The Sun.
London, England, 1868-11-23 00:00:00

211:R. REVERDY JOHNSCcY AT BRIGHTON.

Mr. d onnson, tne American Minister, Las again neen
saying sweet things and pleasant to the people of Brighton.
He was entertained at a banquet on Saturday evening.
He declared that he had replied to so many compliments
that he had not the words to reply to more. After con-
gratulating Brighton on the position it had taken on
many American subjects, he went on to announce again
the settlement of all disputes between this country and
his own. After speaking of the two other questions, he
took up the Alabama claims:—" Those claims almost made
me wish we never had a State called by that name. There
were two questions involved in the point. The first was
the right of your Government to recognise, at the early
period they did, the Southern Confederation as belligerent.
The second was, if the Confederation were belligerent, did
your Government exercise due and proper vigilance, as
neutrals, to guard against your citizens or otters violating
the obligations of your neutrality ? If either is decided
in favour of the United States, I know, and every-
thing I have seen and heard since I came to England
assures me, that no people in either country will I e more
satisfied than the people of England. If it is settled in
favour of your Government, I know the honour of icy
own people so well as to be satisfied that they, too, will
be contented. But, I say this in friendship—l have
hinted it to Lord Stanley, that if I wasa British statesman
and had the power exclusively in my own hand, I would
pay every dollar of the Alabama claims et once ;
because the principle which will be established if there
is no such payment will be a principle which in the
future may operate most injuriously, and, in regard to com-
merce, most fatally to England. In case of war between
your country and any other, every sea being covered by
your commerce, the wealth almost of the world being
carried under your flag, you would be open to the opera-
tion of any freebooter who might receive a commission
from any neutral nation, and then your loss, I mean the
loss in money—l will not say in character, for your
character you can never lose—the loss in money will
quadruple what you would lose if you paid every dollar
of the claims known as the Alabama claims. You have a
question here about disestablishment, with which, of
course, it is not my province to deal. But we have dis-
established an establishment which our common ancestry
founded in America, and we have disendowed it, too, of
an endowment granted by the same common ancestors.
We have done away with the establishment of slavery. We
have disendowed it of the only endowment ever granted it,
and for which our common fathers are equally responsible.
We have made the negroes to he as God and nature—if we
are permitted at all to indulge in scrutinising the purposes
of God and nature—intended they should be—Christians.
Your Premier, Mr. Mayor, whom I knew long ago by
reading a portion of what, perhaps, he now wishes he had
never given his pen to—but which, perhaps, will
live longer than statesmanship—in a speech delivered
the other day, admirable in its tone, felicitous in its
language, patriotic in its spirit, ventured to say—he had
indulged, I think, altogether his powers of imagination—
that the Englishman had more liberty than the native of
any country in the world. If my right hon. friend will
honour the United States by paying them a visit, he will
see, the first moment he lands on our shores—and if he
doubts it then, will become more and more assured of it
during every day of his residence—that perhaps there are
no people in the world who have more liberty than the
people of the United States ; and if he can say that the
people of England enjoy more liberty, all I have to say is
this, that the sooner it is taken away from them the better.
Others not only have liberty, but they take all sorts of
liberties with all sorts of people."
The Hon. R. JOHNSON subsequently proposed " The
tlayor and Corporation of Brighton." He had deemed
the naming of George Peabody in his previous speech
unnecessary ; but as his friend had been named, he would
say that the name of George Peabody was deeply engraven
on every English and American heart, and will be from
age to age engraven on the hearts of all who axe to follow.
For princely munificence, for the liberal disposition of his
wealth earned by laborious industry and by wise and dis-
creet conduct, he stands almost without a parallel in the
annals of benevolence, and so long as time shall last the
benefit of his munificence will be felt in this country and
in America.