Daily Nashville patriot. [volume] (Nashville, Tenn.) 1860-1862, 1861-09-21

sfve Exaetfons.
newspapers were passed by Congress at its
late session:
SECTION L. The Congress of Confederate
Ststes of America do enact, That persons en-
gagged as dealers in newspapers and periodi-
GALS may receive by mail any quantity Of
such papers and periodicals as they may ord
er. on the payment at the place of delivery,
at the same rate of postage as is required by
the existing law to be paid by the regular
subscribers to such newspapers or periodi-
Gals.
SEC. 2. 1t shall be lawful for persons en-
gagged in buying and selling newspapers and
periodicals, to carry any quantity of such
papers and periodicals over the post roads of
the Confederate States, outside of the mail.
upon preparing the postage at the same rate
charged to regular subscribers to such pa
pers and periodicals into the post Office near
est the place of publication or purchase there
of; and such prepayment shall be indicated
by the stamp of such post Office or by writing
upon the paper SO sent.
SEC. g. Any person violating the provi-
sions of this act shall forfeit and pay the sum
of fifty dollars, to be recovered by action of
debt in the name and for the use of the Con-
tolerate States.
NAPPAOFOAT 1oSUss u, 1oOl-
SECTION 1. The Congress OF the Confede-
rate States OF America do enact, That the
word 1.-The" where it last occurs in the second
section OF said act. be, and the same is hereby,
stricken cut. and the word seaeh" substitute
ed in its stead
. Approved, September 8, 1861
If We are correctly informed these laws
were enacted at the instance of the Post Mas
ter General. Who voted for or against them
we have no means of knowing, as Congress sat
with closed doors. We trust that no mem
Der from Tennessee supported them. They
are behind the spirit of the age; an oppres-
of revenue derived through their operations,
it were unworthy of the government to col
lect as fax upon the dissemination of intel
ligence. How it affects our VOLUNTEERED, can
be seen by reading the following extract from
the Richmond Examiner:
The outrage thus inflicted upon the people
of the South by this brutal suppression of the
news is only equalled by the tax nUw infct-
ed upon the soldiers in the camps for the
newspapers they read. Are the public pre-
pared to believe that the carriers who distri-
butte newspapers among the soldiers encamp-
ed at any distance from our cities, have first
to purchase them of newspaper offices, and
then to pay the amount of the purchase mo-
ney a second time to the Post-Office Depart
ment before being allowed to transmit them
upon the railroads? The agent who sends
thousand papers from any Richmond office
to Manassas must first pay twenty dollars for
them at the printing office. and then pay
twenty dollars to the post-Offce before they
can be sent to the army. A greater hard
ship even than the extOrtion of this sum Is
the requirement that the papers shall be
stamped before transmitted; this delay it
self hazarding the transmission of the papers
at all.
The consequence of the arrangement is,
that whereas, before the post-office levied
this extortionate tax of two cents, the carrier
codld afford to sell newspapers to soldiers
for five cents, he is now compelled to demand
ten cents; the astual cost of the paper, deliv-
cred at the camps, being more than i've cents.
Thus the soldier who wishes to spend the
leisure hours of his time in camp, in reading
the latest newspapers, is Obliged to pay three
dollars each month, out OF his eleven dollars
of pay, for the very harmless recreation.
He is compelled to pay dollar and half
more per month for his newspaper, in order
that the post-office may reap the wretehed
pittance of sixty cents.
The public are aware that in all countries
in the civilized world, except the Confeder-
ate States, newspapers in the mass, intended
for general sale, are transmitted as freight
on the railroads, without any postage tax.
If the finances of the Confederacy were on
their last legs, it might be excused to this ex-
traordnary circumstance, that tax should
DE levied upon their Transmission on the rail-
roads, though this is done at no cost at all to
the Government. But when the POst-Ofice
Department demands the whole price and
cost of the newspaper as a mere gratuity;
demands as much for allowing the railroads
to transmit them at their own cost. as any
large printing establishment, conducted at
great cost, receives for their manufacture,
the folly of the thing, not to call it an out
rage, appears SO monstrous and disgraceful
as to inspire feeling of profound contempt
for the Depar tment which proposed and en-
forces the measure. 1t is bad enough that
the Governments great office of intelligence
should seem to devote its faculties to the sup
preston of information; but when it assumes
TO demand the whole cost of newspaper
the leading and most costly agency of intel
ligence-in gratuity, for merely allowing the
railroads to carry it at their own expense.
its disqualification is melancholy.