The Birmingham age-herald., 1908-05-27
GOVERNOR JOHNSON
 IS GIVEN AN OVATION
CONTINUED ON PAGE so

recent Alabama campaign In the be- ginning, he stated that his oration con tained nothing that was new. He ad- mitted that he had gathered his data from the books"
 "Therefore," he affirmed, with the pleasantest of smiles, while really envying myself this great pleasure. I pity you from the depths of my heart
 He declared his regard for the Uni versity of Alabama. My pleasure" he declared, "in appearing before the alumni of this great institution of learn ing which, 25 years prior to the for nation of the great commonwealth of Minnesota, was giving statesmen to our country, is the most profound
 Governor Conner referred to Governor Johnson one of the present day he- roes. believing in the inalienable rights of man, and the rights of states and one who will fight for these ideas to the last ditch. During his Introduction Governor Conner, in an indirect fash ion, paid his compliments to the rail- roads, the trusts and to predatory wealth.
 Gov. Johnson's Speech.
 Governor Johnson read from manu- script, the subject of his oration being. Land Marks of American Liberty" In describing land marks of American liberty, he reverted to 1500 years be- fore the discovery of America, be- cause, he said, American liberty was cradled in the German wilderness. Anglo Saxon freedom had come down through the centuries to the popular assemblies which decide the issues of peace in the American government of today. Freedom is no accident, tut the product of character on the one 1. -f blood and sacrifice on the other. On are victories and all else is vain par leying with the inevitable. Roman inn perialism snuffed out for time tho torch of liberty, but like an averaging Nemesis the countless hordes swept down from the Alps, from the Rhine and the Elbe upon the corruption and inherent weakness of the Roman em- pire. And if you seek the original birthplace of those other institutions of American liberty-the Declaration of Independence, the Monroe Doctrine and the Proclamation of Emancipation-l will point you to a Bethlehem which borders on the north sea-"
 Governor Johnson recounted the progress of the development of liberty during the first 10 centuries of English history, giving due credit to those re- forms which are of German and Scan dinavian origin. From the period of the Norman conquest English history was found to be a continuous struggle between a people accustomed to local government and a ruler imbued with the Roman idea of the strong inn perial government with out charter linn itations or popular restraint "Mp gna Charta, the Petition of Right and the Bill of Rights constitute" the speaker said, lis the Old Testament of the American constitutions" Eighty years after Magma Charta came the Writ of Summons and the establishment of the commons. The administration of Ed ward I fixed the principle of mo tDX- ation without representation" the rock upon which five centuries later stood the Americans of 1776. Three centuries later Charles was compelled to grant the petition of right and when the King violated his compact arose Oli- yer Cromwell with his Agreement of the People and Lambert's Instrument of Government, and while these consti- tutions were never made operative in Great Britain they eventually became the groundwork of the Colonial char ters and their basic ideas re-appear in American institutions. The habeas corpus act of 1879 is a landmark of
 
 almost every written constitution on the globe and it's violation one of tn e chief grounds for the indictment of George III by the signers of our Declar- ation. The Bill of Rights establishes the ancestry of the Declaration of In dependence as running back through English common law and Anglo Saxon institutions 20 centuries and forever disproves the latter day sophistry ..-I,I ,IAI. ~1. 4l. ciples of 1776 are ephemeral sentiments without abiding character.
 Aspiration for Freedom.
 ''The great fact which stands out sharp and clear throughout the history of Euro pean migration to America IS a dominant and universal aspiration for freedom The Puritans brought with them not only a great purpose but the most progressive thought, the greatest principles and the truest time-tested institutions of the old world and the ages. They brought with them the town meeting, and today as in all time the purest form of what Lincoln described as government of the people, by the people and for the people,. From the beginning the government in America meant to ali practical purposes self-go.- crnment. If the colonial charters reserved certain powers to the nome government ia Europe, these powers were as a rule mere ly nominal; paper powers dead from lack of eXercse.
 The speaker then pointed out the de- yeiopment of this representative form of government m the various colonies, and the determination of the colonies to re- sist any and all attempted abridgement of the rights yielded to their ancestors by the English throne. The English king and his Tory majority, the speaker said, did not recede from the position that they had powers outside of the consttu- ton until Cornwalis surrendered his sword to Washington at Yorktown five years after the Fundamental maxims were proclaimed in the declaration of ndepen- dence.
 And yet" the speaker exclaimed, "how strangely history repeats itself Today after the lapse of a century and a gener- ation since the ratific4tioa of the prin- ciples Of '76 on the battiefields of the American revolution alrer nearly cen tury since these principles were again rati- fled in blood Tn the second war of inde- Pendence, after nearly q half century since the maxims were further ratified enforced and extended at such fearful cost or life and treasure in the civil war, and the thirteenth, fourteenth and fifteenth constitutional amendments, we are told that these principles are of no binding force and that they have no authority which government at Washington IS bound in its sovereign pleasure to recog- toll hnf n d.,,