Chapter 3
The Senate Report recommended the reduction of the rates of postage to five and ten cents, an average of seven and a half cents, with a very great restriction of the franking privilege, on which it was confidently estimated that the revenues of the department, for the first year of the new system, would be $4,890,500; and that the number of chargeable letters would be sixty millions. The House Report recommended stringent measures to suppress the private mails, with the abolition of franking, without any reduction of postage, except to substitute federal coin for Spanish. It estimated the increase of letters to be produced by reducing the rates to five and ten cents, at only thirty per cent. in number, thus reducing the postage receipts at once to two and a half millions of dollars. It will be seen that each of these calculations has been proved to be erroneous.
The great postage meeting in New York, held in December, 1843, had asked for a uniform rate of five cents. After stating the advantages of the English system, their committee still hung upon the length of the routes in this country as a reason against the adoption of the low rate of postage. They said,
“It is plain that a similar system may be introduced with equally satisfactory results in the United States. On account, however, of the vast distances to be traversed by the mail-carriers, and the great difficulties of travel in the unsettled portions of our country, our petition asks that the rate be reduced to five cents for each letter not more than half an ounce in weight—which is more than double the uniform postage in Great Britain. It is a rate which would not only secure to the post-office the transport of nearly all the letters which are now forwarded through private channels, but it would largely increase correspondence, both of business and affection.
“Above all, the _franking privilege_ should be abolished. Unless this is done, nothing can be done. It will be impossible, without drawing largely upon the legitimate sources of the national revenue, to sustain the post-office by any rates whatsoever, if this franking privilege shall continue to load the mails with private letters which everybody writes, and public documents which nobody reads.”
The bill was passed, but the franking privilege was continued, and yet the Postmaster-General has told us that the current income of the department is equal to its expenses. The predictions to the contrary were very confident. Some of the gloomy forebodings then uttered, are worthy of being recalled at this time.
“The post-office department estimates that the deficiency in the revenue of the department, under the new law, will be about $1,500,000, this year.”—_Boston Post._
“An additional tax of $1,500,000, to be raised to meet the deficiencies of the department, in a single year, must principally come from the pockets of farmers, (who write few letters, and are consequently less benefited by the reduction of postage,) in the shape of additional tariff duties upon articles which they consume.”—_New Hampshire Patriot._
“A CAUTION.—Some people may be deceived on the subject of cheap postage, unless they take a ‘sober second thought.’ A part of those who are so strenuous for cheap postage are not quite so disinterested as would at first appear. They are seeking to pay their postage bills out of other people’s pockets. Look at this matter. I am an industrious mechanic, for example, and I have little time to write letters. My neighbor publishes school-books, and he wishes to be sending off letters, recommendations, puffs, &c., by the hundred and by the thousand. This is his way of making money. Now, he wishes the expenses of the post-office department to be paid out of the treasury, and then I shall have to help him pay his postage, while he will only pay his national tax, according to his means, as I do mine. If he is making his money by sending letters, he should pay the whole cost of carrying those letters. I ought not to pay any part of it, in the way of duties on sugar, &c. Let every man pay his own postage. Is not this fair? But this will not be the case if the post-office department does not support itself. The cheap postage system may injure the poor man, instead of helping him.”—_Philad. North American._
“As for the matter of post-office reform, and reduction of the rates of postage, there are not _one thousand_ considerate and reflecting people, in the Union, who desire or demand anything of the kind.
“The commercial and mercantile classes have not desired ‘reform;’ and the rural and agricultural classes, the planters of the South, and the corn and wheat growers of the West, the mechanics and laboring classes, are not disposed to be _taxed_ enormously to support a post-office department to gratify the avarice and cupidity of a body of sharpers and speculators.”—_Madisonian._
“THE NEW POSTAGE LAW.—The following statement has been furnished us of the amount of postage chargeable on letters forwarded by the New York and Albany steamboats:
The last thirteen days of June, $99.66 First thirteen days of July, (same route,) 53.90 Decrease, $45.76.
_Albany Argus._
“I inquired at the post-office to-day for information. One of the gentlemanly clerks of that establishment said to me, ‘Well, Mr. Smith, I can’t give you all the information you desire, but I can say thus much. I this morning made up a mail for Hudson; it amounted to _seventy cents_; the same letters under the old law, and in the same mail, would have paid _seven dollars_. Now you can make your own deductions.’ I then inquired of the same gentleman, if the increase of letters had been kept up since the 1st of July. He replied ‘_no_,’ but added, ‘the increase of numbers is somewhat encouraging, but not sufficiently so to justify the belief that the new law will realize the hopes of its advocates.’ ”—_N. Y. Correspondent of Boston Post._
“From the city post-office we learn that the number of letters, papers, and packages, passing through their hands, unconnected with the business of the government, has increased about 33 per cent., when compared with the business of the month of June. The gross amount of proceeds from postage on these has fallen off nearly 66 per cent., while the postage charged to the government for its letters, &c., received and sent, is enormous. For the post-office department alone, it is said to reach near $40,000 for the month just past.”—_Washington Union, Aug. 2._
“We observe in the Eastern papers some paragraphs about the working of the new law, in which they suppose it will work well. Unquestionably it will work well for those who have to pay the postage; but as to the _revenue_, it will not yield even as much as the opponents of the system supposed. We do not believe the receipts will equal one half received under the old system. We are told that the experience of the first week in Cincinnati does not show more than _one quarter_ the receipts.
“Private correspondence is increased a little; but the falling off in the mercantile increase is immense. It cannot be otherwise; for many letters now pay 10 cents which formerly paid a dollar. Double and treble letters pay no more than single letters. In large cities three-fourths of the postage is paid by _business letters_. These letters are nearly all double and treble. A double letter from Cincinnati to New York, Philadelphia, Boston, Baltimore, or New Orleans, before, paid 50 cents; now it pays 10 cents. The largest portion of postage is reduced to _one-fifth_ part of the former postage.
“We are well pleased, however, that it will turn out as it will. The law will be too popular with the people to be repealed; and it will oblige Mr. James K. Polk’s administration to provide ways and means out of the tariff to meet a deficiency of two millions in the postage. This will work favorably to the tariff.
“All things will come right in the end. The lower the postage the more economical the post-office department must be, and the more money the government must raise from the tariff.”—_Cleveland Herald._
“Mr. McDuffie is reported to have made the following correct and just remarks, showing he understands well the operations of that Department. If the bill shall become a law, our word for it, that in less than six months one-fourth the offices in the Union will be discontinued, because nobody will be found who will keep them. But let the bill go into operation, and in less than twelve months the very clamorers for low rates of postage will become so sick of it, that they will be the first to unite in demanding its repeal. If we supposed our advice would have any influence, we would recommend to the Department and all Postmasters to hold on to the old books, arrangements and fixtures, even if the bill does pass, because in two weeks after Congress shall meet next year, it will be repealed and the old order restored.”—_Kentucky Yeoman._
“ ‘Mr. McDuffie rose, evidently much excited, and after expressing his regret that bodily infirmity disabled him to give the strength of his convictions in regard to the evils which would flow from the bill, he protested against its passage, as a measure more radical and revolutionary than anything that had ever been done by Congress. He denounced it as most unjust. It removes the burden from those who ought to have it, the manufacturers and merchants of the North, and throws it upon the farmers of the South and West, who are already oppressed by the tariff, and who will have to pay the expense by a tax on their necessaries.
“ ‘You will sacrifice the intelligence of the people to the rapacity of the manufacturers. He could not imagine that the agriculturist anywhere could feel postage as a burden; it is but a moderate compensation for services rendered by the government. A poor man pays $10 duty on his sugar, salt and iron, and now you make him pay the postage. You will break up one half of the smaller offices, you will in ten years make the post-office the greatest organ of corruption the country has ever seen, and the man who wields its patronage can command the sceptre. By throwing it on the treasury, you destroy the responsibility of the head of the department, and in ten years you will have it cost you ten millions of dollars.’ ”
Instead of a revenue of nearly four millions, it is therefore probable that the revenue of the first year of the experiment will not much exceed a million and a half. It will be remembered that Congress appropriated $750,000 to make up the expected deficiency; but this will fall far below the necessities of the service; and it is very probable that this sum will be consumed in the payments of the contracts for the two first quarters. They are very busy at the Department sending off letter balances, the postage of which will of course constitute a charge on the Treasury; and as the postage on each of these packets will amount to about three times as much as the first cost of the balances, the Department will make money out of this transaction.—_Charleston Mercury._
“I voted against this act. It is probable that a reduction might have been made in the rates of postage which would not have diminished the amount of revenue; but the reduction made by this act is too great, and will have the effect of throwing the Post-Office Department as a heavy charge on the general treasury, which has not been the case heretofore. The post-office tax was the only one in which the North and the East bore their share equally with the South and the West. We would all like to have cheap postage; and if that were the only consideration involved, I would have voted for the act; but there were others which influenced me to oppose it. The reduction of postage will cause a diminution in the post-office revenue, which must be supplied by the _general treasury_. The treasury collects the revenue which must supply this deficiency, by a duty levied on imports; so that the tax taken off of the _mail correspondence_ will have to be collected on _salt_, _iron_, _sugar_, _blankets_, and other articles which we buy from the stores. The manufacturing States profit by this, because it aids the _protective_ policy. I might add other objections, but deem it unnecessary at present.”—_Letter of Hon. D. S. Reid, of ——, to his constituents._
The Postmaster-General, in his report made Dec. 1, 1845, says:
“So far as calculations can be relied on, from the returns to the department, of the operation of the new postage law, for the quarter ending 30th September last, the deficiency for the current year will exceed a million and a quarter of dollars; and there is no reasonable ground to believe that, without some amendment of that law, it will fall short of a million of dollars for the next year.”
The actual deficiency for the year ending June 30, 1846, was only $589,837; and for the second year above alluded to, ending June 30, 1847, it was but $33,677. And the Postmaster-General’s report for December, 1847, estimates the resources of the department for the year ending June 30, 1848, at $4,313,157, and the expenditures at $4,099,206, giving an actual surplus of $213,951. If this expectation should be realized, (and there is hardly a possibility but that it should be exceeded), the income will exceed the annual average receipts for the nine years before the reduction of postage, $51,467. The Postmaster-General ascribes the increase solely to “the reduction in the rates of postage,” while nearly a million of dollars are saved in the expenditures by the provision of the law of 1845, directing the contracts to be let to the lowest bidder, without reference to the transportation in coaches. So far, therefore, the triumph of the law of 1845 has been complete. It has proved that the same economic law exists here as in England, by which reduction of price leads to increase of consumption.
On the other point, however, of meeting the wants of the people, so as to bring all the correspondence of the country into the mails, its success is very far from being equally satisfactory. The five and ten cents’ postage does not have the effect of suppressing the private mails and illicit transportation of letters.
The report of the House Committee in 1844, showed beforehand that such a reduction could not have the effect here, just as the parliamentary report had shown in 1838, that nothing but an absolute reduction to 1_d._ could suppress the private mails in England. “Individuals can prosecute on all the large railroad and steamboat routes between the great towns, as now, a profitable business in conveying letters at three and five cents, where the government would ask the five and ten cents postages.” Hill’s New Hampshire Patriot said, shortly after the act went into operation:
“Private expresses _have not_ been discontinued in this quarter. Far from it. They are now doing as large a business as ever, carrying letters at half the government rates. And, strange as it may appear, they appear to be sustained by public opinion. The new postage act did not abate what is called ‘private enterprise,’ and the act itself, it is thought, will soon be found to be insufficient.”
The report of the Postmaster-General in 1845, speaks of a practice of enveloping many letters, written on very thin paper, in one enclosure, paying postage by the half-ounce, and thus reducing the postage on each to a trifle.
“An incident recently occurred which will forcibly illustrate the injurious effects of such a practice upon the revenues of the department. A large bundle of letters was enveloped and sealed, marked ‘postage paid, $1.60.’ By some accident in the transportation, the envelope was so much injured as to enable the postmaster to see that it contained one hundred letters to different individuals, evidently designed for distribution by the person to whom directed, and should have been charged ten dollars. The continuance of this practice would, in a short time, deprive the department of a large proportion of its legitimate income. The department has no power to suppress it, further than to direct the postages to be properly charged, whenever such practices are detected. This has also introduced a species of thin, light paper, by which five or six letters may be placed under one cover, and still be under the half-ounce.”
He adds:
“The practice of sending packages of letters through the mails to agents, for distribution, has not entirely superseded the transmission of letters, over post roads, out of the mails, by the expresses. The character of this offence is such as to render detection very uncertain, full proof almost impossible, conviction rare. The penalties are seldom recovered after conviction, and the department rarely secures enough to meet the expenses of prosecution. If the officers of the department were authorized in proper cases to have the persons engaged in these violations of the law arrested, their packages, trunks, or boxes, seized and examined before a proper judicial officer, and, when detected in violating the law, retained for the examination of the court and jury, it is believed that the practice could be at once suppressed.”
In his last report, December, 1847, he also says that, “Private expresses still continue to be run between the principal cities, and seriously affect the revenues of the department, from the want of adequate powers for their suppression.” The complaint is continually, of a want of adequate powers to suppress the practice. The law of 1845 has gone as far as could be desired in the severity of penalties and the extent of their application, involving in heavy fines every person who shall send or receive letters; and every stage-coach, railroad car, steamboat, or other vehicle or vessel—its owners, conductors and agents, which may knowingly be employed in the conveyance of letters, or in the conveyance of any person employed in such conveyance, under penalty of $50 for each letter transported. What the post-office department would deem “adequate powers” for the suppression of illicit letter-carrying, may be seen in the following extract of a bill, which was actually reported by the post-office committee of the House of Representatives, and “printed by order of the House:”
“And it shall be lawful for the agents of the post-office, or other officers of the United States government, upon reasonable cause shown, to arrest such person or persons, and seize his or their boxes, bags, or trunks, supposed to contain such mailable matter, and cause the same to be opened and examined before any officer of the United States; and if found to contain such mailable matter, transported in violation of the laws of the United States, shall be held to bail in the sum of five thousand dollars, to appear and answer said charge before the next United States Court to be held in said State, or district of said State; and upon conviction thereof, shall be fined as aforesaid, one hundred dollars for each letter, newspaper, or printed sheet so transported as aforesaid, and shall be held in the custody of the marshal until the fine and costs are paid, or until otherwise discharged by due course of law.”
The report of 1845 thinks there is “no just reason why individuals engaged in smuggling letters and robbing the department of its legitimate revenues should not be punished, in the same way and to the same extent, as persons guilty of smuggling goods; nor why the same means of detection should not be given to the Post-office Department which are now given to the Treasury.” That is, the power of detention and search in all cases of suspicion by the agent, that a person is carrying letters. What would be the effect of carrying out this system, in breaking up the practice complained of, or what would be the amount of inconvenience to travellers and to business, of a thorough determination in the department to execute such a law in the spirit of it, all can judge for themselves. The British government, as we have seen, dared not entertain such a proposition. I have no hesitation in saying, that such a system of coercion can never be successfully executed here. It is better to meet the difficulty, as the British government did, in a way to make the post-office at once the most popular vehicle of transmission, and the greatest blessing which the government can bestow upon the people. The New York Evening Post said, years ago:
“Congress yields, and passes such a law. What then? Is Hydra dead? By no means, its ninety-nine other heads still rear their crests, and bid defiance to the secretary and his law. In Pearl street, there will yet hang a bag for the deposit of the whole neighborhood’s letters,—at Astor House, and at Howard’s, at the American, and at the City Hotels, still every day will see the usual accumulation of letters,—all to be taken by some ‘private,’ trustworthy, obliging wayfarer, and by him be deposited in some office at Boston, Philadelphia, Albany, Baltimore.”