1893, he was appointed as a collector of internal revenue for the fifth district of Kentucky by President Grover Cleveland, he served this post until August 10, 1897.

Johnson was the sole Southern Democrat to vote in favor of the Dyer Anti-Lynching Bill.

In 1926 he decided to return to Bardstown and practice law again, he refused to be a candidate for the nomination that year.

The following March he returned home after 20-years in Washington, D.C., Johnson died at the age of 92, in 1950, in Bardstown and is interred in St. Joseph's Cemetery.