St. Johnsbury Caledonian. [volume] (St. Johnsbury, Vt.) 1867-1919, 1889-04-04


Westminster Abbey America ought
to wear mourning for him also, be
cause, in her darkest hours, when the
Union was trembling in the balance,
and when the councils of foreign
powers were inclining to the support
of the Confederacy, his voice, all po-
tent with the then rising democracy
of England, was heard in our behalf.
Joined with him were the two others
named, among the greatest intellects
of the time, and these three men stem
med the tidei in English opinion which
was setting against us.
We cannot know positively what
might have taken place if Golden,
Bright, and Mill had not lived and
taken our part at that crisis. We
that the Queen was on our side also,
and that the Queen had and exercised
more political power a quarter of a
century ago than she has now. What
we do know is that the influence of
the governing classes was almost
wholly adverse to us, and that this
influence was cOuntervailed in large
part by the non-voting democracy,
whose leader and apostle was John
Bright. Must it be acknowledged
that we have never rightly appre-
ciated the services of these three great
friends in our hour of need? 1t hap
pened that Golden and Bright were
the especial champions of free trade,
and that we were welded to an OPP
posing doctrine. Itcannot be denied
that our prOtectiOniSm drew scales
over our eyes and obscured the tran
scendent merits and services of these
our friends. We never saw all that
they did for us. We never apprecia-
ted the sufferings of the workingmen
in English factories who sided with
Golden and Bright when their wives
and children were famishingf for want
of the cotton that our blockade kept
from them. We saw plainly enough
the ill-will of Liverpool. We did not
see the self-sacriicing steadfastness
of Manchester The workingmen's
convention that resolved, amid scenes
of penury and almost of despair, that
the cause of the North was the cause
of human rights, and that it must be
sustained though the heavens should
fall, was, if not the work of John
Bright, the work that he most pow
erfully contributed to and most dear
ly loved. Therefore ought America
to wear mourning for him, and there
fore will America hold him in warm
affection and higher esteem as the
years roll on. Westminster Abbey
may receive him and bury him by the
side of Chatham, but there is no place
where he will receive more honor III
coming generations than in the
United States of America. His speech
es will become household words and
schOOlbOy themes, like those of the
great orator who preceded him and
who fought for our ancestors as he
did for us
But .Jonn Bright's part in the strug
gle of 1868 was only a single cpl
sOde in a great career. 1t was an in
cident in his public life. 1t was such
an incident as we were led to expect
by the other things he had done He
had built up a great name. He had
established a reputation SO that all
men might reasonably predict that
he would be found on the side of the
enslaved and oppressed in any crisis,
in any part of the world, if his voice
and example could be of use. All his
years-he was then just turned fifty,
and in the height of his splendid ora
torical pOwers-he had given to the
emancipation of his country1nen from
another sort of enslavement The
masses of the English people were
held in bondage to the landlords by
a tax on the importation of bread.
Every man was required to contrib
ute part of his earnings to the sup
port of q protected class. The many
were taxed for the benefit OF the few,
as they are now in some countries
that we need not name. At the age
of thirty Mr.. Bright entered the lists
against this panOplied wrong. He
took the high moral ground that the
Corn Laws were a crime against hu-
man nature, an infamous conspiracy
against the rights of man. THE
time has COME he said, when we
must no longer look upon this infa-
nous law as mistake on the part of
the aristocracy and the landowners
it was no mistake, it was no acct
dent, chance had nothing to do with
tit was crime of the deepest dye
against the rights of industry and
against the well-being of the British
people, and
Not all that heralds rake from coffn'd clay,
Nor fiorid prose, nor honied lies of rhyme,
Can blazon evil deeds or consecrate a crime
With such words as these he went
on stirring the consciences of men,
while his fellow-worker, Golden,
pointed out the economical loss and
endless folly of protection. Together
they battled until Englishmen were
emancipated, and when the way was
open for another emancipation of a
different kind in a different hemis-
phere, these two were again side by
side in the way we have already
shown. Such men light the path of
human progress, and although their
bodies perish their light never goes
ont New Nnrl, EuenIru Post