The Sun.
London, England, 1868-11-18 00:00:00

PROGRESS OF ELEC7IONS.

The Hon. John Lathrop Motley delivered the
opening lecture at the Fraternity course in Boston
on the 20th ultimo, taking for his subject the Pre-
sidential election. Ile closed with a summary of
Grant's character, given in a style of which he
-proved himself a perfect master. The great attrac-
tion of his speech centred, however, on the financial
questions now interesting the United States, for
into a subject so worn he managed to introduce a
novel mode of treatment. He considered that the
election was to decide, among others, the question,
" Shall the U❑ited States pay or repudiate their
debts ?" That it should be a question was an awful
thing, one no honest man, after reflecting on could
trifle with for a moment. " What is a dollar ? Let
us turn to that excellent work, Webster's Dic-
tionary.' A dollar I find to be a silver coin—that
of the United States being equal to 100 cents, or
4s. 2d. sterling.' Sterling shillings mean genuine
shillings. It is also well known that by statute
of the United States gold as well as silver is a
standard of value. A dollar means, therefore,
in English arid other civilized languages, a
coin.' What is a coin ?' Let us again dip in the
pure well of " Webster's Unabridged." A coin we
shall find to be a piece of metal bearing a legal
stamp and made current as money.' It is metallic
or hard money, as god or silver.' Now, if language
cannot be invented to conceal thought, the United
States' Government, when it sold those bonds, pro-
mised to pay the holder a certain number of pieces
of stamped metal, gold or silver, each of them being
equal to four genuine shillings and twopence. In-
stead of these pieces of metal, it now appears from
the New York platform that Government has the
right to force upon the holder a new promise to pay
such coins at an indefinite period, without interest.
And this is p ayment in full." lie spoke with wither-
ing contempt of such financiering, and went on as
pithily to expose the amazing logic by which it was
supported. He then, by way of showing what ne-
cessity existed for all this folly, touched on the
wealth of the United States with a future which it is
difficult for the mind of man to realize. " This," he
said, "is the richest country in the world. The
accumulated capital of the British Empire may be
one-third larger, although it is probable that the
results of the United States' Census of 1870
will make surprising revelations ; but the annual
product of the United States is now far greater than
that of the British Empire, while the untouched re-
sources of this nation are of almost fabulous extent.
It will be much within limits to assume a yearly
product at this moment of $4,000,000,000 gold.
But that which makes our financial strength not
only encouraging, but astounding, is the tremen-
dous ratio at which our wealth and population in-
crease. On the most moderate computation our
population doubles every 23 years, our wealth every
ten years. At a moderate estimate, the population
14 years hence will be 60,000,000, and the valua-
tion of property $60,000,000,000 ; the debt, even if
not reduced a donor before that time, will then
amount to about four per cent. of the accumulated
capital of the nation. What individual in this
country wishes to-day to repudiate his personal
debts, maturing 12 and 15 years hence, because they
are likely to amount to a 25th part of his assets ?
Why, the State of Massachusetts created in the
year 1866, the first year after the war, $517,003,000,
according to the interesting and admirable address
of his Excellency Governor Bullock. During the
preceding ten years the increase of production was
72 per cent., although the yearly increase of popula-
tion was but 3 per cent., much below the national
average. Were the whole country as industrious
the annual product would at this moment be
$16,000,000,000, instead of $4,000,000,000, accord-
ing to the moderate basis which we have taken. To
talk of the inability of the United States to pay
their debts in coin is an insult to human reason.
When the war was over and our whole outstanding
liabilities had been figured up, the total of the
debt, on the Ist of August was found. to be
($3,287,733,329) a little less than three thousand
three hundred million dollars. On Aug. 1, 1868,
it was $2,485,000,000. I) uring three years, therefore,
we had reduced the debt just one quarter, say
eight hundred millions. . . Add the interest
of the debt at six per cent., say $120,000,000, to
our ordinary expenses, and you have less than
$200,000,000 gold as our yearly budget. That of
Great Britain is $350,000,000, and of France
$100,000,000 at least. Each Power is spending at
this moment twice as much as we spend, while the
principle of the French debt is quite aslarge as ours
and that of the English 60 per cent. larger. Well
may we hang our beads at the humiliation of our
national credit. It is even conceivable, if the pru-
dent and masterly financial policy which the Re-
publican party has been pursuing be persisted in,
and which is not yet fully appreciated at home, and
entirely unknown elsewhere, that we are to see our
6 per cents. hawked about at 75, while other great
empires, not more wealthy, vastly more ex-
pensive, and much less progressive, place their
funds at 3} and 4} per cent. interest ?"
No doubt Motley's address, which has been exten-
sively circulated, is in the nature of a campaign
document, intended to aid the Republican cause,
which in a measure detracts from its value, as no
such paper can be wholly free from party bias.
Still the force and beauty of its own language, and
the literary fame of its author, give it a value de-
nied to almost all such contributions. As the day
of the election approached such addresses flowed
still more freely. Mr. Wendell Phillips and Mr.
Charles Sumner made speeches, and Mr. G. T.
Curtis wrote a letter. Governor Seymour peram-
bulated Pennsylvania, and canvassing grew fast
and furious. Even Miss Mary Walker, dropping
physic, spoke on a Republic in platform in New
York. Governor Seymour, we regret to say, was
obliged to omit the greater portion of his speech at
Pittsburg, in consequence of the weakness of his
voice. Francis Kiernan, of Utica, tried to pacify
the crowd with some of his second-rate talk, but it
was of no use ; they wanted Seymour or nobody.
Horace Greeley published a card announcing his
withdrawal from the canvass in the Fifth Congres-
sional District of New York. John Morrissey,
George Francis Train, and two or three others con-
tinuing the contest.
The letter published purporting to be from Justice
Chase has caused great annoyance, as it has proved
to be an impudent forgery. Alexander Long has
published a denial. He says it is a fabrication, and
h 3 never received such a letter. Secretary Seward
spoke iu Auburn on the 31st. Mr. Stanton also
spoke at Philadelphia, whore he bitterly denounced
Mr. Seymour. The latter had concluded his can-
vassing tour by speeches at Wilkesbarre and
Scranton, in Pennsylvania, and also at Utica.
He appeale 1 to the magnanimity of the Republi-
cans not to continue to oppress the suffering and
humiliated South, and he urged all, irrespective of
party malice, neither to use nor submit to coercion.
The elections on the 3d November embraced a
variety of officers, independent of the President
and Vice-President, and in five States questions

affecting State affairs were then decided. Minne-
sota, lowa, and Missouri voted on amendments to
their constitutions, to extending the suffrage to
negroes, and in the former State to persons of
mixed white and Indian blood, who have been
declared by the district court competent to exer-
cise the rights of citizenship. Minnesota also voted
upon the disposal of the " internal improve-
ment Bonds" and upon the abolition of the grand
jury. New Hampshire voted upon the question
of calling a convention to revise her State consti-
tution. The following States elected State offi-
cers, Congressmen, and one or both branches of
the Legislature ; Massachusetts, New York, New
Jersey, Illinois, Michigan, Missouri, and Kansa>.
California, Delaware, lowa, Kentucky, Maryland,
Minnesota, Rhode Island, Tennessee, Wisconsin,
Arkansas, and North and South Carolina electA
Congressmen, and the whole number of Represen-
tatives chosen at this time was 139. Wisconsin,
Minnesota, and lowa elected Legislatures, and the
latter State officers with the exception of Governor.
Of the Legislatures elected those of the following
States each chose aUeired States Senator : New York,
Massachusetts, New Jersey, Michigan, Wisconsin,
Minnesota, Missouri, and Nevada. 'I he Senators
whose terms expire are: Edwin 1). Morgan, Chas.
Sumner, Fred. T. Frelinghuy, sen., Zach. Chandler,
James R. Doolittle, Alexander Ramsey, John B.
Henderson, and William M. Stewart. In the late
territorial election in Dacotah the Republicans were
successful, carrying all but two counties, and elect-
ing S. L. Spink delegate to Congress. The of ...ial
returns make the Republican majority in Ohio at the
recent election 17,372, in Pennsylvania 9,671, and
Indiana 1,054. In Oregon, the Republican members
of the House, being in a hopeless minority, have all
resigned, leaving the House without a quorum and.
the State without any appropriations, and setting
a very improper example for any party to follow.
The registry offices in New York closed at 9 p.m.
on the 31st October. The Tribune was earnest in
its appeal to good men, of whatever politics, to
scrutinize the registry of their election districts, to
detect the villains not legally qualified, who sought
to register and vote, exclaiming—" A few hours
personal effort now may save your country front
fearful calamities." By the Holsatia we have
news to the day of the election, and we learn that
Superintendent Kennedy, of the New York police,
had issued an order that all persons arrested for
voting under fraudulent naturalization papers shall
be taken before the United States' Commissioner
instead of the local courts as heretofore. Mayor
Hoffman and the Democratic members of the police
have protested against this order, as an unwarrant-
able assumption of authority,and as calculated to pro-
voke a riot. The Sheriff (who is a Democrat) has
enrolled 10,000 special deputies. A serious conflict
of the authorities and a collision were feared. It is
evident, from the appeals of the leading papers, how
much the Republicans dreaded fraudulent votes, and
we suppese that there was a great row in New York
following on the election, caused by that party
asserting the returns to be false. John Savage was
a candidate for the district represented by Fernando
Wood, and was one of the only Fenians nominated.

OPINIONS OF THE AMERICAN PRESS ON
HIS EXCELLENCY REVERDY JOHNSON.

We are very sorry to have to recur once more to
Mr. Reverdy Johnson's performances in England ;
but it would be useless, even if it were right, to at-
tempt to conceal the fact that he is causing the
judicious of all parties to grieve deeply. Of the
speech-making in which he is indulging we shall
only say that, in the first place, it needs more dis-
cretion than he seems to possess to prevent its doing
mischief ; and, in the second, that no diplomatist who
knew England would expect to do any good. There
is no country in Europe in which, in spite of the
popular form of Government, oratory is of less use
to a foreign Minister. But we might forgive Mr.
Johnson's speech-rraking if it were not for his fra-
ternization with notorious enemies and revilers
of the United States Government. Considering
what kind of stuff after-dinner oratory is, we are,
as a general rule, indisposed to hold a gentleman
who is replying to a toast responsible for anything
he says, as in nine cases of ten he doesn't know
himself what he is saying ; but an American diplo-
matist, who cannot keep from singling out Lord
Wharucliffe and Mr. Roebuck and their like for
expressions of friendship and esteem, even in after-
dinner speeches, had really better come home. In
doing this, as we have said two or three weeks ago,
he is not simply wounding American susceptibili-
ties, but he is violating all the proprieties of diplo-
matic life. His last performance in this line has
been e public and cordial hand-shaking with Mr.
Laird, at Liverpool. It may not he generally known
that Mr. Laird was not simply the builder of the
Alabama and other Confederate ships—for this he
might have been in the way of trade—but that
he built them joyfully and put feeling into them,
and boasted in the House of Commons of his
share in sending out the Alabama as the act
of his life in which he felt most satisfaction. He
was one of the most truculent and insolent advo-
cates in Parliament, also, of the recognition of the
Confederacy ; and one of the last occasions, if we
are not mistaken, in which he opened his lips in
public about the war was in July, 1863, when he
gleefully and tauntingly predicted that the next
mail would bring the news of the destruction of the
Federal armies in Pennsylvania and the capture of
Washington by Lee, and force the Ministry to ac-
knowledge the independence of the Confederacy.
We suppose Mr. Johnson has by this time com-
pleted his negociations with Lord Stanley. If
so, we hope Mr. Seward will have the grace to re-
call him. Where is " McCracken" all this time ?
Those who 'opposed Mr. Johnson's appointment,
however, because he is a Democrat, need not at-
tempt to take any comfort from these admissions of
ours about him. He has failed not because he is a
Democrat, but because he is—well, something
which a good many fine young Radicals are also.—
Nation.

The Round Table says :—" Some of the news-
papers have been working themselves into a state
of excitemenc, because Mr. Reverdy Johnson, our
new Minister to England, is behaving himself like
a courteous gentleman there and a statesman who
has gone to get things done, not to get them re-
fused, and because he does not write letters and
make speeches about the people among whom he is
a sojourner, like the " anti-English" diatribes of
the Evening Post or the not dissimilar frothings of
George Francis Train. Surely we have had enough
and to spare of the Pogram and Jefferson Brick
business, whether from the Nation or from papers
less respectable."
The Spirit of the 7 imes begins an article thus :
" When the Senate sent Reverdy Johnson to the
Court of St. James, it committed the terrible mis-
take of supposing that he would represent the Go-
vernment of the United States. Mr. Johnson has
shown that he entirely misunderstands his mission.
lie believes that he is sent to represent the Soutberu
Confederacy, and to protect the rebel interests in
England ; and what he believes he is executing most
faithfully ;" and ends it thus :—" Let the American
Press do as we now do—demand the immediate
recall of Reverdy Johnson for betraying the trust
reposed in him, misrepresenting the interests
of his country, and compromising her honour.
When even a British paper can say that his
charity toward Mr. Laird, who constructed the
Alabama, applies equally to the pirate Semmes
who sailed her, our own journals should not be
silent. Congress should be called upon to act at
once. Its first business in the next session should
be to pass a vote of want of confidence in this
twaddling old man, who is now spinning on Lord
Stanley's thumb, while friendly fillips from Laird
and Roebuck keep him revolving in ecstacy. At
his latest banquet, the third or fourth in Liverpool
—and he seems to have done nothing else in Eng-
land but eat public dinners and write protocols at
desert—Reverdy Johnson said that he was ready
to accept the censure of his countrymen with Chris-
tian resignation. That is not the kind of resigna-
tion we demand."

The Springfield Republican remarks :--" All true
Americans, both at home and abroad, are disgusted
with Mr. Johnson's course since he has been in
England, particularly his allowing himself to be in-