The Sun.
London, England, 1865-05-02 00:00:00

dealing with notorious offenders. But if he do, to
whom is this change to be imputed ? Lincoln leaned
to mercy—and he was taken off. Johnson has not
promoted himself. The magician who worked this
change is the enemy himself. (Hear, hear.) It
would seem almost as if it were the will of Heaven
which has interposed the possibility of this mar-
vellous retribution. Yet, even if we make proper
allowance for this difference, the great fact re-
mains clear, that Andrew Johnson, like his pre-
decessor, will exert himself to the utmost of his
power fully to re-establish in peace and harmony
the beneficent system of government which he
has already hazarded so much to sustain. (Cheers.)
And should it happen that he, too, which Heaven
avert, should by some evil design be removed from
the post now assigned to him, the effect would only
be that the next man in the succession prescribed by
the public law, and inspired from the same common
source, will be summoned to take his place. And so
it would go on, if need be, in a line, like that in
Macbeth's vision, " stretching out to the crack of
doom." (Applause.) The Republic has but to com-
mand the services of any of her children, and,
whether to meet open danger in the field, or the
more crafty and desperate assassin, experience shows
them equally ready to obey her call. (Cheers.) So
long as the heroic spirit animates her frame, the re-
quisite agents will not fail to execute her will. Any
attempt to paralyze her by striking down more or
less of them will only end, as every preceding design
to injure her has ended, in disappointment and bit-
ter despair. Let us, then, casting aside all needless
apprehensions for the policy of our land, now con-
centrate our thoughts for the moment upon the
magnitude of the offence which has deprived us of
our beloved chief in the very moment of most in-
terest to our cause ; and let us draw together as one
man in the tribute of our admiration of one of the
purest, the most single-minded, and noble-hearted
patriots that ever ruled over the people of any land.
(Loud applause.)
Mr. MORSE moved the first resolution, which was
as follows :

" That we have heard with the greatest indignation and
the most profound sorrow of the assassination which has
deprived our country of its beloved chief magistrate, as well
as of the audacious assault which has greatly perilled the
lives of the Secretary and Assistant-Secretary of State ; and
that we regard the taking of the life of our chief executive
officer while our country is passing through unparalleled
trials, after all loyal Americans had learned to love him,
and with good men the world over to confide in him, and
when so much of national and individual welfare and hap-
piness depended on his existence, as the great crime of the
19th century, memorable in its atrocity, and entailing on its
perpetrator the execrations of mankind."

He said when the wires flashed the sad intelligence
of Mr. Lincoln's death from one end of the vast
country which he governed to the other, 20,000,000
people were at once bowed down to the deepest sor-
row, all business was suspended, and villages, towns,
and cities were draped in mourning. (Hear, hear.)
That sorrow was felt irrespective of party. It was
felt, in the first place, on account of Mr. Lincoln's
own personal qualities, on account of his kind and
genial heart, his unselfishness and his patriotism ;
and, in the next place, because during four trying
years of a war such as no other country had ever
waged, he had amid unparalleled difficulties carried
on the government of the nation with moderation,
ability, and success. (Cheers.) He need not re-
mind them how Mr. Lincoln had prosecuted that
war, nor of the great end at which he aimed—
namely, the restoration of the Union, and the pro-
pagation of liberty throughout the land. (Cheers.)
With regard to Mr. Lincoln's successor, he would
say that having been in Congress for some years
with Andrew Johnson he had never during all that
time heard one word whispered against his fair fame.
(Applause.) He had never once heard him re-
proached with intemperance. He had seen Andrew
Johnson daily and knew him well, and he knew that
to accuse him of habitual intemperance was one of
the foulest of slanders. (Applause.) Andrew John-
son came from the ranks of the people ; he had been
in public life for 30 years, commencing as an alder-
man of his city, then becoming mayor, next member
of the Lower House of Representltives, then a
Senator for the State of Tennessee, then presidential
elector, then member of Congress for ten years, then
Senator of the United States, until at last he was
made Vice President, and now the Providence of
God has raised him to be President of the United
States. (Cheers.) The American people had
no distrust of that noble man who had
made his way from the ranks of thepeople. (Cheers.)
As had been well remarked by the late Pre-
sident in the spring of 18G1, when everything
seemed to be crumbling around him in Washington,
when Southern senator after senator and member
after member left his seat and went home to carry
on the rebellion, when Slidell, Mason, and Davis
were plotting in the cells of the Capitol, where the
light of day never entered, Andrew Johnson was at
his post in the Senate, upholding the flag of his
country like a true man as he was. (Prolonged
cheering.)

Mr. LAMPSON seconded the resolution, which was
carried unanimously.
Mr. H. BERGH moved the second resolution,
which was as follows :

" That we tender to Mrs. Lincoln our heartfelt sympathy
and expression of condolence in the great affliction that she
and her family and the nation have sustained."

_ . _,....
Mr. MORGAN seconded it, and it was carried
unanimously.

Dr. BLACK moved the third resolution, viz.

" That in the long public career of Andrew Johnson,
now President of the United States, the early and pre-
eminent sacrifices he made from his devotion to the cause
of the Union, and his pledges to maintain the great prin-
ciples of human liberty, we have every assurance that he
will faithfully prosecute to its final success the wise, hu-
mane, and statesmanlike domestic and foreign policy of
President Lincoln."

He said that people who had never lived in the South
could have no idea of the courage which it required for a
man to resist every influence which surrounded him.
(Hear, hear.) It was a grand moral spectacle to see An-
drew Johnson as he stood there. If any man chose to
doubt the integrity, the ability, the patriotism, the kind-
liness of disposition, the broad power of looking at great
subjects possessed by Andrew Johnson, let him read the
speech which ho delivered in the Senate of the United
States on the 19th of December, 1860, and any man who
should do so, if he had the slightest common sense, could
not but feel that it was the effusion of a great mind and a
great soul. (Cheers.) The American people wore safe in
the hands of that man. (Renewed cheers.) The enemies of
republicanism and of the government of the people were
ready to catch at everything. (Hear.) Mr. Lincoln was too
tall; he was not polished enough; he was too good-
humoured; he said too many capital things. He was at fault
in everything. But not so now. (Cheers.) The world now
acknowledged that he had done wonderful things. He had
had before him one of the most difficult tasks that ever fell
to the lot of statesmen, and he had successfully performed
it. (Loud cheers.) And so it would be with Andrew John-
son, who had now upon his hands as difficult a task, for he
had to bring the war to a close, to reconstruct the Union,
to put its finances on a sound basis, and to conciliate hurt
feelings everywhere. (Hear, hear.) Grant and his generals
would close the war, but then came the greatest of all the
difficulties —namely, the reorganisation of the Union, be-
cause that included the question what should be done with
the slaves—where were they to be placed, how many privi-
leges were to be given to them, how far were they to be
brought in all respects near the position of the white man.
That was a difficult question, but not so difficult as the
enemies of the United States gloated over when they talked
of it. In Jamaica a great difficulty had been felt, but the
negroes in that island had little in common with the negroes
of the States. In Jamaica there used to be fresh importa-
tions of native Africans every year, who kept up the bad
habits of the race ; their masters were always in England,
and they never had association with anybody superior to
their drivers, so that at last slavery and labour became
synonymous in that island, as did liberty and laziness.
But in the States the case was very different. Lies upon
lies had been heaped up with regard to the cruel treat-
ment of slaves in the South. (Hear, hear.) He was a
Southern, but a Union man to the backbone, and he
had always been so. Southern men had done badly
enough, but they had been punished to the last degree
for their cruelty and wickedness. But, to return to his
point. Since 1808 there had been no admixture of fresh
Africans with the slaves in the States. And here he would
remark that it was the United States that first abolished the
slave trade, and Great Britain followed. But the black men
of the States were from association with the families of
their masters entirely different from what those of Jamaica
had been. They were willing to labour, and so there would
be no difficulty on that point. Many persons, with the
kindliest dispositions, were fearful that America would not
pay her debts. But in 1815 England had a debt nearly twice
as great, while her commerce at that time could not
be com-
pared with that of the United States at present, and her
population was not half so great. And did not the people
of the United States, shrewd as they were,
know well that
it was their interest to pay their debts ?
(Hear, hear.)
Mr. H. PARKE; in seconding the resolution, said that