WATCH THE WASTE PAPER.
One of the postal regulations (sect. 217) is as follows:—
“The postmaster, or one of his assistants, in all cases, immediately before the office is swept or otherwise cleared of rubbish, is to collect and examine the waste paper which has accumulated therein, in order to guard against the possibility of loss of letters or other mail-matter which may have fallen on the floor or have been intermingled with such waste paper during the transaction of business. The observance of this rule is strictly enjoined upon all postmasters, and its violation will constitute a grave offence. Postmasters should be careful to use, in mailing letters or packets, all wrapping-paper fit to be used again; and the sale of any such paper is strictly forbidden.”
A neglect of this section might lead to serious consequences, inasmuch as letters are continually falling from the tables and trays to the floor, and, unless looked after, would unquestionably find their way to the “waste-bags.”
The proprietor of a paper-mill informed us that one of the girls employed by him in separating the waste paper purchased from postmasters had found several letters, one of which contained $30 in Treasury notes, and another contained a note for $500 and an order to cancel stamp placed upon a note since it was signed, as stamps could not be obtained at the place where the note was signed.
The above letters had been thrown into the waste paper by some careless postmaster or clerks, and sold at two and a half cents per pound; and some other postmaster or clerks have been under suspicion of committing a depredation upon those letters; and had this girl been dishonest they might never have been able to convince the parties interested of their innocence.
This is inexcusable carelessness; and postmasters who read this article should see that they or their clerks are not caught in this way.
SEALING-WAX.
Under no circumstances use sealing-wax for postal purposes. Wax should only be used for letters or documents when a person is anxious to display his seal or coat of arms, or where it may be required for a legal purpose, and only then when they are more effectually secured.
The practice of sealing letters passing more particularly through warm climates with wax is attended with much inconvenience, and frequently with serious injury, not only to the letters so sealed, but to the other letters in the mail, from the melting of the wax and adhesion of the letters to each other. The public are, therefore, recommended in all such cases to use either wafers or gum, and to advise their correspondents in the countries referred to to do the same.
English newspapers—indeed, nearly all European printed matter—come to us sealed with bad wax; and if many of them were not secured by thread, few would ever reach the parties to whom they are addressed.
COMPLAINTS ABOUT MISTAKES.
When complaint is made of letters or newspapers lost, miscarried, or delayed, to furnish information as precise as possible regarding all the facts of the case, and to enclose whatever documents may throw light upon it. The day and hour at which the letter or newspaper was posted, as well as the office at which and the person by whom this was done, should always be stated, and, when possible, the cover or wrapper, in an entire state, should be sent, in order that the place of delay may be ascertained by an examination of the stamps. Cases frequently occur in which complaint is made against the post-office and redress expected, although little or no means of tracing the error and of guarding against a repetition of it is supplied by those who alone are able to do so.
A LAW CASE.
In 1806 a case was tried in the District Court of Maryland, “United States vs. Barney,” which we deem essential to the nature of our work.
“Winchester, J.—The indictment in this case, which charges the defendant with having wilfully obstructed the passage of the public mail at Susquehanna River, is founded on the act of Congress of March, 1799.
“The defendant sets up as a defence and justification of this obstruction of the mail that he had fed the horses employed in carrying the mail for a considerable time, and that a sum of money was due to him for food furnished at and before the time of their arrest and detention.
“On this state of the facts, two questions have been agitated:—
“1st, Whether the right of an innkeeper to detain a horse for his food extends to horses owned by individuals and employed in the transportation of the public mail. And,
“2d, Whether such right extends to horses belonging to the United States, employed in that service.
“The first question involves the consideration of principles of some extent, and to decide correctly on the second it may be necessary to state them generally.
“Lien is generally defined to be a tie, hold, or security upon goods or other things which a man has in his custody, till he is paid what is due to him. From this definition it is apparent that there can be no lien where the property is annihilated or the possession parted with voluntarily and without fraud. 2 Vern. 117; 1 Atk. 234.
“The claim of a lien otherwise well founded cannot be supported if there is—
“1st, A particular agreement made and relied on. Sayer’s Rep. 224; 2 R. A. 92. Or,
“2d, Where the particular transaction shows that there was no intention that there should be a lien, but some other security is looked to and relied upon. 4 Burr. 2223.
“If, therefore, in this case the agreement between the defendant and the public agent actually was that he should be paid for feeding the public horses on as low terms as any other person on the road would supply them, he could not justify detaining the horses; for the particular agreement thus made, and under which the food was furnished, is the foundation of the remedy of the defendant, and it can be pursued in no other manner than upon that agreement. Or, if there was no particular agreement, this case is such that between the defendant and a private owner of horses and carriages employed in transporting the mail I incline to think it could not legally be presumed a lien was ever intended or contemplated. A carrier of the mail is bound not to delay its delivery, under severe penalties; and it can scarcely be supposed that he would expose himself to the penalty for such delay by leaving his horses subject to the arrest of every innkeeper on the road for their food, or that in such case the innkeeper could look to any other security than the personal credit of the owner of the horses for reimbursement. But the law on such a case could be only declared on facts admitted by the parties or found by the jury, and is not now before the court.
“3d, The great question in this case rests on a discrimination between the property of the government and individuals.”
After defining the constitutional rights of the government and its general power to lay and collect taxes, duties, imposts, and excise, to pay the debts and provide for the common defence and general welfare of the United States, and quoting numerous authorities, the judge concludes with the following:—
“A stolen horse found in the mail-stage. The owner cannot seize him.
“The driver being in debt, or even committing an offence, can only be arrested in such way as does not obstruct the passage of the mail.
“These examples are as strong as any which are likely to occur; but even these are not excepted by the statute; and probably considerations of the extreme importance to the government and individuals of the regular transmission of public despatches and private communications may have excluded these exceptions. But whatever may have been the policy which led to the adoption of the law, which the court will not inquire into, it totally prohibits any obstruction to the passage of the mail. It is the duty of the court to expound and execute the law, and therefore I am of opinion and decide that the defendant is not justified.”
POSTAGE-STAMPS.
Connected with stamps, whether used as a currency or for the increase of revenue, there are many curious and interesting circumstances. The idea of producing a revenue by the sale of stamps and stamped paper in America was promulgated almost forty years before its final development in legislative enactment in 1765. Sir William Keith advised the policy as early as 1728. In 1739 the London merchants advised the ministry to adopt the measure, and public writers from time to time suggested various schemes predicated upon the same idea. In 1770, Douglas, in his work on “British America,” recommended the levying of a stamp duty upon all legal writings and instruments. Dr. Franklin regarded the plan favorably, and Governor Sharpe, of Maryland, was confident in 1754 that Parliament would speedily make a statute for raising money by means of stamp duties. Lieutenant-Governor Delancey spoke in favor of it in the New York Assembly in 1755, and the following year Governor Shirley, of Massachusetts, urged Parliament to adopt a stamp tax. The British press urged the measure in 1757, and it was confidently stated that at least three hundred thousand dollars annually might thus be drawn from the colonies without the tax being sensibly felt. The tax bill became a law in 1765 and was repealed in 1766. Had not ministers been deceived by the representations of the stupid and selfish governors in America, it probably would never have been enacted. Those men were frequently too indolent or indifferent to make themselves acquainted with the real temper of the people. Regarding the mass as equally servile as their flatterers, they readily commended that fatal measure which proved the spark that lighted the flame of the Revolution and severed forever the political connection between Great Britain and the thirteen American colonies. The stamp so carefully and so artistically prepared, bearing upon its imposing front the crown and its motto, “Honi soit qui mal y pense,” and intended to enhance the power and might of kingly rule, sealed the doom of monarchy in the colonies forever!
The use of stamps, however, apart from tax purposes, is not of modern invention, but for postal purposes they bear date quite recent. Stamps of one penny and twopence each were first introduced in England on the 6th of May, 1840.
When Victoria succeeded to the British crown—midsummer, 1837—there were eleven thousand parishes in England and Wales, and only three thousand post-offices. A fourth of the population were entirely destitute of postal accommodation. Four hundred of the registration districts, the average extent of which was nearly twenty square miles, were without a post-office. In 1839 the number of chargeable letters was in the proportion of four a year to each person of the population of England and Wales, three in Scotland, and one in Ireland. In 1864 the proportion of letters is twenty-four a year to each of the population of England and Wales, nineteen in Scotland, and nine to Ireland. The increase from 76,000,000 letters in 1849 to 600,000,000 in 1864 is really an increase of nearly seven hundred per cent. A stamped envelope was used at first (consisting of a very absurd allegorical group, said to have been improved by Mulready, the eminent painter, from a drawing by Queen Victoria herself!); but this was superseded, in a few months, by a stamp called ‘penny blac’ compulsory prepayment, which was begun in England, has become the rule in the many countries which have adopted Hill’s postal reform. This reform, which went into operation in England on January 10, 1840, was not adopted in the United States until July 1, 1845.
Perhaps no country in the world has ever yet produced such a number of stamps as the United States of America. Foreign nations limit their postal stamps; we issue them in quantity and variety to meet the demands of the public without stint or hindrance. The denominations of postal stamps in the United States are 1 cent, 2 cent, 3 cent, 5 cent, 10 cent, 12 cent, 24 cent, 30 cent, and 90 cent.
| The amount of stamps and stamp-envelopes issued during the year 1860, ending June 30, was | $6,870,316 19 |
| Total amount for 1861 | 6,690,233 70 |
| ” ” ” 1862 | 7,078,188 00 |
| ” ” ” 1863 | 9,683,384 00 |
| ” ” ” 1864 | 10,974,329 50 |
The postage-stamp system has been adopted in all parts of the world, by over ninety different kingdoms, states, provinces, colonies, islands, and free cities,—in fifty different parts of Europe, in over a dozen parts of Asia, including China, in some twenty parts of the New World, in every province of British North America, in seven parts of Africa, and even in St. Helena on one side and the Sandwich Islands on the other. There are postage-stamps used in Ceylon; but the Japanese have not as yet arrived at that period in perfection which would lead them towards its attainment.
The stamps of the secessionists command a high price in foreign markets,—probably as much for their having the head of “Jeff Davis” on them than for any artistic skill or beauty attached to them. When the rebellion broke out, of course a line was drawn between the two sections of our country, leaving the South in possession of slavery and its fruits, and the North, with its vast amount of wealth, intellect, and artistic power, to contend against the world. Of course the South, heretofore dependent on the North for every thing genius, art, and skill produced, found they could not have a stamp cut that would even do credit to their bogus government. The first ones produced presented a most counterfeit-like appearance of something once belonging to art: even Jeff Davis became ashamed of them, and he applied to his good friend and secret ally, Napoleon of France, for assistance. Something better was produced by a French artist; and thus the stamps came over with a variety of other things to strengthen the Southern Confederacy and assist her in maintaining something of the appearance of a people who could claim some consideration among other advanced nations of the world.
Connected with the issue of postal stamps is that strange mania which seizes upon a certain class to collect and treasure up every thing that is termed unique or new in art or science. These stamps in time will become relics, and possess an interest for the antiquarian equal to that of old coins.
To such an extent is this passion carried, that in Europe cabinets are formed and albums invented wherein these stamps are fancifully arranged. In many instances men make such collections a matter of business, and these receptacles for stamps bring very high prices,—in fact, like old coins, many of them command fabulous prices. The collection of these miniature paper currency circulating mediums is decidedly a British institution. Periodicals devoted to the interest of dealers are established in various parts of the kingdom, and agents employed, not only to furnish information upon the subject of new issues, but to procure various stamps for orders. The demand in England for American stamps is great, and they command—more particularly those of the Southern Confederacy—very high prices.
We have no objection to this, although a strange fancy on the part of those who are seized with the mania, because it opens a new trade for the enterprising speculator on the infirmity of human nature. A house in New York advertises for “correspondents all over the world,” for furnishing and supplying it with stamp news. Another in Montreal advertises “stamps cheaper than ever:” these consist of foreign, British colonial, and European stamps of all kinds. The number of North American is enumerated at fifty varieties.
Connected, however, with the various stamps now in use in this country is the necessity of teaching to our youth their use and application to banks, custom-houses, railroads, post-offices, pawnbrokers, and, in fact, as stamp tax to every trade, business, and department of government.
In several of our commercial colleges an actual stamp department is invented, and mock-banks, custom-houses, steamboat-offices, post-offices, &c., are fitted up for the purpose of familiarizing youth with their use in the various mercantile and governmental departments of the country. This is what we term the best and most useful knowledge that the stamps can impart to those who are so anxious to treasure them up in albums and cabinets.55
We annex the following article from Appleton’s “United States Postal Guide”[1864]:—
“By the Sonora, a few days since, says a Californian correspondent, some two hundred of Uncle Sam’s orphans arrived, and were distributed around. Some were sent to Fort Alcastra, some to the barracks at the Presidio, and the remainder were quartered at Benicia barracks, preparatory to being assigned to the different companies of the regiments in this department. They will soon be scattered from Oregon to that most delightful post, Fort Yuma, in Arizona,—a place where they have to put rocks on the roofs to keep the ends of the boards from curling over like little dogs’ tails. It is a wretched place to live at, and to be ordered there is enough to make any officer resign, unless a Catholic, who acknowledges the justice of being sent to purgatory. They have a little fun even in that awful place sometimes, and an officer was telling me the other day of how he lost his postage-stamps. He had sent up here for some twenty dollars’ worth, and had left them on his table. Now, the habits, manners, and customs thereabouts are considerably on the free-and-easy style, and the Indians are allowed to roam around the garrison ad libitum, if they behave themselves and do not steal. On this occasion a young squaw, who had the run of the quarters, and was very much at home anywhere and everywhere, happened to stray into my friend’s room, and, seeing the postage-stamps, began to examine them with great curiosity. She discovered they would stick if wet, and forthwith a happy idea struck her. Now, the fashionable dress of the ladies of her class in that warm climate is of the briefest description. She was ambitious to dress up and excite the envy of the other Pocahontases. So she went in on the postal currency, and, much to the astonishment of the garrison, made her appearance presently on the parade-ground entirely covered over with postage-stamps. She was stuck all over with Benjamin Franklin, and the Father of his Country was plastered all over her ladyship’s glossy skin indiscriminately, regardless of dignity and decency. The ‘roar’ that greeted her, from the commanding officer down to the drummer-boys, was loud enough to be heard nearly at head-quarters in San Francisco; but, Indian-like, she preserved her equanimity, and did not seem at all disconcerted, but sailed off with the air and step of a genuine princess, while my friend rushed into his quarters to discover himself minus his twenty dollars’ worth of postage-stamps, and that what was intended for the mail had been appropriated to the female. She might have been put in the overland coach and gone through: she certainly could not have been stopped for want of being prepaid.”
REPORT OF MR. GEORGE PLITT.
Amos Kendall, postmaster-general from 1835 to 1840, anxious to have the postal department as perfect as human efforts can avail towards such a state of things, sent the gentleman whose name heads this article to Europe for the purpose of adding to our store of knowledge on postal matters. Mr. Plitt was well calculated for this mission, having served seven years in the New York post-office, and was familiar with its operations. He left New York in the month of June, 1839, and returned in August, 1840, after having visited “the post-office departments of England, Scotland, France, Belgium, Saxony, Prussia, Austria, Bavaria, Wirtemberg, Baden, and the free Hanseatic cities of Frankfort, Hamburg, Bremen, and Lubeck.”
Among other reforms and suggestions made in Mr. Plitt’s report are the abolition of the franking privilege, the prepayment of all letters, as well as of newspapers and all printed matter. He strongly urges the reduction of postage, and quotes the English postal law as an evidence of its pecuniary advantages. As many of the reforms suggested, based on the European system, have been introduced into ours, and nearly every other improvement carried into the department, it is not necessary for us here to name them; but, at the same time, it is due to Mr. Plitt to state that his report met with a cordial response from the department, whose instructions he had so ably carried out, and whose ideas on and about foreign mail arrangements afforded it an opportunity to improve those of our own.
He also suggested the establishing special agents and mail-guards. In Europe they form a prominent feature in their system; but as regards the necessity of the latter in this country, we doubt if their services would be required, unless in time of war, frontier insurrections, or disgraceful rebellions, such as a vile portion of the land had inaugurated, and over whose downfall and ruin our nation’s flag is now proudly uprising. It will float again,—float in its might and power over every foot of land that Columbia calls her own; but not until
“Bold rebellion’s blood has all been drain’d.”
The subject of the reduction of postage had been agitated in Congress before Mr. Plitt’s visit to Europe. In 1836, Edward Everett proposed measures for that purpose, but no well-digested plan was brought forward. There was no Benjamin Franklin there to propose one. In 1843, three years after Mr. Plitt’s return from Europe, the general discontent of the people on the subject of postage was expressed in the form of resolutions by the legislatures of several States, instructing their Senators and requesting their Representatives in Congress to take some measures for a reduction. Mr. C. A. Wickliffe, at that time postmaster-general, made some investigation in regard to the English system, and in an elaborate report advocated some reduction, but not a radical one, on the ground that the department would become a heavy charge upon the government if large reductions were made. Subsequent reductions far greater than those proposed at that period show how much the postmaster-general and those who sustained him in this idea were mistaken. It was not until 1845 that Congress was enabled to pass a bill for a reduction. March 3, 1845, a bill was passed, which went into operation July 1, 1845. Its rates were as follows:—for a letter not exceeding a half-ounce in weight, whether of one or more pieces of paper, under three hundred miles, five cents; over three hundred miles, ten cents, and an additional rate for every additional half-ounce or fraction of a half-ounce. Advertised letters, two cents; pamphlets, magazines, &c., per ounce, two cents, and each additional ounce, one cent. Newspapers, under thirty miles, free; over thirty and under one hundred, or any distance within the State where published, one cent; over one hundred and out of the State, one and a half cent. At various periods since, changes have been made, until it is now reduced to a system based on the lowest rates, which under proper and efficient management must, and no doubt will, result in self-sustaining the department: certain abuses have of course to be corrected.
ENGLISH POST-OFFICE.
Mr. Plitt states in his report that the number of persons employed in the English post-office, London, is one thousand nine hundred and three.56 This number comprises all the letter-carriers and receivers employed within a circle of twelve miles from the post-office. In this circle letters are delivered at the residence of the person addressed and taken up from the receiving-houses five times per day. There is besides an inner circle of three miles from the post-office, within which there are seven deliveries per day, and also seven collections from the receiving-houses, to go by the general post, as late as five o’clock P. M.57
FRANKING PRIVILEGE.
“This privilege is entirely abolished under the late new law. Members of Parliament, even before the law was passed, were restricted as to the number of letters they were allowed to frank, and were, besides, obliged to put the day of the month upon each letter franked by them.” The privilege, however, was not entirely abolished, inasmuch as it was granted to the Minister of Finance and some of his agents.
PENNY POSTAGE.
Stamps of one penny and twopence each were first introduced on the 6th of May, 1840, and since that period there has been an increase of nearly three hundred thousand letters. Mr. Plitt strongly advocates the cheap postage system.
LETTER-CARRIERS IN PARIS.
In Paris, where there are six deliveries of the “Petite Poste” per day, the carriers of the General and “Petite Poste” letters are the same. In a report made by Rowland Hill on the French post-office, in October, 1839, speaking of this plan, he says, “The plan of employing one set of letter-carriers for the delivery of all letters appears to work exceedingly well in Paris. All that I heard and saw in Paris tends to confirm the opinion I have already expressed, that great convenience and economy would result from the union of the two bodies in London.”
INDECENT POSTAL MATTER.
“Sec. 16. And be it further enacted, That no obscene book, pamphlet, picture, print, or other publication of a vulgar and indecent character shall be admitted into the mails of the United States; and any person or persons who shall deposit or cause to be deposited in any post-office or branch post-office of the United States, for mailing or for delivery, an obscene book, pamphlet, picture, print, or other publication, knowing the same to be of a vulgar and indecent character, shall be deemed guilty of a misdemeanor, and, being duly convicted thereof, shall for every such offence be fined not more than five hundred dollars, or imprisoned not more than one year, or both, according to the circumstances and aggravations of the offence.”
Apart from this act, there is an understanding between the postmaster-general and postmasters generally relative to obscene and vulgar postal matter. So far as the secrets of the office are concerned, that understanding is “contraband.” But this is not sufficient. If the post-office is to be used as the medium through which the vilest works of art pass so readily, and calculated to corrupt the innocent and excite the passions of youth by high-colored pictures, the public, at least, should know how and why so many reach the persons to whom they are directed, and to what extent this espionage extends. It would require no breach of the observance of postal rules to ascertain almost at a glance the nature of the book or picture which comes under the head of “indecent postal matter.” These publications, varying in accordance to the artistic taste of the originators, pass through the office in the shape of splendid photograph albums, handsomely-bound books, embossed prints, transparent cards, and “yellow-cover pamphlets,” à la Dr. Young, and photograph cards of a most indecent character. At other times they are posted as letters, addressed chiefly to young ladies, containing a card and making the most dishonorable proposals. In several instances the parents have shown the author these letters, and upon a close examination he feels satisfied that the only motive the writer had was to corrupt and demoralize, without the most distant idea of ever reaping the fruits of his villany. The imagination cannot conceive or pencil paint a more hideous picture of a fiend than one who would thus attempt to corrupt the young and innocent by such means. The idea could only have been suggested by the devil, and as readily carried out by his agent. Artists of well-known reputation lend themselves to this work of destruction; and specimens denote the highest order of talent, as well as the most exquisite workmanship of art,—art devoted to the production of the most vulgar and disgusting subjects the human mind ever conceived or a diseased imagination conjured. That very intellect which should have shed a halo over the pure things of earth is here devoted to the production of things evil.
A tendency to sap the foundation upon which rest the pillars of morality, and to poison the minds of youth, seems to be a prevailing vice. High literary attainments, great mental powers, have been brought into the arena to battle for crime, lasciviousness, and vice. In all ages the vile corruption of man’s nature, aided by genius and talent, has been manifested in the production of things evil. The rapid and, we may say, alarming increase of crime, the callousness manifested at the recital of human suffering, the want, or, rather, the absence, of a correct moral standard in every thing appertaining to social life, the sneering at the tenets of our holy religion, the assumption as it were of omniscient powers on the part of sinful men, have led to a state of things which will require stronger measures than that of mere reasoning to remedy.
Our streets of a night are flooded with the daughters of vice; temples are dedicated to licentiousness, sanctioned by the authorities, who grant them “license” as it were to corrupt youth and demoralize the masses. Intemperance and pauperism are the results of the “law’s license” to common crime. Thus the dark shadow of vice extends its fatal power over that portion of the human family from whose domestic circle the voice of prayer never ascends. There instead is heard the sound of rattling glasses: loud oaths, the bacchanalian song, there throw around the circle of which they form the nucleus an atmosphere to poison and destroy. Much of all this can be traced to the estimate men place upon the modern mode of education. If genius invents something that places vice in a brilliant light, in and through which all that is startling in picture-view or description presents new features to the novice in licentiousness, it becomes at once an institution from whence flows a stream that poisons a city. In an instant these productions take miniature shapes: art combines with the genius of the originators, and, lo! they go forth through the post, spreading ruin and desolation everywhere. It is that very facility which the post affords that gives power and influence to these fiends; and, alas! how many, dazzled by the “refinement of vice,”—refined by the touch of art,—fall into the snare by the very excitement they produce! Many of these photographs of the more vile character reach “young ladies’ seminaries.” Many books of a similar character find their way hither, and thus corruption works its way to the ruin of their inmates.
We would have—what under no other circumstance would we suggest to the department—an espionage over all suspicious postal matter.
ESPIONAGE OVER THE POST-OFFICE IN FRANCE.
That country must be in a bad way where the heads of the several departments find it necessary to resort to the most infamous means of tracing out suspected traitors. Thus, in the postal department, every letter is subject to the system of espionage, and the innocent as well as the guilty alike suspected and their private correspondence betrayed. In time of rebellion, insurrection, or an attempt to assassinate a king or an emperor, there might be some excuse for the exercise of such precaution; but in the absence of such startling causes the system is both mean and cowardly. In France, at the present time (1865), private letters, newspapers, and pamphlets are subjected to the most anxious scrutiny. A large portion of every day is devoted to such examinations by a skilful and energetic body of men. Between the time when letters are received at the chief office from the district-offices and the time they are sent out again, two hours elapse. During this period they are in the hands of the police. The police have a list of certain addresses, and are furnished with examples of the handwriting of every one in whose correspondence the government is interested. With these and practised eyes the officials set to work, carrying all suspected letters into the Cabinet Noir, where they are read, copied, delayed, stopped at discretion; and the police are very discreet about seizing letters: it is done as seldom as possible. The system is so perfect, it works so well, that the only chance of evading it is to correspond under assumed names, changed with every letter; and this is actually done by people who are not more treasonable than the majority of Frenchmen, but who, being eminent and powerful, are condemned to the degradation of shifts like these, or every letter they write would be read by the police. Governments maintained thus are never safe in power.
THE POST-OFFICE SOLVENT.
The following article we take from the “Philadelphia North American and United States Gazette” of the 13th July, 1865. The view the editor takes is simply, however, from a hastily-arranged statement made shortly after the appointment of Mr. Dennison as postmaster-general. We have our doubts about its accuracy, inasmuch as the short time for reductions of salary and other expenses would not lessen the debt against the postal department and yield a surplus of seven hundred thousand dollars. Well may the editor say, “How long this is likely to continue we cannot say.”
“For the first time in many years the United States Post-Office Department has become a paying institution, the revenues of the last six months having yielded a surplus of more than seven hundred thousand dollars above the expenses, and the ensuing six months will tell still better. How long this is likely to continue we cannot say. During Mr. Blair’s administration of this department he reduced the expenditures to such an extent as to afford an astonishing contrast with the old Buchanan dynasty, when the annual deficit of the department was five millions of dollars. We thought Mr. Blair’s management unprecedently good; but still he could not bring the department to a paying standard, which his successor has now done very handsomely. Mr. Dennison has done this by means of a system of the most stringent and searching economy, reducing the force of employees everywhere, cutting down salaries and allowances, examining carefully into items of expenditure, the management and compensation of contractors, &c.
“In fact, Governor Dennison brought to the conduct of our postal affairs the excellent training he had received in the executive government of Ohio, like his predecessor in that office, Mr. Chase, and he has looked carefully into every thing under his charge with an eye to economy and efficiency, and the service, instead of suffering by this scrutiny, has been largely benefited. But with the renewal of our authority in the South comes back a region wherein before 1860 the postal service was always carried on at a heavy loss to the National Government. It hardly admits of a doubt that this deficit was owing solely to the running of great numbers of useless mails to gratify local influences. This was consequent upon the predominance of Southern politicians at Washington. Their demands for favors of this kind were incessant, and, as they were generally with the ruling element in Congress, they got whatever they asked for. It may be inferred that modesty was not one of their faults, and that they did not lose any thing for the want of asking.
“In places where a weekly mail would have answered, a daily, semi-weekly, or tri-weekly mail was run, and so where a place of somewhat more consequence needed a semi-weekly mail a daily mail would be run. Instead of making every post-office a paying one, by making it the depot for a sufficient population, swarms of unnecessary offices were created to gratify local politicians, the effect of which was that none were remunerative. We are sorry to say that this evil afflicts the service in many parts of the North, and that there is great need of discontinuing offices now in existence. Sometimes the ambition or the jealousy of villages led to this multiplication of useless offices, but generally it was caused by the Congressmen catering for their political supporters. Since the year 1860 the necessities of the government have compelled the department to reduce both the number of these offices and of the mails run. The deficiency always visible in the postal revenues at the South, aside from the causes we have referred to, arose also from the evil policy of the slaveholding oligarchy. Four millions of the Southern population were prohibited from a knowledge of reading and writing, and of course the post-office was not needed for them. The planter had no right to complain of being reduced to a weekly mail; for in a region of six square miles there might not be more than three families using the post-office, the rest being all slaves, or illiterate ‘poor white trash.’
“Yet these planters would make a vast deal of fuss about their mail facilities, and to satisfy them the National Government sustained an annual loss of millions of dollars. It was not only the prohibition of letters toward the slaves that caused the loss, for the poor whites labored under no such prohibition, and yet were as ignorant as the slaves; but it was the total absence of all provision for the education of the masses of the population throughout the South. The poor whites could not read newspapers if they received them; they could not write letters, nor could they read them. Moreover, the mail-matter was still further reduced by the refusal to allow anti-slavery newspapers to circulate at all in the South. A merchant could not receive the commercial papers of the North, because of their sentiments about slavery; a clergyman could not receive the religious papers of the North, for the same reason. If a man in any of the interior districts received frequent letters from the North, he would be sure to find them a matter of inquisitorial questioning, and would be obliged to give an idea of the nature of his correspondence.
“The question how the postal service can be rendered permanently remunerative at the South involves three distinct and very important considerations:—
“How can the ignorant masses of the Southern population be educated in a knowledge of reading, writing, and arithmetic, and insured hereafter the benefits of a well-established common free-school system for their children?
“How can we relieve the national mails of that infamous espionage which, down to the present time, has been rigidly enforced in every hole and corner of the South, sometimes by the post-office itself, but generally by outside parties, though always in the interest of the plantation aristocracy and their political agents and domination?
“How can we prevent the renewal of the old evil of supernumerary post-offices and superfluous mails all over the South, and so gauge the service that each office shall pay expenses and each mail be well filled with paying matter?
“These are the problems to be solved, and it behooves us all to reflect upon their exceeding difficulty when we complain that our postal department is not better managed. Although the franking system is bad enough in all conscience, it is not responsible for the bulk of the postal loss. From what we have said above, it must be plain that the despotic social system, established for the benefit of the plantation aristocracy, has been annually paid for largely out of our pockets. We have paid five millions of dollars annually as a premium upon Southern ignorance. We have helped the planter to keep his slaves and his poor white neighbors in ignorance and degradation, and, in order the better to enable him to enforce his cruel and abominable despotism, we have given him the surveillance of our mails, and allowed him to terrorize over them as he saw fit. Mr. Dennison, we can readily believe, is not the man to put up with this hereafter; but it requires vigilance to prevent it altogether, and the exercise of other powers than his to remedy the great evil,—Southern ignorance.”
SALARIES OF POSTMASTERS.
Under the old postal arrangement, the salary of postmasters of the principal cities was limited to $2000. This compensation was derived from a commission out of their receipts, which could not exceed the amount named. This would appear at first as small pay for such an important position,—more particularly as under the administration of Postmaster Blair the salary was raised to $4000: yet there is not a postmaster but would willingly go back to the old system. Under the former provision of the postal law postmasters were allowed the amount arising from the rent of letter-boxes in their respective offices as a perquisite, and also certain other matters, which shrewd men knew well how to place under this head. During the existence of this system the desire for the office far exceeded that which was and is likely to be manifested under the latter, inasmuch as $4000 per annum and no perquisites is scarcely a desirable position for an ambitious and popular politician. Many a business-man, outside of the political ring, would consider it quite sufficient, however: business-men are not cormorants. It is true, even under the old law, by an act passed March 3, 1847, the rent of boxes to be credited to the postmaster was limited, restricting the amount so received to $2000,—consequently limiting his salary to $4000: for all over and above that amount he had to account to the department. Under some administrations postmasters became rich, whether by husbanding their actual income or the perquisites are questions simply of conjecture.
THE PENNY POST.
The first attempt to establish the penny post in the United States was in the years 1839-40. It was simply a speculation, and resulted at first in almost total failure, but revived again under more enterprising parties. Previous to this, however, contrary to the laws of Congress,—particularly the law of 1825, sect. 19, which enacts that no stage or other vehicle which regularly performs trips on a post-road or on a road parallel to it, and no packet, war, or other vessel which regularly plies on a water declared a post-road, shall convey letters,—certain persons, actually availing themselves of these modes of conveyance, constituted themselves “private posts,” travelling as passengers, and carried packages containing valuable letters, documents, and other available matter: these were, of course, transported as baggage or freight. The conveyances used by these men passed regularly over post-roads, and thus they travelled in company with their powerful opponent, “the post-office department.” It was also well known to the department; but as they were not special posts, the law of 1825 did not reach them. Still their system was a secret one, and hard to be detected. The law, however, of 1827, sect. 3, enacts that no person other than the postmaster-general or his authorized agents shall set up any foot- or horse-posts for the conveyance of letters and packets upon any post-road which is or may be established as such by law.
This law paved the way for the establishing penny posts by individuals in cities and even in rural districts. At first they were called expresses, but soon they assumed a more postal shape. The postmaster-general’s annual report of December 2, 1843, stated that “numerous private posts, under the name of expresses, had sprung within a few years into existence, extending themselves over the mail-routes between the cities and towns, and transporting letters and other mailable matter for pay to a great extent.” Suits were commenced against parties residing in New York, Massachusetts, and Maryland. It appears from the postmaster-general’s report of November 25, 1844, that the government had been unable to suppress the private expresses, which were still continued “upon the leading post-routes.” In this and in the former annual report he recommended legislation by Congress for their suppression. There is yet no law of Congress to suppress these expresses. Governments, more particularly that of ours, cannot enact laws that will interfere with the commercial interests of the people. It may facilitate every movement by such laws as are legitimate; but taking out of the hands of individuals their legitimate business, connected with no department of the government, becomes at once not only a monopoly, but assumes the complexion of tyranny. The decision of the judges in the cases referred to settled the question, until compromise stepped in and the government came down to the “penny system,” and thus satisfied the public.
In 1860 Mr. Holt, the postmaster-general, by virtue of the act of March 3, 1851, by a formal order declared all the streets, lanes, avenues, &c. within the corporate limits of the cities of Boston, New York, and Philadelphia, to be post-roads, and notified all engaged in the transportation and delivery of letters for compensation in said cities, that they would expose themselves to the penalties imposed by the third section of the act of March, 1827. The private expresses in the cities named acquiesced in the legality of the step, with the exception of one in Philadelphia long and familiarly known as “Blood’s Express,” and subsequently, “Despatch.” In despite of the act of 1851, or the penalty imposed under that of 1827, Blood’s Express continued its regular delivery of letters in defiance of the department. A bill in equity was filed with a view of restraining the company from this habitual and persistent violation of the postal laws; but, upon full argument and consideration had on the questions involved, the injunction was denied.
The mere existence of a postal department of the government is not an establishment of monopoly. No government has ever organized a system of posts without securing to itself a monopoly of the carriage of letters and mailable matter; but this was never intended to control individual enterprise in the express line. Judge Grier, who indorses the decision of this case, says,58 “The business of private carriers of letters and mailable packets, even on principal mail-routes, is lawful unless legislatively prohibited. A private monopoly, secured by prohibitory legislation, cannot require the suppression of a rival business of competitors who do not infringe the prohibition, merely because the continuance of their business would lessen or destroy the profits of his monopoly. A like rule applies in determining the effect of a government’s legislative prohibitions to secure its own postal monopoly. The monopoly cannot be extended beyond the legislative prohibitions, merely because the continuance of a specific business which has not been prohibited would reduce the postal earnings of the government, or even frustrate the purposes of its exclusive policy.” Streets, lanes, alleys, and avenues were not, in the opinion of the judge, “post-routes.” Public streets intersecting a municipal town are as highways distinguishable specifically from the general public highways of a State beyond the town limits. The streets are, indeed, as thoroughfares, general public highways of the State; but, independently of this character of thoroughfares, the streets are specially local highways of the town. Internal affairs of municipal towns affecting their local interests alone are always regulated more or less by their local governments. So far as these streets over which the mail may be carried are entitled to be termed “post-roads for the passage of the mail,” there is no question; but whether Congress has the right to declare the streets of a city post-roads for any purpose is questionable.
When Blood’s Express was first established, its main object was to accommodate merchants, mechanics, and professional men generally, by furnishing a medium of communication with their customers, clients, &c., which would anticipate the slow movements of the old postal mode of delivery. If this continued to be its legitimate object, it is very probable the commercial community would have taken a much greater interest in it than they did; but, unfortunately for this new postal system, it assumed the character of a “Parisian Bureau,” for the reception and delivery of small documents, wherein “love, courtship, and marriage” were all treated with an eye to excitement rather than as a virtuous incentive to their study and moral consequences. Young and inexperienced girls were gradually led into (initial) correspondence with “fast young men;” foolish widows and old maids to advertise for husbands, and equally silly, weak-minded elderly gentlemen to imitate their example. Added to this, many made this penny system the medium to originate practical jokes, and thus the “express” became a sort of Pandora’s (postal) box for “all sorts of people” to try experiments with fickle fortune, either by marriage or swindling. Both in some instances succeeded.
The same was attempted when the government took charge of the “express;” but the department soon put a stop to this nonsensical practice by ignoring as legitimate matter every thing of an initial character. Young girls, foolish widows, old maids, and weak-minded men, who could without much publicity send and receive communications through “Blood’s Express,” found a post-office somewhat too dignified an institution for their childish intellects.
Still, this class of people,—and it takes all kinds to make up a world,—added to another class who make of crime a pastime and licentiousness a pleasure, adopted other modes of carrying on their “vocation,” which we here allude to under the head of “Indecent postal matter.”