Year: 1871


CONGRESS Yesterday - Steamship subsjdy


hiiis-Tas Military Academy DiGlculties.


The Senate yesterday, as IL by way Of va
riety, devoted itself to practical legislation.
There is no subject in which the people Of this
city particularly and the people of the whole
seaboard Of the United States, have deeper
interest than in the revival of our commerce:
and yot, with degree of ignorance or care
lessness strangely at variance with the pros-
parity Of that interest and with the policy Of
all other enlightened nations, our government
has paid ne attention whatever to that most
important subject. We are within about a
fortnight Of the termination Of the Forty-fr
Congress, and with the exception Of the closA
ing hour of the last session, when IN the tur-
mol and confusion incident to adjournmeut
there was a fruitess attempt made to legislata
for the benefit Of our shipping and commercial
interests, itmay be truthfully said that Con-
gress has paid no attention whatever to che
question OF revival of American commerce.


This neglect Is the more oulpabIe when tho
frivolous matters over which the time Of Con-
gress has been FILTERED away are taken into
consideration, as, for instance, the Senate
spending the whole of Mondays session over
the question Of an official oath of Senator.
and the House spending the whole of yes
tcrday's session over contested election Case
which had been already decided and over q
squabble of schoolboys with which It should
never have interfcred. But at last the Senate
did yesterday take up the subject of our COM
merclal interests, and did something in the way
of revival Of commerce. 1t discussed and
passed, by vote Of twenty-four to twenty, a
bill for the establishment Of a semi-monthly
mail steamship service between New Orleans.
Galveston aud the ports Of Mexico. BY the
terms of the bill the Postmaster General is
authorized to make contract for the carrying
of the mails on that route. The company il
to supply, within eighteen months, three first
class iron steamships of not less than
fifteen hundred tons burden, built so as
to be easily convertible into ships for
war purposes. The contract is to be linn
tied TO ten years, and the annual compensa-
tion to the company is to be limited to one
hundred thousand dollars, besides q reason
able allowance for any pioaeer vessels that
may be placed on the line during the next
eighteen months, or until the contract really
commences. The Post Office Committee of
the Senate has also agreed to recommend an
appropriation in the Post Office Appropriation
bill to double the service and the compensa-
between San Francisco, China and Japan.
We hope that these too-long deferred efforts
may not prove abortive by means Of factious
opposition in the House of Representatives.
We know that the idea Of subsidies is repug-
nant to a very large class of people in Con-
our mind to the proposition that without
liberal subsidies we shall never again see the
American flag floating from the steamships of
any American ocean steamship company. The
amount that would be drawn from the Trea-
sury for the purpose of fostering such enter
prise would be returned tenfo!d in the addi-
tional wealth that would be poured into the
country through the development of our trade
and commerce, and we hope that the stigma
will cease to be attached to our republican
government that it is the only enlightened
government which refuses to aid its citizens or
subjects In extending their steamship enter
prises to al! parts Of the globe.


Several other masters of minor interest wefS
attended to in the Senate yesterday. A House
bill, to pay five thousand dollars to George r.
Robinson, in recognition of his services in saw
ing Secretary Seward from assassination. in
April, 1865, was passed. Adverse reports
were made on the House bill remitting
duties on imported articles donated TO fairs
and disposed of for the benefit of destitute
citizens of France, on the ground that it would
be practically impossible TO execute such
law, aud on the House bill authorizing the
Secretary Of State to have the bodies of United
States ministers and consuls who died abroad
conveyed back to and inferred in the United
States, on the ground that it would be pre-
cedent in like cases fot all time to come.


In the House, as we have already intimatad,
the whole Of yesterdays session was COM
pletely wasted. FIRST, two hours Of it were
occupied in talking over contested election
case, after IT had been air lady decided by
vote OF the House; then three hours more
were consumed in discussing the measure Of
punishment to be inflicted on some schoolboys
a. the West Point Military Academy, who had
committed an act Of folly under the stimulus Of
high and honorable feeling; and. finally,
the hours of a night session we're devoted
to the senseess absurdity of letting few
members read to empty chairs snl deserted
galleries essays, studiously prepared, on
different topics, and which might jnst as well
have been banded in to the reporters for
publication In the Congressional Globe.
ssBehold,' said the Swedish statesman, ''.i.h
what little wisdom tie world ia governeai'


Tho Snaw S.csM-Tie STREETS.