NP, AP 2/27/1863

From the Athens (Tenn.) Post
 
February 27, 1863
 
Letter of Maj. Campbell Wallace
President E. T. & Ga. R. R.
 
Office East Tenn. & Ga. R. R. Co.
Knoxville, Feb. 10, 1863
 
Hon. John H. Reagan
Postmaster General, C. S. A.
Richmond, Va.
 
Dear Sir,
   In view of the difficulties in the way of Congress making appropriations out of the Confederate Treasury for the support of the Post Office Department after March, and aware of the great reduction of mail facilities that must take place after that time, in order to make the department self-sustaining, as required by the Constitution, I suggest that it would be proper for Congress to limit the price to be paid to railroad companies for carrying the mails to fifty dollars per mile, commencing the first of April, and to continue until the end of the year and no longer.
   I am satisfied that the railroad companies of the Confederate States would cheerfully acquiesce in such a law rather than the people should be restricted in their postal facilities. I would make the rate uniform -- giving to all the roads the fifty dollars per mile, as it is not so much the weight of the mails carried that enters into the cost of the transportation as it is the preparation for the work, and that expense is about the same per mile, to the 2d and 3d class roads, as it is to the first. For instance, this company, under your classification is receiving one hundred and fifty dollars per mile, while some other roads, carrying lighter mails, but at an equal expense, receive only one-third of that sum. I do not wish to be understood as intimating that the price now paid first-class roads for mail service is too much. On the contrary, my experience in many years of railroad management, has been that often I would gladly have given up the mail contract, rather than adopt schedules which were necessary for mail facilities, when I knew that such schedules would lose the company in local travel five dollar for every one received from the Government for carrying the mail.
   But our Government is now in its infancy. This is the day of our trial, and from many years' intercourse with the gentlemen who control the railways in the Confederate States, I do not feel that I am hazarding much when I say that you will find them, without exception, acquiescing in such a law, not grudgingly, but cheerfully. The result to the finances of the Post Office Department, while not bearing heavily on the roads, would, according to the figures in your report, be a saving of not less than a half million of dollars per annum on your present contracts, which saving will be much greater when the Confederate States will have reclaimed her railroads and extended her mail facilities in territory now overrun by the Federals.
   In this connection, I would respectfully suggest that you withdraw your recommendation to increase the rate of newspaper postage, and the suggestion to tax printing establishments with postage on their exchanges. I cannot well conceive of any one thing that would be more disastrous to the prosperity of our young Republic than any action of Congress lessening the facilities for furnishing the people with information, or trammeling the operations of those engaged in preparing, in suitable form, that information for the people. The press has been everything to us in this crisis, and should not, in my opinion, be placed alongside with the ordinary industrial pursuits of the country. Its mission is to elevate man -- its work is with the intellect, and in proportion as you foster a virtuous, free press, you build up a virtuous free people, and make them strong to defend that freedom. The history of the world does not furnish evidence that ever before has the press been more free from personality and a tendency to licentiousness, in times of either peace or war, than it has been in the Confederate States for the last two years, and never before has a government been more ably and patriotically sustained by the press.
   Give newspaper publishers then, every needed facility for cheap transportation. They have not advanced their prices in proportion to their increased expenditures. Newspapers to circulate freely and widely must be cheap -- cheap in price -- cheap in postage -- like salt, the consumption is in proportion to the cost -- cheap salt creates a large consumption, and hogs, horses, cattle, sheep and bacon always give unmistakable evidence of the advantages of cheap salt. So with the mind -- the man. Give communities the advantages of cheap books -- cheap newspapers -- cheap mail facilities and you will always reap a rich reward in good morals and a highly cultivated people -- willing to sacrifice all else than the right to govern themselves, and herein lies the strength and power and success of the Confederate States in this unnatural and terrible war.
Truly your friend,
C. Wallace

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