New Orleans daily crescent. [volume] ([New Orleans, La.]) 1851-1866, 1866-05-19

crate States, and ending with such persons rs may
have been guilty Of lawless crueIties to
Union soldiers and sailors" The bill says moth
ing about the exclusion of such persons as may
have baen guilty Of "lawless cruelties" to Con-
federste prisoners; but suppose that this is be
cause no crueltes practised on Confederate prs-
oners could, in the opinion of the committee, have
been lawless. These gentlemen think it is lawful
to hang and exile "rebes " after the restoration
of peace forti0rj it could not have been law
less to treat "rehels y with cruelty in time oil
war.
These bills, as we have said, complete the
scheme of reconstruction. Just about the Time
that TIE plan is contaminated, by the nounoauon
to Thaddeus Stevens of the political hari-karl OF
the Southern States, involved in their acceptance
of the proposed amendments, we expect to near
that a tunnel has been constructed under the
Atlantic that Sumner has become wise and
magnanimous statesman and that New England
has begun to mind her own business.
Vt
MONOPOLY IN OCEAN NAvIGATIoN.-We see it
stated that authentic information has beenreceived
that the British government has notified the
Cunard Company, that the mail subsidy will be
Withdrawn from the line on the termination of the
present contract, which expires next year. Thus
another blow has been given to the protective
system. The mail subsidy, since it always far ex.
ceeded a reasonable amount of compensation for
carrying the mails was nothing more nor less than
a bounty, which could have no other effect than
that of establishing and maintaining monopolies
in the hands Of particular steamship companies.
The pretenee that steamships cannot be run with
ont these bountes is entirely faacious and it has
been exposed by experience whenever trade JUS
tifed the establishment of steamship lines. The
real object was to create monopolies by cutting
offcompetition. Thus the public was the sufferer
instead of being the beneficiary as must alwaysbe
the case under this false and pernicious system Of
protection-whether it be developed in the shape
of restrictive laws prohibitory taxation or direct
bounties,
For some time, we believe, the mail subsidy
system has been abandoned in this country, The
post bfice department, few years ago, adopted
the plan of encouraging self.sustaining ocean
steamship service, based on postage earnings.
Post Master General Dennson is jealous defen-
der and supporter of this system, and thereby
shows that he has imbibed the true idea to GER
| tain extent, The existing system is however, not
entirely free from the Objectionable features of
protection and from the deleterious intrusion Of
| the protective spirit. 1t would have been much
better TO adopt the free trade view at once, in all
its extent and bearings, by permitting all steam
ships to carry the mails and paying them for the
actual service performed, at its real value. Even
when the compensation is restricted to qudrt'aa
a,,erit and is thus relieved from its Objectionable
character as bounty, it is protection to the
extent that competingIines do not enjoy the same
privileges. However the present plan is vast
improvement on the maisubsidy system and it
possesses a great advantage in strengthening the
post master general in his opposition to the yari
GUS speculative and lobbying schemes which are
pressed on the attention Of Congress by persons
who are longing to get hold of rich monopolies
The withdrawal Of the subsidy by the British gov
eminent from the Cunard line, deprives the monop-
olists of their last argument