Daily Nashville patriot. [volume] (Nashville, Tenn.) 1860-1862, 1861-10-16
Vampires.

So outrageous and graspiEg have specula-
lions recently become in the country among
tradesmen and adventures, that the Execu-
tive of our Stale has been forced to recon-
mend stringent legislation on the subject to
the General Assembly, now convened at
Nashville. The reasons given for imposing
restraint upon the custom by legal enact
ment. as presented in the message we pub
lished on yesterday, are quite plausible, and
certainly deserve the most careful considera-
ton at the bands of our public legislators.
The laws of trade, depending solely upon
supply and demand, are so simple, that in
ordinary times tampering with them by leg
islaton would be universally regarded as
impoitic, not to say indefensible. But at a
crisis like the present, when the very exist
ence of our young republic is at stake, and
hungry vampires, unmoved by an instinct Of
patriotism, aud bent only on the satisfaction
of their own rapacious appetites, are sapping
the very life-blood of the government by
monopolies and eXtortfons, the question as
sumes an entirely different aspect.
If public opinion cannot put down this in
famous system, which has obtained among
a large number of unconscious scoundrels,
it is time for the strong arm of Government
to be brought to bear upon it. We must ac-
knowledge that the step is exceedingly dan
gerous at any time, unless regulated by pru-
duce and wisdom of rare character, and in
taking it, the Legislature should be careful
to keep one distinction constantly in mind.
A difference must be made between mercan-
Tile transactions where bona fide sales take
place at mar ket prices, and cases where pro-
fessional spectators are holding large stores
of goods, merchandise and provisions, wait
ing for an advance in price, and refusing
absolutely to make any sales at present what
ever.
u w IF
~ DAY hiding away under lock and key such
necessary articles of food as coffee, pork,
sait ETC., used daily by our army, with the
expectation of realizing on them ten times
their original cost. Men in this city have
been at this sordid and misery work, caring
little doubtless who conquers in this war,
provided only they can get ten dollars a sack
for salt which cost them one, or fifty cents
for pork that cost one-siXth OF that amount.
THIS class of gentry-we mean the dilatory
kind that are holding on with a deadly
clutch, waiting like MICAwBER for something
to ''turn up"-should receive the especial
attention Of the Legislature. They are as in-
sensible TO the modification of popular odium
as a rhinoceros hide TO a stroke from an or
binary horsewhip, and, of course, cannot be
Influenced in the slightest degree by mere
exposition of their infamy at the hands of a
journalist. Tufts of grass Will fail to bring
them down from the tree they have climbed.
Missiles OF heavier character must be used.
But there is another view of the subject,
which will do well to attract the attention of
the General Assembly, involving the adop-
ton of an entirely different policy towards
these bloated vampires. 1t is TO let them
quietly continue to hoard aud hold on to their
accumulated stores, 10 the capacity of trus-
tees for the government. When the army
shall stand in want of these necessares, and
find it impossible to obtain them elsewhere,
government can order them to be seized and
appropriated to its own use, paying the own
ers a reasonable price for the labors of their
agency, aud a profit that falls considerably
short of their own unconScionahle calcula-
TONS There can b. no doubt about the fact
that this course, on the part of the govern
ment, will be fully justified by public opin-
ion, tor if resorted to at all, it will be- done
with great reluctance. Bat grasping monop-
olists, who are dissatisfied with any profit on
investments, falling short of five or six hun
dred per cent, had better take warning in
time, and ''save their bacon.'
The policy of the Confederate authorities
thus far, in scrupulously observing every lit
tie constitutional technicality however inSig-
nificant, shows their laudable spirit of for
bearance and Cancellation towards conspirA-
tors of all kinds, mercantile, finasciaI and
poiiiIOai' Dus VIC PiotAPeiHSo VI p1uio
ism fail, sell interest will induce these parties
not to go beyond their tether lines, remem-
boring that there is limit beyond which this
forbearance will cease to be a virtue. The
of our national liberty upon u
safe and permanent basis is the goal towards
which we direct our concentrated energies,
and no dishonest schemes of spectators and
extortionists can be allowed for one moment
10 circumvent or Illustrate this great and
glorious consummation.-Mtmp appeal.