The New York Herald

THE CONGRESS PRINTING--A HALF-WAY JOB.

The Select Committee of the House of Representatives, have, at length, reported a plan for the printing of Congress, which is as follows:-

First, to repeal the present contract system. Secondly, the election of a public printer, who is to execute the printing, not only of Congress, but for the Executive Departments. Thirdly, the appointment of a superintendent of printing, to stand between the public printer and the government, to see that the work is neatly and expeditiously done, and to exercise a general supervision over the subject. The price to be paid for type-setting, about twenty per cent below the prices of 1849, and the government to furnish the white paper.

This is a little bit better than the old party jobbing system--a little better than the present bungling contract system; but still it is only a half-way piece of work. It will be an easy matter for the superintendent and the printer elected, to jog along together and divide the spoils. The superintendent must be honest far beyond the average of the political bucksters at Washington, to avoid the temptations to a corrupt collusion with the printer. Why, then, does Congress not make a clean breast of it at once, establish a national printing office on the plan we have heretofore indicated, and thus save the treasury from one to two hundred thousand dollars every year, besides having their work done promptly and in superior style? They will have to come to it in another year or so. There is no other alternative for a satisfactory execution of the work, and the suppression of the corruptions of the old jobbing system with the party organs.

The democratic majority, however, appear to be anxious to give the Union a plum. Under Gen. Armstrong it has scarcely had even a smell of the flesh pots of the treasury. But there seems to be considerable apprehension that the free soilers and secessionists, co-operating with the whigs, will lay out General Armstrong as flat as they did Major Donelson. It is certainly very hard that the democrats cannot agree upon an organ, or that the only organ they have in Washington should languish for want of a little treasury pap, and in the midst of the necessities of a Presidential canvass. But if the majority of the two houses can't agree upon a printer, it is to be hoped that, for once, consulting the public interest, they will agree upon a printing office. There is always some hope of public justice in a party squabble over the spoils.