Nashville union and American. [volume] (Nashville, Tenn.) 1853-1862, 1859-12-16
rae Lsel.latlve Un.sn ana Anerle@n--

rhe Legislative UnIon and AneEIean--
Oar Reporter for the House.
We regret exceedingly that our Reporter for the
House has failed to give entire satisfaction the
members of that body. Complaints have come to us
from gentlemen of both parties, and we dc not sup
pose that any charge made of unarness in polit
cal sense. Inaccuracies Language will occasion
ally occur with the best reporters-it is the case
in Congress-but these can always be corrected by
the sggreved party calling attention to the fact The
principal ground of complaint is not without
foundation, and that should be corrected, but work
ing much to prejudice as to the prejudice of
members.
To remedy this evil, better understanding be-
tween the publishers of our legislative paper and
the members of the House is essentially necessary
We discover from the published remarks of the rep
resentstve from williamson and from conversations
with other gentlemen, that an erroneous impression
has been made upon their minds to the character
Of our undertaking, and what they were author.
lied to expect of us. In the prospectus which we
laid before the public, and before the members of
the two Houses of the General Assembly. we pro
posed to print Legislative paper devoted exclu-
sively to the publication of impartial Legislative re-
ports, and official State documents"-referring to
the paper issued by us from this Office two years
ego as a specimen of what those reports would be
We intended nothing more and promised nothing
more. 1t was an unauthorized inference, there
FORE to suppose that intended anything approach
ing to full report of the discussions on the floor
To have Undertaken what some gentlemen seem
to think was intended by would have cost thous-
ands of dollars more than the small pittancc which
we receive for our labor. 1t would have required
volume equal almost in size TO the COngression-
al Debates Our desire was to give faithful report
of the actual proceedings had, and brief synopsis
of the debates upon important questions nothing
more. We trust that members viii be no longer
deceived in this particular, and that in future they
wilnot consider themselves entitled to be reported
in full in legislative paper, they have no right
to ask nor the ability to grant any such favor.
jut an error has been committed -innOcently, no
loubt, the part Of oar reperter-by preparing
for gentlemen at their instance, permitting them
prepare for themselves, lengthy reports of their
speeches an inserting them in the regular proceed
ys which not only did injustice to us by imposing
Al IN lue amount of matter and expense on US, but
ausiice to those who have sought to be fully
r. ,orted For instance, he has given in our paper
= lengthy report of the speech of the member from
Williamson in opposition to the Free Negro bill'
Neither that gentleman, nor any other gentleman of
the House, had the right to claim, by virtue of
agreement publishers of the Legislative paper,
the labor and expense to which it subjected u.s. and
in future they need not expect it. 1t would be unjust
to ourselves and unjust to other members less IA
Vored. The appearance of such speeches in our pa
per has been by courtesy, and not by right.
So far the columns of the UNION AND AMERICAN
are concerned the matter is entirely different 1t is
pOlical paper, and publish just such matter as
we think proper. 1t is organ of the Democratic
party other papers in the city are organs of the
Opposition party Our political friends have claims
upon u.s. and it will afford great pleasure to print
their speeches whenever we can find room for them
and they choose to write them out or employ others
to report them for us. The duties and response
bilities Of the UNION AND AMERICAN newspaper are
separate and distinct from those of our legislative
Journal and we trust gentlemen will do US the jus
tice to recognise this distinction.
We have endeavored to discharge our duty faith
fully to the Legislature, and if have in the least
failed, ii has been as much at our own expense as
theirs, and is much their fault as ours We re-
peat now what we stated at the opening of the ses
sion, that we have not undertaken to publish this
paper with any hope of pecuniary reward but
laudbe enterprise that should enttle Us to the kind
consideration and thanks of the Legislature We
would very gladly transfer to that body all the pc
cuniary consideration we receive from it, if they
would only consent to foot the expense With this ex-
PLANTATION shall make increased efforts to comply
fully with promise, trusting to the fairness of
III imperial gentlemen to do us simple Justice We
lsk for nothing more.